Vancouver/Richmond : June 18th weekend, anyone?

thanks to clinton, madbad, Pete LSD and others for a most incredible trip.

i just stepped into my home and will write up a report and share with everyone tonight.

 

here is my trip report.

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Firstly i want to thanks everyone who showed up this past weekend. i had an incredible trip playing badminton, chatting about badminton, eating while chatting about badminton, and anything in between. i thoroughly enjoyed everyone’s hospitality but i want to especially thanks clinton whom i met and stayed with in Seattle and madbad and Pete LSD for arranging court/food and hanging out with me while was i was in Vancouver.

I just had a most incredible and feathericious trip this past weekend. the reason and main purpose of the trip was to attend my high school friend’s wedding in Vancouver. my friend i knew for 20 years and is one of the best badminton player i know, in fact, he was my badminton teammate back then.

round 1

my trip started on Friday with my 8pm flight up to Seattle. immediately after i hopped out of the plane at 10pm i head north to Seattle Badminton Club to meet up with Clinton and my friend Michael, along with them there were two other crazy badminton people, Michael's sister Natalie and their friend Kel. why crazy badminton people? who else will start playing badminton at 11.30pm and not leave until way pass 2am? and not to say we started a match of singles at 2am. besides the 10 games that i played, which were all super tight and competitive, we also chatted about badminton like true badminton fanatics. i could’ve gone on for a few more hours if i had need to wake up the next morning to head up to
Vancouver at 7am.

after 3 short hours of sleep at Clinton’s, i bid farewell and headed up north to Vancouver. on the way up i was greet with some authentic Pacific Northwest weather, light rained all the way up until 9+am. i was a bit worried passing through the immigration as i have less than 10 days before my passport expires. but i passed through without much issue and drove into Canada.

i got to the wedding well ahead of time and was really happy that i was able to make it to one of the most important day of my friends life. i was very glad to see that he has found the love of his life. this guy i know and was good friend with for so many year, being 2 yrs my junior he is like a brother to me. i also want to note that his wife is also a good badminton player and that’s how they met. badminton really do bring people together.

round 2

after the ceremony i had a few hours free before the evening banquet. i met up with madbad and PeteLSD for lunch and we again had a great time chatting about anything badminton and BC related. after lunch we drove over to RichmondPro to meet up with around 10 other BCers for a round of badminton. it was really nice to see everyone again and also to meet some new folks. i think everyone’s skill has improved, esp for the young folks, and the mature one at least our skill has not deteriorated, which is already very good.

after a quick run for bubble tea and more badminton chit-chat. i went to check into my hotel, took a shower and then head off to the banquet.

it was a big banquet with 25+ tables in a nice restaurant, the poor bride and groom was so busy taking pictures and making speeches and greeting guests. i was mentioned in the groom’s speech as the person to go to for badminton games, i guess i do have that type of reputation. the groom also mentioned that his parents always forces him to play badminton when he was young, and now he understands why, badminton helped him find his life partner which is a wonderful thing. also his wedding cake is decorated with shuttlecocks, my lawyers will be sending him a bill for the loyalty fee for copying mine.

the banquet was most enjoyable and i had great fun talking with the guests at my table, most of whom are new or will be parents. the 12 course chinese style banquet was just delicious.

round 3

the banquet ended at 11pm and i drove back towards Richmond. my friend who i met in SBC the evening before and his sister will be playing at the Yumo club, so i went and check it out.

Yumo apparently opens really late so i went ahead and changed for the 3rd round of badminton. again, whoever gonna play badminton way pass 11pm are gonna be crazy badminton people and the people at Yumo are no different. we played with a few guys from Douglas college which is the best collegiate badminton team in the country and where many of the national players come from.

these guys are pretty incredible, fast, powerful, and most importantly, they had a lot of fun playing. there were no short of laughters and messing around during the games and in general just so much fun. these guys have badminton scholarships from the college and they practice 4+ times a week. they told me that they schedule their classes around their team practice which is absolutely incredible. i wish i can do something as crazy as that.

needless to say, we got our ass kicked playing against these guys but while doing so everyone was having so much fun the winning and losing wasn’t really important anymore.

we got out almost at 2am and they continued to party somewhere else while the old man goes back to his hotel. after only 3 hours of sleep the night before and 8 hours of badminton in 26 hours, i fell asleep the moment my head touched the pillow.

the next morning i met up with GrandMaster Pete LSD to check out his toys. Pete as we all know is a stringing demi-god. his wisdom is beyond all our mortals knowledge put together and visiting his den to chat with him about stringing was a great honor. upon entering his house we can see his Gamma and Victor lined up tidily right in the middle of his living room, taking up the most important center spot of the house.

when i walked in he was in the middle of string a client’s racket on his Gamma and i got to watch him stringing in action. the meticulous process he goes through with every pull is just incredible to watch and puts my own job to shame. we chatted and exchanged ideas about stringing and generally had an awesome time.

but too bad it was too rush as i had to head back south to catch my flight.

another 3 hours of driving i returned the car and headed back to the airport. just making it to the flight and headed back to California.

this was probably one of the craziest and most whirlwind trip i have taken. less than 48 hours with a wedding banquet, 8 hours of badminton and equal amount of driving. but nothing really matters as i had so much fun meeting up with friends old and new, and had a great time together doing things that we love, that’s what was most important.