Tales from the Departure Lounge

#14 Chris Price (My Heart Skipped A Beat)

• Andy Plant & Nick Cuthbert • Season 1 • Episode 14

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Have you ever had to face your own mortality? Sobering and funny, this episode features Chris Price (Adventus) who told us about the factor-5 blood clot that nearly killed him after flying from London to Miami. This is essential public service broadcasting for everyone who wants to stay fit and healthy on the road. Not one for the faint hearted (no pun intended... you'll be paranoid after listening to this). 

Chris is also the ultimate road-trip junkie. Like some sort of Smoky and the Bandit throwback, he tells us some comic misadventures from his time behind the wheel including his run-ins with the authorities in the US. 

This is a TFTDL road to Damascus moment, a ventricular highway to the danger zone via Gloucester services... seat belts on please. 

Final boarding call: Whistler, Canada

 This episode is sponsored by Enroly! CAS Shield automates the CAS, visa and arrival process for universities, agents and international students. In the last academic year the  platform managed the arrival and onboarding of 1-in-4 international students coming to the UK. Find out more at www.enroly.com


Tales from the Departure Lounge is a Type Nine production for The PIE www.thepienews.com

Andy:

there's a bit of a delay on the line. It's a bit distracting

Nick:

it all just comes out in the edit.

Andy:

Right. Should we get stuck in?

Nick:

Welcome to Tales from the Departure Lounge. This is a podcast about travel for business, for pleasure, or for study. My name's Nick and I'm joined by my co-pilot, Andy. And together we're gonna be talking to some amazing guests about how travel has transformed their. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the journey. Welcome to the podcast.

Andy:

Today on the show we have Chris Price. He's the Senior Vice President for partnerships, UK and Europe for Adventists.

Nick:

And back in episode three, Amy Baker told us about Chris having a medical emergency While he was in Miami.

Andy:

So he talks us through that experience and how somebody saved his life. He gives us some great advice on how to stay healthy traveling the world.

Nick:

He loves a road trip.

And he's had a few run-ins with the law. He's a bit like smokey and the bandit.

Andy:

He's one of the original international education professionals. He loves the great outdoors, loves doing what the locals do, and has had a large dollop of sketchy experiences. He's still on the run in several US states.

I feel like the phrase large dollop is a bit insensitive to his blood clot.

Andy:

Let's get some tales in the Departure Lounge from Chris Price.

Chris:

Safest guy on the plane. I always remember that phrase says he'd be the safest guy on the plane. Don't worry They, get me into the ambulance. They put a pressure cuff on, they do all the kind of basic checks, and then the lights go on and they say, we're getting it there as quickly as possible because we think you're having a heart attack. I had driven down a one-way street the wrong way in the middle of the night and pulled into a deserted car park downtown Detroit, which had a terrible reputation for violence at the time. So I, I probably asked for it to be honest. not sponsored by Nature Valley. This podcast I has to add. I like the chocolate chip ones with oats and stuff.

Nick:

So before we get into this episode, we are very excited to announce a new sponsor in Enrollee. Enroll platform. Cash Shield automates the cas visa and arrival process for university's agents and international students. And in the last academic year, the Enrollee platform managed the arrival and onboarding of one in four international students going to the uk, which is pretty significant. I've seen the enrollee cash shield in action myself, and I've gotta say it is the. Best tech innovation I've seen in the admission space. The platform takes the pain out of compliance and document collection. It protects your sponsor license and it maximizes post offer conversion. It also integrates with loads of other systems and private providers. So seriously, if you work in admissions, compliance, recruitment are student experience at a UK university, then check out, enroll today. It will save your team heaps of time and stress. So that's enroll. E N R O L Y. They've also come up with a great engagement idea, so I'll tell you more at the end of the episode.

Andy:

Chris, welcome to the show.

Chris:

thanks for having me, fellas. It's nice to be here,

Andy:

Let's get straight into it. where would you take our listeners today if you could take them anywhere in the world?

Chris:

I've been traveling the earth for, 30 something years, and I've been to all sorts of weird and wonderful places over But what I decided to do, I thought, you know what? I think sometimes the journey is as important as the destination. So we're gonna fly to Vancouver and then we're gonna take a road trip up the Sea to sky Highway up to Whistler. I'm a bit of a road trip junkie. and I think, it is very easy in this profession to go to an airport, fly to somewhere, hang around hotels, do you work, go back to the airport and fly home. But, I think the journey is just as important as the destination, like I said, and that, that Cedar Sky Highway is still, one of my favorite drives on earth. I'm quite an outdoorsy person, so I like to do hiking and zip lining and skiing and Whistler has to be one of the top destinations for me.

Andy:

Awesome. talk us through the road trip then.

Chris:

Basically you fly into Vancouver it's one of the few cities in the world where you can see all the ski resorts light up at night from the city center cause everything's is very close. and then basically, jump in your car and you've got this two hour drive up to whistle. It's not that far as it happens, but you, you drive this winding road the elevation goes up and up and up and up, and you just realize how awesome the world is when you see these snowcat mountains. It's actually the drive where I'm amazed I haven't crashed on it. I, to be honest with you, because there's so many incredible things to see and you're like staring out the window and and you, you, oh, bloody hell. He's trying not to get hit by a, a Laurie coming in the other direction. These incredible glacial lake sorts, snowcap, mountains or pine forests for as far as the eye can see. And I just think, it's a place where you can breathe the air. You go through a place called Squamish, which has got this incredible mountain in it it's called the old man. And you see all the climbers going up this sheer scope, you free climbing. I, I wouldn't dare to do that. I would definitely be dead if I tried that, and then after Squamish, you arrive in Whistler, which is, a playground for adults there's some of the best skiing in the world there, I would argue. Um, and I'm a hiker, so I like to hike up the mountains and try and get as high as I possibly can before my legs give out. I like the kind of skiing concept of the Apre ski. if you're an old fella like me, getting the energy put back in your body at the end of the day is very important.

Andy:

around my way there's loads of cyclists and they're like swarms of locusts. They swarm into a village. They stop at the cafe, devar all the cake, and then leave again. that's what's keeping these places going. I think.

Chris:

And they leave in this, in these dreaded pelotons where they like clog up the road. Now I'm a cyclist actually, Andy, so I'm gonna be a little bit defensive about it. But I don't like the Pelotons, I think drive me crackers cuz they all fill up the road

Nick:

have you ever cycled down a mountain? Is BMXing anything you do?

Chris:

BMXing, that sounds like something I would've done a long time ago. I did mountain bike,, down whistler. That's really hard. Bloody work.

Andy:

And our survey continues on Toson, the Departure Lounge. Have you ever met a bad Canadian?

Chris:

have I ever met a bad Canadian? No. I honestly would say no. None spring to mind, so I'm gonna say no. I haven't met a bad Canadian. I'm sure they're out

Andy:

Phenomenal, isn't it?

Chris:

just, I'm sure they're out there. But, you know, I, I've, fortunately, one of my kind of core philosophies, is treat people as you meet them. And everybody deserves respect until they prove otherwise, and so far the Canadians have not disappointed.

Nick:

What things make for a good road trip?

Andy:

You need a strong bladder, of course, for road trips. I found.

Chris:

Yeah, absolutely. Especially when you're going to a country where, they don't have proper service stations like you might expect if you're driving up the M six or something

Uh, yeah. The M six.

Nick:

There's that lovely services that's like a farm shop that looks like the

Andy:

Lost the services. Yeah.

Nick:

That's it?

Andy:

It's an absolute treat.

Chris:

You recommend a road trip to that service station? I must, look it up and go there for the sausage rolls. Yeah.

Andy:

Honestly, it makes a trip to the Southwest.

Chris:

one of my favorite road trips is driving from Pindi, Raul Pindi, up to PHA in Pakistan. Anything can happen. You've gotta just follow what the locals do all the time, as much as you can. Otherwise you don't get the true experience. So they said, okay. Have you ever had dud patty, which is a, um, a very sweet tea with cardin seeds in it and with condensed milk. It's very sweet. And I don't usually, I'm a northern Englishman, so I don't really drink sweet tea normally, but, you do what the locals are doing. So we stopped in a truck stop halfway on this journey, and we're sitting on the roadside in a truck stop, which barren is not like a truck stop in the west, right. It's a, it's, it's really spit and swords sitting on these battered plastic white chairs, like somebody's wrecked garden furniture drinking out of this teapot that's on the boil, and it's had tea in it for days on end. They don't clear it out and start again. They just top it up and, and you have this incredibly sweet tea. And I just sat there thinking, how often do you get to do stuff like this? Who would ever do this? Even if you went on holiday to Pakistan, you are very unlikely to do that. I think the little things on a journey make it the most memorable

Nick:

we need a playlist for this road trip? Are you into dad? Rock and roll, Chris,

Chris:

I'm sure my daughters would say so, Nick, to be honest. Um, uh, no, I, sometimes, I think, sometimes I think music can be a distraction to a good journey. But I, I must admit, having a good playlist, is a good idea. I have one on my phone My Shazam Faves, you Shazam the song and then I create the playlist from it.

Andy:

I'll tell you what else is good. Chris is, travel related education podcasts or education related travel podcasts, should I say?

Chris:

Very good, Andy, that's, uh, very professional of you.

Nick:

I like the idea of us being Shazamed right now, Andy.

Andy:

Yeah.

Nick:

Chris, in Amy Baker's episode, she talked about some health problems that you'd had, whereas you've been painting this picture of a healthy outdoors lifestyle here. So tell us a little bit about that.

Chris:

Amy alluded to it and I've talked to Amy a lot about her. I think she was very interested being a journalist. She's interested in people's stories. Right. So, it was sometime, it was in 2015, I think it was, I went to the ISF Miami event, um, and I, I'd arrived in country and, uh, been there for about 24 hours. And then, I was presenting at the ISF conference with a friend of mine, Pamela Barrett, and we were talking about working with agents and more effective management of agents and, I started having breathing problems. I hadn't been feeling great anyway. I started really having labored breathing when I was presenting. You had to stop and you breathe like that, which is unusual for me., and at the end of our presentation being me, I kind of soldiered on. I didn't stop. And at the end of the presentation, one of the organizers from ISF came up to me and she said, Chris, we've called an ambulance. And I went, really? Why? And she said, there's something, there's something really wrong with you, and we're, we're worried about you, so I went, I, I think I'm all right. I just, I'll just take a couple of Advil. I'll go to bed early. I promise I won't go out drinking or dancing or whatever. I'll have an early night, cuz tomorrow's a busy day anyway And she says, no, no, no. We've, we've called an ambulance and they're gonna be here in a minute and they're gonna take you and check you out and if there's no problem, you come back. I said, Isabelle, why are you, what, what, what has been the motivation for you to, to do that? And she said, oh, her husband has renal problems. And, she said, he sometimes he has blood clots, uh, and I think you've got them in your lungs. I went, wow. Okay. So anyway, the ambulance turns up, they, get me into the ambulance. They put a pressure cuff on, they do all the kind of basic checks, heart and blood pressure and stuff. And then the lights go on and they say, we're getting it there as quickly as possible because we, we think you're having a heart attack. And I'm like, really? I don't feel like I'm having a, I don't feel great, but I don't feel like I'm having a heart attack. And they, anyway, they got me into the er. This attending, this senior doctor comes down and he says, Chris, what we think's happened is you've got blood clots in your lungs and one of them has traveled into your, uh, pulmonary artery and it's basically killing your heart. It's basically, that's why your heart rate so high and your blood pressures through the roof. So basically that's what we think has happened. Um, so the immediate intervention is they shoot you full of heparin, a kind of radical anticoagulant medication and can shoot it into your stomach and it radically thins your blood really quickly. And then they admitted me obviously cause I was at serious risk of dying. so they admit me to the hospital. And I remember the surgical team came down, it was a teaching hospital, with all these students, you know, student doctors, thank God for student doctors. And, the, the surgeon says, well, we probably would've done an intervention here, but we can't because the guy downstairs has shot you so full of heparin. If we do anything, you'll bleed to death. So we're gonna just monitor you for a while. So after a week or so in this hospital, eventually they, the clot had started to reduce in size because the faster your blood flows, the more it strips the cells off a clot. So the idea is thin the blood quickly, that the blood flow will increase and it'll strip the cells off the clot and the clot will reduce. Now, given it was huge and life-threatening, cause it was basically killing my heart, my heart was having to go crazy to draw blood in and pump it out. it was, it was quite a, quite a frightening moment. I don't think I ever really felt my mortality until that conversation I had with that doctor. They tested for a thing called factor five liden, which is, um, A genetic fault. It's a gene that quite a lot of humans have. but they just don't know it. Cause it's not generally tested for unless there's something happens like what happened to me. And basically what that is, is it means my ancient ancestors had very efficient blood clotting. Which is a good thing, right? If you're being chased around by sabertooth tiger, it manages to bite you. You don't wanna blink to death, So a hundred thousand years ago is a very useful thing to have. And in the modern world of staring at screens for hours on end and not moving around and not being as hydrated as we should be, and, getting into pressurized tubes for 12 hours, it's not a good thing to have in the modern world. So I'm actually what's now called reoccurring Venus thromboembolism. I have to take a, a lifetime medication as a result of that. Um, but it was quite a moment, I must admit it was quite a moment, quite frightening. I I didn't really realize what was going on until it actually reached the point where it was a, a very life-threatening issue. But I've learned a lot from that. And one of the things to get across in your podcast guys is for our colleagues, a lot of people get on planes and travel. There's a number of things we can all do in order to keep ourselves as, as fit as we can, to reduce the chance of this happening, given that the chances are probably another person in this room might have the same thing that I've got. So, stay hydrated, walk around on the plane, I'm obsessive about movement now since this happened to me. I will not sit still.

Andy:

So they can directly link that clot to your flight. That happened previously. It doesn't build up over time. It was that single flight.

Chris:

Yeah, correct., They say it was directly related to the plane flight from London to Miami. a lot of people have blood clots and die, unfortunately, of heart attacks or strokes or whatever, and it's not really diagnosed back to the point in time where it happened. But the consultants, the attendings, I should use the Americanism, in the hospital said it was directly related to that plane flight. One thing actually, I didn't mention it, but it was getting home. Cause you are in Miami, it's December, you've been in hospital for 10 days, you're finally discharged. And think I wanna go home and none of the airlines would carry me. Cause they think we don't want this guy on our plane cuz there's a possibility of recurrence, you know? Eventually one of the doctors that had been dealing with me, I went to his outpatients clinic for a while and he wrote me a certificate saying that this guy is so full, of anticoagulant medication. The chances of him having a blood clot caused by a deep vein thrombosis on the plane flight is now so small is to be n nearly impossible, safest guy on the plane. I always remember that phrase says he'd be the safest guy on the plane. Don't worry.

Nick:

were you scared of flying again?

Chris:

Um, I can't say it didn't cross my mind. I eventually got back on planes, um, but that was more a case of airlines would allow me to travel with them again. Because there was some time, where you have to declare medical problem through your insurance.

Nick:

how much do you think about that moment that if the lady hadn't called the ambulance, if you'd gone to bed with an Advil how much does that play on your mind

Chris:

Um, Yeah, it does. You know, it was a moment, it was a moment in time. You know, I've had, I've had friends who've, who've died and we, we know people in our lives who've died. Um, but I did think, was that my moment? uh, and I'm always eternally grateful to Isabel who, who very likely saved my life. Cause if I'd gone to bed that night, my chances are I would've probably had a heart attack in my room at three o'clock in the morning, and I do wonder, you hear about a colleague, who's on a business trip and has a heart attack or something, and you think, I wonder if that they had what I had. You know, it does make you wonder.

Andy:

The next part of the show is called any laptops, liquids, or sharp objects, and it's where you get to tell our listeners, What you take with you or any travel hacks that you have.

Chris:

Okay. This was a, sorry,

Nick:

You're feeling all Chris,

Chris:

good. All good? All good? Yeah. No, we're all fine.

I'm so paranoid.

Chris:

We're all fine. Um, like, like a lot of international offices or people who work in international education, I have rituals. We all have rituals, packing rituals, travel rituals, what you do when you get to the airport, what ha what your behavior is on the plane, what happens at the other end? And I think it, it is a commonality in people who've done this for a long time. You've a set of processes you go through to get yourself from A to B. so what I would take with me is, a packet of nature valley biscuits, they're all full of oats and they're very good for you, blah, blah. because as I say, you never know when you're gonna be able to eat again. And of course I always have an ample supply of Warfarin, which is the anticoagulant medication I'm now on. Cuz if I actually go on a trip and forget that I probably have a major problem in a not too distant space of time.

Nick:

Have you ever forgotten it?

Chris:

I forgot it once when I went to my mum's, but she's only in Liverpool, so that wasn't really a problem. It was only like a four hour drive away. But if I went on a, a two week business trip to Nigeria or Pakistan, I'd be nervous. Yeah.

Andy:

Are there any side effects?

Chris:

I just find a bit of fatigue from time to time. Or maybe that's just age,, I'm probably just knackered, you know.

Andy:

Is it okay to have with beer or, sweetened Pakistani tea?

Chris:

With it's very good. alcohol interacts with it. Actually, you have to be careful when I have to go for a thing called an I N R test every couple of weeks, a magic number comes up. Like how many times more is my blood thinned compared to yours? And if the numbers are too high or too low, the first thing the nurse will say is been drinking this week. I still drink. I just drink more moderately than I probably used to 20 years ago.

Andy:

Nick, what would you take, what's your food? this travel hack of taking biscuits because you never get, you never know you're gonna eat. what would be your go-to?

Nick:

when Chris was talking, I was quite interested by the fact that he named Nature Valley, and I wondered, is your ritual so precise that it's gotta be Nature Valley

Chris:

not sponsored by Nature Valley. This podcast I has to add. I like the chocolate chip ones with oats and stuff. I just like them and Saintsbury sell them, so why not?

Nick:

I'm from a family where we made sandwiches to go on the airplane I'll often pack a baguette just as emergency only and then you have that lovely moment that maybe you forget about the salami baguette. And there it is when you least expected it and you need it.

Andy:

My wife makes a, a huge batch of flapjacks in a Tupperware. Which then get passed around the plane A amongst the family. But then, you know, the surrounding passengers as well end up scaffolding quite a few, which is nice. But then, if I'm traveling on my own, it is kp dry roasted peanuts, big bag. They'd last a long time on a trip. But I've been horrified recently because when I've been going on planes, they tell you that you're not allowed to open the peanuts because, of airborne

Nick:

Nu.

Andy:

allergies

Chris:

Oh dear, by Nature Valley Biscuits, my friend. they've got nuts in them probably, but they've, nobody's ever said can't

Nick:

May contain nuts.

Andy:

Ever been on a plane where they've called for a doctor, Chris?

Chris:

I have, yes., I've also been on a small airplane where they asked for anybody with any flying experience, and I was in the Air Force a long time ago, and, uh, I thought, oh God,

Andy:

Oh my God.

Chris:

I, I will not be able to take this. I will crash and kill everybody. Fortunately, there was somebody further ahead of me that was actually a qualified pilot

Andy:

That's absolutely terrifying.

Chris:

Yeah. It's,

Nick:

That could have been your moment. You could have landed the plane.

Chris:

or flew it into a hillside

Andy:

I just can't imagine somebody coming back into the plane and saying, can anybody land this jet?

Chris:

Actually there was a recent incident of some guy who was, who's having a, was it a flying lesson? like a Piper Apache smallish plane. And, the, instructor pilot was ill, became incapacitated and passed out for whatever reason, probably had factor five liden or something, but probably had a blood clot building or something like that.

No allergy.

Chris:

And the, the student pilot who'd literally only, just taken control for the first time they actually landed it. But, if you walk onto the flight deck of any modern commercial airliner, is this said anybody got flying experience? I'd just walk onto that deck and I'd look at it and go and go, no, I can't do that. We're gonna die quicker if I take over than we would do if it was naturally gonna crash.

Nick:

we have got a lead on a commercial airline pilot who might come on the show,

Chris:

god, that would be really interesting. I'll definitely, tune back in for that one. I don't suppose it helped that most of my training was on helicopters,

Andy:

The next section of the podcast is called, what's the Purpose of Your Visit? Chris, why do you do what you do?

Chris:

It's actually a very personal thing for me. I was an international student myself many years ago and I thought that experience for me was transformative. I was first generation university in my family. I packed my life into a little crappy suitcase and traveled, Only to the us but still it's quite exciting thing to do. so I think I know what that feels like for international students that started me off on, into this entire life that we now have. I had a job as a student assistant cause I ran out of money within about 10 minutes of arriving. the head of admissions at this university, said, look, do you wanna work for me? I'm looking for somebody to drive around Michigan with me and I'm do presentations to high schools and colleges and try to encourage those students to come and study at our university. And I said, Why not? There's more road trip opportunities, right? So we have this kind of double act. This fellow and I we're basically, He'd say, right. I'll do a very quick introduction. I'm gonna go straight to Chris, tell him about your experience of being a student at the university. And then you sit down and I'll start talking about why they should apply to come to us and I said, I don't understand why you gonna put me, so early on the agenda? And he goes, the moment you open your mouth, they're all gonna pay attention cuz of the accent. You're going to upstate Michigan and you're a British guy, you open your mouth and people go, Ooh, that's different. And so when I finally drifted home to the uk, I thought is even a career in this? Can you actually do this for a living? and this was in very early days of international education, and an international office in a university would literally be one person in a broom doing exchange programs. That would've been it. So I started off doing marketing the University of Westminster Business School, and then as a business school person, I was often invited to go on international visits with the international office. And I started traveling all over the place thinking, wow, this is brilliant. I had a very good boss there at the University of Westminster, who was very open to it. he gave me my breaks in this business and he said, look, I need an assistant director of the international office. And then you career accelerates accordingly, so I think that's how it all started. That in experience of being an international student in the great state of Michigan all those years ago,, has led me to where I am today. And I tell you a fu a funny thing, right? when I first, when you go to international student orientation, I mean there now are times I've delivered these. And then this is years ago when I was actually on the other side of it and this international director office lady Said, those of you that are new to Detroit, you need to be careful with your interactions with the Detroit Police Force. Because, the Detroit police have got a reputation for shooting first and asking questions later. And, um, Bloody hell. a police officer pulled his gun on me, and I thought, I'm gonna get my head blown off. and it all flashed back to that moment in the orientation. So I remained extremely calm and I was like, oh, hey officer, please. I was all very calm and polite and did everything he requested of me.

Andy:

That's when the British accent really turned on, wasn't it?

Chris:

yeah, yeah. Probably, probably helped. But he, he kept his gun on me for quite a while and I thought, has he not realized? I'm not a threat to him yet, but, you know, there was a drunk guy in the back of the car, and I think these two police officers thought we were murdering somebody or taking them to dump them in a, in a river or something like that. I think it was that moment was happening. Can I explain? He's just a drunk German fell, don't worry. Not dead.

Nick:

And you got out the car. And then he pulled his gun or he came up to the window and pulled his gun.

Chris:

You're told not to get outta the car until they tell you to, and you have to keep your hands on the wheel and you can't see a bloody thing because they put these bright lights on so you can't see what's going on. So you hands on the wheel and I was smoking at the time. And I remembered the orientation. Whatever you do, don't go down there like that because they think you're reaching for a gun. And this thing's burning down on my fingers and I thought just popped out the window thinking, okay, that's, and this gun, this is after they'd calmed down and they'd gone back to check the registration. And, he comes running up to the car and he goes, what the hell do you think you're doing? And I went, please don't kill me. And he said, don't you know littering is an offense in Detroit? And I went, yeah, yeah, I'd imagine it is. it's honey goes, you've just thrown a cigarette butt on the floor. I'm gonna write you a ticket for that. And I'm like, fine, please just don't shoot me. Yeah. And I didn't say that, but I thought, well, my brain was thinking. I was all being very English and polite and thank you so much. And oh, thank you so much for this ticket you've given me for a thousand dollars. I had driven down a one-way street the wrong way in the middle of the night and pulled into a deserted car park downtown Detroit, which had a terrible reputation for violence at the time. So I, I probably asked for it to be honest.

Nick:

You talked about when the sector was just someone in a broom cupboard, and then we've seen this explosion in the industry around international education. is that for the better, do you think, is modern life rubbish

Chris:

that's a great question and I what I would say, I think it's infinitely better. the fact that there is actually a career in international education, as opposed to doing it by accident, which is how I started, I think is brilliant Provost, chancellor International or D V C International, that's a big change. The fact that universities have realized that international education it's an intrinsic part of what makes universities function. And that's partly down to revenue, But it's partly down to the fact that we live in this increasingly globalized world, and that if you're sitting in a room full of other British students, that's fine. But if you're sitting in a room with lots of people from all over the world, I think then it, you get a much better perspective of the world. And therefore you are more likely to take a job in New Delhi or in New York, or in Hong Kong or wherever it is So I actually think what has happened over the years, is very positive, really. I think that the world has improved in some ways and not so much in others.

I get the idea that you've probably got more road trips stories. You know that you are always on the road to somewhere

Chris:

here's another funny story. in the US they have very restrictive speed. Re in the old days, used to have kind of 55, 65 on freeways where you didn't see another car for three hours. So being British, I would put my foot down and think, yeah, fine. Until I realized that these guys would be waiting for you every few miles. There'd be a local sheriff or somebody like that. So I was going from. Detroit to New York for, new Year's Eve, which is something I'd always wanted to go to Times Square, watch the ball drop, On the return leg of that trip, I got pulled by a, a local sheriff in some. Middle of nowhere place. And he said to me, and I was, I, I knew what to expect by then. And he gave me a ticket. He said, for speeding, fine, and he said, oh, I'll see you next Friday. Then I said, sorry, excuse me. And he goes, no, no. If I give you a speeding ticket in this county, you have to come to a court appearance and so I can't just pay it by post or something. He goes, no, you have to do a court appearance. And I went, okay, see you next Friday then. And I got, we just took off and we drove off and I went, there's no way I'm gonna drive 300 miles to, for a five minute court appearance. So I, I'm being stupid. I, didn't do that. And, uh, the next thing is my, my dad rings me up and he says, there's some letter arrived that says your driving license has been suspended in seven states. And I went, whoa. And because apparently there's some kind of interstate rule where, if you failed to do a court appearance in for a speeding offense, then all the other states would ban you from driving, which I had no idea about at the time, obviously. So when I did this mad three month road trip at the end of my time in the States, so I had to plan all the states I couldn't drive through. So the, the map was a bit, sort of in the end, this kind of crazy journey. And we drove from San Francisco to Detroit in about two days, which, if you look at it on a map, it's a hell of a distance. And we drove like nut cases and didn't get any tickets on that leg of the journey. A hasten to add.

Andy:

You're in the real life gumball rally.

Nick:

I think it's more like Smokey in the Bandit. where's the NAFSA conference taking place? DC They're probably gonna be waiting for you to pick you up after all this time,

Chris:

do, you know what? I only got pulled at Newark Airport once and this guy goes,, can you come with me please? This was about seven or eight years after I've been a student in America. I went, mm sure is there a problem? And he goes, you've just come with me. And they put me in this room. And, I was sitting there for about an hour going, this is bonkers. What is going on? And then I thought, oh my god, they did issue a warrant for my arrest, you know, I said, bloody hell, maybe this is it. This is the moment I'm gonna end up in Rikers Island in the prison or something. And they came in and he said we believe your passport's a forgery. And I went, Hmm, okay. Thank God it's not the other thing. I thought, and another guy comes in and asks me the same questions, expecting a different answer, which I did Point out to him, said, you're gonna get the same answer. You can ask me the same thing as many times as you'd like. And eventually, I, I, I got fed up with it and I said, look guys, I dunno what to say. My passport's not a forgery. And the only way I can. Prove this to you, is he, you must have some kind of uplink to the British Home Office. You must be able to check with the British Passport Authority. that I am who I say I am. And he goes off and he comes back and he throws the passport back over at me, says, you can go now. I said, oh, so you did check then, did you? I, I am who I say I am. And he goes, you can go now. And I thought, Hmm. Not a very positive interaction with authority there.

Andy:

I like the way that he threw the passport back at you and you went, phew. It's not the other thing.

Chris:

Not the other thing. No, no, I didn't go. Oh, you should check that as well. I was like very grateful to be leaving the building,

Andy:

The final section of the show is called Anything to Declare, and it's a free space for you to talk about anything you want to.

Chris:

There's not many careers where you can change people's lives for the positive, right? I used to have this thing, I used to call it the shave test, where, you shave, you look at yourself in the mirror in the morning and you think I'm gonna do something that's gonna affect somebody's life for the positive today. There's not many places that do that. And I think international education is a wonderful, an amazing thing. I used to say it in my presentations to students, if, if any of you have got the capability of doing this, even if you go for a week, you should do it because we don't understand our world until we've met other people from other bits of it, at the very least, and traveled to it and seen it. Otherwise, we're gonna stay in these echo chambers forever. So I really, I'm a, a bit of a, a believer, in what we do. And I would honestly say there's been very few moments where I've hated it. And there's been a huge amount of moments despite all the near death incidents I've had, where I think this is just a brilliant thing to do.

Andy:

I'm also interested in those near death experiences you talked about.

Chris:

I was in a very bad car crash in Pakistan with a couple of other British University people and it was one of those moments that I, I was the only one who wasn't injured catastrophically or very badly. And to walk away from a car wreck like that, you think, dunno, there must be some guardian angel looking out for me because, my two colleagues, one had a very badly damaged arm and the other one had a broken her back so, There was those moments where you think, God, I'm either really bloody lucky

Andy:

how did it happen? The car crash.

Chris:

We were in very bad weather conditions. We were traveling along a highway in Pakistan and you get these incredible weather fronts the monsoon type rain and the car started did aquaplaning. And it hit the central reservation. And it careered across the road and hit another reservation and then finally ground to a halt. But it was, it didn't turn over anything. But I say, thank God for German engineering, the German government had paid for this new highway to be built some years before I was using it. And they built, crash barriers on the inside lane and if they hadn't built those barriers, the car would've gone off the side of the hill and into a massive lake and we'd all be dead. That would be the end of it.

Andy:

Chris, have you got any other stories you want to throw in?

Chris:

I think I've given you all the high notes, really. There's probably a few. I I wouldn't be able to say without getting arrested or, or losing my job.

Andy:

Those are the ones we want. Chris, shoulda got you drunk before you came on, is what you're saying.

Chris:

I'm quite happy to tell my stories and say way things are. I don't really hold back. I think I've earned the right to do that. And you spend 32 something years doing this, you earn your stripes. So therefore, I'm happy to tell people of what I think without really being worried about whether I'm gonna get promoted or whether I'm gonna get fired or something. You, very liberating.

Andy:

Have given me an idea, for a spinoff show that you and I could look at Nick, which is Drunk Tales from the Departure Lounge.

Chris:

Yeah, the ones where you get hammered in Beijing and you'd vomiting into a bathtub all night and then, you miss your alarm and you have to pay some guy a ton of money to drive you at 120 miles an hour to the airport to get your flight onto wherever you're going. and you just, you pour yourself onto the plane and go, oh my God. So the hangover's kicking in. You've all there. We've all done.

Andy:

Awesome. Chris, thank you so much for coming on the show. It's been great having you.

Chris:

You're very welcome. It's been great being here thank you guys very much for putting it together. Much appreciated. I'll see you on the road.

Nick:

Hello everyone. Thank you so much for listening. As always. Now, we've teamed up with our sponsors and Rollie to get you our listeners involved. What we wanna know is where would your final boarding call be? Where's that bucket list destination that you can't wait to travel to, or where's the place that you can't wait to return to? You can tell us at Sick bag at tales from the departure lounge.com or social media. We'll be recording a special episode of the Frequent Flyers Club to discuss your suggestions. Safe travels everyone. Tales from the Departure Lounge is a type nine production for the pie.

People on this episode

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Andy Plant

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Nick Cuthbert

Host