10| On Embracing the Journey: Journalist and 6-time Beijing Boxing Champ Nick Bedard

Nick Bedard embraces the journey.

From using guerrilla journalism tactics to get his NBA credentials, to becoming a Chinese culture reporter and 6-time Beijing city boxing champion, to returning home and attempting a start-up, he shares his stories and lessons learned along the way.

Show Notes

Follow Nick on Instagram | LinkedIn

Basketball Buddha 

Theme music by: Ruel Morales

Audio Transcript

Brian Schoenborn  0:01  

Hello, hello. Hey everyone. Our guest today has embraced the journey. He’s man whose explored very many parts of the world and done some pretty incredible things, including his time since I’ve known him in Beijing as the six-time Beijing city boxing champion. He also got to start as an NBA journalist in Korea, I think he covered the Korean basketball league as well. Meanwhile, as boxing city champion six times, he moonlighted as a Chinese propagandist, or journalist or journalist with a white face. Give it up for my friend Nick the Quantum Beast Bedard.

Brian Schoenborn  0:51  

My name is Brian Schoenborn. I’m an explorer, people, places and culture. In my travels spreading over 20 countries across four continents, I’ve had the pleasure of engaging in authentic conversations with amazingly interesting people. These are their stories, on location and unfiltered. Presented by 8B Media. This is Half the City.

Nick Bedard  1:18  

Thanks for having me on Brian. I’m happy to be here. I’m happy to share I’m happy to share the journey. Like you said I do embrace the journey. The destination is important but the the mass emphasis of my you know, lifestyle and so on has been the journey time and time again and we’re going to talk about a few of those journeys today. So thank you very much. I hope this is going to be you know, entertaining. If not, you know, if you learn anything from it, that’s great. But I’m here to share my story because that’s what this podcast…right.

Brian Schoenborn  1:56  

I’m coming back off from a brief hiatus. I had to take a little bit of break due to some family emergencies. But I’m posting up in the studio right now in Hollywood. A nice little spot. And we’re doing this one remote baby. Nick’s hanging out. Where are you? Where are you at? Are you in Montreal? Or? 

Nick Bedard  2:14  

I’m in Toronto, Canada. 

Brian Schoenborn  2:15  

Toronto. Right? Okay. Right on man. So, what brings you to Toronto? What What do you mean? What are you doing back there now? 

Nick Bedard  2:22  

Well, this is home for me. So after almost a decade of you know, traveling and and, you know, fulfilling journeys that I’ve always wanted to fulfill, I finally come back to my home base and used all of the knowledge used all of the experience to establish the career that I’m doing now, which I’m super excited about. I don’t want to spoil it right away. I guess we could start with kind of what brought me to Asia in the first place, because that’s kind of where the journey all began. 

Brian Schoenborn  2:52  

And so you said you spent what, like 10 years in Asia roughly.

Nick Bedard  2:56  

In nearly a decade, yes.

Brian Schoenborn  2:58  

So how do you make a decision to go from Canada, you know, Western, Western culture, you know, Western lifestyle. How do you make that decision to go, you know, take that jump from that to something probably completely different to you. I mean, I know I lived in Asia as well