Recently things have been really hectic for me. Our poker federation has been flying at supersonic speeds not just with member growth, events and content but now we are reaching and gaining recognition internationally. This trip we have secured the support of CTP (Taiwan), HKPPA (Hong Kong) and GPI Asia. I will have even better news end of this month. In the coming weeks I am also traveling to multiple cities to join meetings and conduct classes.
But since 2015 I have committed to keep this blog alive with at least one post a month so I want to write about my most recent trip, to Taipei. I love Taipei, and it is rare for me to miss a major event there. Plus with meetings lined up I couldn't choose anywhere else. The costs are reasonably low, food is great, direct flights, soft fields, it is an easy decision for me. In fact I am returning there within a month since I left, and most likely will go again before the end of the year! Like any of my trips, before I go I would pray for 3 things. Safe trip, happy trip and a profitable trip. I know I have not been specific enough previously so I made sure to ask for at least a 5-6 figure profit.
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| Nice moment with this guy right after his win |
First two events I felt I played flawlessly. In one of them I played hyper disciplined coming back from 5bb to a 55bb stack only to run KK into AA. The other I had JJ vs QQ on a QJ board. I came to rail my friend MrEnox just in time to see him win the mystery bounty for about $USD60k. Not bad when I had 5% action on that. Then I continued to maintain a 100% OTM (out of the money) record for the rest of the series whilst he was 100% ITM. Shoutout to BlueIce for beating the Pros as well. I like to think that I played a big part in these two Isaacs' careers. I was the one who encouraged Enox to play full time, and BlueIce would not have gotten the votes he needed without MPF! At this point I was stuck roughly 192k.
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| Best ROI horse |
On the last night before our flight home, instead of firing another bullet for a trip saver, I resigned to cutting my losses and spent my time preparing a special invitation for MPF. I finished the invitation and sent it to my high profile bosses and friends. The next morning as I was getting up to go to the airport, one of my bosses replied that Paul Phua is coming to Taipei. My first reaction was, ah too bad I am leaving today. As I continued to get ready to pack up, it suddenly dawned on me, why don't I extend my trip? So in a matter of 15 minutes we burned our return flights, decided to stay another 4 days.
The following day APT was still running, so I took another stab at the Closer event. Two bullets later I am now stuck 212k! Not sure if extending the trip was the best decision, the following night I went to visit the Dream Room, which coincidentally was in the same building as my Airbnb. I was touching distance away from Paul Phua, who's my poker inspiration for a while. Sabah gor as he is affectionately known as has a colorful past. I believe he is one of the few people who's life is more interesting than mine. When he was playing on PokerStars long ago, his nickname was "MalACEsia" (Malaysia). He since went on to create numerous poker companies, including the prestigious Triton Poker Series. In some ways we are quite similar, in terms of bankroll, then no. That night even though I didn't get to talk to him, I had a profit of about 60k. (balance -152k)
The following day APT was still running, so I took another stab at the Closer event. Two bullets later I am now stuck 212k! Not sure if extending the trip was the best decision, the following night I went to visit the Dream Room, which coincidentally was in the same building as my Airbnb. I was touching distance away from Paul Phua, who's my poker inspiration for a while. Sabah gor as he is affectionately known as has a colorful past. I believe he is one of the few people who's life is more interesting than mine. When he was playing on PokerStars long ago, his nickname was "MalACEsia" (Malaysia). He since went on to create numerous poker companies, including the prestigious Triton Poker Series. In some ways we are quite similar, in terms of bankroll, then no. That night even though I didn't get to talk to him, I had a profit of about 60k. (balance -152k)
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| Mad respect for the man |
The following day Enox calculated my 5% share, and it came to 138k, so out of the sudden, I am only stuck 14k for the trip! That night I crushed the TLT for a 190k profit to put me now in the black for 176k or so. Unfortunately though I did not get to see Paul that night but I did catch a very impressive lineup of who's who for the grand opening. Little did I know I had one more shot the next day. I took my photo with him, gave him our patch as a conversation starter, and it worked! He asked about it and we had a short but productive conversation. Now that the seed is sowed, I hope we can continue this conversation at a later date. Since I was there I saw a table opening so I jumped in not knowing it was a VIP invitational to play with Jungleman. It was pretty cool and I even hit my 5th career royal flush and beat Jungle on the very last hand of the day. I booked a small loss for this session though.
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| Second time meeting Jungle |
At the end, I got a safe, happy AND profitable trip. You can technically argue that it was a 6 figure profit. As amused as I was with His sense of humor, the fact that I got to where I am was a culmination of a number of things that had to happen the way it did. From way back when I started poker, expanded my network, always making friends, got jobs in poker companies, built a bankroll to afford HR events, running deep in one of them, getting recognized enough to be invited to high stakes games, won on those to afford creating MPF, to bricking all at APT so I had enough time to write that invitation and send it, and be invited to meet Paul... I can't wait to see what will unfold in my very exciting journey in poker and in life!
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