H Jenkins on October 16, 2018
Chris Jericho has been through just about every hoop in the pro wrestling business has to offer, but his journey to Saudi Arabia was really a wild experience. We previously reported on the real reason why he thinks the Casket Match against Undertaker was canceled — Vince McMahon can be a bitter dude. But he went on to tell about another strange experience on Inside The Ropes.
Jericho started off by calling Saudi Arabia a “strange place” and the trip was so long and the show was hard to do because you immediately land and have jetlag. He spent some time doing a podcast with Daniel Bryan for Talk Is Jericho, and then he had to get ready for the Greatest Royal Rumble show.
“So I’m sitting there for 14 hours and dude, this stadium is like a f*cking Roman Empire stadium. It’s dusty, there’s nothing to do, there’s nowhere to go. So f*ck it. So I do the match and I’m only in it for like four minutes or something it’s like I was literally laughing: A) At some of the guys f*cking up their spots and B) How much are they getting f*cking paid to do this for me to be in this f*cking thing, whatever.”
“I get something to eat — there’s no alcohol allowed in the country so there’s no partying, there’s nothing. I wake up, actually, I didn’t go to sleep because 5 am was my bus call.”
“Now, the other guys stayed but me, I went straight to the airport and flew out it was just me, Kidman, Finlay, Jamie Nobel, and Adam Pearce so we’re all on this bus together. Combined 200 years of experience between the 5 or 6 of us. Kidman’s been in the business for 25 years and he’s probably the ‘young boy’ in this situation or Adam Pearce.”
“We just get dropped off at the terminal and we walk off like morons. We don’t have a handler, we don’t have a security guard and f*ck — people there are very touch-feely – ‘Oh, selfie, selfie.’ Dude — I’m not kidding everybody wants a selfie and they’ll just come up to me and go ‘SELFIE, SELFIE!’ Now times that by 100 and I’m starting to get angry and we’re getting surrounded.”
“‘Get the f*ck outa my face’ — I’m turning into Alpha Jericho — ‘Get the f*ck out of my face – F*ck you, f*ck you, f*ck you.’ And they’re all coming for me cause the agents are all legends but I’m the only guy that they know.”
Jericho said it was like a scene out of a zombie movie as he was swarmed by Saudis demanding selfies and being very pushy about it invading his privacy. But Y2J wasn’t set up with any kind of security so that’s what happened. He pushed through the people and eventually found out that he was dropped off at the wrong airport and had to travel 45 minutes to the other northern airport.
He said there was no way to get to the other airport but it was 45 minutes away too. Then he got to the airport and everyone was in the same line waiting for the plane with no VIP line or anything. He started to think that he didn’t need this but when he got through the line, someone recognized him from the GRR and he said: “I know you, I’m going to give you a present!” So he upgraded Jericho from row 12 to row 10 in the same section. But the frustration didn’t stop there as Jericho had to wade through another sea of selfies as he waited in customs when he got to his destination.
There was nothing to do during his layover except for sit and wait because there was no restaurants or anything else for the passengers as they waited for their next flight. Then he had to get on a bus and then get off and walk and go up more stairs and then go through a whole new system of checks and more traveling before he could get on his flight to finally get home. Once they got an hour over airspace and he could order a drink, he ordered a double vodka because he said he needed a drink.
He said that “now that I know how much money they got paid for it they’ll have to pay me triple what they made.”
So it’s safe to say that Jericho won’t be itching to return to Saudi Arabia any time soon.
If you use our quotes credit Ringside News
October 16, 2018 10:19 am
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