It was early February in 2020.
And I was living at the Flying Fish hostel in Cebu, Philippines.
Life was good.
I didn’t much other than:
- Training Brazilian jiu-jitsu daily
- Preparing myself to be a skipper
- Dining and drinking with hostel friends
I couldn’t complain.
Leaving For France
I have met my now girlfriend at the end of 2020, on the boat that was I about to be a skipper on.
After she had been on the boat, she had to leave for France, where she was going to study as an exchange medicine student.
I missed her so damn much.
So I decided to take a little “vacation” from the Philippines and go to France.
I didn’t have any cash.
So I had to sell some of my stock shares, so I could pay for an airplane ticket.
I ended up selling for 17.000 DKK.
A Friend in Town
France was awesome.
I was back in the Philippines.
And just before I was about to leave the hostel room to start working on the boat, I got a call from an old friend.
“You are in the Philippines right?! I’m in Bangkok! Get your lazy ass over here, and we will have a blast!”
That invitation didn’t require any convincing.
I had never been to Thailand, and it was a 2-hour flight away from me.
So I started to sell some of my shares again, to fund my extended weekend in Bangkok.
I ended up selling for 5.000 DKK.
It was the very last flight I got from Bangkok to Cebu before Thailand shut every flight down because of the corona.
Living on the edge.
Boom and Crash
The stock market was booming before my two trips.
And selling some of my shares didn’t seem like the worst idea when everything went so well.
You can say that my investments paid for those trips.
There had already been some rumors about a Chinese tourist who was corona positive. But the government couldn’t find him after he had left the hospital.
I didn’t pay too much attention to this corona thing. And just thought that was a part of living in Asia. They have experienced similar before.
I had just finished renovating the boat I was going to be a skipper on. And 8 guests had arrived from Denmark.
But before I knew it everything crashed.
Some of the guests left the Philippines the same day as they arrived, others were stuck and couldn’t find a new ticket home.
And it was a mess.
The skipper is the last person to leave a sinking ship. So I stayed with my first maid (and diving instructor) and two of the patient guests who thought that everything could be fine.
But before we knew the Danish government sent a plane to Cebu, to get stranded Danish people home.
We thought it was the first and last time to experience our government sending a flight for us, so we decided to jump on board.
My Portfolio
Just before I left for France on the 10th of February, my stock portfolio was then at an all-time high on:
530.292 DKK (84.234 $)
But just a couple of weeks after I got home from Bangkok (16th March) my portfolio was now only worth:
379.252 DKK (60.250 $)
Or said in another way.
My portfolio had just shrink:
151.047 DKK (24.000 $)
Why didn’t end up losing all of that money is because I didn’t sell anything when we world seemed to go into an apocalypse.
What I regret doing is not buying any shares on the way down.
But I was a sailing bum, without that much cash on hand.
So I was just satisfied that I managed to get some “free” trips instead.
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