It’s often impossible to recognize you’re in a storm when you’re sitting in the eye, and by that time, it’s often already too late.

As I’m sure many OutKick readers have realized, I haven’t been around much the past couple weeks. The loyal YouTube viewers (the best of the best) are also aware that I’ve been out of the country for some time taking care of business.

Rumors have been flying in the comments that I’ve been somewhere in the Middle East, including possibly Iran.

Allow me to make one thing clear.

I wasn’t in Iran, but I was definitely not anywhere near the United States. It was the highest of highs. The lowest of lows. An adventure that, fortunately, didn’t end with me in foreign custody (not for lack of trying!) and presented multiple odd and peculiar moments.

Working class man takes Europe by storm.

The trip started on the gloomy afternoon of April 21st. Bags packed, a variety of different outfits ready to roll, passport secured, a bag of working-class cash cash and some other items we can’t talk about here!

My wife and I were getting ready to walk out the door when President Donald Trump announced another extension of the ceasefire in the Iran War.

Problem No. 1 had arrived.

With the clock ticking down until our ride to the airport arrived, I had to drop everything and rush to my studio to film an update.

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The work simply never stops.

I finished filming with less than a minute until our ride appeared at our front door. Edited in the vehicle, arrived at the airport, dropped our bags at baggage check-in, found a drink in the working-class private lounge of Icelandair and geared up for our first major destination (some details are withheld for privacy and security reasons) of the trip:

Dublin, Ireland.

We had a short layover in Reykjavík, Iceland.

A couple observations to share.

There is a noticeable difference in quality of airlines and airports with international travel compared to America.

People in America dress like absolute slobs at airports and the service is comically bad. Flying can be hell on Earth.

Not when flying internationally.

Icelandair was incredible. The service was top-notch, the flight attendants were amazing, the food was outstanding and I had no complaints at all.

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Now, did I sit in the first row of the plane against my working class roots? Yes, but we’re at war currently. It’s for security reasons. It’s not because of luxury. You don’t need to thank me for my sacrifice.

Second, the people at the airport in Iceland were all in shape, dressed well and weren’t behaving like zoo animals who had been cut loose. It was an incredibly refreshing change of pace from the nonsense you see stateside.

Little did I know the disasters were looming on the horizon.

 

Disaster strikes immediately in Ireland.

We touched down in Dublin early on the morning of April 22nd, and the first major problem is just moments away.

First off, I was expecting customs to be a nightmare. That wasn’t the case at all. The whole thing was over in about five minutes. Maybe less. I don’t really remember. I was too busy giving everyone around me a visual patdown and scanning for threats. I determined we were likely in a safe area.

What wasn’t safe was my money.

My wife, a retired professional athlete, has traveled the world many times over. Far more than I have, and I tasked her with handling the currency exchange……after being promised it would be fine.

Spoiler alert: It wasn’t.

She hands a few working class thousand dollars to the currency exchange counter at the airport. I then got handed back around €3,000.

My immediate reaction: Where the hell did all my money go?

Turns out airport currency exchanges are more or less complete and total scams. I lost a small fortune between fees and a degraded exchange rate.

A total nightmare and disaster on every level. How is that nonsense even legal? How is it tolerated in a civilized society?

Fortunately, a savvy man like myself plans for all contingencies, and with a second secure reserve of money and my cards, I knew we’d be okay.

Frustrated and enraged? Yes, but the mission must go on.

We call an Uber and travel deep into the heart of Dublin to stay at a blue-collar five-star hotel. Now, what you have to understand is that I’m not used to nice things.

I grew up in the bitter and cold land of rural Wisconsin. You grow up quick when you grow up that way. You learn to get by with what little you have. You’re so rough around the edges with a hardened heart that you honestly don’t even realize it. It’s just the way life is. Embrace the pain. Learn to love it.

Now, imagine a guy like me walking into a five-star hotel. I’m pretty sure people like me are usually shot if they attempt entry into elite society.

Somehow, I managed to go unnoticed. It’s the small victories that matter.

Now, I can’t get into exactly what I was doing in Ireland because I don’t need every IRGC member with a blood lust looking to settle scores. So, we’ll keep the details about Ireland fairly thin, but what I can say is that disaster, yet again, was looming on the horizon.

We spent the first night dining at some local establishments and getting into contact with my network on the ground, including the advance teams that had been in the country since at least a week earlier.

After a few Guinnesses (shockingly good after never having one before in my life), I turned in for the night. That’s when all hell broke loose.

I woke up around 3 a.m. so sick that I honestly thought I might be dying. My throat felt like it had a knife jammed in it from about six different angles, I was freezing cold, almost certainly had a high fever, was coughing so bad you could hear it blocks away and felt like death would have been merciful.

I went to bed feeling 100% fine. I woke up feeling like Satan himself had gripped me. What is critically important to understand is that I was in Ireland for a very specific purpose, and being healthy was going to be necessary. The (restricted info) mission launch time was on Saturday afternoon. That meant I had roughly 48 hours to figure this sickness out and beat it fast.

I start chugging water and popping medicine in a fashion that is borderline hard to describe. Slowly but surely, I started rounding the corner, but the true chaos was just getting started.

We had to move to a different location on Saturday morning about 45 minutes outside of Dublin. Transport was arranged, but what I witnessed next was nothing short of shocking.

A person in our group dumped his luggage all over the floor of the five star hotel and started rifling through it looking for an item. If there was ever a time I thought we might actually be discovered or shot, it was right then and there. I have a picture of it, but that’s best saved for the archives for the time being. It was ludicrous. People dressed in the nicest clothes you’ve ever seen right next to a guy with his underwear and socks on the ground of the lobby. Utter insanity.

Fortunately, we moved to the secondary location without further trouble, and I just keep ripping tea with honey to make sure my voice remains functional.

I immediately see that the secondary location is sufficiently isolated and secure for the event that is going down later. Slowly but surely, people start rolling in, and it’s a fascinating group.

International business owners, government officials, academics, engineers, land moguls and more are gathered in one spot. I turned to one guy while surveying the room, and noted there’s enough power here to start a war if we want to.

Fortunately, that wasn’t the goal.

The journey to Normandy.

Now, I have to skip ahead here due to the fact that the details of that Saturday and Sunday are best kept in the shadows. I’m sure many of you have theories. Some on YouTube have already figured out what happened, but not the time for me to share.

Next up, France.

We cut loose most of the ground party to head back to the USA with just a skeleton crew remaining in Ireland for a few days. Soon, we’re airborne to France.

Now, what you have to understand about the French is that while they’re our cousins in terms of the cloth they’re cut from, they’re not exactly like us.

Specifically, they have some outrageous laws, specifically about nicotine. They’ll let an eight year old smoke and drink wine (or so I’ve been told), but if you try to pop a nicotine pouch, you’re facing five years in prison. Just wildly unserious people. You can have my Alp when you pry it from my cold dead hands, and I’ll leave it at that for now.

First stop in France:

Normandy.

We checked into another working-class five-star hotel in Bayeux with one goal and one goal only.

Spend the next few days soaking up the Beaches of Normandy and honoring the American heroes who liberated Europe starting on June 6, 1944 with the D-Day invasion.

I’m not a very emotional person. I find emotions often distract from logic, but I’ll be the first to admit that standing on the dark and cold sand of Utah Beach and Omaha Beach is bound to make an American man shed some tears.

You can’t really understand what it’s like until you see it with your own eyes. It’s nothing like the movies.

The waterline to the German bunker positions is hundreds of yards that young American men had to run while facing overwhelming machine-gun fire and artillery.

The beaches were very well-designed death traps.

The significance of it is simply overwhelming. I stood there in silence taking it all in wondering what the noise must have been like as the blue water turned red stained with the blood of American patriots.

Just like an American man, I found myself wondering if I could have done what those men did in 1944. I’d like to think the answer is yes, but the only appropriate answer for any man is to simply hope to have done even a fraction of the job they did.

Seeing the scorched roofs of the German bunkers, the bomb craters, bullet holes, dried blood on church pews and the absolute carnage and destruction was a sobering moment.

You can read about D-Day all you want, but it hits in a totally different manner when you see the aftermath more than eight decades later.

The American Cemetery in Normandy is also a must-visit for every single American who steps foot in Normandy. A wave of emotions will wash over you as you look at the seemingly endless rows of headstones of American patriots.

President Ronald Reagan summed it up perfectly when he said the following:

It is, in a way, an odd thing to honor those who died in defense of our country, in defense of us, in wars far away. The imagination plays a trick. We see these soldiers in our mind as old and wise. We see them as something like the Founding Fathers, grave and gray haired. But most of them were boys when they died, and they gave up two lives—the one they were living and the one they would have lived. When they died, they gave up their chance to be husbands and fathers and grandfathers. They gave up their chance to be revered old men. They gave up everything for our country, for us. And all we can do is remember.

I will also say the people of Bayeux couldn’t have been nicer. The people in that region of France seemingly worship the ground Americans walk on, and it’s not hard to understand why.

The people living there are the children and grandchildren of the French who lived under German occupation and were liberated by Americans. It was humbling the way my wife and I were treated. So much gratitude from complete strangers.

The food in Bayeux was also nothing short of amazing, and shockingly cheap. Of course, when you live in the Washington, D.C. area, it’s hard to get much more expensive. Everything feels cheaper. Normandy was certainly a step down in terms of money spent for anything you need.

 

Onward to Paris.

Next up was Paris – after a brief pitstop not worth wasting time or energy on. Let’s just say I’ve seen enough castles and similar things to last me a lifetime.

Paris……is odd, to say the least. It’s a wild blend of different cultures and people.

One street will feature the nicest restaurants imaginable and incredible wealth. Go a few blocks away and you won’t even know you’re in Western Europe. I was in a state of shock seeing some of the areas. You think the immigration problems are bad in America?

I have NEVER seen anything like what I saw in parts of Paris before. How did this happen? Why hasn’t it been dealt with? Why are people who are, clearly, not French allowed to take over entire sections of the city?

And it’s not just me who noticed this insanity. I had drinks in one of the coolest private compounds I’ve ever stepped foot in, and the insanity of French immigration policies was impossible to ignore.

I didn’t want to be anywhere near those sections of the city, and as a friend of mine texted me, it might be time to get out while I still can.

Now, for French landmarks and monuments. The Eiffel Tower at night (we had a private working-class river cruiser) is fairly cool, and it lights up. Past that, I wouldn’t say anything really pops off as fascinating.

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I guess it’s the curse of being an American. Everything we do is bigger and better than everyone else. It’s hard to be surprised or impressed when I can just hop on over to any state and see remarkable things before morning coffee.

Paris has the Luxembourg Gardens. The United States has aircraft carriers you can tour. You tell me which is more interesting. Different strokes for different folks, I suppose.

What I will say is that people in Paris are nothing like people in the rural areas of France. I was warned ahead of time that many French people hate Americans. As I noted, that wasn’t my experience in Normandy at all. They couldn’t have been nicer.

A very different vibe in Paris!

The people there are much more pretentious and elitist. Kind of funny considering the only reason they’re not speaking German is because of our grandparents and great uncles.

I can’t prove it, but I’m fairly certain I received very poor service at a bar due to the fact I’m an American you spot from a mile away. Now, I want to be clear, there were also some incredible French people in Paris, and that wasn’t the experience everywhere. Having said that, I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t point out some of the French were unbearable. All societies have rude people, but as an American, I don’t need to be talked down to or lectured by a damn Frenchman. If I need their opinion, I’ll ask for it.

Medical nightmare unfolds on flight home.

Lastly, I thought it was going to be smooth sailing back home after leaving France, but one of the biggest nightmares was just beginning. The guy sitting behind me in my working-class seat at the front of the plane for security reasons was insanely ill. I’m not talking about a minor cough.

I’m talking about absolute mayhem. This dude sounded like he was ready to die right on the spot. Every time he breathed it seemed like his lungs might get ripped out of his chest. I get a body search for wearing a hoodie through security and someone carrying the next possible plague is allowed on a plane to infect us all? I just got healthy! Make it make sense.

It was so bad that everyone in my area was looking at each other shaking their heads thinking the same thing. I saw multiple people even put on masks out of fear of what this guy was carrying. To make matters worse, he didn’t seem to be taking any measures to mitigate the situation, such as covering his mouth. You know, basic common courtesy moves. I’ve never wanted to be off a plane more in my life. It was appalling and beyond disgusting. Next time, stay where you are and get healthy before putting us all at risk, and I’m far from a prude or someone scared of germs. I just didn’t need a front row seat to whatever this guy had.

Random observations:

• Getting Celsius in France is shockingly hard. Insane that a developed country doesn’t have the best energy drink on the planet readily available.
• The nicotine pouch ban is so comically stupid that an act of resistance is the only option you have.
• People in Paris hate guns, and are terrified of their own shadows. Use that information however you’d like when striking up a conversation.
• Paris smells bad, and it looks like many people don’t know showers exist.
• The best parts of Paris are off the beaten path, but just stay out of the dicey areas. You can thank me later.
• Tipping isn’t really a thing in France or Ireland, but service workers still appreciate it a lot.
• Get ready to answer a million questions about America if you’re traveling overseas. People are fascinated by it, and really only learn about it through American movies, TV shows and media.
• Normandy is A LOT colder than you’d expect on the beaches. Dress accordingly.
• European portion sizes are shockingly small.
• McDonald’s and Burger King in France and Ireland are significantly better than in America, and the clientele is noticeably better.
• People in Europe either hate or love Trump. There is no middle ground.
• Get ready to get a lot of dirty looks if you’re wearing an American flag hat, but don’t back down an inch.

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Now, I’m back in America, successfully evaded French nicotine laws and didn’t manage to get stabbed while in Paris. Will I be back? Maybe. Maybe not. The future and fate are unpredictable.

I was legally robbed at the Dublin currency exchange, nearly had to be hospitalized with what seemed like a life-threatening illness, came face to face with parts of Paris I will never go near again and lived to tell the tale. It was certainly an adventure, and one that I’m glad I took. Special thanks to everyone who was on the ground with me making sure we made it back to America safe and sound. Now, I rest and get ready to get back to YouTube and life in America. God bless the USA and let me know your thoughts at David.Hookstead@outkick.com.