From Banking to Wildlife: Omar Samra’s Exceptional Career Change

- [Narrator] This is an audio course. No need to watch, just listen. Welcome to the latest edition to LinkedIn Learning. Podcasts. We've curated some of the best business podcasts and made them even easier to listen to. Each episode is split into sections. Use the links in the contents area to skip to whichever section you like. We're always looking for new ways to help you learn, and we'd appreciate your feedback. Thanks for listening. - [Dana] I'm Dana Ballout. - [Hebah] And I'm Hebah Fisher. - And you're listening to Al Empire. (gentle music) - [Woman 1] It went viral. It was everywhere. - [Woman 2] I used to tell my father, you will see one day, I will make you feel mine and we go to camp. I think that's why I say that. - [Man 1] I felt insulted. I was like, where is my audience? - [Man 2] I didn't go to therapy. I think I should have. - [Dana] This is Al Empire, stories of exceptional Arabs around the world and their journey to the top. - Today we're speaking to the exceptional adventurer and entrepreneur, Omar Samra. - [Hebah] Okay, so what are all the impressive accomplishments that you've done? So you've summited the highest mountain on every continent. You have skied the North and South Poles. - [Omar] To the North and South Poles. - [Hebah] To the, I don't know. Are they not like, okay. Yeah, you've skied to the North and the South Pole. - [Omar] So there's two separate journeys, like skiing to the North Pole and then skiing to the South Pole. - [Hebah] Okay. And then, and then you are, you did the Atlantic row. - [Omar] I attempted to row across the Atlantic Ocean. I rowed about a thousand kilometers with my teammate before capsizing in a massive storm, the boat not self-righting, the life raft not opening and spending 13 hours not knowing whether we would live or die. - [Hebah] He says casually. (Hebah and Omar laugh) - Which has now actually been made into a movie. So that's really exciting. - [Dana] Omar is the first Egyptian to climb Mount Everest. He's completed the Seven Summits, where he climbed the tallest mountains on each of the seven continents. He skied to both the North and South Poles, rowed across parts of the Atlantic, and has traveled to Antarctica, climbing mountains no other person has before. Omar started his own business, Wild Guanabana out of Cairo in 2009, the company is a different kind of travel company that hosts adventure trips around the region and globally. - [Hebah] So I first heard about Omar Samra probably back in 2013. I actually met him at a coworking space here in Dubai. He was the first Arab adventurer that I had heard of. And that, as a chosen profession, is very unique, right? I mean, I know we used to be explorers but today we're just, you know, well we don't do this kind of stuff anymore. - [Dana] Yeah. - [Hebah] You don't really, you don't scale mountains, and you don't journey into the forests and Omar has done all of that. And I wanted to know, I wanted to know his story.