Common Sense Safety While Traveling: Day 21 of 30w30d

on 9-23-2009 in 30 Ways in 30 Days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World

This post is part of 30 Ways in 30 days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World. This series seeks to give you the practical, real world steps you need to take to get from wherever you are, to exactly where you want to be– traveling the world and living the lifestyle you want.

30 ways in 30 days, travel advice, common sense, dangers,

Many people are concerned for me, when I tell them that I travel.  Even family and friends living in Boston have concerns about me getting raped/murdered/robbed even though those things are more likely to happen to me in Boston than they are while traveling.  In the last three years, there were 387 homicides of US citizens overseas.  In 2008 alone there were over 14,000 in the US.  In fact, when I’m traveling, I’m more likely to die from a car accident and I’m almost equally likely to drown or commit suicide than being a target of a violent crime.

I will admit that I occasionally harbor some of those irrational fears too.  Sometimes, when a  local is overly nice to me I wonder what they want.  Other times, I become paranoid and imagine someone is following me, and for a flash I imagine an unlikely scenario: them grabbing me in broad daylight in a busy street and robbing me at gun point.  However it’s important to still travel with confidence.  These fears keep us sharp, but they aren’t meant to keep us locked up in our rooms at night or fearing the smile of every stranger.  We can’t control the outcome by being afraid.

Also, there’s no accounting for plain dumb luck.

Minimizing your losses in case of being robbed

  • Keep your money, passport and credit cards somewhere safe, like an interior pocket, a money belt or locked up in your hotel room.
  • You’re always supposed to have a passport on you, but if I’m going out for an evening, I’ll bring a photocopy of my passport, so that I can’t possibly have mine stolen.
  • Never put anything you don’t want to lose in a pocket, backpack or purse, especially if the zippers face away from your body.
  • Only carry as much cash as you need, stash the rest away.

Avoiding getting robbed

Ha.  There is no way to completely avoid it.  Everyone gets robbed, eventually, if you travel enough– so stop blaming the victim.  Besides, it’s just money.  You can try these:

Don’t look like a tourist: too late you already do, even your trying looks like a tourist.  Listen, I can tell if someone is from Revere, MA vs Leominster, MA– don’t you think there are subtle cues that are going to be screaming “Hey this guy is not from around here”.  So yes, maybe not wearing a t-shirt with the country’s name on it might help, but I kind of doubt that pickpockets are that discriminating.  You are a foreigner and foreigners have money.  Even the stinky hippie backpacker ones.

Don’t leave your stuff unattended:  Yeah, this works great until you start traveling.  If you’re going anywhere, that means taking a flight, a bus or a train.  Three perfectly good reasons to be separated from your luggage and three great times for the other travelers and/or the staff to rifle through your stuff.  You will have to trust and hope.  Keep the most valuable things physically on you and if you go to sleep, sit on them.  Most of the time they won’t lift you up to steal your stuff, but don’t be surprised if they do that too.

Don’t wear fancy clothes or otherwise look affluent. Yes, this makes sense if you’re wearing diamond studded tiaras, but for the most part this falls under the same rule as looking like a tourist.  So sure, leave the suit made out of 100 dollar bills at home, but otherwise don’t worry about it.  Affluence is affluence and trying to send socio-economic signals saying that you’re not upper middle class, but more like used-car-Target-shopping lower middle class to people who make $400 a year is kind of a waste of time.

Scams, Hot Girls, and Dumb Things We Do

If you want to worry about something, there are some common ways to separate tourists from their money.

Someone at your hostel got robbed!  Or an American approaches you on the street they “have been robbed and just need some money to get back home”. Or they are having money Western Unioned to them but it won’t get here until tomorrow… can you loan them a few dollars?  Probably they are lying.  Help them if you want, but do they look like a regular traveler or are they a little rough around the edges?  Maybe living on the street, doing drugs?  Just saying.

An incredibly hot girl wants to talk to you (you’re a guy).  She is smoking hot and just wants to hang out and get drunk.  You wake up the next morning with a bad headache and empty wallet.  Did she drug you?  Maybe.  Probably she just got you drunk then cleaned out your cash.

Professional Con Artists. I met one of these in Cancun on my way to Cuba.  He kept telling us stories of him as a musician, saying he opened for Bjork, but then later it was Red Hot Chile Peppers.  Hmm.  Then he invited us out for drinks and bought us all a round.  Oops, his wallet was missing.  Could we cover him?  I left after a bit, but my friend got completely hosed on a huge drink bill and some other not-so-nice-stuff.  We saw him around the rest of the week working his circuit.

As For Everything Else

You already have the common sense you need, so don’t buy a safety whistle or pepper spray just yet.  If you’re traveling with kids, keep them close in crowds.  If you’re going out drinking, take a cab home instead of walking the streets late at night.  You know, common sense stuff you’d probably do anyway.  Sometimes it might feel like everyone just wants your money, but mostly they’re willing to just overcharge you on knickknacks for it.  World poverty is a serious issue but for the most part the people you meet will be more helpful and kind than you could possibly deserve.  It will hurt and make you mad to have something stolen, but only for a bit.  You’ll get better at reading people.  You’ll sense when someone is trying to sell you, even when there is no product on the table.  You’ll spend more time fending off vendors than watching out for criminals.  After a bit you’ll feel just as safe as you do at home.

pic: xava du

67 Travel Friendly Jobs to Consider: Day 20 of 30d30w

on 9-23-2009 in 30 Ways in 30 Days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World

This post is part of 30 Ways in 30 days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World. This series seeks to give you the practical, real world steps you need to take to get from wherever you are, to exactly where you want to be– traveling the world and living the lifestyle you want.

30 ways in 30 days, careers, resources, online travel

I’m sure there are 1,000 different jobs you can do overseas, but here are 67 just to illustrate how varied the options are.  If you’re struggling to find a way to make money while you travel, perhaps one of these offbeat stories will give you a new angle.  Most of these are first hand accounts, others are links to job boards you might not have considered and a few are how-to articles.

  1. “I have an incredible job”.  Be like this guy.
  2. Work in the Foreign Service.
  3. Take your US based strategic communications job on the road
  4. Work as a Theatre Tech.
  5. Get a job in Hong Kong from the job boards.
  6. Find a paid internship in IT in India.
  7. Act your way across Europe.
  8. See Antarctica up close with the many job opportunities.
  9. Find jobs across Asia at the PacificBridge
  10. Become a wildlife biologist
  11. Turn your full time job into freelance
  12. Help on a farm.
  13. Teach English.
  14. Make money with your blog and showing other people how to do it.
  15. Find  jobs online in Thailand
  16. Guide Bicycle Tours.
  17. Work in an Eco-lodge.
  18. Start up a business in Hong Kong.  Or in Japan for that matter.
  19. Become a Diver Instructor
  20. Search for jobs in Malaysia
  21. Join the legions of IT professionals working remotely and become an IT consultant.
  22. Beyond teaching English… use your English skills to land other customer facing work.
  23. Be like Rolf: become a Travel Writer.
  24. Get a pub job.
  25. Work in a Ski Resort.
  26. Join the bon fire and work at campsites worldwide.
  27. Managing Editor of an online travel network slash guidebook writer slash translator slash…. well you get the idea.
  28. Become a geologist.
  29. Work in a hotel in the UK
  30. Find jobs from house-sitting to farm hand at  wwoof.org
  31. Help businesses and writers polish their prose as a freelance copy editor
  32. Start your own import/export business
  33. Be a bar hostess in Japan
  34. Snap up an IT job in Europe.
  35. Take care of little ones anywhere in the world: become an Au Pair.
  36. Help individuals and small business get off the ground in developing countries by working in Microfinance.
  37. Work in New Zealand wineries.
  38. Get a job on an Alaskan Fishing boat.
  39. Check out jobs in Singapore
  40. Sell your photographs to glossy magazines like Vogue
  41. Take your corporate job abroad
  42. Get your hands dirty and work on a farm in Tuscany.
  43. Write what you love and become a freelance writer
  44. Fund your travels by playing online poker.
  45. Chicken Sexer, Bollywood Extra, and 18 more weird travel jobs
  46. Do what you love and teach others how to, too.
  47. Search the online classifieds for jobs in Japan
  48. Put your design skills to work and be a long distance Art Director
  49. Be an english language radio announcer.
  50. Search the Gajin Pot for even more jobs in Japan
  51. Become a Backpack Filmmaker
  52. Become a local, then find opportunities like voice over work, corporate English gigs and more.
  53. Search the online listings for jobs in Korea
  54. Be an on-the-ground journalist as freelance foreign correspondent.
  55. Become a company’s Twitter Guru
  56. Play the market and sell stocks
  57. Search the online listings in India
  58. Become a bush pilot.
  59. Take photography to the next level and become a freelance photographer.
  60. Be a nurse overseas.
  61. See the world from the open sea: find work on a sailboat.
  62. Travel port-to-port as you crew Cruise Ships.
  63. Show tourists the sites in Rome as a Tour Guide.
  64. Check out the job listings from the Maldives
  65. Become a professional freelance web designer
  66. Search the job boards on ExpatForum.com
  67. Learn how to become a freelance translator

Are there more?  Absolutely.  If you think of another, please leave the link in the comments.

Paying Bills While Away and Other Sundry Tasks: Day 19 of 30w30d

on 9-23-2009 in 30 Ways in 30 Days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World

This post is part of 30 Ways in 30 days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World. This series seeks to give you the practical, real world steps you need to take to get from wherever you are, to exactly where you want to be– traveling the world and living the lifestyle you want.

30 ways in 30 days, paying bills, day-to-day, travel around the world

Ah yes, the little details that threaten to upend any good plan.  How will you get your mail?  Deposit checks?  Pay your cell phone bill?  Vote?  Renew your license?  Short answer: online.

Getting Your Mail

I currently use a product called Earth Class Mail, which is one of about six online companies that offer a mail scanning service.  Here’s how it works:  they assign you a mailing address (mine is 93 S. Jackson St. #7363 in Seattle, WA) you forward your mail there, they receive it, scan it and when you log onto their website, you can see each piece of mail you received.  All online.  It’s genius.  Then if you want to open it, they’ll scan every page for you.  Or you can have them shred it.  ECM will also deposit checks or ship your mail to you, wherever you are (for a fee).

My experience with ECM over the last year has been flawless and they have hands down the best customer support.  But I’ll probably be changing companies this year, since they doubled their price ($10/mo to $20/mo).  Be sure to search around for the best deal, because there are some cheaper alternatives.

Paying Taxes

This can be done 100% online and in combination with a tax program like Turbo Tax and your online mail service you should have no problems filing.  I get my W2′s and 1099′s mailed to me, I have my mail service scan them in and online I take a look at the numbers.  I enter all the data into Turbo Tax, get a pdf copy for my records and electronically submit.  If I have a refund, it is deposited directly into my bank account.

Paying Bills

There are three ways I’ve had to pay bills back home.  Calling the company directly (using Skype) to make a payment with my debit card, using the online pay feature (if supported) with my bank or setting an automatic EFT.  I’d suggest getting 100% online with your bill paying before you leave.  This means going through each bill and figuring out what they’ll accept.  Sometimes there are forms to sign (in the case of EFT) and it’s just easier to handle before you go.  I’d also set up a PayPal account and have your bank account verified with them, just in case you need to transfer money on the road (it’s cheaper and easier than Western Union if you need someone to send you emergency funds– although it can take 3-5 days to land in your bank account)

Vote!

First, are you registered?  Yeah, you’ll want to do that.  Then it’s easy to vote from overseas and online.  When the time comes go to http://www.fvap.gov/

Renewing Your Driving License

Yes, you should probably do this before you go, but it is possible to do it online for many states.  First, change your address to your new online mail box, so the license gets sent to the correct place.  Next follow your state’s DMV steps for online renewal.  Finally when the license hits your online mail box, you can pay to have it shipped overnight to your current location.  The shipping may cost you but it’s cheaper than flying back home to renew.  (You can probably only do this once, they typically want to update your picture for the next renewal).

Depositing Checks

As I mentioned above, Earth Class Mail (and other services) offer check depositing services, if you get mailed a check.  Personally I prefer to avoid that and try to get all of my payments either through paypal (convenient even if the payer doesn’t have an account, they can still use their credit card to send you money) or through direct deposit.

Making and Receiving Phone Calls

If you haven’t heard of Skype, go check it out.  I use their paid service so that I have a permanent phone number people can call no matter where I am in the world.  Skype also allows you to have those incoming calls forwarded to your local cell phone, so even if you’re offline, you can still connect.  However, it has some problems.  It’s perfect for calling back home, but a little shaky for business calls.  To be fair, it’s not all Skype’s fault– your internet speed is going to be a big factor.  But what if you’re traveling through a country that has slow internet everywhere?

If you need to make work related calls, I highly suggest getting a cheap local pay-as-you-go phone as you travel.  I’ve also tried to use my Blackberry overseas, but the fees are just too high, even with AT&T’s so-called Travelers program.

Getting Prescriptions Overseas

This one is tricky.  If anyone knows a better way, please let me know.  We have struggled with this as my husband takes meds for ADD.  The amazing thing is, it’s so easy to get a prescription in many parts of the world (walk in to a pharmacy and tell the on call doctor what you want).  The cost to pay out of pocket was often cheaper than our copay back home.  The big problem?  Getting the drugs.  He uses a specific brand and it works.  But it wasn’t available in many places.  Or if it was, they wouldn’t have very much.  Or they’d only give us 10mg instead of his prescribed 30mg.  We’d go to half a dozen pharmacies in each city trying to track it down– not fun.

Now, we get a three month supply in advance (the most our insurance will allow) and have them delivered to a family member back home, who then mails them to us overseas.  It’s not the most elegant solution, but it will guarantee you have the exact prescription you need.

Seeing Your Mom (or other loved one)

Yes, travel rocks, but you’ll probably have family just dying to see your face.  There are a lot of programs out there for video chat (Skype has it, so does Microsoft Live Messenger), so it might behoove you to make sure that: a) your mom has a web cam and knows how to use it (before you go) and b) that you have a web cam that you’ve tested.  My laptop has one built in and I use it like crazy with my husband when we’re apart.  He was able to get a cheap $10 web cam attachment for his PC that works just fine.  There will be a lag, and depending on your internet speed it could be significant, but chatting via video is a very nice way to keep in touch.

Pic: Matt McGee

The Part-time Digital Nomad: Day 18 of 30w30d

on 9-23-2009 in 30 Ways in 30 Days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World

This post is part of 30 Ways in 30 days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World. This series seeks to give you the practical, real world steps you need to take to get from wherever you are, to exactly where you want to be– traveling the world and living the lifestyle you want.

30 ways in 30 days, digital nomad, part time, career, travel sites

To date, this series has been covering the lifestyle redesign involved in moving overseas or traveling long term.  However, that’s not to imply that traveling is an all or nothing proposition.  For many people, giving up their house or traveling year round isn’t the goal.  Instead, perhaps you imagine summering in Greece or taking month long trips once or twice a year.  How does this effect the planning process?

Breaking Free to Travel

Career-wise you can go two ways: quit your job every six months to take off to some far flung destination or find work flexible enough that you can schedule those same getaways.  The first option isn’t rocket science- most college students have perfectly the work and dash lifestyle.   However, getting a boss let you unplug and take off for 1/3 of the year will take significantly more finesse.  That’s why you don’t want a boss.

There are a handful of seasonal jobs: school teachers, construction, landscaping, golf courses, tourism, university jobs etc.  However,  short of landing one of these temporal jobs, the chances of convincing your boss to let you take the summer off or to extend unpaid vacation as a job benefit are extremely low.

The best way to become a part-time digital nomad, is to become a full time one.

That means either starting your own business (as long as you can leave periodically), becoming a freelancer or getting a  job where you work 100% remotely.  For most of the year, you’ll live like every other digital nomad, except your location of choice will be your hometown.

While You’re Gone

Unlike a full-time digital nomad, you may be able to spend your traveling time work-free.  Of course if you’re working for an employer remotely, this won’t be possible, but it’s not at all uncommon for the self-employed to travel sans assignments.  On my travels, I’ve met many people in this situation… small business owners taking six weeks off to learn Spanish in Guatemala or the IT Guru that would work six months at $100/hr then take the rest of the year off.  If you’re traveling full time you might be tempted to feel a bit sad for their short term plans, but as you’re banging away on your laptop during the day, they’re making the most of their travel time.  Untethered, completely free and enjoying their time because of it’s finite nature, not despite it.

The key is to create the systems before you go, so that your livelyhood doesn’t come to a screeching halt.  If you own a business you need to plan from the beginning, to be able to confidently hand it over to someone else while you travel.  If you’re a freelancer, then you need to be a strict time-master and be clear with your clients that you absolutely are not available during your scheduled travel times (you don’t need to tell them why, just be clear).  Having a trusted freelancer that is willing to cover you during your away time is a good strategy to keep clients from straying too far.  If you’re working seasonally, you may have the easiest time picking up and leaving.  Just don’t be surprised if your coworkers are less than impressed with your healthy tan and travel stories when work picks up again.

Which is better?  Full-time or part-time?

I have a theory that most full-time travelers eventually become part-time digital nomads (if they continue traveling).  While traveling around the world for a year or five is wonderful, after a while most people settle down, at least a bit.  That doesn’t necessarily mean they settle back home– perhaps they spent the winters somewhere warm and then travel, albeit more slowly, throughout the rest of the year.  For someone planning their first big trip, I’d advise you not to worry about this too much.  Most people travel for a full year before they start day dreaming about having their own bed and a place to put things–that’s bigger than just what they can carry.

Which is better?  I always think people should travel as much and as far as feels good and no further.  If you’re burned out, stop traveling.  If you’re bored again, it’s okay to change plans and leave early.  We’re all doing this and making incredible sacrifices–but it’s only worth it, if you love it.

Resources:

1.  The 4-hour work week.  This book is recommended heavily by many travelers, but it’s really ideal for the part-time digital nomad.  Tim Ferris focuses on the kind of travel we’re talking about here, but he calls them “mini-retirements”.  He has plenty of advice on how to minimize your need for contact with your business while away.

Extreme Debt – Pay or Stay: Day 17 of 30w30d

on 9-23-2009 in 30 Ways in 30 Days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World

This post is part of 30 Ways in 30 days to Redesign Your Life and Travel the World. This series seeks to give you the practical, real world steps you need to take to get from wherever you are, to exactly where you want to be– traveling the world and living the lifestyle you want.

30 ways in 30 days, debt reduction, real estate, choices, traveling or travelling

As I was preparing this series, a surprisingly large number of people emailed me with their stories of extreme personal debt.  The question is always the same: what should I do, it’s essentially hopeless, I don’t want to stay but I can’t afford to go?  On the surface, it’s easy to blame the borrower, but not always. But what if you’re debt was for a noble cause?  A business plan that didn’t work out.  Medical expenses you couldn’t avoid.  Or a $100,000 graduate-level education? Should you be stuck for the next 5, 10 years working a job you don’t like, putting you’re life on hold?

I think the sternest of advisers would say: “Travel? Ha! You have to pay off your debt first!”

If I was to advise against paying it off first, someone would say: “Oh Please.  What are they are they going to do, file bankruptcy and pass on their bad judgments to consumers who actually pay their bills?”

I know this because last year I wrote a post called, 8 Things I Wish I Knew When I Was 22, wherein I suggested that young people fresh out of college could defer their student loans in order to travel for a year or more (among other things).  Of the 150+ comments it received, there was a number of people who practically spat on such an idea.  Have fun now!  Pay it off later!  Irresponsible! How dare I even suggest it.

The truth is, if I was indeed 22 again, I would do just that.  I’d defer my loans ($12,000 of them at the time, not much I know) and travel as long and as hard as I could.  If I had $100,000 in loans, I’d probably do the same thing.  But that’s just me.  It’s knowing that I would be able to make six figures if I wanted after I returned and the hindsight to know that I would have missed less in those first few years of work than I would gain traveling.

It comes down to a judgment call.  Obviously it’s best to pay off your debt first.  But with extreme debt – $100,000 or more, even the most frugal saver could take up to five years to get caught up.

Formulating Your Own Personal Gut Check

I won’t presume to tell anyone what’s best, that’s up to you to figure out.  Despite all the varying advice out there, there really is no right way.  Will you tell the guy who left his massive debt behind, scrounged up $5,000 to start a business in Central America and ended up paying everything off faster than if he had stayed– that he was wrong?  Or will you look the other way at the post-doc who wanted to follow her passion and ended up living overseas, working her dream job, but unable to afford a house, to get married,  or to have kids, when the time came?

1.  You have to know what you’re dealing with. If you don’t already, you should know what your total debt is and what it costs you per month.   So that $100,000 law school degree is a monthly payment of $1200, but $500 of that is interest.  The second part is as important as the first.  You need to calculate what it costs you to travel.

2.  What will this cost you? If you’re planning to travel, say for one year, then the cost to you is your interest ($500 from the case above) per month.  In this case, that’s $6,000 for one year. That’s how much more debt you’ll have in a year if you defer payment.

3.  Is this too much? You don’t need a fancy table to tell you.  If you see the number $6,000 and you say, “ah well that puts it into perspective, I can deal with that”– then you have your answer.  If you see $6,000 and you say, “heck no, travel for one measly year is definitely not worth a $6,000 increase in debt”– then you too have your answer.

How to Pay Off Debt

First, get professional help, if you can.  I used the methods below when I was cleaning up my credit report post college recklessness and as I paid off my debt before travel (that’s right, we took a year to pay off everything, including some old expenses from a short-lived business before we started traveling).

1.  Get your credit reports from all three bureaus.

2.  Call everyone you owe money to, tell them you are struggling to pay and see if you can make some arrangement.  (Just do it!)

3.   If your credit report is a big fat mess, sit down and write a letter and contest everything on your report.  Debts are bundled and sold.  You could be getting dinged from one $100 doctor’s fee you never knew about, not once but three times.  From the doctor, from the collection agency he sold it to when you didn’t pay, and finally from the next collection agency who bought your debt from the first.

4.  Start paying everything with the lowest monthly rates you get get from your creditors, so that you avoid no payment fees or more dings to your credit.  If you have extra, pay down the smallest balances first.

5.  Saving money comes last. Even if you invest your savings, chances are you won’t out earn the interest on your debt.  Pay everything off and then save.

6.  Work the pyramid.  I don’t know where I first heard about this method, but every debt-guru seems to use it these days.  Pay as much as you can across your debt.  When a bill gets paid off, apply that amount to the next smallest bill.  Keep working through your debt until you’ve paid everything off.

Options for the Debt Weary

So yes, paying everything off is ideal, but in the back of your mind, you just know that you are not going to do it.  That’s okay, it’s not the end off the world to be in debt.  Sure it sucks and sure it’s better and cheaper to pay it off first, but it’s not a zero-sum game.  It’s not pay it off or die.  Here are some interim steps you can take if travel is priority now:

1.  Just pay the interest. Assuming you are living within your means now, (if not now is the time to start), then planning to pay just the interest on your debt will allow you to travel without putting you further behind.  (From our example above, that would mean saving or earning an extra $6,000 during your year of travel).

2.  Try to negotiate lower rates for what you can and pay off some of your debt. For instance, one reader wrote to me and mentioned her $130,000 student loans, but she also had $12,000 in credit card debt.  For her, maybe it makes sense to eliminate the high interest credit card debt before traveling, but leaving her student loans in deferment.

3.  If your deal is high student loans, you may be able to alleviate some of your responsibility and still travel at the same time (depending on the type– are they Stafford or Perkins loans?  Are they private loans?).  I would check with your alumni office for programs, but you might also consider the Peace Corps and other volunteer positions abroad that help pay down debt and let you see another country.

4.  If you have a large mortgage, it’s better to sell at a loss, than to go into foreclosure. If you are in the process of foreclosing, you might want to demand to see the original loan documents.  This has worked for many homeowners to delay or stall completely the foreclosure process as it’s required by law that they have the original signed documents in order to collect on your loan.  With the way home mortgages were packaged, sold, bundled into securities and resold, there’s a fair chance that you’re current mortgage company bought your loan as a part of a large bucket of loans and the paper work has long been lost.

If I Didn’t Say This Before…

The best thing to do is to become debt free.  Sure there are options, but it’s postponing the inevitable.  If you can, pay it down.

pic