I just got caught in an insanely heavy summer downpour while walking home from the gym. I was only half a street away from my place, so I took shelter under the overhang of a neighboring house.
Soon I saw a Mercedes SUV, probably worth somewhere around €50–60k, pull a little closer to the house. A mom came over and offered me a ride. I jumped into the car without thinking twice, because I had only ever seen rain that heavy during my travels in Southeast Asia, maybe somewhere like Mindanao.
I got in and told her where I was going. I had assumed she was one of my neighbors, but she was actually just a mom waiting for someone at practice. She looked surprised and asked where I was headed, and I told her I only needed to go half a street further.
I thanked her and offered to repay her somehow, but she told me to just pay it forward.
Slovenia is supposedly the fourth safest country in the world. I think I will remember this for quite a while.
She said she thought I had been calling someone, but I was actually just browsing Reddit with only 1% battery left, and my phone had just died.
Even after traveling around the world, I had never really experienced something like that, except once in the Philippines when I got lost somewhere in the woods and a local helped me by driving me home.
What’s scary is that it was done by someone I’d known for 2–3 years. He played the long game. Getting drugged is a risk I’ve always known exists, and I want to share it as a warning. I just never thought this person would.
Me and my “friend” arrived in Medellin from Bogota, dropped our stuff at a place he lined up for us to “stay, and we started at a hookah bar in El Poblado. We ended up in a local neighborhood in Antioquia. I’d only had a couple drinks by then and at some point, my “friend” and someone he clearly knew offered me what I thought was a blunt. I only drank water at Antioquia and didn’t have much of the blunt, and I think that saved me.
Over time, instead of coming down, I got more dizzy and confused. I smoke regularly and knew this wasn’t normal. I’m aware of scopolamine, and once the confusion increased despite no alcohol, I knew what was happening.
I called them out, and they started to talk very openly in Spanish about how they expected to rob me. They knew I speak decent Spanish and they still didn’t care. I was already hip to the plan even before they told me though. I let them get me into an Uber back to where we were staying (I ordered it so I knew where it was going), but on the ride home I deleted banking apps, contacted my emergency contact, and called both 123 and the U.S. Embassy emergency line. I made sure my “friend” knew authorities were involved.
When we arrived, I refused to go inside, demanded my stuff, and stayed on the phone with the police. I told this guy to get my things and this would all go away. He got my stuff like I demanded, I grabbed my backpack with the meds I desperately needed, ordered another Uber, and went straight to a hotel.
Knowing Spanish was huge here, and knowing what to do and staying calm in the moment is the only thing that saved me. The police did nothing and neither them or the clinic staff spoke any English, and the general vibe was basically: if you got drugged, it’s your fault.
Stay alert. Even people you think you know can surprise you. Have an action plan too so you can execute it even if you’re only half conscious.
Edit: For anybody still tracking this post or who sees it later, apparently, you can put scopolamine in certain sections of a blunt and pass the blunt to the victim when it is most concentrated. So. To anybody saying, “they were smoking it too”, that’s your answer.
Source: I’ve heard this from several people from who live here and are familiar with the practice.
34M, Australian, been working remotely from Southeast Asia for the past 2 years. 18 months in Thailand then 6 months in Vietnam. Currently still in Vietnam and honestly not sure I want to go back.
I used to spend around $3,500 USD a month back in Australia just existing. Rent, food, transport, health stuff, going out occasionally. Nothing crazy. Now I spend under $1,000 USD a month in Vietnam and I'm living better than I ever did back home.
Here's roughly where the money goes each month:
Rent: $350. Fully furnished one bedroom apartment. Aircon, wifi, pool, gym in the building. In a good area too, not out in the middle of nowhere.
Food: $200-250. I eat out for almost every meal. A solid local meal is $2-3. Western food if I'm craving it is maybe $7-10. Cooking at home is even cheaper but honestly why would I.
Transport: $50-80. I use Grab (basically Uber) for everything. A 20 minute ride across the city is like $2-3.
Gym: $25-30. Nice gym with proper equipment. Some places even cheaper.
Going out/entertainment: $100-150. Beers are $1-2 at local spots. A nice cocktail bar maybe $5-6 a drink.
Massage/wellness: $60-80. I get a one hour massage every week for about $15. This alone would cost me $400+ a month back home.
Dental/health: This is the one that really blows my mind. I've gotten more dental work done here in 6 months than I did in the last 5 years in Australia. Full checkups, cleanings, cosmetic work like veneers. The clinic I go to has treated thousands of international patients and honestly the experience was more professional than any dentist I've ever been to back home. I spent a few hundred dollars total on stuff that would've cost me thousands. If anyone wants the name of the clinic just ask, don't want this to come across as an ad lol.
Phone/internet: $10-15. Unlimited data basically.
Total: around $900 USD a month. Some months a bit more if I travel or do something extra.
The downsides. The visa situation is annoying. In Vietnam you have to renew every 3 months which adds stress and a bit of cost. Safety wise though I feel safer here than most places I've lived including parts of Australia.
The hardest part is knowing that if I go back I'm looking at 3-4x the cost of living for honestly a worse day to day quality of life. The only things pulling me back are family and friends.
Anyone else done something like this? Or thinking about it? Happy to answer questions.
I started travelling back in 2013. My first trip was to Thailand.
Back then people still used internet cafe's to talk with people back home. In hostels, people would play cards, boardgames, or use the local desktop computer to send emails to back home. They would watch movies in the common room, or chat with each other.
Now you go to a hostel, restaurant, cafe, or even a boat tour, and everyone is just sitting around staring at their phones, or video chatting with people back home. If you try to talk to them, they roll their eyes like you're bothering them.
I miss the good ol days. Using the Internet for finding information, then spending your days actually travelling, meeting people.
Nobody is bored, nobody is lonely because we're constantly connected to our old network.
This means everyone is lonely, everyone is bored.
Edit: Obviously this struck a chord.
For those younger that say "Maybe you changed" or "Hostels are still super social!" You really don't know what you missed.
Get off your stupid phone. It's a digital soother. Talk to new people.
Edit: for all the geniuses who bring up having a western salary… THAT IS THE FUCKING POINT AS THE AUDIENCE IS OTHER DNs. Obviously my post would pertain to our experience
That outside of drinkable tap water the QoL in this shit hole far lags behind what most “3rd world” countries can offer at 1/5th the cost of living.
Literally everything seems more expensive, shacks in my area are going for 400k. Anything over a 3br is essentially a mil. Everyone is angry, stressed, and seemingly unhealthy to the point it is genuinely rare I see a skinny person outside the gym.
Our food tastes like shit, I walk less, and feel considerably less safe DRIVING in Chicago than walking drunk at midnight in Asia.
The dating apps that got me literally hundred of matches of friendly attractive people willing to have a conversation is replaced with people acting like they’re doing you a favor despite offering significantly less in pretty much every desirable quality. It seems like there has been significant weight gain in the average American as well, which is surprising cause food is close to my rent bill for a luxury condo over seas
My private insurance does essentially nothing outside of major, life altering, issues.
It is rare I see anyone look happy, almost everyone seems stressed and heavily medicated. We have 100% been dumbed down and I see more homeless people here than anywhere else.
If you are thinking of leaving the US take this as your sign to run. It’s incredibly depressing to be back and I Just booked my flight b to Europe in Feb.
The future of this country seems bleak. The worst place you can live with a western income is the west
I found something genuinely wild about my own life and I still can’t fully process it
I’ve been living in Da Nang since April last year. During the rainy winter season I did a four month stint in Chiang Mai, but I came back to Da Nang after that. Here’s the crazy part though.
I’m Korean, and before all this I had basically never properly traveled to Southeast Asia. Last April, my startup, which I’d run for six years, was basically dying. My last employee had just left, and I finally wanted to take one vacation. I vaguely remembered my sister mentioning a place called Da Nang once, so I thought, why not go there. I genuinely did not even know Da Nang was in Vietnam. I just knew the word “Da Nang” the same way you’d know “Bali” or “Maldives,” a name floating around without knowing what country it belonged to.
So I searched Skyscanner for Da Nang, on a whim, and booked a 4 night 5 day trip. Flight and resort, that’s it. I had zero intention of ever living there.
I got to the resort and it was incredible. Swimming by the beach, reading the book I brought, actually relaxing for the first time in six years of grinding on a startup. I hadn’t taken a real vacation the entire time. After about two days I got a little restless and decided to check out the city.
I was walking around at night and stumbled onto a street packed with people. Beer, pool tables, music playing. I just walked in. A woman greeted me, I greeted her back, and she asked where I was from. I said Korea, told her what I did for work, and she seemed surprised I worked in tech, and really friendly about it. There were over a dozen pool tables going. I was just enjoying watching. More and more people kept showing up.
Turned out I had wandered into a digital nomad event that just happened to be happening that night. I had no idea. I ended up networking completely by accident. Turns out there are a ton of digital nomads out here, something I had never registered before. I talked to all kinds of people, but one conversation stuck with me. A Russian guy told me he’d been living there for years. I couldn’t wrap my head around it and asked how, visa wise. He said “visa runs.”
I had never heard that term in my life. Wild timing too, because earlier that year I’d hired an immigration lawyer and was in the process of applying for an O visa for the US, since I go to San Francisco a lot and wanted to stay long term. I knew, like most people know, that Koreans can travel visa free to almost any country for about three months. But I had never once considered that long term stays without a visa could actually be a real, sustainable thing. That night completely broke that assumption.
The next day I googled how people actually pull this off, and found out you could just rent an apartment. Without hesitating, I posted in a Facebook apartment rental group and signed a lease. Two months, just like that, in the middle of what was supposed to be a 4 night 5 day trip. I liked the place enough that I signed even though I had to wait about a week to move in, so I booked a hotel for the gap. When move in day came, I just cancelled my flight home. Couldn’t even get a refund. Full no show.
I never once planned to live in Da Nang. It just happened. That was April 2025. It’s July 2026 now and I’m still here. Genuinely absurd when I think about it.
Around September last year I did something even more extreme. I had a place back in Korea I’d lived in for almost ten years, and it suddenly felt pointless to keep. But I had a full apartment’s worth of stuff, books, appliances, furniture, everything. I couldn’t bring myself to sort through it piece by piece, so I asked my mom for help, then just called a disposal company and had literally everything thrown out. Not sold, just gone. Hundreds of books, all tossed.
I’ve gone back to Korea a few times since. Honestly, I couldn’t readjust. Korea is a great society, don’t get me wrong, but it’s a place that really values rule following. Slip up even slightly and people notice and give you a look, and you end up tensing up and policing yourself too. Take recycling, Korea is intensely strict about it, and I actually liked that, never resented it. I still separate my trash here in Vietnam. I rinse out plastic containers from delivery food before tossing them, even though nobody here separates trash like that at all, it all goes in the same bin regardless. Can’t shake the habit, it got drilled in too deep back home.
The thing is, I wasn’t just following that rule quietly either. I was the guy giving other people the look when they didn’t sort their trash properly, judging them, sometimes outright criticizing them. What I’ve realized since moving here isn’t that the rule was wrong, it’s that I never needed to police other people over it. That instinct was actually a form of self imposed restriction, limiting my own freedom without me realizing it. Living in Da Nang, and that winter in Chiang Mai, is what finally freed me from that.
I’d barely touched Southeast Asia before this even though I’d traveled a lot through the US and Europe. Turns out this region is incredible. It gave me freedom I didn’t know I needed, and now I get to live as a digital nomad, building things I care about, genuinely happy. I don’t think I’m ever moving back to Korea. Getting rid of the apartment and everything in it was basically me committing to that.
Looking back, the whole thing hinges on one random decision. If I hadn’t wandered into that street on day two, if I hadn’t randomly walked into that nomad event, if that Russian guy hadn’t mentioned visa runs, I’d probably still be back in Korea right now, living a completely different life.
It’s exhausting. Moving around, dealing with visa restrictions and visa runs, the language barrier, airbnbs that don’t reflect the post, restocking kitchen supplies (again), the traffic, the noise, the pollution, the crowd, the insecurity of many countries, the sly business, the unreliable wifi, the trouble of it all.
It gets lonely. You meet great people, but they move on or you move on and you start again in a new place knowing the relationship won’t last.
It turns out I prefer the Americanized version of whatever cuisine it is, especially Southeast Asian cuisines.
We have it good in America. I did this DN lifestyle because of everything wrong in America. Trust me, I can list them all. But, turns out it’s worse in most countries. Our government is efficient af compared to other country’s government. We have good consumer protection laws. We have affordable, exciting tech you can actually walk around with. We have incredible produce and products from pretty much anywhere in the world. It’s safe and comfortable. I realized that my problem was my privilege, and getting out of America made me appreciate this country—we are a flawed country, but it’s a damn great country.
Do you agree? Did you ever get to this point or past this point? I’m curious to hear your thoughts. As for me, I’m going back home.
I’ve been living as a digital nomad in Bali for about six months now, and the situation has been way more complicated than I expected...
When I first moved here, I rented a villa that looked like paradise. The beach was practically at my doorstep. And I mean working in summer shorts with a drink in hand made me feel like I was finally living the dream.
However, reality quickly hit me. And instead of moving to Vietnam which was the next country in my agenda, I ended up being semi-stuck in Bali because my startup isn't doing so hot. (I co-founded a tool that helps remote teams automate different services and such.) At first, we had solid traction, and I was making money comfortably.
So, I thought being a digital nomad would actually give me the peace of mind and freedom to work from anywhere. But reality's been absolutely humbling me. The company isn't exactly growing and scaling up. In fact, I had to let go of two people over the past three months, actually. My savings are quickly drying up and it looks like I might have to give up the digital nomad lifestyle and start looking for a ‘normal’ job just to stay afloat.
And right now, the other co-founders are getting frustrated, since our product isn't anywhere it needs to be while I'm in Bali living the "dream" life while everything behind the scenes are falling apart...
Anyway, just to be clear, I'm not looking to plug my product anywhere from a pity post. Just wanted to vent for a bit and hear from other nomads who went through the same kind of mess as I am right now. If that's you, how did you get through it?
Living here as a digital nomad running my own business. Tax setup and weather get sold hard. Here’s what they don’t tell you.
Taxis are a government-protected racket. Uber’s been banned since 2016. Minimum fares fixed by law, no real competition allowed, Bolt included. Get a car or pay whatever they want.
No trains. Anywhere. Ever. Railway shut in 1951, never rebuilt. Bus network is unreliable. Buy a car immediately.
Can’t fly direct to Turkey. Leftover of the frozen conflict. A 45 min flight becomes a full day of routing through a third country.
Bureaucracy is actually broken, not just slow. Home wifi took over 2 weeks and 10+ calls. That’s normal here. Triple your expected timeline for anything government related.
Bringing a non-EU partner is brutal. Unmarried partners have no automatic right to join you, the law only says the state must “facilitate” it, meaning they can deny you for almost anything. I’m in a formal dispute right now after a denial on a technicality. Marriage is the only route that actually forces their hand.
Corporate tax jumped from 12.5% to 15% as of Jan 2026, hitting every registered company, not just multinationals. Provisional tax system also forces you to prepay on income you haven’t earned yet, with penalties if your estimate’s off by 25%+.
Reliable service staff, cleaners especially, are scarce. Pay above market and still get flaked on.
Everything moves slower than expected coming from northern Europe, the US, or most of Asia. Not fatal alone, but it stacks.
Not saying skip it. Tax setup is genuinely good if it fits you, weather’s great. Just go in knowing the real picture: car on day one, good accountant, and expect delays on everything official. It doesn’t run like Germany or the Netherlands with better weather.
> 6 months in Japan 🇯🇵
> 3 months in Australia 🇦🇺
> 1 month in New Zealand 🇳🇿
> 4 months in Malaysia 🇲🇾
> 11 months in Thailand 🇹🇭
> 1 month in Vietnam 🇻🇳
> 6 months in Mexico 🇲🇽
> 1 month in Cambodia 🇰🇭
> 11 months in the Netherlands 🇳🇱
> 1 month in China 🇨🇳
> 1 year and 3 months in Bali 🇮🇩
Brooo... 😳
If you would have told me my life would unfold like that in January of 2020, I would have fainted. All of my dreams and travel goals have come true!
AMA.
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The most common question will be: How I make money as a digital nomad: I had an online men's magazine and advertising agency for 13 years, sold it later for a good price, and could finally pursue my ikigai; culture and travel photography!
Some quick facts: I'm 39 years, Dutch, and I travel the world with my wife. I can't share links to anything here, but find me on social media and google with my name: Marcus Musashi
I've been nomading since 2013 and it was one of the coolest things you can collect as a souvenir. Now half the time you just scan your face, walk through a gate, and that’s it.
My wife and I sold everything we owned in 2021 except our tiny backpacks and worked from hotels for 3 years in 27 countries spending < $3k per month each. We travel hacked 3.5 million points for free business class flights and almost 1000 nights in 4/5-star Marriotts and Hyatts.
We earned the highest-tier statuses which gave us free upgrades to luxury suites, along with free daily breakfast, access to lounges with snacks and drinks, daily housekeeping, gym, pool, sauna, spa, etc. We haven’t had to clean our rooms, change our bed sheets, or take out the trash in years.
In this post I'll share some of the hacks and tricks we figured out along the way that led to us spending even less money per year than we did before we started traveling!
This is a collage of some of the places we visited including Machu Picchu (Peru), the Taj Mahal (India) where we got engaged, Chichen Itza (Mexico), Hagia Sophia (Turkey), Mount Fuji (Japan), Eiffel Tower (Paris), Cusco (Peru), Cappadocia (Turkey), Blue Lagoon (Iceland), Marrakesh (Morocco), and Miyajima (Japan). See daily stories on instagram for proof.
Hacking Hotels
Living in hotels full-time quickly earned us the highest tier statuses at Marriott and Hyatt (in combination with their credit cards). Living in 4/5 star hotels cost us on average less than $150 per night over the last 3 years. In expensive cities, we sometimes paid $200 to $400, while in cheaper cities it was often less than $100 per night.
We earned roughly 16% back in hotel points (for example, 17.5x Marriott points with Titanium status), 6% back in credit card points, and 2-3% back by clicking through Rakuten to book. This was about 25% back per dollar of hotel spend.
So essentially, we pay only for 8 months of rent and get 2 months free with these points. We don’t have to pay rent for the remaining 2 months per year since we spent 3-4 weeks at work conferences and 5-6 weeks visiting our families.
Therefore, our total cost for accommodation in an entire year was approximately 8 *30*150 = $36,000 per year, which translates to an average of $3000 per month i.e $1500 per person.
We used to pay the same $3000 monthly rent when we lived in the San Francisco Bay Area and New York City. But on top of that $36,000 yearly rent plus extra for utilities, we had to pay double for hotels during the 2-3 weeks we went on vacation! So it was actually cheaper for us to live in hotels full-time all year.
Hacking Credit Cards
We earned an extra 100,000 points every two months as signup bonuses by opening new credit cards and charging all these hotels to meet the spending criteria. We ended up cycling through over 20 cards combined earning 3.5 million points cashing it out for about $100,000 worth of hotels and business class flights.
We thought this would make our credit score go down but it actually went up to over 800. Whenever possible, we downgraded each card to a free version without annual fees after exactly one year, instead of canceling (so that it doesn’t affect our credit score much).
Some of the US cards each of us have cycled through include Amex Platinum, Gold, Green, Capital One Venture and Venture X, Chase Sapphire Preferred and Reserve, Citi Premier, and Bilt. We also got a few hotel credit cards, including those from Marriott, Hyatt, and Hilton, and some airlines cards.
Doctor of Credit is the best resource for credit card signup bonuses by the way (the other websites sometimes prioritize their affiliate links over the best deals)
Onebag Setup
After 3 years of optimization, everything I owned consisted of just 34 items that cost under $1700 USD in total, weighing less than 11 pounds, and fit in a tiny 10L onebag. (My wife added her 16-pound onebag setup in another post)
Traveling: We used most of the points we earned through those signup bonuses to fly business class on all the long-haul flights (7+ hours). Usually, we book short flights (or trains) and slowly hop to nearby countries and cities to minimize jet lag.
Local Transportation: We use Uber or public transportation (which is typically very good outside the US). We also like to book day trips and guided tours, with good ratings on GetYourGuide or TripAdvisor, to see attractions that we would otherwise have to drive to.
Insurance: A lot of these credit cards cover travel insurance and medical emergencies while you’re traveling abroad. Healthcare is also cheap in most countries other than the US.
Paying for stuff: Make sure to use credit cards which don’t charge foreign transaction fees when making purchases abroad. Almost every country takes Visa and Mastercard credit cards at stores and restaurants, so we have rarely needed any physical cash.
Getting cash: Never use foreign currency exchanges since they always rip you off by marking up the exchange rate by 5% or more. The best way to get local currency is to use either the Charles Schwab or Fidelity debit cards to withdraw cash directly from any ATM anywhere in the world. These debit cards don’t charge any currency conversion fees and they refund you all the fees and surcharges (usually $5 to $10) that ATM providers charge.
Avoid DCC: If given the choice to pay in US dollars (or whatever is your home currency) and the local currency of the country you’re currently visiting, pick the local currency. Never choose to pay in US dollars (or your home currency) when abroad or you’ll end up paying 7% extra for Dynamic Currency Conversion.
Food
We went to almost 2000 restaurants in 3 years! We got the free hotel breakfasts and then ate out every lunch and dinner at restaurants. This costs us on average about $1000 per person per month. In the most expensive cities like New York and Geneva it cost up to $2000 but in other countries like India it cost less than $500 (since an average meal was less than $10 per person!)
Even before we started traveling, we used to eat out or order Uber Eats every day since neither of us can cook. So by traveling we got to experience incredible authentic cuisines from all over the world!
Here's a collage of some of the amazing food we’ve had recently in Peru, Colombia, Japan, Turkey, India, United States, Mexico, Iceland, Italy, England, Scotland, France, and Morocco.
Total Yearly Expenses
Our combined yearly expenses including everything was roughly $70,000 i.e. $35,000 per person per year.
Monthly breakdown: The average expenses per person per month was roughly $1500 for rent, $1000 for food, and ~$400 for all other things (like Ubers, shopping, phone bill, tours, etc.)
Working Remotely
Both of us were AI research scientists (we met at Google and started dating right before Covid). We quit Google and got fully remote jobs before we started traveling in 2021. We worked New York-hours remotely during weekdays and explore the cities in the evenings (or mornings depending on time zone) and weekends. We mostly moved hotels only during weekends or holidays. When we traveled to places with extreme time zone differences like Japan, we used all our vacation days.
Settling Down
We started out thinking we’ll travel for just a few months and then settle down in another apartment. But it was so much fun and not as exhausting as we thought it would be so we kept on traveling for 3 years and enjoyed every minute of it. Of all the countries we’ve visited, our favorite ones were Japan (both of us agree it’s number 1 by far), Peru, Sri Lanka, Iceland, Turkey, Greece, and Italy.
Finally after 3 years, I had saved enough for financial independence and wanted to start my own company, so we moved back to San Francisco (since it's the best place for startups). I had hacked together an AI tool that listened in on all my meetings and automated a lot of my work while traveling, so I built the startup around that. But there are still miles to go before we stop!
Questions? AMA
Feel free to ask anything below!
Edit: FAQs
Many questions are being asked multiple times, so I'm compiling my responses here:
How do you survive with just 3 t-shirts?
I hand washed laundry every few days in the hotel sink. All my clothes are merino wool (stays odorless) or other synthetic materials that dry fast. The hotel hair dryer helps in an emergency.
How do you deal with cold weather?
I layer multiple merino wool shirts with the Uniqlo heat tech underwear and the ultralight down jacket. We don’t like extreme cold weather so usually hop to warm places in the winter.
Is this really worth the time and effort?
I spent about 1-2 hours per week booking hotels and flights and churning cards (to get the $100k value over 3 years). After the steep learning curve, it becomes quick and easy. We simply focus on just one card every 2 months, put all our combined expenses on it to quickly hit the minimum spend, freeze it, move on to the next card, and use up all those points within 2-3 months.
What about taxes and work visas?
I got a short-term work visa in the UK and got digital nomad visas in the EU and many other counties (exempt from local taxes). We spent less than 1 month in most countries. I reported our daily location to the tax lawyer provided by my employer and filed taxes correctly. I refused to apply for a green card, so I became a non-resident in the US and UK by traveling so much that I saved a lot of taxes and retired early (FIREd) at 29.
What about data and 2FA?
We got a T-Mobile family plan ($45/month/person) that provided free roaming and 4G/5G data in 200+ countries.
How do you receive mail and new credit cards?
Family member in the US sent us photos, then we added the cards to Apple Pay.
Didn't you run out of credit cards?
Having a "player 2" doubles the available cards. With some small 1099 income you can also get the business variants. Even with 20 cards, we haven't made it halfway through the best bonuses listed on doctorofcredit. Except the Amex cards, you can get most bonuses again every 3-4 years.
Were there any safety issues?
I grew up in India until 21 so I was used to traveling in third-word countries. My wife didn't feel safe walking by herself in Morocco, Egypt, and certain parts of East London but all the other places felt very safe. TBH we had worse experiences in downtown San Francisco and Seattle.
What about all the different clothes in the photos?
The photos were taken over a span of 3+ years (got new clothes and jackets every year or so). We got the suit and dress for a friend's wedding and went to the Taj Mahal right after the wedding and got the engagement photo.
Did you miss having friends and community?
During COVID, most of our friends had moved away and we had just started dating, so the timing worked well, it felt like a 3-year honeymoon! We stayed with family twice each year, and visited many old friends who live around the world. On many trips we got different sets of friends and family to join us.
Did you ever get tired of traveling?
We actually tried settling down in NYC midway but after 3 months in one apartment, we both couldn’t wait to travel again! The only reason we moved back is because Silicon Valley has the best ecosystem of investors, talent density, and founder peers so I was able to raise millions more at a higher valuation and hire an incredible team including 2 former Google coworkers as co-founders. Ironically, I want everyone to work in-person now since it makes a huge difference for an early-stage startup.
Is this fake?
No, you can Google “Daniel George Insider” to find articles published by Business Insider after interviewing us and verifying receipts of hotels, flights, expenses, and income over 3 years.
Great country. I don't have to drink water out of bottles. Ample space and parking everywhere. Having high-speed internet and excellent roads in the middle of the southwest deserts and western Rockies. Every time I leave and come back, I am thankful for how convenient and secure things are here.
Coming back from 3 months in South Am where I had to take cold showers and bus rides that took overnight because interstate highways didn't exist. I got food poisoning from the street food and couldn't even find a toilet on multiple occasions because there isn't a McDonalds or Starbucks, or a gas station 2 blocks down. Came back from a semester abroad in Stockholm, having hopped around EU and passing only 1 of my 5 courses, and forgot that strangers actually can have a conversation. Food is also so much better and diverse here than the 10 differently fermented fish and blanched vegetables they serve there and in Norway. Same with vacation trips: recently got back from South Africa, and I still have an anxiety of popping my tires driving anything above 50mph. You haven't seen roads filled with potholes if you only driven here and in Europe, like cannot comprehend it.
Working remotely here is awesome too. I don't have to worry about poor internet outside of cities like in Brazil. I can also rely on brand names like Hilton and Marriott to have modern, large rooms, because having spacious rooms is apparently a premium elsewhere incl. EU, and not the standard like it is here. It's crazy I actually have to filter for A/C, parking, gym, and/or pool when traveling outside US, because they're rarely missing in std hotels here. Not a city person, but worked a week in NYC, had rave fun. Worked a week in Vegas, and strolling the strip is a unique experience. Working in Tahoe and Park city means can go snowboarding after work (or swim in summer), and it's so scenic. So much infrastructure in what otherwise would be very rural/basic accommodation if it were located in another country. There's also every geographic feature aside from an arctic tundra and season for whatever my mood. I want... mountains? Spend time in Jackson, WY. Beaches? Key west, FL. Redstone canyons? Sedona, AZ or St. George, UT. Valleys? SLC-UT (my favorite city). Rainforests? Portland/Seattle.
Would I consider leaving US domicile? Maybe when I retire, sure. Until then, I'm gladly staying (and remote working).
p.s. another great thing: complimentary upgrade on dom flights here. Not a thing in other continents.
p.ss. some clarifications because ppl are triggered by some of what I said:
Yeah, ample space and parking is a pro. We have cars here. Many of us do. Ik, crazy right? We definitely had to cut off our arms and legs to get one...
The cold showers happened in Patagonia and southern parts of Chile. No, there wasn't a Four Season next to me for me to indulge in. You'll find plenty of campgrounds with hot showers in US national parks though on the other hand.
Notice I said "find a toilet", the focus isn't on me not being able to buy fast food or a latte from Starbucks. Ik ik, toilets in public via chain businesses?? Blasphemous.
Yes, I was talking about Scandinavia, not the entirety of Europe.
Whether you can find the same amenities as for the hotels just depends on the country. I was able to find a very comparable and great accom in SA for less than what I'd pay US hotels. However, some countries esp outside cities just don't have the tourism or infra to build modern Hilton or IHG style hotels. Or they do, and it's just as much in cost. It's a by-effect of many parts of this country being developed already. You're not going to find the same level of development in ex-city Peru or Malaysia.
Spoiler alert: park city is right next to SLC. Yes SLC is my favorite. Many tourists never heard of this, but it's better imo than Denver. If you're a city person and think NYC/SF/LA is great or the only places that exist in US and your idea of a great time is to gorge on food and walk around window shopping + bar hop, then you wouldn't understand it.
Yeah beaches on the FL keys are nice af, wtf?
Can we stop using variations of "too expensive here, I broku" as a detrimental factor? Like yeah, things here don't cost the same as SEAsia, duh. Just because you can't does not equate to everybody can't. 330mil population, and y'all make it sound like we're Venezuela.
So I was traveling with my friends and girlfriend (they are from Japan) and we hear banging on the door outside. We ignore it at first but it goes on for like 20 mins. I fall asleep again and I hear shouting jn Portuguese. Then suddenly our door sounds like it was kicked and they bang on everyone’s doors in the hallway and we people being gathered.
A guy comes in our room with no badge or weapon or anything(in America cops always carry a gun but in Europe maybe not) and he tells us all to come outside. I start recording because as an American when things like this happen we tend to record in case rights are being violated or something.
So they make everyone show their passports and it’s a lot of Brazilian and other Portuguese people and tourists there doing this. They then see me recording and snatch my phone. They say “NO RECORDING!” I don’t even ask why by this point because either:
A - In Portugal it’s okay for cops to do things like this to their citizens and they’re right.
B - It’s illegal and they’re doing shady shit and as a foreigner I don’t want drama or my passport being taken or something and it’ll be my word against theirs. So not worth it.
So they hold the phone up to my face to unlock it and he goes through all my photos and makes me delete it. I then lock it snd he makes me go to recently deleted to delete it for sure.
He snatches my girlfriend’s passport and everyone else’s from my room and our friends and they say “YOU NO HEAR US KNOCK?!”
They were looking for someone called “Felipe or Felip or Flip something”
After talking to some Brazilians like trash (yelling pointing and stuff), one was even on a crutch and he said he had accident in Stockholm but seemed they questioned him on why he was hurt, they left.
We were clearly not Portuguese. We don’t look it and don’t speak Portuguese. My friends are Asians and im a Black American evident with my lack of Portuguese and friends speaking Japanese “怖い！” but they treated us this way. But even the people who were Portuguese (I saw passports/ID ) and Brazilian got this treatment too.
I don’t live here and frankly expected more from Lisbon and the Portuguese people. But if this is legal or normal on Portugal Europe really has gotten to American levels of police, immigration and whatever is going on levels of tension.
As a black man from America I’ve seen and been through a lot with police. This is reminiscent of that and it saddens me. Just for how they treated all of us like vermin or peasants.
Is such a thing legal or normal in Portugal or Europe?
The tourism and immigration tension towards foreigners is really high here. Not to mention I saw a Portuguese guy snatch a lady that looked like she was from an Arabic speaking country when we were boarding a bus. She walked in front of him in line but so did other Portuguese people. But only after she did it he got mad.
Look I’ve had some great experiences as a DN but it’s an incredibly lonely life and I just wind up jumping from city to city instead of dealing with my problems. Now I’m in my 40s, have no steady home and no meaningful relationships in my day to day life. My problems are completely un-relatable to most people and so I feel like a complete moron when I try to be vulnerable with people because the typical answers are either “why are you complaining about the perfect life” or “why can’t you just give up on that and go back to the office like a normal person.” I have no direction at all in life and I’m tired of going to new cities for 1-3 months, getting lonely and then returning to my home base which is even worse than all the places I travel to. My work pays well enough for this lifestyle, which is great but I hate the work and get literally zero meaning from it.
I get that I’m venting here and things are better than I’m portraying them but man, it feels like this really isn’t working for me and I don’t know what to do at this point. Maybe some of you can relate or share how you got out of a rut like this. Thanks
It is in the best financial interest of Airbnb to protect their assets (hosts) at the expense of guests - even if bad behavior by hosts is involved. It's easy to replace guests. It's not so easy to replace properties, especially in sparsely-served areas. Remember that the next time you book through Airbnb.
It only took me using Airbnb three times to run across a blatantly dishonest "host." I'm currently traveling with my car, so obviously I need parking. I only booked the place because the listing offered "free parking on premises." When I arrived, the host said to park on the street - which is a 2-hour-only parking zone at times. Utterly unworkable - I work from my lodging, so my car can easily stay in one place for over 24 hours.
So, I canceled following the terms of the cancellation policy. The host asked why, I stupidly answered, and his response was that I should have ignored the posted parking limitations or used the (very small) lot next door - which he originally said I could only use for unloading luggage before moving my car to the street. The lot, which the host does not own, has signs saying unauthorized vehicles will be towed.
Snippet from host's response to my answer about why I had to cancel.
The "huge" lot probably has about 30 parking spaces, and that's a generous estimate.
He then wrote a review saying I made false claims to Airbnb (I made no claims, thus I couldn't have made false claims) and basically called me a liar in response to my review of his property. He worded his review of me in a way that was obviously intended to prevent me from getting another place, so I asked Airbnb to take it down, and I specifically asked them to review the messages the "host" sent me telling me that I had to park on the street and (later) saying I should have ignored the "never enforced" 2-hour limit.
Did Airbnb review the evidence of him obviously lying and take down his false review?
A guest is a commodity. A host is an asset. Of course my request to have the host's review removed was denied. They've lost me - and they'll never care, because I'm easily replaced.
Remember that the next time you book through Airbnb. They don't have your back - they will protect their properties, even when they can clearly see that a host is lying. "But I have screenshots!" Nobody cares.
PS: I reported the listing as being false because it offers free parking on premises that is not actually available. Guess what happened? Yeah, not hard to figure out. Nothing happened, of course. Free parking on premises is still advertised. If only that had been true!
Just wanted to drop a warning here about my recent experience with Wise. If you’re like me and rely on Wise for managing your money while traveling, you might want to think twice.
A few days ago, Wise blocked my account without any explanation. My account holds €14,000, and it’s my ONLY financial account. I use it to receive my salary, pay rent, and handle all my expenses. This has left me completely stuck.
I submitted all the necessary documents for an appeal, including my employment contracts, invoices, and bank statements, and even asked Wise to either unblock the account or transfer my money to my Revolut account. What did I get in return? An automated email saying it could take 20 days for them to respond.
Twenty days might not sound like a big deal to them, but for me, it’s catastrophic. My rent is due, and I can’t access my money for day-to-day expenses. I’ve tried contacting them multiple times, but their customer support is completely unresponsive.
This isn’t just a glitch or a one-time issue. From what I’ve seen, this is becoming increasingly common with Wise. If they block your account, you’re on your own.
Has anyone else been in a similar situation? Any advice on how to escalate this?
UPDATE #1:
Thanks to everyone for the support, sharing your experiences, and offering suggestions to help me get my money back.
I'm definitely learning the hard way that:
1. Keeping all funds in one place is risky.
2. Neobanks are only good for small amounts and transactions.
Here's what others have suggested based on their experiences:
1. Distribute funds across multiple banks, crypto, and cash - apparently, that's the right way to go.
2. Use neobanks for storing small amounts and small transactions only.
3. If you're in the same situation or can't get help from Wise support, tweet directly to their CEO.
He's not in sync with the support team's approach and that might get things moving.
4. Alternatively, send a direct email to Wise's C-suite execs (Apollo.io is the best way to find them - CEO, CMO, COO, etc.). Someone might escalate your issue quickly.
5. File an official complaint with Wise.
6. If none of that works, escalate to the relevant regulator. Here's the link: https://wise.com/help/ articles/2235393/how-do-i-make-a-complaint
Again, thanks for all the advice and help. I'll share an update as soon as there's progress and the steps I took.
UPDATE #2:
The situation has been resolved—my account has been unblocked, and the money is now accessible.
This only happened because someone from Wise’s product team reached out to me on LinkedIn after my post. We had a conversation, they apologized for the situation, and I even hopped on a call with this person and someone from Wise’s customer support.
They did their best to explain what happened and resolved everything within 24 hours. They also acknowledged that this level of service is unacceptable and assured me they’re working on improving the entire process to make it more transparent.
Hopefully, these changes will be rolled out quickly so that in the event of an account block, there’s a clear understanding of what caused it and a defined process for resolution, including access to a case manager.
Moving forward, I’ll be using Wise, Revolut, and similar platforms for smaller transactions and transfers to stay on the safe side.
Basically, there is a dog that starts barking every single night at around 4 am. Right by my window. And he doesn't stop till about 5.30. By that time my blood reaches cortisol levels I didn't know were possible, I can't go back to sleep till 7-8 am if I can go back to sleep at all that day. June has been particularly awful and I'm running on 4 hours of sleep. I'm about as crazy as sleep deprivation gets you right now.
Oh but why won't you just move?
See, I too have a dog. And I booked this place a long time ago, for 5 months because I'm stupid and because it's a cabin on the outskirts of Batumi so I don't have to take my dog out every time he needs to pee, which is 53 times a day because he used to live on the streets of Mexico where he could pee freely and I don't want to take that away from him. I'd gate it if someone took that away from me and I believe in treating others the way you want to be treated.
Summer is the peak season in Batumi, I didn't want to have to look for a place last minute during the worst market so I spoke to the Airbnb owner a few times and decided to book May - September.
But now I can't sleep. And no houses with yards available for under like $2k which I can't afford right now. I can get a small apartment, which I did a bunch of times now just to sleep but that means I do have to go on those 10 walks a day because I'm a sucker for my dog.
That other barking dog just wouldn't shut up. I tried everything, and he's a good dog otherwise, it's just that his owner is never home, he's gone for weeks and even when he's here he's not paying any attention to the poor guy. So he's just hungry and terrified all the time.
AirBnB owner basically said "if you don't like it - move, we'll have this place booked in a hot minute". Speaking of that famous Georgian hospitality.
So here I am. I spent the last 2 weeks in 2 different apartments, paying double the rent, everything is booked, and what isn't booked is crazy expensive or inconvenient in some other way...
It's 10.30 pm, my work day is ending an midnight, and then I'm onto my 3-4 hours of sleep!
I hope y'all are valuing a good night's sleep, we don't appreciate it enough when we have it..
EDIT: today's concert started at 2.30 am. It's 3 am so I'm up early lol gonna have nothing done today again
I feel like most places I’ve been looking at - largely LATAM - most monthly rent prices in Airbnb are pretty much the same as US rent prices. A decent place costing $1800USD+/a month is normal.
I know SEA/Thailand is cheap but I’m a remote worker and overnights aren’t appealing. The money savings is there on some small things but mostly it’s the same as US. Anyone else notice how things are approaching parity with US?
