I wrote a book called Wanderlust: A Love Affair with Five Continents
From Rachel in California:
…I quit corporate America and moved to Spain to teach English for three months and then traveled Africa, Asia, and Europe for five months. It was an incredible experience. I met a man a few months before I left and he decided to come with me. He’s a professional photojournalist, so it actually worked out quite well for him!
My friend and former colleague Sonja Bricker, now a Spanish teacher in Washington state, has launched a fantastic educational-anthropological project. She’s cycling around Spain shooting videos of local teens and blogging, and conducting Skype broadcasts with her students back home. Here, a 17-year-old in Tenerife explains the “botellón,” a sort of town-plaza pre-party that may or may not draw the police. (In Spanish.) The rest of the posts are here. The world needs more language teachers like Sonja.
Do you have piles of random foreign currency gathering dust on your shelves? Here’s an excerpt from my first assignment for Nuvo magazine:
[We’re] not pioneering a novel investment strategy designed to ride out the global downturn. Although the weight of the box—my inheritance—grows at a rate that would make many investors envious, its contents are mostly useless. The under-the-bed fund is in pesos, won, francs, and dirhams, among other currencies, but contains no single one in great enough quantity to get a forex trader excited. It’s in currencies that have been devalued since anyone in our family last visited the country in question, like Turkish liras, or abolished entirely, like Spanish pesetas and others that gave way to the euro. It’s in currencies belonging to places that we just don’t know when we’ll get back to.
A longer excerpt is on Nuvo’s website. Alas, they don’t run the whole thing online — so retro! But I’m very happy to see a new, thick-papered luxury magazine in business in Canada.
From L in California:
I’m L___, I’m 27 and I hail from NZ. Your writing about NZ was perfect, I currently live in the U.S. and am asked daily, “why on earth would you leave such a beautiful, desirable country?” You understood. There’s not a hell of a lot going on in the Antipodes, gorgeous as it is. May I be egotistical, and assume that perhaps you’re interested in my history? I’m from Kerikeri, in the Bay of Islands, a 45 minute drive north from the Whangarei port that you mentioned. I left at 17, moved to Brazil, and stayed 18 months. Went back to NZ, struggled and struggled to stay put so I could complete my BA in English and PoliSci. Did it! I then left for Europe, namely both Seville & Lisbon for a while. Met an American guy, married him at age 21. Wondered what on earth I’d been thinking as the wanderlust overtook… fooled myself for months thinking at such an early age that I could do the settled, conformist thing in small-town USA! I managed the marriage for about 2 years… Then decided to spend 18 months teaching in China and South Korea, 6 months in Prague, 2 in Vietnam… and of course, back to the husband, who I then left.
So now I’m gearing up to go again, I plan to stay 6 more months here in California at my corporate job. My need to leave tortures me on a daily basis, but I must get the finances in order! After that, I think I’ll be unemployed in Laos and Cambodia for as long as I can possibly afford. But, your book spoke to me! I often wonder what the hell I’m doing. Shouldn’t I be cultivating a future for myself? Almost all of my friends, from both NZ and the U.S., are settling into 2.5 kids & a mortgage. But all I can think of is leaving.
From M in New York:
“There have been vital points in my life that have completely changed who I am. Leaving the country at four years old to visit Paris, was just the beginning of my passion for traveling. Visiting my Spanish family for the first time at seven years old, made me realize that I can identify myself as a Spaniard. Jumping off the Nevis in New Zealand, changed me into the dare devil I am today. Studying in Florence, Italy, helped me realize I have a passion for art, and that I will undoubtedly live in Italy again…
“…I feel more like a tourist in my own life than I ever felt traveling. I can not bear the thought that I may have to settle here with a corporate job and give up my dream of traveling the world.”
This is from another letter I got:
“I am from Barcelona, Spain, and I am currently living in Toronto, Canada…
“My mom has always felt I’ve needed to get away from home because she did something wrong, like it was her own fault. Although I keep trying to explain to her that is not the case, and it’s just for a love of adventure and travel itself, I feel your book explains everything perfectly, and since she loves reading, I’d love giving it to her… if there was a Spanish edition, since she doesn’t speak English…Laura.”Incidentally, Laura was reading Wanderlust on a bus, which tickles me.
