NuNomad

Meet the Nomads - Family on Bikes

by Carmen

Through wanderings of Twitterland I came upon @familyonbikes and was intrigued by their bi-contintental cycling adventure with two young sons.  The Vogel family has literally been "on the road" for two years now.  Beginning in Alaska they have slowly biked their way to Costa Rica and will continue until they reach the tip of Argentina.  In doing so, their youngest son, Davy, will be the youngest person in world history to make this biking trek.  Read on to hear from Nancy Sathre-Vogel about their life on bikes.

I see on your site that the two of you were biking long before you had children.  How many bike trips had you done before this adventure and what countries did you see?

John has been cycling much longer than me, but together we cycled through Pakistan, India, Nepal, Bangladesh, China, Yemen, Mali, and Israel.  He has also cycled in Australia, Zimbabwe, Norway, Taiwan, and Malaysia.  Of course, we’ve also cycled quite a bit in the USA and Mexico as well. 

Taking your children on such a long and physically demanding journey must have been a huge decision.  How did you make the choice that this would be your way to travel and how did your children’s ages factor into the decision?

John and I had always dreamed of taking off for a year-long journey with our kids, but we figured it would always remain just a dream like most people’s dreams do.  But one day John came home after a particularly rough day in the classroom and told me he wanted to take off on a bike trip.  I thought he was crazy – I mean, parents just don’t do that!! 

For the next three weeks John kept talking about the bike trip and he managed to convince me that we only live once, and we had to take advantage of this time with the kids if we were ever to do it.  Four weeks after John first raised the idea, we ordered our bicycle built for three.  Two months after that, we were on the road.

Our biggest concern at that point was that the kids wouldn’t like touring by bicycle.  We had quit our jobs, spent $6000 on a bike, and taken off.  And if the boys didn’t enjoy it?  We were terrified. 

It became evident immediately that our concerns were unfounded – the boys loved their life on the road!  They took to cycle touring like a duck to water.

And so it is that we are still on the road – this time riding from Alaska to Argentina.  The boys learn way more on the road than they ever could in a classroom, and they love what they are doing.  For me and John, this is our one and only chance to spend this time with our boys – soon they will be grown and have lives of their own.  Right now, they are enjoying being with their parents – and their parents enjoy being with them! 

Do you cycle every day or take days of rest on a regular schedule? 

We take lots of days off.  LOTS!!  In fact, we cycle less than 50% of the days. 

How do you decide how long you will stay in a location?

That depends on a lot of factors – what there is to do in that place, how tired we are, what the weather is like, etc…  Basically, when we are ready to move on, we do. 

I see you have many sponsors both corporate and individual.  Have you been able to sustain your life on the road through sponsorships and donations? If not, are you also deriving income from other means while on the road?

We do have a few corporate sponsors who are providing gear, and a few individuals who donate a small amount of cast each month.  However, the vast majority of our expenses are coming from our retirement account.

John and I decided that life is too short to not take advantage of it.  Our boys will only be boys once.  This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, so we decided to go for it.  We will be poorer when we retire, but we’ll have loads of memories!! 

How do you fit homeschooling into your life?

For the most part, our journey is the boys’ teacher.  They learn so much simply by traveling around the world!  Mother Nature is also an awesome teacher and the boys learn tons from her. 

That being said, there are a few areas where the learning can’t come so naturally.  For those areas, we supplement their education with actual lessons.  We have math books with us, and the boys work on that in the tent or hotel rooms.  They also write journals or essays occasionally and are learning to make video documentaries.  They are both avid readers, so our biggest challenge in that area is finding English books!

 

Can you describe the Reach the World program you are participating in?  How does it work for you and the kids in NYC who watch?

Reach the World is an exciting program!  We are connected with classrooms in NYC via the internet, and we become the eyes and ears of the kids in those classes.  Each week we post online about our experiences – writing, photos, and videos.  The kids call that up and learn about the world through our experiences.  It is a neat way for disadvantaged kids to have a chance to experience the world. 

Do you have any advice for nomadic families based on your experiences so far?

The main piece of advice I have is to never, ever, not even for one nanosecond doubt your children!!  Children have an amazing ability to do way more than we give them credit for!

To learn more about the Vogel family, please visit their website Family on Bikes

And We're Off! Our Family NomadingYear Begins

By Carmen

Getting ready to take off for a year of travel means a lot of activity around the departure date!  With our departure from Austin, Texas set for June 22nd there was a lot to do in the final weeks.  Our dear friends from the kids' school hosted a going away party for us, complete with Brazilian capirinhas.  It was a wonderful way to be able to say goodbye to more people than we would have been able to have individual time with.  The girls got to spend some final moments swimming, dancing and playing basketball and ping pong with their friends, and Tony and I got to have some fun conversations with other parents.  It may have been somewhat awkward for Tony since he is not able to do the whole trip with us.  Both he and I answered many questions about how this would work and when he would visit.  I think for a lot of families it is difficult to imagine being separated for this length of time.  Ideally, Tony would join us, but unfortunately in his particular career as a state employee, telecommuting has not yet become acceptable.

After a very lovely evening, we turned our attentions to the final preparations.  The addition of our house needed to be readied to rent.  A renter had already been found through our school community and we needed to remove all of our personal belongings and get the place clean.  I was thinking it shouldn't be too difficult since we had only lived in the addition ourselved for 2 years but it is amazing how many personal items and dust can accumulate in even a short time.  As everything got emptied out, Mia and her friend, Bianca (who will be joining us in Brazil) had a grand time climbing to the top shelves of the closet and peering over the walls!  It is our hope to break even with the money we spend for rent in Brazil and what we bring in in Austin.

I tried each day to do a few hours of preparation and be sure to include some fun in the day.  Since the kids were already out of school it was too much to ask for all work and no play.  We spent time visiting our favorite swimming spots in Austin, including Deep Eddy and Barton Springs.  During these last few days our oldest daughter turned 16 so we also had a birthday celebration and attended an outdoor concert. 

Since our new renter will be sharing the kitchen with Tony, my cleaning efforts needed to extend to other parts of the house.  I'm really not a great housekeeper!  I'd rather be working or homeschooling than mopping.  As a result, I was pulling things out of the refrigerator that looked like the mummified remains of King Tut!

On to packing.

One of the biggest challenges with this particular trip is that we are starting out in the summer of the U.S. and moving on to the winter of Brazil.  We hear Florianopolis is having one of it's coldest winters and friends have told us to bring full winter clothing.  I have been determined to keep everyone to one suitcase and one carry on with the exception of my daughter's viola.  The cello did not make the cut!  In order to do this and have access to summer clothes for the first leg and winter clothes for the second leg I did this: I had each of us pack our summer things and as many winter things as possible into our alloted bags.  Then I mailed a box to Connecticut with our winter coats and a few sundry items like school books.  We have been using our summer clothes on the east coast. When we depart the east coast on July 7 we will unpack our winter coats and put our summer clothes into the box.  I will mail the box of summer clothes to Brazil (since we won't need them for a couple of months).  That way hopefully we will save some money.  I found it was pretty difficult to weigh our bags at home and only hoped we were within the 50 lb limit.  The picture you see is everything we took for 4 people to stay away for a year (minus the box of winter clothes).

With everything ready to go, we awakened at 6 am and Tony drove us to the airport.  We said a short goodbye since we would see Tony a few days later on the East Coast and moved towards check-in only to find that one of our bags was overweight by 6 pounds.  Rather than pay the fine we did a frantic re-arrangement of stuff from the offending bag to another slightly underweight bag and were able to get everyone into compliance.  The flight from Austin to Dallas was uneventful. Unfortunately the travel took a turn at this point.

We had a scheduled 3 hour layover in Dallas. This turned into a 4, then 5, then 6 hour layover as the flights were delayed for weather in Boston. Next, we were told the landing gear on the plane was broken.  Finally, we chose to spend the night in Dallas when it became clear that our arrival in Boston would be well after public transportation shut down.  This was the right move as it turned out other people waited much longer and eventually the flight did not go at all.  We tried to make the most of our night in a somewhat seedy hotel with a final meal of Tex-Mex food and breakfast of Texas shaped waffles!

We were very happy to finally arrive in Boston that afternoon where we stayed with cousins for 2 nights.  It is so wonderful to be able to reconnect with family and for the kids to have a sense of how there cousins live on the other side of the U.S.  We were greeted with cool temperatures and rain.  Although all of our East Coast friends were feeling down about the un-summerlike temperatures, I was overjoyed to be out of the Texas 100+ heat!  Our cousins live on a lovely pond and there is a feeling you are in the wilderness even though in reality it is the suburbs.  The kids also enjoyed feeding their chickens, seeing their huge vegetable garden and eating my sister-in-law's homemade yogurt, strawberry syrup and fresh eggs.

From the suburbs of Northborough, Massachusetts we made our way to the town of Cohasset.  Cohasset is on the Massachusetts shoreline north of Cape Cod and is the town that was used in the filming of "The Witches of Eastwick" with Jack Nicholson.  It is the quintessential New England shore town with lovely homes and gardens.  Here we stayed with an old college friend of mine and her family.  My 8 year old was completely impressed when our 10 year old hostess told us she owned her own sailboat.  We walked to the end of their block where a boat picked us up to take us to the Cohasset Yacht Club.  Here my friend's daughter took each of the girls out on her sailboat one at a time for a short ride.  It's amazing how a 10 year old child can command her own boat with such precision!  Unfortunately, all the water in Cohasset was closed to swimming due to bacteria so the next day we went to the shore in Scituate.  Here the water has nice big waves, there is a long stretch of sandy beach and a rock that makes a natural slide.  We finished our visit with burgers and ice cream at the local street side joint.  Then on to Connecticut.

 South Lyme Connecticut is the home of Point O' Woods, a beach community where my mother in law's father built a vacation home in the late 40's.  We arrived here 3 days ago and will remain until we fly to Brazil next Monday.  Our family has enjoyed our visits here for many years but not until I was able to make my income mobile have we been able to stay for longer periods.  It's great to let the kids enjoy the same traditions that their parents, grandparents and great grandparents have enjoyed.  Ice cream on the beach, beach movies, crabbing and swimming to the dock are but a few of them.  Yesterday was spent catching 57 crabs and letting them race back to the water 2 at a time, then finding sea glass.  Later we'll go hunting for an abandoned grave in the woods.

The challenge ahead of us lies in reconfiguring our luggage for the trip to Brazil and trying to get the girls to continue practicing their Rosetta Stone Portuguese despite the constant lure of fun with their cousins.  I can't tell you how thankful I am to be traveling again, to be able to give our kids these experiences and to be able to maintain my work while doing so.

Nomading - A Cultural Revolution!

by Carmen Bolanos
June 7, 2009

This morning I was talking with my friend Marcia Pirmez (who, by the way, we are going with to Brazil) and I was reminded of several issues about nomading that are close to my heart. Although I've touched on these in the past it seems time to take a new look at the larger social significance of nomading.

While many people may look upon NuNomading (technomading, digital nomading, location independent living, whatever you'd like to name it) as a trendy alternative lifestyle I firmly believe it is much more than that. In fact, I believe NuNomading has the potential to change the future shape of our country and the world.

How so?

In the larger scheme of things, the world as we know it today ie. rushed, dual working families who commute 30 minutes each way to work, carbon emmissions heavy, time short, is a very recent phenomenon. Until the industrial revolution most families spent their days at home, growing their own foods, creating the daily necessities, raising and possibly homeschooling children. Not until the last couple of centuries has the majority of the population been spending their days away from home and away from each other. Of course, life was not all rosy and our ancestors suffered many hardships we do not now. I'm not suggesting we return to the former way. However, I do think we've allowed some very essential life qualities disappear in the process that need to return.
In addition, we've created some real headaches of stress, pollution, resource shortages and isolation that did not exist previously.

How Does NuNomading Fit In and Why NuNomading Needs to Become a Cultural Force

The emergence of the NuNomading movement offers an alternative answer to many of the above cultural woes while maintaining many of the gains we enjoy today. A typical NuNomad works independently of their location, stays in one location longer than a typical tourist, is an owner of very few material goods, and is in charge of their own schedule.

Let's look at what this can mean to our society:

What this could mean:

for employers -

• lessened need to physically house employees resulting in less overhead for office space.


• higher employee retention. As employees enjoy the freedoms of moving independently, being near family, etc. they will be more likely to remain with their company over a company that is not nomad friendly.


• freedom to choose from a broader geographic pool when finding employees. Want that great programmer from Seattle but your company is in Dallas and the guy doesn't want to leave? No problem.

for individuals -

• the freedom to work from where you want, when you want as long as you are producing.


• the freedom to spend more time with family or friends.


• elimination of commute time.


• elmination of the need for a professional wardrobe.


• the freedom to attend to emerging life situations. For instance, your elderly parent becomes ill out of state. With a NuNomadic lifestyle it is simple to relocate to the parent's home while needed.


• less stress.


• higher ability to make one's own meals while working from home and lessening of temptation to "just stop for fast food" due to stress and time shortages.


• more time to attend to exercise, hobbies, other interests by eliminating commute time and being flexible in your work schedule.


• the choice to live in areas of the world with lower living costs


• the choice to experience other cultures

for families -

• the ability to work from home and attend to family with more freedom.


• the ability to expose children to new cultures and world experiences.


• more family time by eliminating commutes.


• lower living costs by reducing the need for "2 car families" and bringing the option to live in lower cost of living countries

for society as a whole -

• the lessening of carbon emissions, thereby reducing pollution and doing our part to fight climate change.


• improvement of overall health of citizens who are less stressed, able to exercise more and tend to health issues with more freedom.


• improvement of societal cross cultural understanding. As more people experience and learn from cultures foreign to their own, greater understanding will be produced worldwide and a decrease in conflicts will result.


• less stress on resources as people learn to measure their happiness in terms of experiences and not material goods.


• a rise in services geared towards nomadic living ie, shared temporary office space, rotating living spaces, internet cafes, worldwide social networking.

So, what will it take to effect this change? I'd love to hear your thoughts. As I see it, the gains are already clear to many individuals and families who dream of this lifestyle and certainly clear to those already living it. The challenge lies in educating our workplaces and governments as to the benefits for society as a whole. Employers are slowly understanding the benefits of allowing workers to "telecommute" however, there are still many digging in their heels on the issue and even more that begin the heel dig when they hear their telecommuter is considering changing continents. The governmental issue lies in a couple of different arenas. First, relaxing their stance about nomadic travelers upon entry and exit. Governments need to gain understanding that a NuNomadic worker is continuing to pay taxes in their home country, and destination country if laws dictate, is not taking from the local economy but rather contributing to it through their spending. Secondly, in the U.S. as our federal government is the largest employer it is often a workplace trendsetter. Government employers in particular must be encouraged to promote nomadic workers as much as possible.

Power to the Nomad!

Preparing Kids for Nomadic Travel - Languages

By Carmen Bolanos
May 28,2009

As strongly as I feel about the merits of travel, I feel equally strongly that children should also have an opportunity to experience the world and cultures different from their own. When we take off next month I'll be leaving with my 3 daughters, ages 8, 14 and 16 for a semester of school in Florianopolis, Brazil. My husband will be staying behind this time but we hope he will visit as often as possible. I am lucky that he is understanding and willing to give us this opportunity even if he can't participate in the same way.

My two oldest daughters have been in a Waldorf/Steiner school here in Texas. My youngest was in the same school but has been home-schooled the last 2 years. At first I thought I'd probably spend the traveling year homeschooling like our nomadic friends, the Atkins family and soultravelers3. In fact, after our planned 5 months in Brazil I may very well home-school for the remainder of the year depending on where we land.

However, for our first destination we found (through the help of a friend)another Waldorf/Steiner school in Brazil that accepted all 3 kids! The opportunity for them to make close friends of their age and be completely immersed in the culture was too much to pass up. (Not to mention, my professional life could use some more designated hours without children.)

While all three are really excited about the opportunity there are also some nerves in the mix. My youngest is especially anxious about being in a classroom of kids where she doesn't speak the language. Enter the Rosetta Stone!

I decided to get the Rosetta Stone, Brazilian Portuguese version and installed it on my laptop. I've been so pleased that the method of this software is such that all of us are able to learn from it. It's amazing to watch my daughters picking up the basics of the language and hearing their beautiful accents forming. So I wanted to share this video of Mia learning Portuguese this week. It's really helping her confidence as well as the rest of ours.

Passport Photos for Free or Almost Free

So as many of you know, I am about to take off with my 3 kids for a year. Since I'm not wealthy I have to be really careful about where the money goes. Even the small expenses aren't so small when you have to multiply everything by 4. We already have passports from our nomading trip to Europe in 2006. Luckily, the kids have not outgrown theirs yet so I'm saving a bit of money that way.

I remember marching them all up the street from the post office where we got our passport applications to a passport office where the pictures were taken more cheaply. Still, we paid probably about 10 bucks a piece.

This time, since we'll be going to Brazil we need to complete visa applications which also require a 2x2 inch photo (in other words, a passport photo). Walgreen's charges about 7 dollars each. OK, so that's not too expensive, but again, multiply by 4 and we're getting close to $30 and to me that's a meal out for everyone on the road. On top of that, I just get irritated knowing I would pay about 19 cents for printing a photo of that size that's not a passport photos. What's the difference?! So I started looking at alternatives.

I was really pleased then, as you can imagine, to find EPassportPhotos. This is a site that will allow you to create and download a sheet of passport size photos for free. It even has regulation sizes for many different countries.

Here's how it works. You stand your subject in front of a white wall, make sure ther'e not a lot of shadow behind them, and snap a picture of their head and shoulders. You upload this picture to EPassportPhoto and crop it until it fits within their guidelines. EPassportPhoto then multiplies the picture and fits 5 of them onto a 4x6 page. If you would like to have them printed and delivered to you they do charge a fee similar to Walgreen's (but this is with delivery to your home). If not, you can download the photo and have it printed at your nearest photo processor for about $.19 per sheet (a whole lot cheaper than 7 dollars!) or you can print it on your own photo quality paper at home for free.

And if you want to be uber-cheap like me - I cropped the downloaded files, collaged them 6 to a 4x6 sheet on Picasa and printed my entire family on one sheet of 4x6 photo paper. Only one piece of paper and a lot less ink!

The one downside - I still haven't figured out how to make myself look good in the picture!

Come Along for a Year Long Journey with Kids

April 26, 2009
Carmen Bolanos

In our bout of blog absence while we've been working on our new book (at the agent's right now - cross your fingers for us!) I have also been planning my next working journey. While my NuNomad partner, Ricardo, is a veteran nomad of nearly 20 years, I am much more of a newbie.

Part of my challenge has been that, like many people, I have a family including 2 teens, an 8 year old, my husband, our home, dog, fish, frogs, etc. and all the sundry bills and obligations that come with such a life. We are also not wealthy.

Nevertheless, we will be traveling for a year beginning July. Our first destination is chosen, the tickets are purchased, and we are full of excitement. Many of our friends are wondering how in the heck we're pulling it off. Perhaps you're wondering that too. If so - I invite you to stick with this blog. I will be writing regularly about how we've made our choices for destinations, transportation, accomodations, technical equipment, etc., etc. You can also read along as I organize our home life to proceed while we're away. And to top it off, my goal is to prove we can have a fantastic adventure and spend less money that we have in years!

So - come along for the ride as we leave Austin, Texas. First stop: Boston, Massachusetts to be followed by NYC, Sao Paolo and then Florianopolis, Brazil.

How's This for an Office View? Heredia, Costa Rica

Unlike my Nu Nomad partner Ricardo, who nomads continually and has for years, I have not broken away from a home base that completely. For me, nomading has meant developing my coaching business until it is completely mobile and having the freedom to work from wherever I like for as long as I like. However, having 3 children of school age we do stay home for extended periods.

Today, though, I am enjoying my ability to nomad. When my mother in law decided we should all go to Costa Rica I knew I could continue to work so our family was able to double our time with her here as compared to the extended family.

We flew in yesterday to San Jose and have spent our first night in La Condesa Hotel in Heredia (a neighboring area to San Jose. This must be one of the most beautiful locations anyone has ever found to build a hotel and the place that was built is quite grand in a "grand old hotel" way. The picture I'm including is the view from our room. The rooms are 2 floors high with a loft layout so that each room has it's own staircase. The central dining area is open air and the grounds are extensive. There is free wifi in the room which I'm using to write this blog.

This isn't a place most of us could stay for an extended nomading experience because the price isn't cheap, but if you wanted to treat yourself to some luxury for a night or two this is definitely the place to do so.

Heredia is a charming place with many small shops and the hustle-bustle of lots of pedestrian traffic. Many cafes boasted "Internet" on signs so I'm led to believe it would not be difficult to work in this town. You can expect numerous church spires rising from this town that sits at the base of small mountains. We were also treated to the site of many fruit vendors, a lovely town square, and homes from cute little bungalows teeming with flowers to the gated homes of the president's extended family who made their fortune in coffee.

I would definitely encourage anyone to check it out! Today we move on to an eco-lodge in Sarapiqui.

Meet the Nomads - Again! - Catching up with the Atkins Family as they Circle the Globe

By Carmen

We last interviewed the Atkins family in May of 2007 as they were in the preparation stages of an around the world trip by bus while homeschooling their 4 children. At that time, the Atkins were overhauling their vehicle to accomodate their trip. Now they have been on the road for 6 months so we thought we'd get in touch and see how they're doing.

Manny, when we last interviewed you and your family, you were in the process of building out your bus and planning your trip. Now you have been on the road for several months. What countries have you visited so far?

We traveled through France, into Spain back into France, across to Northern Italy. Joe then had work in Monte Carlo, so we stayed in Antibes, and went in to work with him pretty much every day, which was wonderful! Back in to Italy, to Rome and beyond. We took a ferry to Greece, drove up through Bulgaria, into Romania to play a couple of concerts for the charity Growing Care. Back through Bulgaria and into Turkey, we spent Christmas in Istanbul, and New Year in Athens. Crossed back into Italy and came back up to France where we are taking a pause after traveling 15,000Km and being on the road for six months.

If you were advising a NuNomad as to what locations in Europe are most Nomad friendly (ie, low cost of living, widely available internet, quality of life) what would be your top picks?

Sometimes we’ve found the best internet access in the most surprisingly remote places (virtually the whole of Bulgaria seemed to have free wifi! just no shops!) and our favourite Italian campsite, in the forested mountains just outside Deiva Marina, had free and excellent wifi. And yet we struggled to find wifi in some capital cities - which surprised me! We have stayed mainly in campsites; which often offered wifi and always had useful info on public transport into the city etc. The free hot water, ability to plug in to electricity, and use of washing machines made sense for us as a big family. We often stayed overnight in truckstops on the autoroutes, when travelling from place to place, but then we’d seek the security and facilities of a campsite to base ourselves. The city sites tended to cost double the rural sites. Spain was cheaper than Italy and France, and the Spanish really know how to run a city! Greece was cheaper still, but we were there very much out of season. Turkey would probably be my top location - not too expensive, good internet, and the warmest and most generous strangers we ever came across. Istanbul was vibrant, and exciting. You cross from Europe to Asia and back, all within one city! Here’s a link to the blogs while we were in Turkey:http://web.mac.com/harryatkins/WTTW_Blogs/The_Family_Blog/Entries/2007/12/22_-_Turkey.html

Was this your original itinerary or have you changed? If you have changed itinerary what factors caused you to do so?

It was always our intention to have a fluid itinerary and while we were in Spain, we decided we weren’t ready to go into Africa. We thought maybe we’d head for North America, but in our (long) search for crossings for us and the bus, we discovered Grimaldi Freighter Cruises. Their office in Naples have been really helpful, and we were thrilled to find we could cross to Argentina. We were booked to travel in April. In fact this crossing has been cancelled, and we are now booked onto the November crossing.
This delay has coincided with a bit of a financial crisis for us: some money we were relying on has fallen through, and so we need to re-fuel our funds. We’ll sit tight for a few months here in France, live as cheaply as we can; earn as much as we can, and learn French! And hopefully be ready to get on the boat in November.

What caused the decision not to go to Africa?

We found it almost impossible to find a realistic crossing from Egypt to Kenya, which was our original plan; also the political situation in Africa seemed to be more and more unsettled. We decided we weren’t comfortable taking the children into a situation where we would be so vulnerable. It was a big disappointment, but Joe and I felt strongly that it was too early in our trip to be facing those kinds of challenges. Life on the road was going so well, and to be honest was exciting, interesting and challenging enough. I have to say though, that now we’re six months in, and have crossed borders in the dark and snow, I’m really excited about changing continents!

How has it been to be in the bus on the road with a large family? How have you all adapted to the close quarters?

The joy of a big family is that no-one ever gets left out; there’s a constant variety of different combinations. We run a very harmonious team to keep everything ticking over, and the children take as much responsibility for the tidiness and running of the bus as Joe and I. It works really well, and it all runs very smoothly. Being so close has become a way of life now, even sharing our huge top bunk with Arthur, our seven year old, feels completely natural. Going to bed is reminiscent of the end of “The Waltons”!

Looks like you’ve been playing music as a family band along the way. How do you set up your concerts and get an audience?

The music has been a great family focus. it tends to come in bursts. We played some summer concerts, at campsites and for friends; and a big Birthday Party last September. Then we played the two concerts in Romania. They were a real adventure. One was for the children the charity helps; they have so little, and live a hard hard life. It was a real pleasure to bring a live gig to them, we felt so appreciated, and it was very humbling! The other was in a big theatre as more of an awareness-raiser with local dignitaries etc. Here’s the blog link to the Romanian concerts - http://web.mac.com/harryatkins/WTTW_Blogs/The_Family_Blog/Entries/2007/12/7_Politics%2C_Philosophy%2C_Harmonics_-_Romania_2.html
We’re playing a gig in a couple of weeks here in France, a musical evening already organised, so audience gathering is not down to us! but we hope it will lead to a few more. So we’re practising hard at the moment. We’ve made no more than a free supper so far, and it would be great to earn a bit; but playing for pleasure carries less pressure!

What are you learning along the way that you didn’t expect?

Just how rewarding home-schooling is
I don’t miss England at all!
I never crave time to myself, away from the family.
The Turkish generosity is boundless.
There are more good people in the world than the media would have you believe! (Actually, I did expect that to be the case!)

How is the bus holding up?

She’s in fine form. She’s running better now than she was when we left the UK. We’ve ironed out oil-leaks and air system problems; fixed the radiator and had the heating re-instated. She’s happiest doing the kind of long, steady, regular drives we do, so really she’s in her element! There is a harmony and trust when we’re driving that’s hard to describe. The bumpy roads of Romania took their toll, and we had some quite big structural repairs to take care of in Turkey. But all in all she’s looked after us, and we’ve looked after her and the respect is mutual!

What has been the greatest highlight/positive experience of the trip so far?

There’ve been a few!
Parking on the waters edge at Camping Fusina, and watching the sun go down over Venice took some beating!
Driving through Greece in the crisp winter sun; snow capped mountains to our left, and crystal blue sea on our right...music playing, family singing... deep inner peace!
Christmas day in Istanbul! waking up to stockings in the morning, and a boat trip across the Bosphorus sea in the evening, the city illuminated magnificently in the moonlight.
I can’t even begin to put into words the way this trip and the preparations for it, have bonded us as a family. It has enriched our marriage and deepened all our relationships.

Welcome to the World.

Meet the Nomads - FB Fabulously Broke in the City!

by Carmen Bolanos
November 9, 2007

Meet FB, a consultant, nomad and blogger who maintains her anonymity for her blog, Fabulously Broke in the City. A recent college grad, FB is passionate about paying off $50,000 in student loans before 2009. In fact, that's a lot of what her blog is about - how to save money. A big part of FB's answer for how to do this is to have a 100% nomadic lifestyle. Interested? Read on....

A lot of people aspire to a nomadic lifestyle because they are drawn to the romance of traveling. You seem to have adopted this life to pay off your debts and start some savings. Can you tell us how you got into being a nomad?

It was really more out of chance than anything.

I graduated almost 2 years ago, and just happened to accept an offer and a career that meant 100% travel. At the time, I didn’t really understand what 100% travel meant, but after the first year of paying $1600 for an apartment that I only stayed in and saw 2 months out of the 12, I realized it was A) stupid to keep paying for such an expensive storage unit and B) it was an opportunity to get rid of one of the biggest living expenses in most people’s lives – shelter.

So one day, I looked at my husband and said: “Oh my god, we could be modern nomads”. He laughed at first, but he slowly came around to the idea, and now has full embraced it in the name of paying off debt. Modern because we are very into technology and this is a new way of living for us, and nomads because.. well, we don’t have a home.

So, less than a year later, we finally made the decision to give up the apartment early 2007, and have only been doing this for a short amount of time, but so far it’s worked out quite nicely for me. I’m hoping to be on a client project 100% of the time next year so I don’t have to worry about paying month-by-month rent, and /or any of that other stuff. I’d willingly give up all of my vacation weeks for that opportunity to be working 100% of the year. How strange is it to be saying that?!

What kind of education or experience does someone need to do the kind of work you do?

Well as a consultant, they generally hire from big name colleges (not all do, mind you), and I got an undergraduate honors degree in business administration, with a specialized concentration in management information systems.

I think anyone could be a consultant. You just have to be given the chance to get your foot in the door. All it takes is the right frame of mind, and perspective, and whether or not you have an affinity for what a consultant does on a day-to-day basis, which can range anywhere from being a project manager of sorts, to having a specialized knowledge in your field – be it strategy and change, human resources, airlines and their tax schedules and laws, supply chain management, finance, information systems, etc., and to be dealing and treading lightly with client members you are not familiar with yet and/or executives who will question your decisions on a daily basis because you have to constantly prove and sell yourself every time you go to a new client, as they don’t know you and what you can do yet. So if you are a person who doesn’t like a challenge, or constantly having to prove themselves, this may not be for you.

But in general, there are many types of consultants in the world, with different skills and specializations, you just have to find the right combination that resonates with your skills and strengths.

As you say in your blog, you have put your personal belongings into storage and you really don’t return to your home base. How does this work?

I put all of my furniture and all the sorts of things associated with an apartment (decoration, towel racks, furniture, etc) all into a storage location in another more rural city because it’s cheaper and you get more space than if you rent a storage location in an urban city. My clothes, shoes and day-to-day things that I need to access on a regular basis but cannot really travel with all the time, are kept in my home city’s storage location, where if I go back, I basically go to the storage location, pick up what I need, and rent an apartment month-by-month when I need to be in the office. Then when I’m on another project that isn’t in my home city, I put everything back into that urban storage location, and leave.

What do you bring with you when you travel?

Generally… clothes (work outfits and a pair of jeans with a sweater – I tend to wear work tops with jeans anyway, so everything I own is multi-purpose for work and play), a frying pan, a kettle, a gaming system (like a Nintendo Wii), 4 pairs of shoes (winter boots, running shoes, ballet flats and a pair of heels), my toiletries (shampoo, conditioner, facial lotion, razor, etc), makeup, perfume, an umbrella, jewelery, a wireless router, 2 laptops (one work, one play), laptop bag, iPod, 2 RJ45 LAN cables, a cellphone, a PDA, etc etc. Basically everything I need.. IMMEDIATELY. I don’t bring things like furniture, a special pillow, décor, none of that. I only bring technology, clothes/shoes and toiletries.

How often have you had to rent month to month in between consulting gigs?

Usually once in between every gig. I usually beg for projects right away, or try and be staffed on a project immediately after leaving my last one, but sometimes that isn’t feasible. I’ve been lucky so far, and if it’s only a week or less in between projects, I crash at my friends’ places, or my parents’ house.

Your husband travels with you. What are the pros and cons about this? Do you have any advice for people making a decision about traveling alone or traveling with others?

PROS: He cooks sometimes, sort-of cleans (tidies up), organizes the travel arrangements and logistics of all that, and drives me everywhere. Plus, he’s fantastic company and he is my best friend – I can always relate to him, tell him how my day is going and basically have my own support at home when I’ve had a tough day.

CONS: You always have to consider his feelings and needs when you’re accepting offers to go out to company dinners, or outings, and whether or not he can come along. I sometimes feel restrained and guilty because he doesn’t know ANYONE in the city, whereas I have work colleagues on the client site, and my own company colleagues. It gets to be pretty guilt-inducing. Oh, I guess to reduce debt further, he could be working part-time here and there, but… to be honest, I couldn’t care less if he did or not.

As for advice about traveling alone or having others with you.. I’d totally recommend that if you are someone who NEEDS a familiar support and network , then bring someone along. But they have to also be in the same mindset and love to travel and/or deal with challenges, and they have to also be OK with being alone for very long periods of time. But if you are someone who is more independent, and can adjust being by yourself for a long period of time, then you don’t need anyone to go with you, you just need to be sure that you really are a self-entertaining, self-sufficient sort of type.

You must know hotels better than 90% of us. What makes a hotel better or worse for a nomad? What do you do to make the room your home?

I basically treat interviewing hotels like I’m looking for a permanent apartment.

MUST-HAVES for Nomad Hotels
- Have a full-sized kitchen (stove, sink, microwave, fridge, and an optional dishwasher)
- Has laundry facilities on-site (the coin operated machines as well as dry cleaning)
- Have a rewards program, because you’ll be there for 5-7 months, and racking up the points at ONE hotel is better than having lots of points across different hotels
- Has security and front-desk staff 24/7 with a keycard lockdown, MANDATORY for entry after midnight (i.e. you have to swipe in your hotel room card before even entering the hotel after midnight)
- Has a clean bed with fluffy pillows preferably in a separate room, very apartment-like
- Has a couch and a TV
- Has a decently sized bathroom that you can fit into
- Has storage – dressers, cabinets, drawers, closets. Some hotels really lack this
- Has cleaning staff that come in every day, not once every 2 weeks – the reason being that having the option to have them come in and clean whenever you want to fit YOUR schedule, is better than not being able to let them in on that ONE day, and missing your chance for 2 weeks
- Looking at who stays there on a regular basis – business people, families, no shady characters and party-animal college students who just want to trash a hotel room for a weekend
- Location is important: near a grocery store, near a pharmacy, near a post office, near a Starbucks (*grin*) and near a couple of restaurants is nice because you can just walk to get a meal if you are too tired to cook
- Has indoor parking if you’re driving
- Has a voicemail system so people can dial your room directly and leave you voicemail messages instead of always going through the front desk
- Has internet/high speed connections in the room
- Is close to my client site – close as in 5 km or less away, so I can walk in the mornings
- Has a list of fees and different charges for things like telephone calls up front

OPTIONAL for Nomad Hotels
- Has a gym or a swimming pool
- Has a complimentary HOT breakfast in the morning (no Continental Breakfasts, thanks. They end up being cold fruit, cold cereal, cheap trans-fat-saturated muffins and coffee and tea)

Have you been traveling only within Canada or internationally?
I have only been in North America, but I’m still hoping.

Any thoughts on what makes a city more or less accommodating for you as a nomad?

If it’s more urban, I’ll be fine. Most companies are located near urban centers, and I tend to “live” and stay downtown, so everything is within walking distance for me. I’m happy if I just have a hotel, pharmacy, grocery store, a couple of restaurants and some form of entertainment or a park, or SOMETHING to walk around and look at.

But it’s when you don’t get a company that’s urban, and is in a more rural setting, that you run into problems like finding a hotel that you normally patronize for the points, restaurants, and entertainment. I haven’t encountered that yet, but…. there’s a first time for everything. I hope I don’t have to ever deal with that but.. 

Oh and if one of the languages is English, I’m set. I’m not against learning another language or picking up a couple of phrases here and there, but it’s going to be a hard road ahead if they only speak another language and I’m supposed to do my job on time and under budget.

Any advice for other people who might want try this lifestyle?

Be prepared to be very lonely and frustrated. Sometimes not knowing the language, the local culture and customs, the slang, and constantly being in a new company environment without any support networks like your friends and family – it can be daunting for those who hate constant change and take a long time to process/learn and absorb new things (like learning new business processes, systems, taxes, ways of thinking). Because once you know and learn everything, you’re off the project and on a new one, where you have to learn everything all over again.

You have to be quite social and outgoing as well, because if you’re an introvert who likes to keep to themselves, and only opens up after knowing people for a while and finally feeling comfortable with them, you’re going to run into problems making friends at work or at least getting on their good side and making going to a new work environment more bearable. You also have to be prepared to put up with company politics, budgets, and financial constraints – meaning they may ask you to do things you don’t want to do, like stay in a bad hotel, carpool with 5 other consultants, spend as little as possible, and deal with the headache of waiting for them to reimburse you for plane tickets, meals, laundry, taxis, etc. The bean counters will (almost always) fight you every step of the way. And then you have to be careful when you do your taxes at the end of the year to claim everything properly and by the book, and to make sure they haven’t messed up on anything on their end or on yours for that matter.

You’re already over half way through with paying off your student loans. Congrats! When do you expect to be done and what will you do when it’s all paid off?

Actually I’m only at 38%. I messed up on my calculations when I re-ran the numbers last night. *embarrassed* I expect to be cleared my loans by December 2008 (all $53,000 will be done! DONE! DONE!). But I’m realistically aiming for the end of December 2009, assuming unforeseen circumstances.

When it’s paid off, I’m taking a 2-week vacation or a cruise (on the cheap, fun and frugal of course), and paying it in full with cash instead of on credit card which is going to feel very cool.

Then, I’ll buckle down, and start saving for a down payment on a home. I’ll be 25 or 26 by the time my debt is paid off, so I have 4 to 5 years to aggressively save every penny I can, before I turn 30, which is my deadline age to buy a home.

I have to note that it’s quite easy to get into the mindset of saying: “Oh look, I don’t have a $1600 gorilla on my back (rent), and I get a lot of the comforts of life paid for (food for example), so I can relax and start spending more than I did before because there’s more leeway”.

In fact, we were in that mindset for the first month or so of our modern nomadic lifestyle. It wasn’t until I started tracking my expenses that I realized we were A) wasting a lot of money and B) buying items that we’d have to carry on a regular basis on every project and/or end up putting it in storage. So essentially, we were spending our money on JUNK and STUFF that we’d have to just put and store away in our already bulging, overstuffed storage locations. We were spending money now, to enjoy the items later, which makes no sense logically, financially or economically.

Now, it’s more of a game for me (my husband is reluctant to see it as an enjoyable experience) to see how low I can get our personal expenses (clothing, overages on food, entertainment), and currently we’re trying to stick to a budget of $500 a month, not including our personal “fun” money, debt repayments, retirement savings, or emergency fund savings.

I think it’s a great lesson for us to learn now and to KNOW that we can spend less than $500 a month in basic, personal expenses. So when we go to finally settle down, I have a good idea of what we can spend as the bare minimum then tack on the cost of the apartment, utilities, food and transportation. Which makes estimating our future living costs a lot easier.

Get Inspired - Host a Nomad!

One of the best ways to get inspired about nomadic living and also meet some very cool people is to consider hosting a nomad in your home. For the last couple of weeks our family has been hosting 3 nomads in our home. (yes, the house sitting has overlapped some and we've been moving between 2 households for a few days but don't even let me get into the complications of my life at the moment!)

For the second year now we've been the lucky host family for Trapeze Experience as they've held trapeze camps at my children's school. Last year we had four guests and their dog, Gia. This year there were only three. I have to say their stay with us has been one of the highlights of the year.

It's a pleasure to meet a group of people who are living their passion. Doing what they love and seeing the world while doing it. In addition, they had wonderful stories to share about their travels and their work, which for them included gigs like Club Med, Cirque du Soleil, O, Ringling Brothers, and touring with Paul McCartney. We shared many meals together, many glasses of wine, and lots of laughs.

One of the greatest parts of the whole experience was for my children to get to know these people. It's a chance for the kids to see that there are a lot more options for life than getting a 9-5 job in a cubicle somewhere.

If you ever have the chance to host a nomad in your home, I highly recommend that you give it a try. If you don't have connections to people coming through town, you might try Couch Surfing or the Hospitality Club. Both are sites that match up hosts with nomads.

Stay tuned later this week, I'll post my interview with J., Randy, and Russell of Trapeze Experience in my next installment of the Meet the Nomads series!