Getting smacked by a big dose of post-travel blues

It was always going to happen.

Returning to my small, cold home-town at the bottom of the South Island of New Zealand after an exciting year of travel was inevitably going to be challenging.

The blues were slightly compounded by the fact that most of my friends have left town.


Fortunately I'm not going to be in Dunedin for long.

Reasons for post holiday blues:

Gone are the three-day stop overs in European cities.
No more fleeting conversations with interesting itinerants.
No more annoying street sellers chasing me everywhere, sigh...
Less exotic food but on the plus side, less diarrhea.

Of course, travelling wasn't all great:

I did get sick.
I was tired from many nights of little sleep.
I did sometimes wish I could just stay in one place, especially when I just started to like it and meet cool people.
I got sick of being on trains or busses for 16 hours or being in airports all the time.

However.... 

I feel that somehow when you're travelling, status means a bit less. In everyday society, it's what you do, how much money you earn. In hostels at least, it seems that people come together in a way that they might not in their normal lives. You can be having an amazing conversation with a mexican guy who owns a bar, an irish woman who works as a G.P back in Ireland and a Brazilian student all at the same time.

Travel snobs:

Travel status comes in the form of exchanging exotic stories. There are those dreadful people who always try to one-up you: the travel snobs. People who think everything they've done is better than anyone else.

 Person 1:  "I went to this great beach the other day in Thailand."

Person 2: "Well, two weeks ago my girlfriend and I went to a remote island with some local chiefs. We were the first Westerners to go there in 50 years and the locals had a festival in our honour."

You get the idea.

Knowing what someone does didn't hold the same weight that it does in everyday life. In travel, I was more interested in someone's thoughts and whether they were fun to hang out than the job they do.

I do not miss sleeper buses

Post holiday blues not helped by looking for work in time of recession:

Coming back to NZ when the youth unemployment rate for 18-25 years is 17.4 per cent is not ideal.

There are still jobs around, but you are competing for scraps. I'm not in the position where I have to provide for a family. I'm predominantly responsible for myself and doing menial labour for minimum wage is not attractive (I did those sort of jobs from 15-21 y.o so I'm holding out til I leave New Zealand again so I can chase a career job). I have been trying to find work and applying for temping positions but employers have got more workers to choose from at the moment so they tend to go with the person with the relevant experience every time (even when it comes to something like retail).

I realise many, many people around the world are in this position right now and at very least New Zealand's minimum wage is okay (10.1 USD an hour).

I do miss this

One thing I really miss about travel is the excitement of constantly going to a new environment.
Back in my home city, it really is just the same old thing. Most people are not particularly interested to hear about your travel adventures.

I'm not quite sure if returning to no job and lots of leisure time is better than if I had returned to a job that I didn't enjoy?

Seeing my family for a while has been good. Experiencing a bit of the world-cup atmosphere has been good too.  Fresh air and a clean environment are a nice contrast to over-crowding and pollution that I experienced in many of the places I visited.

And this

So the world keeps spinning and I'm interested in finding some work that actually helps the world rather than just trading my time for a measly wage and feel miserable.

Would be interested to hear other people's experiences coming home after a big trip.....

New Zealand: A frank look at my home country after a year away

This blog is not about me hating on New Zealand. I'm just re-evaluating some things about the country with fresh eyes. It's a lovely place for the most part and where I will probably raise my kids.

I think its inevitable that when you spend a decent period of time away from where you were brought up, you will view it slightly differently when you return. That's because the more places you experience, the more points of comparison you have to your home town.

It was the rule rather than the exception that the traveller's I met abroad were a bit negative about their home city. When one compares an exciting life of travelling: meeting new people every day, partying, sightseeing and general holidaying, your life in your home city seems dull and boring.

After my first big trip abroad to Costa Rica in 2008, I returned after five weeks and remember arriving back at Auckland airport. Suddenly the flat vowels and general monotones of the New Zealand accent were deafening. Last year when I returned to NZ after being in Indonesia for two months, Christchurch really felt like a ghost town because compared to Indonesia, there are barely any people (and that was before the Earthquake). So how you perceive something is relative to other things you've seen, right?

My friend's house on the West Coast of NZ

Quiet Streets

Whereas the streets of Asia are mostly a throng of activity: food sellers, cars, motorbikes, noises, smells, people eating - Dunedin and more broadly New Zealand streets would be a welcome home for tumble weed or old newspapers blowing in the wind. There are literally nights when you can go on the streets at 7 pm and not see a single soul. If you love peace and quiet, it's right up your alley. We have small population and the climate doesn't always lend itself to being outside (it's pretty cold a lot of the time), so that's part of the reason.

Boozy Nation
The exception to the quiet streets is, of course, when people go out to drink; oh yes, Kiwis love a few ales. Binge drinking culture in New Zealand was more apparent to me after I had travelled to countries where people drink but perhaps don't have the same tolerance for projectile vomiting. I find after a certain time out on the town, say 1am, people get a bit more aggressive. Fights start breaking out (mainly with young people), people stumble about and couples often start rowing. What you see in NZ is pretty similar to Australia or Britain.

Dunedin

Some Queenstown scenery

I tend to be a bit deprecating about my little city of the South called Dunedin. It's got a population of around 120,000 but it feels quite claustrophobic because the inner city is based around one main street. About a fifth of the population are aged 18-24 because it's got a large University and Polytechnic. Returning this time to my family home after a year way is different from it has been in the past. With the exception of one or two, all my friends have left. Dunedin is the sort of city you get out of once you hit a certain age. Perhaps you return when you have kids, or maybe you don't.

It's quite a beautiful place; there's no traffic, it's peaceful and there's a lot of nature nearby. The living costs are also lower than other parts of the country. On the downside, it's small and insular; the weather is spectacularly crap and the wages are significantly lower than in other parts of NZ.

NZ is sweet as because:
The things I can definitely be grateful for about New Zealand are that it's pretty clean (although the likes of the dairy sector don't necessarily tow the clean, green line), that we get free health care and schooling, there are benefits available for those who need it and the people here are mostly friendly, humble and open minded (although there is a bit of closet racism).

Slightly rubbish news

I had always heard that the NZ news media was a bit crap but that was especially obvious when I returned from overseas. The stories that get precedence in the media are often ridiculous and I think that's just a consequence of our geographical isolation. Apart from the occasional look at what's happening with our traditional trading partners (Australia, US and UK) we are mostly inward looking.

Rugby World Cup

The RWC was on last year and it was the biggest event New Zealand had ever hosted. We had approx 100,000 foreign visitors and there was a good atmosphere throughout the country. News hour after news hour, the leading stories were about the price of rugby shirts, or how some trains were late in Auckland, or that it was raining... Presumably the news chooses to lead with what its viewers want to hear but I definitely felt that there were issues that deserved greater prominence in our media than friggin rugby. 

Globalisation has meant we are more and more affected by what goes on abroad so we should all be a bit aware of international issues so that we don't become ignorant about things that are important to both NZ and the world. If we focus too much on what is happening here we risk further irrelevance in the international arena. I think that a lot of people do travel and keep and eye to what's going on but there's also a bit of denial. Some people seem to think NZ is immune from the rest of the world's problems.

My family home (at least in the eyes of foreigners)

But NZ's great, aye?
People love to harp on about NZ is "God's own" or say we are "the best country in the world" blah blah blah.. I want to know how many people who say that have travelled beyond Australia or Fiji? It's best to remain humble about your country because it's quite natural that you would have a preference to where you're born.

NZ does have a lot going for it to be sure. The fact that we have benefits for the sick or unemployed, we have a stable, functioning and not corrupt democracy, that we don't have heavily polluted air or lots of traffic are things to celebrate. But let's not be arrogant..

Where is New Zealand again?

The reality is that a lot of people abroad know next to nothing about NZ. In international affairs, we are a minnow. We do have just four and a half million people and our influence is limited. Those who do know about us often have strange ideas like we all live on some giant farm and there are sheep living in the cities or the whole country is like Lord of the Rings. Maybe being from somewhere like Denmark is similar; small country, quite wealthy but not super-important in the world.

True

Clean and Green, yeah, right. 

I am absolutely in favour of making the best of our environmental policies and looking after this land we have (although I told that NZ has one of the most altered landscapes of any country in the world). However, even if NZ was 100 percent Pure as we claim to be and used absolutely no power or resources it would matter not a bit. All the good work we do here is undone by all the bad done by big polluters like China and the US.
Funnily enough, NZ is a prime exporter of coal one of the most dirty forms of fuel around. Maybe we don't burn it here but we do sell it to countries who do. So it's slightly contradictory. It's like being against war but then selling weapons to North Korea.

Recently our Prime Minister John Key was grilled on the BBC by Stephen Sackur about our clan, green image. Mr Sackur cited Mike Joy, a leading environmental scientist at Massey University, who recently said “we are delusional about how green and clean we are”. Mr Joy made the comment while pointing out that many New Zealand species are facing extinction and more than half the countries lakes and low-land rivers are polluted. “That might be Mike Joy’s view, but I don’t share that view,” said Mr Key when Mr Sackur presented him with the quote.

I try my best to be pro the environment and help the world etc but in fairness I have one of the largest carbon footprints round. A year of flying to different countries has meant my green credentials are not so rosy. When I was in Europe people often said things like: "Oh, you are from paradise, you're so lucky." 

Our illustrious Prime Minister

NZ is definitely a paradise compared to a lot of the world but we have many internal issues we need to look at and fix. Independence and geographical distance from other countries makes the analogy of NZ being like a life raft in the world seem appropriate but lets down blow our own horn too much, aye? 

Questions or comments welcome.

  

Couchsurfing, why it's awesome and why you should join!

 If you are planning travel, a seasoned traveller or just love meeting new people CouchSurfing is a website you should consider joining.

Without hesitation I can say it's the best website I've ever joined. I've met so many amazing people, had incredible hosts who live in interesting places and who showed me generosity and kindness. It's allowed me to experience countries through the eyes of locals rather than just other travellers. It also helped me travel for longer because the accommodation is FREE. For nearly two months in Europe I didn't pay a single penny for a bed and that helped me travel further.

At present there are more than three million couchsurfing members spread about the globe but that number grows by about 20,000 new people a month.

For those who have never heard of CS the basic concept is this: 

CouchSurfing gathering in Jakarta

If you have a spare bed or traditionally a couch in your home and you are open minded you allow travellers to stay in your home. The person will contact you by looking at your profile, then send a request which you then accept, reject or ignore. You then look at their profile and decide whether you will host them or not. The system works because you have feedback on your profile from people you've met, much like with TradeMe.  Ideally, you will get to experience both a host and a surfer.. I've even had the pleasure of staying with people who I had already hosted.

My first guest was Anna for Aachen in Germany and two years after she stayed with me in my home town in New Zealand, this year I stayed with her in her place in Cologne.

I would say that people who offer their bed to strangers are generally pretty cool and not rapists or murderers as some concerned friends have suggested to me.

Your couchsurfing profile is a bit like a facebook profile: 

You can see mine here:  http://www.couchsurfing.org/people/fei/ . 

At dinner with some Sicilians

MY BEST EXPERIENCES: 

* My girlfriend and I stayed with some wonderful Sicilian guys in Palermo.. They were funny, cooked for us, told us a lot about the local culture and we met their friends and were treated to local.

* In Brussels, Belgium I stayed with a flat full of young Dutch Belgians.. I don't think I'd ever met any Belgians before and Brussels was described as being one of the most boring cities in Europe on the forums I had read. I had a fantastic time there! I learned that Belgians love comics, at the time they didn't have a proper government and a lot of them are fluent in Dutch, English and French and are able to switch freely between the three.

* Having two cool Czech hosts in two nights in Prague, one who I shared a really good laugh with, another who
took me to watch an obscure Czech singer/ comic book artist.

* Learning a bit about Thai culture from our Mexican host in Phuket

With some Surfers and traveller's in Vietnam

MOST COMMON CONCERN AMONG POTENTIALS HOSTS: 

But you let strangers into your house!?! Isn't that dangerous?

People say this to me often. I can certainly understand why they would have their doubts. 

Well, hopefully by the time you say yes to the person coming to your house you have read their profile thoroughly, checked their references and had a few emails of correspondence. Over 99 percent of all couchsurfing references are positive so you could conclude there reference system is pretty good. 

Have you ever had a negative experience? 

Yes I have.. Not horribly negative but a bit. I've had about 70 couchsurfing experiences. Some were so-so, 2 were not so good, most were great and several were mind-blowingly awesome. I've made some really great friends too.

In Brussels for dinner with young Belgians

I did lend a Couchsurfer some money once.. I had met a Cambodian guy who ran a school for disadvantaged children in Siem Reap.. He was very nice and genuine and a friend and I organised some fundraising for the school. Anyways.. a while later he asked to borrow some money. I lent it to him and he said he would repay within two months. It ended up being six months of emails and hassling him to get the money back.. I unfortunately found that this guy had done the same thing to other couchsurfers, some who didn't get their money back. Whether he was using the money for the school or not..It wasn't honest to meet people for couchsurfing under the pretext that they might give money to him..

Me on the left with my host (South African) and 2 other surfers

Do people use couchsurfing to find hookups?/ do couch-surfers often hookup? 


Undoubtedly some people do use the website for that purpose.. When I was in Rome I struggled to find a host because nearly all the hosts were men and a lot of the Italian guys had "female only" under their preferences for guests and had profile shots showing off their abs.

It seems inevitable that when young people are using a website like Couchsurfing to meet other people, particularly travelers that some people will kiss, fuck or even find a relationship (as I did)..




Do hosts cook for the couchsurfers?


Well you can if you want to.. You can also ask that they bring their own food, it's really up to the host.. I've had all sorts of different hosts. One girl in Bristol just gave me the keys to her apartment as she went to stay at her boyfriend's place. She also lent me her camera and laptop. I already had about 50 positive references on my profile at that point so she could be pretty sure I was trust-worthy (until I stole everything!!! only kidding)

With a surfer I hosted from the States

So basically, I wholeheartedly encourage you to get involved.. It's lots of fun. It's not for everyone, you have to have time put aside.

Do some people use Couchsurfing just for free accommodation?
It's true that free accommodation is a big part of the attraction to join the website but it would be obvious if someone was using you like a hotel. I've never had that sort of experience but I've heard of people who've had. Part of the point is you spend some time with your guest and make and effort to explain the place you live or even show them some local attractions. It just depends on your level of commitment 

Does any money exchange hands during Couchsurfing? 

If a Couchsurfer offered to contribute some money towards petrol if you are driving around a lot or food if they are staying for more than 4 days then that's fine but generally no money is involved.

SO WHY SHOULD YOU JOIN? 

Arm-wrestle with surfer Lars from Germany. He's one of my good friends and
I managed to catch up with him in both U.K and Ireland

I think that the spirit of Couchsurfing is really great. It's spreading good will and helping create connections between people all around the world. If I were to suddenly think of Thailand or Belgium or Germany, I would think of the locals I met in those places and the experiences I had. Hosting or being hosted has aided me knowledge of foreign countries. And it's so bloody easy!
Increasing one's knowledge of the diverse range of people and places on planet Earth can only enable one to understand it better. CS will not be to everyone's tastes but hopefully to yours!

Hopefully that convinced you to join!


Questions? Comments?