How I Created a Life of Travel

Last Updated on March 15, 2024

Next week marks the 15-year anniversary of the day I left Singapore.

I can’t believe it’s been this long.

In that time, I’ve lived in six countries, and traveled to more than 120 countries across all seven continents. I’ve taken on plenty of odd jobs abroad to fund my travels, before finally fulfilling my dream of becoming a travel blogger and writer.

I even met the love of my life while studying abroad and traveled with him around the world hand-in-hand before having a baby and now bringing her along on our adventures.

To celebrate this 13th anniversary, I’m sharing the story of how I created a life of travel.

My Personal Story

My story isn’t exactly a conventional one. Unlike many adventure travel bloggers who quit their jobs to travel the world, I’ve never really had a career or been stuck in the rat race.

The day I graduated from college with an Engineering degree, I packed my bags and said goodbye to Singapore, for good. I only had $3,000 of savings to my name (no rich parents, trust fund or sugar daddy!) and an overwhelming urge to see the world.

This isn’t a guide to teach you how to work abroad and travel the world, or why you should move abroad.

It’s simply my own personal story, to show that it IS possible to create a life of travel even with no work experience or savings in your bank!

By sharing my story, I hope to inspire and encourage those who dream of traveling and living abroad.

Chapter 1: Studying Abroad in Miami

In 2003, I was in the second year of my university studies when I learned about a student exchange program. My university in Singapore had good ties with many universities around the world and I could choose to study abroad in any of the 50 odd universities for six months.

I’d always wanted to experience living abroad and I knew this was my opportunity. It wasn’t too expensive (my parents gracefully agreed to pay for my housing and food abroad — other than that, I was paying tuition with my student loan as usual) and all my university credits would be transferred.

Miami turned out to be an experience of a lifetime. It opened my eyes to the world and beyond, and it completely changed me and my life in more ways than I could have imagined. I made lifelong friends from different parts of the world, learned about different cultures, and exposed myself to a whole new way of learning (that was a lot more interactive and engaging than what I was used to in Singapore).

In Miami, I also met my husband Alberto (then boyfriend) and we made use of every other weekend to travel all around the States and the Caribbean. I knew then that I didn’t want to follow the conventional path of finding a job, getting married, having kids etc — I wanted something different.

Chapter 2: Traveling Before Graduation

After spending six months in Miami, I had to return home for my final year of studies. It was a tearful farewell with all my close friends, and especially so with Alberto, and I basically cried the whole way home.

That final year of studies was really tough. It was a struggle trying to fit back into life in Singapore, I grew distant with my friends who didn’t understand why I’d changed, and maintaining a long-distance relationship with Alberto was even harder.

I felt trapped like a caged bird and it was destroying my soul. (I sound like a drama queen — but I was really depressed then!).

During that year, I scrimped and saved (around US$2,000 after six months of saving, thanks to an internship I took on) and went to visit Alberto in Spain. We spent one glorious month traveling around Italy and Spain, exploring ancient ruins and historical towns. I absolutely fell in love with it and wished the trip didn’t have to end.

That Christmas, Alberto had saved up by taking a part-time job during his final year in university. He came to visit me in Singapore and we traveled all over Asia: from the beaches of Thailand to the bustling cities of Malaysia. It was then that we hatched a plan to create a life of travel and live abroad after graduation.

We spent the next few months planning and researching on how to work and live abroad. Video calls weren’t quite as easy or cheap as it is now; but we talked frequently and continued to plot our next life together.

Eventually, Alberto and I decided to move to London after graduation. He didn’t need a work permit as an EU citizen then (although now things would be different with Brexit sigh). I could apply for a Work Holidaymaker Visa (opened to citizens of Commonwealth countries) and work in the UK for up to two years.

Chapter 3: Working in London After Graduation

In the few months between the end of my final exams and my departure for London, I took up a high-paying job as a Network Engineer as a last ditched effort to save up and gain some work experience at the same time.

I did pretty well at my job, so much so that when I tended my resignation just five months later and told them I was moving to London, they actually offered me a job in their London office!

It all worked out for me perfectly and I left for London in 2005 with a job waiting for me and over US$3,000 in my savings. It wasn’t much money — but definitely enough for us to pay a deposit for our apartment rental and not stress too much about finances for the first few months.

My job in London was a low-paying administrative position in the London branch of my company, but I didn’t care. I was grateful enough to have a job that would allow me to live abroad and sustain my travels in Europe.

Within a few weeks of us moving to London, Alberto found a job as a video game designer. This was something he’d dreamt of doing since he was a kid. We rented a tiny shoebox apartment in central London and used most of our money to travel — and loved every minute of it.

Living in London was just what I’d dreamt of. I loved living in what felt like the capital of the world: we made friends with people from around the world, went to museums and exciting events all the time, and traveled almost every other weekend.

In a short span of a year or so, we traveled to Paris, reunited with old friends in Amsterdam, spent Valentines’ Day in Venice, summer on the beaches of Brighton and Dover, and island-hopped around Greece. We explored much of Europe and spent all our savings – we had started to create a life of travel.

Chapter 4: Teaching English in Madrid

After a year and a half in London, Alberto was getting rather sick of the dreary weather and hectic lifestyle in London. He was craving to be closer to home (Alberto is from Granada in southern Spain, and he needs his sun, tapas and beer…), so we decided to make Madrid our next base.

Madrid, as the capital city of Spain, would have many more job opportunities for Alberto and also a more international social scene. It felt like a good way to ease into living in Spain, and it did turn out to be an easy transition.

Alberto found a programming job for a large IT firm shortly and I also found work teaching English almost within a month of being in Madrid. This was despite not having a work permit then — it was THAT easy back in 2006. Alberto was happy carving a career in his field of interest and I was excited to learn Spanish and be in a completely new environment. I juggled a few private tuition gigs and ended up earning more than I was making in London. That meant that we saved up even more towards our travel fund.

While in Madrid, we made use of every public holiday and summer vacation to travel. We traveled extensively in Spain. To the eastern corners of Valencia and Alicante, all around the southern corners of Almeria and Cadiz, and all the way up north to the province of Galicia and Asturias.

We also went to neighbouring Portugal, Turkey for an Easter break, Germany and the Czech Republic during World Cup season, Morocco on a summer adventure, Egypt for two weeks, and Norway for a winter break. During our summer holiday, we even went on a Mediterranean cruise with Alberto’s family and hopped all over Italy, Malta, and Tunisia.

Chapter 5: Volunteering in Tanzania

It was in Madrid that we kicked our travels into high gear and started thinking about exploring deeper and further beyond. With all that travel around Europe and the US under our belt, we felt ready to take on more exciting adventures.

After a year and a half of working in Madrid, we also found it about time to leave our jobs behind (I didn’t find much fulfilment in my teaching job while Alberto hated his daily commute and the long working hours). We wanted to travel for a few months at least.

I had always wanted to volunteer somewhere in Africa and make a difference. Looking back, I was so naive to think that way, but I genuinely wanted to help and at the same time find new meaning in our travels. And I felt that it was now or never.

So I started researching on volunteering programs — and even though most of them required a hefty sum of program fees. I found one that was free and only charged for housing which we would pay directly to our host. The program director found us a host in a tiny village in Kilimanjaro, Tanzania, and we would be assigned work in a primary school nearby.

I remember how excited I was about this new move. I would spend hours researching online and in the library. It was our first time in Africa and at that time, it felt like a real adventure going to such an exotic part of the world. We got our vaccinations, camping gear and gifts for our host, and set off for the unknown.

Life in Bomang’ombe was simple and back-to-basics, but very fulfilling. I made very strong connections with the kids in school, many of whom I got to know very well. It broke my heart to know that some of them were victims of AIDS, but I was comforted by how resilient and strong they were. I felt like my students taught me more than what they learned from me.

We also became good friends with our host lady Rosie, one of the teachers in school, Naomi, and her husband Deo, and spent countless evenings with them drinking Tusker beer and chowing on nyoma coma (barbecued meat). In fact, Naomi and Deo came to visit us in Granada two years ago and it was such a special experience showing them around our home, plus it was Naomi’s first time abroad and she was truly blown away by Spain.

Despite only spending three months living in Bomang’ombe, we felt that our lives were changed forever (as cliche as it sounds). While I don’t think we contributed much to their lives, my students and local friends taught us to be content and to appreciate small things in life. The experience also showed us that life had a lot more meaning to just working or having fun.

Chapter 6: Moving Back to Singapore for a Year

From Tanzania, we headed back to Singapore to see my family and grow our roots. By then, I’d been gallivanting for four years and hopping from one job to another. The priority was to save money rather than build a career. Now I felt a need to settle down and make an attempt at carving a career.

Before leaving Madrid, Alberto had already applied for a scholarship to study a Masters in Digital Media at a university in Singapore. When we were in Tanzania, he got news that it was approved and he was accepted into the university. Besides saving on tuition fees, he even got paid to study (How nice to be smart!).

It took me a few months to find a high-paying job that I was actually interested in and could see myself doing long-term. Sadly, this job at a major bank turned out to be the worst experience ever. I hated every minute of it and couldn’t stop thinking about travel. It was possibly one of the worst years of my life (besides the time I came back from Miami) but it also reaffirmed me that climbing the corporate ladder wasn’t for me.

But I made the most out of it and took every vacation day I had to travel around the region with Alberto. We went diving in Malaysian Borneo, hiked around Australia’s Top End, explored temples in Cambodia, bummed around beaches in Indonesia and Philippines, and backpacked all over Vietnam, Hong Kong, Japan, and China with our close friend from Germany.

Chapter 7: Becoming a Travel Blogger and Writer

During those days of misery (2008), I decided to revive an old travel blog that I’d started way back while I was in Miami. I felt that I needed an outlet to express myself and share my thoughts, and so I began blogging about our time in Tanzania and all the travels we were doing while in Singapore.

On one of my blog posts, a friend of mine commented that I was a good writer and that I should consider going into travel writing. I suddenly had a lightbulb moment and started researching on how to get into this competitive field. It was going to be hard to get into travel writing but I was determined to give it my all.

My travel blog became a platform and outlet for me to practise writing and display my skills. I dedicated all my free time to it, spending countless evenings and weekends writing and learning all the ins-and-outs of the industry. While my friends were out partying, I spent any time I had to blog and learn all about travel writing. It was exciting and promising.

Not long after starting a travel blog, I stumbled upon a network for travel bloggers and began to connect with other travel bloggers. I learned so much from everyone — but the biggest takeaway for me was that it IS possible to carve a career in travel blogging. My dream to create a life of travel was starting to become reality.

So I spent even more time building an audience, working on the craft of storytelling, gaining a following on social media, and mastering all the other aspects of blogging. I did ALL THAT while working on the job I hated in Singapore, in order to save up enough money for our next big adventure.

By October 2008, Alberto had finished his Masters program and I had enough of that horrible job. We had each saved over $10,000 for our big trip through South America and we planned to spend around four months traveling before moving back to Spain. I’d also booked myself into a travel writing bootcamp in Guatemala organised by V!VA Travel Guides, where I’d learned all about guidebook writing.

It was an epic journey and definitely THE best trip we’ve taken. We went overland from the vibrant city of Buenos Aires, to the spectacular Iguazu Falls, then the Andean Mountains of Peru, the Uyuni salt flats in Bolivia, and the coast of Ecuador before flying to the Galapagos Islands, and onwards to Guatemala and eventually Belize and Mexico.

There were so many highlights on this trip but the biggest milestone for me was going to the travel writing bootcamp and learning SO much about writing that it cemented my interest and determination in becoming a travel writer. After the bootcamp, the guidebook company even hired me to write a chapter in their Guatemala book and so I stayed on for a few months after that to research and work on the assignment.

By the time we returned to Spain in 2009, I was ready to dedicate all my time to blogging and becoming a travel writer. I was getting advertising inquiries through my blog and my readership was quickly climbing up the charts, but I also took on part-time teaching jobs to supplement my income. I eventually got my first invite to a press trip in Barcelona in early 2010, and the next one came a few months later, followed by another…

By October 2010, I was earning a healthy income of around US$2,000 a month and getting invites on media trips every other month. I then decided to quit my teaching job, take a leap and become a travel blogger.

The rest of it is history. These days, I get paid to travel to amazing places like Alaska, Antarctica, Brazil, Nepal, Iran, Uzbekistan, Ghana and Zimbabwe. I’ve come a long way from those early travel days of job-hopping and backpacking on a budget — but I’m thankful for this journey that I’ve taken to get here.

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Do You Want to Create a Life of Travel?

I’m lucky to have found my way into travel blogging. It’s been the most rewarding career I’ve had and I even get paid to travel (sometimes I still pinch myself).

If you want to dabble in travel blogging as well, read my piece on how to become a travel blogger.

But you don’t have to be a travel blogger to live a life of travel. Read this article for other ways to make money while traveling.

I hope by sharing with you my story, I’ve shown you that you CAN work and travel the world at the same time.

Good luck!