South Africa 2002: Poor Undergrad. $7/hr. Saved for one year. Lived there four months, taught dance to at-risk substance abusing teenagers. Received $2,000 in scholarships and private donations for the $2,000 airfare. Spent another $1,500 while there.
South Korea 2005: Made $10/hr. Saved for six months. Raised $800 by putting on a charity performance with friends. The cause? Teach drama to youth at risk, and to do performance art myself. Lived with relatives there. Spent about $2,000 total.
India 2007: Very Poor Graduate Student. $8/hr., plus raising $1,000 from selling my art and music cds. Saved for one year. Lived there six months, taught dance and art at a boarding school. Spent $2,500 total.
Japan 2008: Finally a salary! Saved for six months. Stayed for 10 days. Spent $1,500 total, flew standby.
Costa Rica 2009: Saved for four months. Stayed 10 days. Spent $800 total, and used skymiles for airfare from all these previous trips!
Egypt 2009: Saved for five months. Stayed 15 days. Spent $1,000, and created the possibility that my $1100 airfare would be free. Which it was, and is quite a fun, random story.
Travel can be expensive, but not when you have a plan. When I was saving for that year for my South African trip, I was making $7 an hour!! How is that possible? I remember having to decline invitations to go out to dinner, or go to the movies. I knew what I wanted, and every dollar counted. My current wealth expert calls this "Cutting the Fat" from your budget. In India, I lived embarrasingly cheaply. I remember one taxi ride cost $12 and I was truly freaking out. That was way out of my budget!
...but I was there...
Don't make excuses...
"I have kids."
"I have a steep mortgage payment."
"I am unemployed."
"I don't know where I would go."
Make a plan. Cut your budget's fat. Create a vision bigger than your excuses. Where do you want to be next summer? Or in two summers from now? The #1 answer I hear to this question is first a sigh, and then a dreamy "on a tropical beach somewhere". Get a grip, and pick a beach for crying out loud! Make it the next click after you leave my blog today. Find an organization where you can give even 3-4 days of service, and then contact us. Our sponsors are eager to give you a scholarship for your international service-oriented dream. And we fully anticipate you'll spend 3-4 more days lazily sighing on that beach...
1 comment:
I hear this. If you make travel cheap, it's cheap. I've traveled all my ways with only buying two real plane tickets lately. The rest were standby, benefits, or given to me.
Yee haw.
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