Less than two weeks ago I arrived back home, to Egypt, after exactly 175 days, or almost 6 months, on the road, mainly in Indonesia with one month in Thailand. And I have to admit: I got so used to being away from home; I have been changed in so many ways, but mainly from ‘not so sure if travel is the thing for me’ to ‘I 100% want to do this again!’
I know that many people travel for longer times, some have been traveling for years now, so it is not me who is supposed to be saying this, but it is different for me! Here is why…
Most of those who have decided that travel is what they are going to do for the rest of their life, or at least for a long time in the near future, know that they go home to work for a bit, or to visit family, or to even just take a break and then head back abroad to explore more countries, or to continue their life as expats in some country.
For me, I have made that decision that I want to continue traveling for a long time! But here comes the difference, once I came back home, I am not sure when is the next time I will be able to leave, and this is for so many reasons!
For example, I have a bank account that has less than 150 dollars at the moment, as I spent every penny when I was in Indonesia and I just started again from scratch! That wouldn’t have been so hard if I could easily get a well paid job in Egypt, but that doesn’t happen: I am jobless! And the only job I could make some quick money from is working in my parents’ pharmacy in Sharm el Sheikh! (That fast money is still less than 400 US dollars per month, not excluding my expenses!)
Here is a confession I rarely make: half of my previous travels were funded by my family! I held my father to a word he said 7 years ago, before I started studying pharmacy; “Get a bachelor degree in pharmacy, get your certificate and then do whatever you wish and I’ll support you!” And thus, I have been asking him to complete my funds for traveling…
When I went to walk el Camino de Santiago, he paid for my flight tickets back and forth. Same with my last travels to Thailand and Indonesia; I asked him to keep his words and, with calculations, decided that I will only have enough money to spend (including money made from this blog) but I will not be able to afford the air fare and that this is his job now to “support what I want to do.”
But now, I feel like I’m asking for too much! Especially after the Egyptian revolution two years ago, and the state of economy and tourism now, I will be a massive overload on my family if I ask them to partially fund my travels again!
What is confusing me now, besides being confused about what to do, is how I feel! I feel like it is quite easy; and that I am just back home for a few weeks/months and soon I’ll be packing and leaving again! Although the thinking side of my brain knows this is quite hard to accomplish, my feelings refuse to believe it!
Do I have any plans or even half plans for what to do to solve my problem? No, I don’t. Period. If you have any suggestions or ideas you’ll be most welcomed to share them, as I am already itching to travel again, and this website isn’t yet generating enough money to fully support that!
*All photos in this post are from Flickr creative commons
15 Comments
Trackbacks/Pingbacks
- Cleaning the Closet Experiment - [...] a traveler, albeit a totally broke one, I need this money! I don’t need my old desktop computer table, ...
After reading this I have no clue what to say, but can tell you that I understand you on the “not being able to make quick money in Egypt” part. Since I started dating an Egyptian I have got more of an inside look at how things work here and I hate it along with the salaries. I can only imagine how hard it is to save money here and also how hard it must be to get VISAs to some countries or how expensive those must be too. I know we messaged on FB and know you are back. We must meet up soon so we can chat about this and many other things that are in my mind (like maybe giving tours in Cairo/Egypt). My piece of advice is DON’T GIVE UP keep saving as much as you can and don’t let the dream fade.
Looking forward to meeting you Jaime! I have been toying with the idea of giving tours in Egypt for quite a while now, so maybe I’ll make it come true soon (hopefully!)
I won’t give up, but I really wish things would become a little easier, or at least start clearing up so I can have some more hope
You have a good degree and you speak very well English! How about fleeing your country and start working in an English speaking country?
Save up some money, and move to England? Start in a pharmacy and save up, invest in property. When you have enough take up loan, buy a small house (maybe a bit old, If you have some skill on refurbishing a house?). Lets say the house has a basement, take those rooms and make them into studio apartments and rent them out. And use the main floor as an apartment you can also rent out. Hopefully you will have enough income from the house to cover the loan, and a bit more to keep you on the road. If you need to, use one of the rooms in the basement when you’re not traveling.
This plan might take some time, but I have big faith in it! Cause I’m doing the same. I have some number I can send over to you on FB.
Remember: The only thing it will not be any more of is space.
hey Chris, as I told you, going to another country and working as a pharmacist requires taking the pharmacy boards exam of that country + an unpaid internship, the over all of around 1.5 years without getting paid… Plus the fact that I don’t really like working as a pharmacist. I tried it and it was making me extremely unhappy all the time.
I really like your house plan, we already talked about it in private messages and I might be considering way to do something similar… Thanks for your great suggestions and help!
wow… lucky you your parents can give you money…
anyways, i suggest you try applying for online jobs in odesk or elance as a writer so you can work on your parents pharmacy and then earn additional income through your writing gigs on the site.
build more commercial website that could attract more advertisers…
goodluck1 as what Jaime said, don’t lose hope! 
you can do this!
I started looking at stuff on odesk! Thanks for the suggestion!
And yeah I am lucky to be able to get some money from my parents, but this cannot happen for so long! That is why I really want to find ways I can support myself and my dreams without external help!
It’s my first time here in your blog and I also have the same dilemma. Right now, I am concentrating on building niche sites. I also started taking freelance online jobs by maintaining a number of SNS of companies here in the Philippines. Just don’t give up
lucky you have your parents to back you up financially. Might as well talk to them and start something from it 
I’ve been toying with several ideas lately and one of them was making one or two niche sites! and also you are not the first one to suggest freelance online jobs! Where do you get those jobs? Also odesk and elance?
About my parents, I think I have asked for so much already!
It is a bit hard to ask for more…Specially given the current economic status in Egypt with the revolution and all…
Mina:
My girlfriend has been in the same shoes as you for quite some time, working for $400 to $500 USD per month in Mexico.
Slowly, she’s been learning throughout 2012 how to do social media, and she’s starting to run the Spanish language side of Marginal Boundaries in 2013, beginning in February. I’m splitting 50% of my book sales with her…just like I do with all of my affiliates. So she’s making money there.
But more than that are our language immersion classes during Destination Freedom. For March, April and May I’m bringing people in and teaching Monday through Friday in the evenings social media, brand building and website development, along with passive income generation. But she’s teaching Spanish language classes every single morning for 3 hours, Monday through Friday, for three months.
I won’t divulge the exact salary here but she’s going to be making more than quadruple her salary here in Mexico for all of her adult life…and dropping her working hours from 12+ a day to a mere 5-6.
My first suggestion to you would be this: teach your native language to foreigners. Create an immersion program and use your clout in the travel blogging industry here to see who is going to be coming to Egypt and who would want to come stay with you for, say, 6 weeks to 12 weeks at a time, and then run a language course for them.
Alternatively, teach English to Egyptians, cash money, under the table. You have enough skills you could make it work.
Write an eBook…teach classes on something via Google+ Hangouts….lots of different options.
Write a book! This is one of my dreams! I just don’t know what to write about yet…
I might be doing some English teaching in the near future, however, this isn’t very well paid in Egypt either…But some money is better than no money at all! I am looking forward to the day when my online income would e sufficient on its own to keep me going!
More than anything else…man…social media is the doorway to infinity, bro! We can create realities out of nothing more than imagination, so once you can pinpoint your passion you can use things like G+ Hangouts to do group classes and teach meditation, cooking, clothing-making, guitar classes, language classes. Facebook pages and Twitter accounts…you already have the base built up
It’s just waiting for you to aim and shoot 
I find the whole “travel blogging” title to be a bit misleading. What you are really accomplishing is becoming a teacher, someone who has a very specific role to play in the development of the human species, and every single one of us has that ability within us. And now with global communication and freedom of information (for the most part, and it’s only getting better), there are unlimited possibilities
I am extremely ignorant with G+!
I have an account but I really don’t know what to do with it…Will be trying to learn more about it, hopefully! 
Well, you have a nice website, you are a great storyteller, you are funny and have friends around the world… You have a lot of odds, so if I were you I would just relax for a while at home, visit your family and friends ask them… Why don’t you try to publish a book? just an idea, good luck!
The book idea again!
It really is one of my dreams to write and publish a book, or even an ebook (as I heard it is easier with all the legal processes, and cheaper!) But the thing is I still don’t know what to write about 
Thanks Laura
Also, dude, consider organizing tours in and around your favorite areas of Egypt. It’ll take time to get going, but if you could do 2-3 tours per year, and find 5-10 people per trip who want to go, you can build up from there.