Thailand and Paradise Business Camp
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Chaweng Beach
I’m right now in Thailand and I’ve been here for a little more than a week. I’m currently staying in Chaweng which is the major area/beach here on Koh Samui. It’s a little bit too much touristy for my taste (it’s quite similar to Kuta Beach on Bali where I went 2009). Fortunately I’m staying at the quieter and more relaxed southern part of Chaweng, about 15-20 minutes away from the main ‘tourist ghetto’.
The mission with this trip is not to see how many buckets of Red Bull & Vodka I can drink before I become insanely drunk (even though I will dedicate 1-2 days to empirically study this phenomenon) but rather to work remotely from here. In Sweden the weather was about -10 to -5 degrees celsius when I left, and it’s +25 to +30 degrees celsius here in Thailand. Suffice to say, it pretty much was a no-brainer going here.
I do really enjoy myself here, and I love hitting the beach for a few hours, having a swim, and just plainly relax. After my usual early stay at the beach I’ll usually head to my adopted office (the guest house’s café/restaurant) where I’ll do a few hours of work. It is a lot more comfortable working from an office back in Sweden, but adding in the weather and atmosphere here, Thailand wins hands down.
Chaweng Beach
Another major and very prominent reason for heading to Thailand is that I’ll be a part of something called Paradise Business Camp. Paradise Business Camp is very similar to Project Getaway and the idea is that a few entrepreneurs meet up at some exotic location and work remotely from there. Everyone works on their own projects, but we’ll help each other out, share ideas and generally have a super awesome and inspiring time together.
I’ll meet up with the Paradise Business Camp (PBC) guys (and girls) somewhen between the 24th to 29th of January. We’ll probably be staying in Hua Hin or Koh Chang, the final location hasn’t been set yet. I’ll mainly work on Hemmalivs (the e-commerce store selling groceries online) while occasionally working on improving RoboBlogger and launching quite a few sites/blogs using this plugin.
The return flight home is booked the 6th of March, but if I really enjoy myself here (which I’ve done so far) I’ll probably extend my visa another month, re-book my flight and have another month of awesomeness.
If you happen to be around Hua Hin or Koh Chang in February, March, or April — drop me a comment or e-mail and I’ll gladly meet up for a beer or something.
Matt is awesome
I might just be the last person on earth to find about Matt, but I think that this guy deserves some more praise.
Matt (according to his site) “is a 32-year-old deadbeat from Connecticut who used to think that all he ever wanted to do in life was make and play videogames”.
After quitting his job back in 2003, Matt decided to explore Asia until the money he saved up ran out. During a trip to Vietnam one of Matt’s travel buddies gave him the idea to perform his (now quite famous) dance while he was filming:
The video eventually spread virally, and in 2006 the gum manufacturer Stride Gum got in touch with Matt to see if he was interested in doing another round of spontaneous dancing around the world – a trip they would pay for.
This video also became a viral success but Matt still wasn’t satisfied. After doing his last tour around the globe a lot of people wanted to participate while he was dancing. So he came up with the idea to do another round of dancing, now mixing in locals in his dance routine. And yeah, Stride Gum sponsored the whole thing once again:
So in the end Matt got two trips around the globe paid for and his videos have collectively been watched over 38 million times on YouTube. Friggin’ awesome!
And oh, he also wrote a book about his experiences with making the videos.
Western Australia
So my little two week getaway to Western Australia is coming to its end. I’ve had a blast here and I’ve seen heaps of cool stuff.
If you’re heading over to WA, be sure to check out Perth, Fremantle, Cottesloe and Rottnest Island.
I went to Rottnest yesterday, and it was a really cool place. On Rottnest there’s a very special animal called Quokka and those guys are basically bigger and cuter versions of rats. They’re pretty curious and one of them almost got away with my pack of Mentos (don’t think he would’ve liked them though).
In about 4 hours I’ll be on my way to Bali where I’ll meet up with a mate from Sweden.
Chengkui!
Cultural Learnings of Australia for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Sweden
All rightie, guess I should have posted this earlier – but I’m lazy.
I spent the last weekend celebrating Easter with a friend and her family and it was without any hesitation one of the most fun Easters ever.
So without further ado, here’s the lowdown on the Aussie Easter:
- Rent a house somewhere on the south coast.
- Add people.
- Add meat.
- Barbecue.
- Add beer/vodka/whatever.
- Get drunk.
- Hit the beach.
- All in all, have a friggin’ awesome time.
Oh, and there’s also something called ‘Good Friday‘ which I’ve never heard of. Apparently you shouldn’t eat meat, drink alcohol etc. on this day and a majority of all shops are closed as well. Weird!
And yeah, Borat’s my best mate. High fiiive!
The best experience of my life so far
So I guess I haven’t really jotted down my general thoughts of my experience in Australia – so here we go. A bit of a warning though, this might turn into some deep stuff.
I’ve been here almost two months now and I can’t seriously remember the last time I felt so happy and excited about life. Doing this journey and traveling by myself is hands down the best learning experience I’ve had in my life so far.
What I’ve realized is that by traveling by yourself you’re automatically forced to be outgoing, sociable and keen on meeting new people. Since I came here I’ve become a lot more social and a lot more confident compared to what I used to be.
Basically, this little journey has forced me to take care of a lot of shit I didn’t like about myself, stuff I needed to improve upon in order to become a better person.
For those thinking about going by themselves somewhere, just do it. It’s the best possible way to learn a new language (or improve an existing one), get to experience a new culture and meet a lot of awesome people. And yeah, you’ll also be able to get to know yourself in a way you won’t normally be able to.
And regarding Sydney… all I can say is it’s abso-fucking-lutely fantastic. Yeah sure, you can see pictures of the place and get a hint of what it’s like but Sydney is as much about atmosphere as it’s about awesome scenery. There’s always something going on, always people on the go. One minute you can run around in the central business district and be surrounded by high rises and a few minutes later you can chill with the fruit bats (by the way, they’re kinda ugly) in the Botanical Gardens.
Well yeah, going from a town with a population of 40,000 to a city with a population of 4,5 million people can also be a part of why I’m so fascinated. But just slightly though :).
To all of those I’ve met here, thanks for making my stay here extremely awesome. I really appreciate it.
Manly
All right, time for another awesome update!
Yesterday it was time for some touristy stuff again. It all started out with taking the tourist bus around Sydney. Gotta say that the driver was awesome, it felt like he just got his license (alternatively: just stole the bus) and at times the tour was little bit like a roller coaster. But hey, I survived.
After that me and Karen headed over to Manly, which hands down, is abso-fucking-lutely awesome! Nice beach, a good vibe to it and eye catching nature surrounding it.
I took quite a few awesome photos there I must say. Check ‘em out!
The Australian Museum
All right, so today I wanted to do something touristy again. This time I headed to the Australian Museum to see what cool things they had to offer.
To be honest, it was okay, but that was it. The dinosaur skeletons and the regular skeletons probably were the coolest things they had to showcase.
Tomorrow I’ll probably do the most touristy thing one can do: hop on the tourist bus for a tour around Sydney. Awesome!
The über what-I’ve-been-doing-the-past-week post
So alright, I seriously suck at writing new posts about what I’m up to. High five!
Monday last week I went to the Sydney Wildlife Park. It sucked compared to Taronga Zoo, but it was still fun to walk around there a bit. After that I met up with Karen and we went for dinner or something (all I know is that it must have involved Darling Harbour and wine, I seriously don’t know why we always end up there with a bottle of wine in front of us).
I don’t remember exactly what I did on the Tuesday, but on the Wednesday I almost got my arm bitten off (well, let’s just say that for the dramatic side of things) by an enormous cockatoo. No, but seriously, you should pay attention while you’re hand feeding these guys. I looked away for a second and he grabbed my hand with his claw and it started bleeding and stuff. Way uncool dude!
Thursday and Friday I guess I was hanging out in the city somewhere (best guess: Darling Harbour). On the Saturday I was running around in the Botanical Gardens feeding half its population with bread. Too bad I got stung by mosquitoes or ants or whatever the hell it was, those buggers completely owned my leg. Aaargh!
On the Sunday I went to Australia’s capital Canberra. The Parliament was cool and all, but the city in itself just felt lame compared to Sydney. The shopping center downtown was a bit cool though, but it still isn’t Sydney. Man, I love Sydney.
And yeah, check out the new photos:
Lack of updates
Hey. For those wondering, I’m well. I’ve just been busy with a lot of activities going on.
I’ll be posting updates on what I’ve been doing the past few days shortly.
Antibiotics!
Apparently, it wasn’t just food poisoning (or whatever it was) that I caught about a week ago.
After running around yesterday (I had an awesome time though) I felt like shit again this morning when I woke up. This has been going on back and forth since it all started. Some days I’ve been okay, while other days I’ve just felt like shit just like today.
It initially just felt like a regular cold, but when I started having massive and intensive headaches and a completely clogged up nose with yellowish/brownish mucus it was time to re-evaluate this stuff.
Since I was pretty bored of this I went to the medical center today and got myself examined. It turns out that I’ve got a case of sinusitis (swedish: Bihåleinflammation).
So now I’m supposed to eat my fun little green pills three times a day for a week or something.
Awesome!
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