2021 resolution

Hello everyone, 

First of all, I wanna tell you why I decided today to open a blog. I wanna take you all with me on what I hope will be a successful story of a girl in love with the world around her. Today is the first day, when I actually sit down and done a bit of a research on how I could make a change to lead me towards this goal: SEEING THE WORLD. So let me introduce myself and we continue. 

 I am Lori, and I am 26 years old. I am Romanian and because of the pandemic I had to come back home, moved back in with my parents and for months I looked for a job. The past 8 year I lived in 3 different countries, travelled a bit, on a budget, and made friends from different parts of the globe. I have been living in the Netherlands for studies, I went to Norway for an Erasmus programme and did my internship and later found a job in Spain. 

I have always wanted to see as much as possible of this world, to taste foods from different countries, to smell the scents of different cities, to listen to the waves on the world's beaches, to wander at the summits of the high mountains around the globe, but I always thought that is a dream of a rich person. I never imagined someone can travel the world, or take a gap year if it's not a rich kid. BUT when the pandemic hit us and we all were locked inside I started looking up beautiful hidden spots in the world and travelled around via Youtube videos. 

Oh man for 2020, I had so many plans, I was on a mission to travel more. I went to Dublin in February, and I was supposed to go to Thessaloniki (Greece), Timisoara (Romania), Madrid (Spain), Andorra for leisure and sport purposes. But there I was in my rent-out room, locked inside, alone, with no idea of what is going on (I am sure it was just the same for you).

But yeah, coming back, I started watching those video bloggers and explored the world through their vlogs. I can say, proudly, that I visited the whole world in 2020, I watched videos of every single country. Did you know there is a country called Eritrea, with a huge Italian vibe, in Africa? Or have you ever heard of Palau - the Pristine Paradise? Or the Comoros Islands? Or have you ever seen videos of Kosovo or Armenia, oh man their natural landscapes. The Maya Pyramids in Guatemala, less crowded than those in Mexico, or the South Sudan Royal Pyramids (check some pictures at least :) What about Afghanistan, we all heard about it, but were you ever interested in its culture or nature, its people? Or the Iraqi Kurdistan? And the list goes on and on

Besides seeing a bit of each country of the world with those guys, I was curious have can they travel for living? What is the secret? What are the compromises? So I digged in, and researched and read articles, listened to podcasts just to find out the secrets. 

It turned out it is not much of a secret, the key thing is: commitment! Yeah, you read it right, it is commitment, because you gotta give up a lot for it and the result might be the one you want or not. What I mean is you have to give up on some of your guilty pleasures to save money, you might need to change your rent, find a cheaper apartment, maybe get a second job, give up some of the nights out, dinner out, a fancy cappuccino during lunch break, erase from you list that new Iphone, not buy those new jeans if it is not a must....

So, you have to save money, many of those vloggers talk about a 50-70 euros budget per day. Then you do the math, how many days you wanna stay? Sum it up! That is your start up budget. So how can you reach that amount? Being committed! So you know how much money you need for that 6 month travel, it would be around 9300 euros. Let's say you wanna leave next January, so it would be: 775 euros you must save per month.  This is just an example, you do your calculation, maybe you need to save for longer than a year (depending on your income, your country, your expenses), or maybe you wanna traveller for longer...

However, for now I wanna travel regularly, not sure I have the courage to quite my job and go away alone. So till I build that confidence or till I find a crazy one to go with me, I wanna save up and travel regularly, for a weekend, or a few days, save up for a longer trip in summer.

What I plan on doing from now is:

- continue living with my parents for as long as I can (I am still working from home, but maybe soon we should be back in the office, and that is in a different city)

- stop spending on unnecessary things (cloths, Starbucks coffee, Netflix)

- lower my phone contract (it will expire soon, so I will get a cheaper one)

- continue workout from home, so I skip the cost of gym

I am going to be positive at this beginning of the year, and as I hope we would be able to travel again soon here are my 2021 resolutions:

    - visit 3 new European countries

    - go on a new continent (I ve only been in Europe and Asia)

    - do a solo travel 

With this being said I hope 2021 will be a superb year for us all, with a cascade of happy memories and may all our dreams come true.

Take care and see the world!