I'm going to miss this country 🇹🇭

Introduction and Thailand Departure

0:16 Hey everybody, I thought I'd just come on here and do a live stream. I know it's pretty late in Southeast Asia, but it shouldn't be too bad. It's probably midday in most of the US, late morning on the West Coast, and then early afternoon on the East Coast. But yeah, feel free to chime in. I know I just got it rolling, so I'll give people some time to hop on here. I know it was last minute, and I just wanted to do an extra stream because I'm waiting on a piece of equipment that broke, and so I had to order a new one. That's what stopped me from getting out as many videos as I wanted. A couple of different things broke, and so I ordered one thing, and then the second thing broke. That's what's delayed my videos.

1:12 But yeah, I mean, it's also been nice to have a little bit of downtime and do some more exploring of Bangkok. I've also been able to catch up on errands. I made more progress on my tax stuff. I follow an extension, so that's going to be nice to get that finished, hopefully before I leave Thailand in a couple of weeks. I've got about two weeks, so two weeks from tomorrow, I'll fly out to Vietnam.

1:50 Actually, I got my visa. I'm not sure if I should show that on camera, but I do have it printed out. I found a print shop near my apartment here in Bangkok, about a 15-minute walk, and walked over there. Paid one baht, about three cents, and was able to get that printed. So, once my time is up here, then I'll be heading to Vietnam. I'm trying to think of what I want to do in the last two weeks.

2:25 I didn't really get any of the activities I wanted done because it's been really hot this week, to be honest. I've been sleeping during the day, and a lot of the activities that I have left are daytime activities here in Bangkok. They're not open after hours, like the reptile farm closes at 1:00 PM a couple days a week and 3:30 PM the other days. So that's one that is not going to be as easy. And then the Green Lung, because I find myself getting tired and going to sleep early in the morning.

3:04 That's probably the ideal is probably to wake up early morning and then get on a bus and head out to the pier or catch the boat across the water to the Green Lung. But yeah, welcome, welcome subscribers. Feel free to chime in anything that's on your mind. I thought I'd just do a late-night stream because I'm waiting on my equipment to be replaced.

3:41 I know it might not be a super convenient time for everybody, totally understandable. I did have an interview Friday, and we'll see how that went. On Monday, I'll get some information back as to whether or not they were going to move forward to the next step or not. If not, you know, full steam ahead on Vietnam. I've done some applying to some other roles, but I'm not sure. Right now, the market's in a tough position.

4:17 I love the opportunity to join another software business, but at the same time, this isn't the worst place in the world to be interviewing from, as far as having beautiful sunlight and hot weather. It's really, I feel really relaxed in Southeast Asia.

Passport Renewal Challenges in Vietnam

4:47 But yeah, like I said, Vietnam is going to be a lot of fun. One thing that I think may be a little bit tricky is trying to get my passport renewed. The timing on this is kind of funny, but you know, time flies by so quickly, and this will be my first time doing a passport renewal. My passport actually expires next summer, and so that's going to be a little bit tricky to pull off because I'm going to need to get the new passport and then transfer the visa from the old passport to the new passport.

5:19 That's something that I've never had to do before, so that's something I'm going to have to be careful about now. I've heard you can mail the passport to the embassy, pay the fee, they get it done for you, then they can send it back to you. I don't know if, for whatever reason, it's not possible to send it back to me, then maybe I'll need to actually head down to the physical embassy or consulate.

5:48 The embassy is in Hanoi in Vietnam. The consulate is in southern Vietnam in Ho Chi Minh City or Saigon. I need to learn the difference. What is the difference? An embassy is the diplomatic delegation from one country to another. A consulate is a building that supports the embassy and its host country. Okay, that makes sense.

6:18 Yeah, why don't I pull up Da Nang here just to show. Oh, so not the easiest place to start off with in terms of a renewal, right? Because Da Nang is in the center of the country. North here in Hanoi is where they have the embassy, and then down here in Ho Chi Minh City is where they have the consulate. So those are the two places, say, as a US citizen, that I can go to actually do my passport renewal.

7:04 And, you know, I'm not going to be there in Da Nang, right? So in Da Nang, then, it's, you know, they just don't have one of those two. So I'm trying to decide, do I want to do a sandwich where I stay in Da Nang for one month, go down there, start the renewal process? I've also heard it can take long, and you don't want to be near the expiration of your visa and then not have your passport in hand, right? Because then you could end up overstaying, which can come with certain ramifications, certain consequences.

7:44 So that's where I'm at. Do I want to immediately, as soon as I land in? And maybe I should even do it now, like reach out to the embassy or the consulate and just say, hey, you know, my visa is coming up, I want to start that process as soon as I land in Da Nang. Is it possible for me to mail you my passport, pay the fee, and get that started as soon as I land, right? So there's no question that I'll have it back in hand.

8:17 Of course, the other concern of mine too is what if I want to leave Da Nang? If I want to fly in-country, let's say I send it to Ho Chi Minh City for whatever reason, and I want to fly to Hanoi, then am I going to be at risk to not be able to fly because I'm not going to have my passport in hand? So this is one of those interesting, tricky kind of problems that I thought would be worthwhile to discuss.

Navigating Visas and Passport Renewals Abroad

8:40 Welcome, welcome. I just had to renew mine for the first time in Thailand. Scary process. Yeah, I think you just feel so vulnerable, right? I think that if you're a person that, you know, you're not from Thailand, you're a foreigner like I, and you don't have a Thai passport, and you don't have a second passport, right? If I had a second passport, for whatever reason, I might be a little bit less worried if I was a dual citizen.

9:09 But yeah, it's definitely going to be nerve-wracking, especially in Vietnam, because, you know, Vietnam, you get three months. It's not, as far as I know, there's no one-year visa anymore. It's not like the Philippines, right? If I was doing this in the Philippines, which part of me thinks I should wait to do it in the Philippines, I get three months or I get up to three years, two months at a time.

9:35 But there's such a good relationship between the US and the Philippines that it's like, okay, three years, that's way more time than I need to do the renewal. But in Vietnam, it's like, okay, if I start it late, man, that's going to really, that could be pushing it on the edge. So I may end up pushing it back and doing it in the Philippines, even though that's going to be more legwork. It might be just a better result.

10:02 Christopher says, hey Alex, just catching up. Great to see you, Christopher. How long before your passport expires? And so my passport expires end of June, actually about a year from today. So one year from today. And technically, I won't be in the Philippines until probably like October, unless I get an offer like I mentioned back home, then I'll probably head to the Philippines around October, which will be around the eight-month mark.

10:31 And you mentioned going to suggest waiting until you go to the Philippines if you can. Yeah, that's what I'm leaning toward because I know they have a lot more English there. It's just a lot easier to communicate with people there. Their relationship there is just really, really strong, and everybody is familiar. There's a lot of infrastructure based around the military as well, because the Philippines and US military have a great relationship.

10:58 Not to say the relationship between the US and Vietnam isn't good, but the Philippines and the US probably have one of the best relationships in this part of the world. I think we have nine different bases in the Philippines as well. So yeah, I don't know, I may just wait until I get to the Philippines.

Manila vs. Bangkok City Living

11:28 Because yeah, that's the challenge. So I have mixed feelings about Manila. It's definitely interesting to me as far as big cities go. Like, I'm living in Bangkok right now, and Manila, a lot of people, you know, they would point at it. For people who are familiar with Southeast Asia, that's the Philippines' version of Bangkok. And in Thailand, Bangkok is Thailand's version of Manila.

11:50 So the mega city with all the conveniences, but it's also the most densely populated city in the world. And I think that part of me could feel a little bit overwhelmed by trying to stay there for like a month. And it's not even like some might suggest it could be like a budget thing. It's not even really that, because I've done research. I've spent time in Bangkok. I found, you know, Manila is going to be more expensive, but it's not going to be so dramatically much more so that I'm worried about it.

12:19 It's more so just kind of the stress of being in a big city for an extended period of time. I've been in Bangkok now for close to two months, and sometimes it just kind of wears on you because you may not be used to that amount of population density. Of course, I could look at some areas maybe outside, outside of Manila or on the outskirts of Manila, like you've got, you know, out here, more specifically like.

12:48 Places like Dasmarinas or even places like Dasmarinas, I know Steve Philippines Info Channel is based in Tracy. I know another subscriber of mine, a friend of mine, Michael, he's based around Tanay. So, you know, these places might provide a good alternative where I can get to town, I can get to the city, or get to the embassy to handle the passport renewal process. But that I'm not dealing with the hustle and bustle of Manila 24/7.

13:23 From what I'm told, if you go to the embassy, they give you your old passport back right away, so at least you'd have that. You can also expedite the process if you tell them that you have something important to do or travel soon. I agree about cities; I'm not a fan. Well, thanks so much, Doom Hower, that's great to keep in mind. It would be nice to have that one just in hand because I think I'll go back to the States after the Philippines.

13:52 And, you know, so it wouldn't be like the end of the world to have to navigate getting an emergency passport or whatever. You know, it's direct. Like I'd basically, if I was flying back to the States, I'd probably fly direct from Manila to San Francisco or Manila to Los Angeles because there's a ton of those flights. And from there, fly to Tennessee.

14:17 Or, if I get a job offer there, then I'm great because like I get off the plane immediately, I can go back to work. But yeah, I mean, I like cities in short bursts. I like it for some people don't even like it for that. Like I have friends that are like, I don't even want to spend one night in Bangkok or Manila. I like it for a few days, maybe a week, and it's exciting and interesting. But after that, it's just like every time you walk out the door, you've got traffic, cars, you're waiting in line if you want to grab a bite to eat.

15:00 If you want to go anywhere in Bangkok, it's going to take you at least an hour, maybe two hours, depending on how far you need to go. And so that can just kind of wear on you after a while. I wanted to go for more time in Bangkok on this trip because it was just a matter of convenience for this last couple of months. Like I could have left and come back, but I hadn't spent much time in Bangkok at all on this trip. I mostly focused on Chiang Mai and then places in the south of Thailand, Krabi, Haad Yai, Pattaya.

15:35 But, you know, I've got my Bangkok fix. I think I'll be fine to go a while without coming and spending time here because it's just so busy. It's so, so busy. And let's see, and but yeah, it's just so, it can get really busy and feel like, I don't know, it just feels like hard to get personal space. It's hard. You can't really go down to the beach here in Bangkok. It's a city for doing business, right? Like these mega cities in Southeast Asia are business hubs.

16:18 And well, the countries are well known for tourism and for vacations and enjoying nature and that kind of thing. The cities are more there for people to do business. So there's this kind of dichotomy there where they do have a lot of cool stuff going on. Like Bangkok has amazing shopping malls, very cool fruit markets, beautiful neon lights everywhere, very cool tall buildings and skyscrapers. It does kind of wear on you after a while.

Finding a 'Goldilocks' Living Situation

16:49 Christopher says, 'Yes, I want to go visit and survey those same areas outside of Manila as well. I am considering relocating there in the future.' Yeah, you know what? I likewise, Christopher says, 'I likewise am seeking a Goldilocks area, not too big, not too small.' Yeah, and a lot of people really seem to like that area. A lot of people really seem to say good things about it. And so to me, it's like, okay, maybe that's the compromise. Maybe I book a place for like a month in that area and I go and handle my stuff in Manila.

17:21 But otherwise, I can just, you know, enjoy that kind of in-between space. Not feel like I'm in the middle of traffic and smog and people trying to get to work, right? Like that's something I don't like as much about traveling in big cities is you sometimes feel like you're in the way of people trying to get to work. I mean, of course, we all know how to be polite, but even so, like it is kind of weird for me to be in vacation mode or long-term travel mode and see people in business suits, well-dressed and ready to go out and make some business deals or attend some meeting or write some program or whatever it may be.

18:01 And that's just so different, whereas if you're in a more provincial, more laid-back area, people aren't so in a hurry to get things done. People aren't kind of stressed out. Like I've definitely noticed here in Thailand, in Bangkok, people do at times seem more stressed out than other parts of the country, especially my friends that are working. Like I have friends that have corporate jobs and they always seem very, very busy, and they're telling me they're working a lot of hours.

18:29 And so, even if you have friends in Bangkok, it's not always easy to have free time with them. Like any other big city, it's very similar in LA or New York, San Francisco area. Let's see. Christopher says, 'Oh, Doom Hower says, totally agree. My max is a week in Bangkok.' Yeah, that's plenty of time here. You can see so much too in a week if you're near the BTS or MRT systems. You can just hop on one of them and go halfway across the city in an air-conditioned, comfortable environment.

19:01 Like I was just in, last night was it? Friday night, I went out and met my friend at Benji Kitty Park, and then we got in her car and drove to Terminal 21. We had this place called Get Fresh. It's a great, I'll try, I'll share the name of it, but we had Get Fresh and Terminal 21, really good. I had the nachos, she had shakshuka, which is this egg dish. And then afterwards, she drove me to Cyan BTS.

19:41 But yeah, let's see. Doom Hower, nice. You guys are into the same type of living as me. I like my home quiet and peaceful, but close to the action if I want it. Yeah, I think that's the best of both worlds. Doom Hower is that you have access to some of those conveniences that you want. Like you want to be able to go out and have some international food sometimes. You want to be able to easily get to the convenience store.

20:07 Like for me, if my phone runs out of data, like I'm pretty good about topping it up, but occasionally, you know, maybe it'll pass because I'm busy doing something. I'd like to be able to just walk down to the shop and put some more load on it, as they call it in the Philippines, or just add some more data to it. I like knowing that there's some hospitals in the area, right? If I need some kind of medical attention for whatever reason, it's really nice.

20:36 Like I live near St. Louis Hospital here in Bangkok, so I'm near St. Louis BTS. And if something were to bug me or happen, I could easily just walk down there and get treatment with no issue. Pharmacy, if I need to go to a pharmacy, all the different things are really close by. But my neighborhood does still feel a bit more busy than I'd like.

21:00 And so ideally, you know, ideally, if I spend some time in Manila, then I won't be downtown. So I'm going to look more at some of these places south of the city, maybe to stay for a month, maybe a place that's on a main road so I can easily get to and from wherever. Let's check it out. Actually, so here's the embassy, okay? So it's on Roxas Boulevard.

21:29 Okay, well, you know, that's not too far. One of the places I was looking at, I forget how densely populated Manila is as well. It looks like it should be much bigger based on the population numbers, but because it's so densely populated, you forget everything is kind of in downtown or surrounding it. And then once you get to the suburbs, then it's a little bit harder to see places like Marikina as part of like the big city vibe.

22:05 Christopher, yeah, feel free to reach out on Instagram and send me a message anytime. Always happy to chat. This trip will probably be until unless I get like some kind of job offer beforehand, I'll probably be traveling until the upcoming spring. So, probably ideally six or seven more months, and then I'll probably go back to work just to keep adding to investments and continue preparing for moving over here more long-term.

22:41 This has been more of a scouting trip, trying to just see what's out there, see what I like, see what I don't like, figure out my preferences. And yeah, I was kind of tricked by Bangkok because I talked about it a bit before, but last time I was here was during COVID, well before this year's trip. So before last summer was during COVID, and the city emptied out, but a lot of the businesses were still open until eventually they closed. But before they closed, I was just like, man, this is such a big city, but there's nobody here. It's so easy to get things done.

Bangkok's Busyness and Future Travel Plans

23:13 But now that the tourist crowds have returned, Bangkok and also the locals are getting out more too. The city feels a lot busier than the way it did when I was here four years ago. So I'm learning and realizing, hey, you know what? It's super convenient to be in such a big city, but maybe it's more peaceful, relaxing, a little bit outside of the city. I'll be right back. I'm going to turn the AC on.

23:52 But yeah, I mean, so that's where I'll be headed if I head to Manila. Maybe I'll get a place in Manila like out south to handle that, and then fly to Dumaguete from there. That would probably be most convenient. What did everybody get into this weekend? Did anybody do anything fun this weekend? Did anybody watch UFC this weekend? I watched it this morning, actually, well, Sunday morning.

24:56 Actually, well, Sunday morning, it's now into Monday morning, but I watched it Sunday morning and it was really awesome. The card was based in, I think this was a Riad card, actually, based in Saudi Arabia. It was just interesting to see the differences. Some people were saying, 'Oh, this crowd is too quiet.' I didn't see it that way. I thought they were really respectful, but yeah, it was just cool to see in a different environment.

25:26 But yeah, back to Manila. I think it's going to be a little bit less touristy than Bangkok, just because Bangkok caters to tourists every step of the way. I think Manila is maybe not quite there yet, but it could be there in the future. One of the places I'd like to see, the big one that a lot of people keep telling me about and I keep seeing videos about, is Intramuros. This is like the old Spanish-era landmarks, and this is some of what's left over of old Manila after the unfortunate circumstances in World War II. So you get a taste and a sense of the way Manila used to look a long time ago.

26:26 Solo transient, hey Alex, I'm all set to go. I've booked my flight, hotel, and applied for Eva. Keep us posted. Definitely in our next livestream, let me know when you get that approval. It took me 72 hours. I hope it takes the same for you, if not faster. But that was such a good feeling when I got that approval because you know you're all set to go.

Preparing for Vietnam and Manila's History

26:53 So yeah, I think it's going to go well. I've got mine printed out over there. I'm flying out two weeks from today, probably 10 days from now. Probably when I'm about three to four days out from leaving, I'm going to empty out my backpack, go through it, clean it out, dust it out, and start packing it up. Start putting everything in there that I'm going to be taking to Vietnam, but also set up and organized in such a way that I can get my Eva at the airport, show it to the flight attendants, and then show my passport as well. Have it all packed up ready to go so that the day I leave, I just grab my bag and head to the airport.

27:39 Whether it be a cab or a Grab taxi or however I get there, but yeah, it's a good feeling. I still need to book my accommodations. I'll probably do that tonight. It's Monday morning, probably Monday night. I've been waking up at like 3:00 in the afternoon, so I'll probably book it tomorrow night and just go ahead and book the first week. I think I'm going to look around more just because I try to get a sense of where I'd like to stay.

28:15 But I'm still having trouble with that. Doom Hower, I'm resting. Just had a trip to Vietnam for five days after getting a new passport and transferring my visas and stuff. Very hectic and Denay because of it was a holiday. Was it Tet? Because I'm hearing Tet holiday is the most important holiday in Vietnamese. Oh no, that was in January. Wow, I'm way off. So I'm six, five months off. I didn't realize it was the Lunar New Year. Okay, so totally just scratch that. But yeah, what holiday was it, DoHow?

28:51 Christopher says this weekend was just chilling out at home, searching accommodations around Manila. Actually, my wife and I visited Intramuros. The old fort was cool if you're a history buff like we are. Yeah, I'm really interested in history, and that's a big appeal of Intramuros. To me, the contrast there is wild because here you see the old-school architecture, and then in the background, you see the skyscrapers of Manila. So it really, I like stuff like that in Bangkok too, like near an old Chinese cemetery. It's very interesting to see the old-school Chinese Cemetery with the skyscrapers in the background.

29:34 Also live near a Muslim Cemetery. It's also interesting to see how they pay their respects in the traditional way, and then side by side, there's these brand new skyscrapers. Yeah, really interesting contrast there. And yeah, I'm interested in the history, and I think it'll be really cool too because I've traveled in Latin America, and the Philippines does have some of that Spanish influence in a way that you don't really see elsewhere in Asia. So I think it'll just be kind of different because you're so far away from Spain.

30:15 I mean, when we think of Latin America, yes, it is far from Spain, yes, you do have to cross an ocean, but the countries are more similar, the surrounding countries are more similar. And in the Philippines, that's not the case, right? They have local dialects, but they also have a prevalence of English. So I think it's going to be really interesting to see Intramuros. And I'm glad you and your wife had a nice time there enjoying the history.

31:05 We did talk about BGC last time, how it's like ultra-modern and like tall skyscrapers, that kind of vibe. I'm trying to think of what else. I guess we could scroll down.

Exploring the Philippines: History and Geography

31:25 That looks old school as well, the Aguinaldo Shrine. It's a museum. Beautiful with their traditional defense. And yeah, this is really a beautiful area. I didn't realize how much history there is in Manila. So like, a lot of my Filipino friends don't live in Manila, so I've been focused on other parts of the country. And Manila definitely has a lot of interesting history.

32:10 DoHow says June 10th, TD, no festival, or maybe H Festival. Yeah, I'll have to look up pictures of that because I missed it. But yeah, it sounds like your experience in Dang was super busy.

32:38 DoHow, I am curious about Cavite City because this reminds me a bit of like Cadiz in Spain. I can pull up Cadiz. So you see how it's like isolated, kind of on its own. I checked out Cadiz when I was there in Spain last winter, and so there's this interesting parallel there where you see that they're similarly designed. And I think that'll be really interesting to look at and see the Spanish influence and development there. I didn't realize they had an airport here. I don't think Cadiz in Spain has an airport, but yeah, nonetheless, just really, really interesting design there.

33:45 I've heard a lot of stuff about, well, let's talk about Baguio first, and then we can go on to the next piece. Baguio is super high on my list. So one of the things that's been getting to me a bit is the heat in Southeast Asia lately, like more so in Bangkok, and more so the last few weeks or month where it's just been really, really like a humid oven. In places like Baguio, that are up in the mountains, offer like maybe 10 degrees cooler. I have heard they tend to be overcrowded because of this.

34:19 So at least in the case of Baguio, because all the foreigners, you know, they want that cooler weather. I think you see something similar in Dumaguete with Valencia, where people go up into the hills because they get to live in their favorite place, but they don't have the same heat that you deal with in the South or in the lower lying areas by the beach. And that might be a good tradeoff for me because I'm more of a mountains guy than a beach guy. I think you still have some level of proximity to the beach, like people in Baguio could come down here to La Union.

34:59 Yeah, I've heard about La Union. Like a lot of people really like this area. So I don't really see any beaches in this photo, so maybe it's a situation where people have to go further south or further north, like the San Fernando area. But yeah, Baguio with the mountains looks gorgeous. I am kind of curious about the altitude in Baguio.

35:35 Because, okay, so it's almost a mile high, so it would take some adjustment. That's almost as high as Denver. I do think people would need to take some time to adjust if they were going to go up there from sea level.

Baguio's Cooler Climate and Mindanao Safety

35:46 Solo transient says you should also check out the province of Bataan. It's the history capital of the Philippines. Okay, Solo transient, let's pull that up.

36:05 Okay, I'll keep this in mind. Bataan is not too far from Manila either. It's like west of the capital. So yeah, that's interesting. Let's pull it up here. Oh, you even see immediately in the second picture, this boat has unfortunately sunk now. It looks like it was sunk a long time ago, but certainly, I think it looks gorgeous.

36:45 Yeah, there is a lot of history. Wow, apparently the Dutch landed in Bataan trying to take the islands from Spain. That's wow, there's a lot of difficult history there. Yeah, I have a lot to learn as Solo transient. Certainly, about the history in Bataan. This is beautiful, right? Like these are the beautiful red groves. I don't know if that's clay or what they make that out of, but it does look quite beautiful.

37:33 And what else? Oh, Vigan. I've heard that Vigan is a nice city. Apparently, yeah, so this is what I was talking about. It does still have that old-school kind of vibe. It looks like Seville. This looks like a Spanish city in this part of the city. I'm sure there are newer parts of the city that don't maintain this look, but it definitely looks like a city in Spain, especially with the horse-drawn carriage.

38:25 Pictures. Yeah, so this one has been covered by several vloggers recently, and it looks beautiful. I'm definitely interested to check it out. What else? What else? I would like to see the very north.

38:39 Okay, that's strange. This is also Calayan Island. That's funny because there's Calayan and I guess it's Camiguin del Norte is the one that I've been to. This one must be Calayan del Norte. But yeah, up here in seeing the northernmost point of the Philippines.

39:07 Malis Island. Okay, so that's what we're looking for here. So this is the northernmost point of the Philippines. That's almost to Taiwan. I did not realize. I'm thinking more of the northernmost point of Luzon as opposed to the northernmost part of the country, because that's almost to Taiwan. And I imagine it's not easy to get up there to this spot. It does look beautiful, but obviously very sparsely inhabited, if there's anybody living there.

39:40 Inhabited if there's anybody living there at all, maybe a few research scientists. But yeah, I doubt very many people are living there at all. The water is absolutely gorgeous, but yeah, I mean, it looks like a very specific place that you'd want to go to, right? I don't think anybody's getting up there by accident. It does seem somewhat remote considering you're not super, I mean, you're close to Taiwan, but there's not much else up there, I guess.

40:23 They probably do some kind of adventure tourism where you can get a boat from, like a ferry from up here, like Pagudpud or Claveria, to like Fuga. And then, you know, you probably take progressively smaller boats as you go further north. That looks like it'd be time-consuming and expensive to get there, but I'm sure it's worth it. But even just getting to the northernmost point of Luzon would be really beautiful, like up here, you know, would be really, really nice.

40:58 And I think you get the full sense of the scale of the country. Like I didn't appreciate how big the United States was until I went from the northernmost part of Thailand to the southernmost point of Thailand in like an hour and 45 minutes or two hours, versus the US, you know, you're talking more like if you're flying from like New York to Miami, that's like probably a three, three and a half hour flight. And then much more so if you're flying across the country, like if you're flying from LA to New York or something like that, it's probably like more like a four and a half, five hour flight.

41:34 And so it did give me a stronger appreciation for the scale of my home country because I've been pretty far south in the Philippines. So I've been as far south as Cagayan de Oro, not quite as far south as Davao or General Santos, but quite far. And so getting to the opposite point of that would be interesting.

42:13 I did go to Siargao last time. I think I've covered Siargao in a stream. So yeah, maybe it's a situation where I'm best off flying into Manila, spending that first month in Manila, getting my passport updated, transferring the visa from the old passport to the new passport, which I need to do at Manila as well. And then once I get all of that sorted away, then going down to Dumaguete, spending some time in Dumaguete.

42:48 And then from there going to, I think I don't think you could take it very, from Dumaguete to CDO, my buddy suggested you can, but I think it's more like take it to Dipolog and then go over. And I'm not interested in doing that. Some of these spots can be kind of sketch.

43:05 So yeah, it may be a situation where I fly from Dumaguete back to Manila and then to CDO, or to Davao. And then I just go up north. So like landing in Davao, maybe spend a little bit of time in Davao, and then take a bus up through here to the mountains, to Malaybalay.

43:31 So the way I look at it, Mindanao, this is broad, this isn't advice, this isn't suggestion for other people, but kind of how I split it is, there's a kind of a dividing line from Cagayan de Oro to Davao and west of that is where it gets sketchy. And east of that, a lot of people have found that it's generally fine. I'm not going to say it's been free of issues, but that's just the general guidelines that I've been told about. And so as you can see, the place where I've talked about Malaybalay is east of that line. I know foreigners living there right now. I'm also friends with Filipinos that live there right now.

Future Travel: El Nido, Siargao, and Bohol

44:18 But yeah, that's just something kind of general I wanted to throw out there about Mindanao safety. And Mindanao, this is my assessment of the situation. If you decide to go, you have to come up with your own determination. Some will not go at all. Others would say you're fine anywhere. I think I'm in the middle there, where I think there's some areas that are unsafe, and I think there are other areas that are, um, probably just fine.

45:03 And who knows, you know, I may get the travel bug where I want to bounce around once a month or something like that. I found that can be a little bit more stressful trying to move from place to place too quickly, but there's some places I really want to see. I mentioned where I want to see in Luzon. El Nido is really high on my radar. I've heard a lot of great stuff about El Nido just in terms of development.

45:26 I wouldn't mind going back to Siargao, but Siargao, I don't know, it's just kind of, it has kind of a Manila light feeling, and it may be a little bit too many people for me to stay long-term. I didn't feel as overwhelmed as I did in Bangkok at times, but you still get some of that, right? Like sometimes the traffic and the congestion can just be a lot when you're trying to like coming out of the mall and being like, oh wow, there's all these people.

45:54 Like, you don't get that sense as much in some of the smaller cities in the Philippines. So I have mixed feelings about it. It is an interesting city, but it's also pretty compact.

46:27 Bohol is supposed to be beautiful. I've flown over Bohol. So I distinctly remember flying over the Chocolate Hills, and it's, they almost to me look a bit comical. Maybe it's because I'm so used to the Rockies, where you have these sharp and jagged peaks, and then the Chocolate Hills are just kind of like, I don't know, they're just soft. They look a lot more soft, I guess.

46:57 This is the, um, case I want to see. One of these, I forgot the name, but they have a lot of these interesting wildlife specimens and critters throughout the Philippines, some of which I don't want to run into. So there's certain snakes that I don't want to run into in the Philippines. But I'll be careful. But yeah, you see here like they just, really, really unique geography, really neat to look at.

47:31 Hey Tony, good to see you. Welcome to the stream. I'm going to drink some water. Really, Tony, how are you doing today? Tony, it's, uh, yeah, it's a late, late night stream tonight on here on Monday night, or Monday morning, I should say. It's, uh, yeah, it's been a nice week. It's been really, really hot here. Lazy Sunday. Oh, I'm glad you're joining me today, Tony. It's, um, yeah, it's been a lazy Sunday here too. I haven't really done a whole lot.

48:16 Just kind of been chilling, waiting on a piece of equipment to get back to me in the mail. It's coming from overseas. That will help me edit some of the videos that I've recorded over the last few weeks and get caught up on that. And, um, yeah, that'll be great to put out some more videos because I like the live streams, but I look at them as complimentary to the videos and vice versa. I think the channel is most effective and I'm able to produce more interesting content when I work at both.

48:46 And, uh, yeah, so Discord, great question. Tony's asking about the link to my Discord channel. So Discord is like this app. It's almost like you can create your own sort of forum with it. I learned about it just through the technology community because it's really popular for software developers. It's also popular in the crypto space, and it's free to join. So I just have a discussion board in there.

49:14 I'll admit to you, Tony, it's not super active. I think that will change if I grow the channel and we have a, you know, larger subscriber base. Then I think we'll get more and more activity on there. I've done some stuff on there for now. I look at it as a place for us to discuss our travels, you know, discuss like, you know, if people want to meet up, or if people want to like talk about ideas or places they want to go, or places they've been. And I kind of just, I'm active in it when I'm traveling.

49:47 Yeah, so that's a great point. It's like a message board, and for anybody that wants to join, yeah, open all the time, no charge. Just, you know, open to discussion. There's numerous people that have jumped on there and asked questions. And I, I haven't always been on it as much as I could have been. Sometimes I'll catch things late, but here lately, as we've had more people joining and my subscriber number has gone up a lot, then there's been more activity in there. And I think it'd be cool, you know, to help facilitate conversation and, uh, yeah, and to just share ideas. And yeah, it's open all the time.

50:27 Um, I, they don't charge me anything to keep it open, so I don't mind just having it up all the time and having this place for people to chat. Let's see, so yeah, Chocolate Hills, very, very cool.

Siargao, Surigao, and Introvert Travel in the Philippines

50:57 What else do I do want to check out? Siquijor, but it's, I've heard it's kind of become more of like a party island, and so that is a little bit dissuading to me, as I'm not as much of a partyer these days. Maybe something I check out for like a weekend or something like that, just see what it's about. But, uh, yeah, well, it does look like, you know, it may be a situation where it...

51:29 Well, there's not any direct ferry routes. I was going to say normally you can see on the lines, they have direct ferry routes to other places. I'll have to double check and do more research, but yeah, uh, it's, you know, it's a little bit lower on the priority list.

51:42 I have heard Siargao is really popular among digital nomads, traveling people that travel at work. Like it's, uh, apparently gets a lot of great waves for surfing. I have heard they do get hit with inclement weather, so it's something that I would need to check the season on to make sure that I'm going over there at a time when the weather is cooperating, because as you can see, it's on the eastern coast of the Philippines. And the east coast of the Philippines seems to take the brunt of a lot of the storms.

52:19 And you'd think that Leyte would have that same issue, but I don't seem to hear as much about that being an issue in Leyte. So yeah, um, that that's just what I've heard, but not not certain. Surigao is supposed to be cool as well.

52:51 Surigao, I can zoom in on it. As opposed to looking at the city proper, oh wow, they've got hot springs here, it looks like, with a swimming pool, beautiful swimming pool and a nice koi pond. Ah, the Philippines is just so tropical and gorgeous.

53:31 And let's see, it looks like the port is super active. So if you're a person who wants to go elsewhere, like, you know, throughout the eastern part of the Philippines, then you've got that here. You've got a ferry, you got a...

53:44 Here you've got a ferry, you've got a bunch of ferries to Nonok, and a lot of these places I've never heard of. I've heard of all the big places and the populated places, but a lot of these smaller islands I've never heard anybody really talk about. There are over 7,000 islands in the Philippines, and I think it could be a matter of prioritizing.

54:11 For a lot of people, they look at the less populated places and they're thinking, "Oh, well, it's not going to have the foreigners." So, if they want to make nomad friends, then it's going to be harder in some of those less populated places. I imagine there's not as much in terms of western amenities like your big box shopping, your shopping malls, your burgers, you know, all these stuff. It's less for people who tend to like that, and that's going to be harder to find in some of these remote places.

54:47 Tony asks, "How would you rate the Philippines as an introvert destination?" You know, I have mixed feelings about it. On one hand, it can be quite boisterous and fun-loving, right? It's well-known for karaoke and people just having a good time, being laid-back, fun-loving, cheerful. So, sometimes, like when I was there last time, I could feel overwhelmed at the need to socialize.

55:18 But on the other hand, everybody speaks English, and people can be a bit shy. So, it's this odd mix of people being kind of outgoing, not, you know, having so much fun in the sense of karaoke, that there's some expectation on the foreigner to accept it. So, you have to, I think you need more flexibility in the Philippines because you can communicate with people, which in some ways is very good, but in other ways, if you may be feel impatient or you feel stressed out, it isn't so good.

55:56 There's times in Thailand, I hate to say it, where I'm glad that me and the other person couldn't really communicate effectively to one another because maybe they were impatient with me, or I was impatient with them, and nothing extreme, you know, nothing that's going to get out of hand. It's all relative. I haven't had any major issues here in Thailand. I've had a few minor situations that were kind of stressful.

Philippines as an Introvert Destination

56:24 In the Philippines, I'd say what you want to go for, you can enjoy it as an introvert. You're going to have to be prepared to spend a bit more. One thing I would look at if I was going to stay in the same place long-term now, this is somewhat limiting. It's going to limit you to certain cities, but somebody said, I read something in a forum that was really funny. They said, "BGC (Bonifacio Global City) is like the Philippines' tutorial mode."

57:02 So, you might consider, if you look at the Philippines, starting off in like Bonifacio Global City, unless you're not a big city person. Some of my subscribers are big city people, some are not. But like in, let's see, Bonifacio Global City, if you're in a skyscraper, you're going to be far above like the sound of roosters or karaoke or maybe somebody has modified their vehicle to be a bit loud.

57:30 And that's what I found in Cebu was nice. I stayed at the Griffin Hotel. I'll pull up the Griffin Hotel here. So, I stayed here when I was in Cebu five years ago, and it's above, like, you know, I was pretty high up in the building, and so I didn't have exposure to the noise, which is like one of the only challenges or stressors in the Philippines.

57:54 If you're not used to that, like I grew up an only child, single parent, suburban area, so I'm used to spending a lot of time isolated or a lot of time alone. And being over there where people are, like when I was in the Philippines last time, people kept asking me, "Why are you traveling alone?" At first, I got a little annoyed about it, but then I had to understand, like, that's their culture. They're very group-oriented, family-oriented culture.

58:28 And it's important for me as a foreigner to meet them halfway and understand that they prioritize different things. There's certain ways in which the people are much more cheerful on average, and part of why they're more cheerful than people in the United States or in Western democracies is that they put a lot of value on relationships. I don't think you see that sense of loneliness in the Philippines that you see in a lot of the developed world.

59:03 And so that's where it's like, yeah, it did kind of wear on me at times because I'm just not used to people talking unless they have to. Like in the South and in the west coast, and in the US in general, people are just really busy. A lot of people are grinding hard at their job, working hard at their job. For me, like I got paid to be outgoing, so in sales work, I'm not really outgoing, but I'll be outgoing for work. But I also use up all my batteries at work, and I'm not super social after work because I've just spent so much time talking to people that I'm ready for a break from people.

59:48 And that's something that, like, if 10 is highly introvert-oriented, like Scandinavia, Japan is up there too. And then one is highly extrovert, Colombia. I sense the Philippines is about a three. Yeah, I think that's about right. The Philippines is probably about a three.

Filipino Culture and Business Opportunities

1:00:10 Like, people will come up to you and talk to you. But to me, it's just important to consider context. I didn't understand the friendly culture when I was there five years ago. I was just skeptical because I came there from Tennessee, where there's kind of the good old boy culture, and if we haven't known you, if we didn't go to school with you, we don't want to be friends with you, kind of thing. And that's not the case in the Philippines at all.

1:00:41 The people are super welcoming, and, "Hey, check out my house, check out my neighborhood, let's go get food, let's go spend some time." And I should say, not everybody in the South is like that, but more so in the small Southern towns, like not Nashville, but you get out into like rural Tennessee. It's very much, "You ain't from around here, are you, boy?" You don't get that experience in the Philippines. At least I didn't. I went to some rural areas in the Philippines, and people were smiling at me, and I did not feel unwelcome at all.

1:01:18 I wasn't sure about the language barrier, so I was still unsure at that time of how much people speak English in the Philippines. So, I was a little bit nervous to approach people, but it's one of those places that has been good for my soul in some ways. Even though the overly outgoing nature is different from me, it's something that's a great teaching experience.

1:01:46 These people are outgoing, they're not trying to take advantage. Like in the US, if I'm around some people that are super outgoing, part of me suspects that there's some kind of ulterior motive there, like they're trying to engage me to build up false rapport to try to get me to buy something or, you know, who knows what it is. I didn't really get that sense as much in the Philippines.

1:02:09 Like, I was pretty, it was pretty obvious from the start if I encountered somebody and they were wanting something from me. Like, one time when I was in Cagayan, a guy stopped and was really insisting that I take his phone number and call him if I needed some kind of tourism service around the island. And I didn't, I was actually leaving like the next day or day after. And so, you know, I took the phone number, but it was clear he was trying to make some money, and I don't blame him.

1:02:48 It's almost the Philippines, in some ways, is like a place like Hawaii. I've never been to Hawaii. I almost went around COVID, but the flight got cancelled out of Manila airport. But it's, you know, it's a place that's beautiful and it's sunny, and there's beautiful nature, but the industry is not there as much as it is in some other countries, just because of things like inclement weather. Same with Hawaii, Hawaii has gotten hit with storms before.

1:03:25 Also, you hear about the wildfire issues. So, some of the most amazing places to live or to visit, you know, they're not necessarily great places to build a business. I don't recommend people start businesses overseas unless they're extraordinarily experienced, they know a lot about that business doing that business in their home country. It's a natural evolution. I just think most expats are going to fail trying to start some kind of business abroad.

Introvert Havens: Portugal and Georgia

1:03:58 Tony says, "We should create a new country, all expats fleeing extroverted places. We can call it Introvert Stand. No loud noise is allowed, everything oriented towards singles." Yeah, that sounds like paradise, Tony.

1:04:12 I think a lot of introverted people would be happy in a place like Portugal. I do think Portugal tends to be more expensive than Southeast Asia or Latin America, but Portugal I found to be amazing. If I had retirement money, I would strongly consider a place like Portugal because it's just quiet, it's peaceful, it's shockingly quiet.

1:04:44 Like I was walking around Faro in The Algarve, and I do have a plan if I decide the Philippines, I'm not going to stay for six months. I'll probably leave and go to Indonesia because I haven't been to Indonesia yet, and that would be the last country in Southeast Asia that I would consider living in that I haven't visited. Myanmar is off the table.

1:05:13 Myanmar is off the table for obvious reasons right now. Laos is not really a place I would consider living because I don't know anything about the Visa situation. I've gone over that in the past, but if I find that the Philippines is a little bit too loud for me, a little bit too boisterous, I'm also looking at a smaller town area.

1:05:40 Now, there is the risk in the smaller towns that you do have barking dogs and roosters. I asked my Filipino friend about it, and he says it's not really a major issue in the city that I'm looking at. But his definition of quiet is different from my definition of quiet, so it may not be agreeable with me.

1:06:01 In that case, I would just thank him for being a wonderful host. I'd have accomplished the meetings that I needed to accomplish and then I would look at going to Indonesia. Indonesia, and then I'd fly back to the States, probably after Indonesia.

1:06:24 Algarve, very, very peaceful. I mean, I remember walking around Algarve and being like, where are all the people? It was in the winter when Algarve kind of shuts down, but I was just surprised. I came down here to the docks and I was just surprised. You have all these beautiful boats, but not that many people.

1:06:47 There were some guys that looked like they were fishermen, but yeah, it's a beautiful city. The tile work is gorgeous, but it's really peaceful.

1:07:10 Oh, you're talking about that was in Peru, I think. I think that was in Peru. So, the one in the kitchen is, I think you're thinking of Amit from India.

1:07:29 Do you know says I used to go to Algarve about 20 years ago. What was it like then? I only went to Portugal for the first time early last year and I liked it a lot, but I've heard it's also changed a lot. It's become much more heavily populated by tourists and it's not what it was.

1:07:54 But I'm curious what your thoughts are if you think it was better 20 years ago. Certainly, some places get better over time, some places may get too cool or too popular for their own good. I feel that way about my hometown, Nashville. It's like too popular for its own good.

1:08:16 Tony, I think you may be thinking of the one I did with Amit. I'll go back and look because I just don't think I have any friends. I have a friend from Colombia that's living in Portugal right now, but he didn't want to be on camera, which I totally respect.

1:08:46 I'll have to go back through and look at some of the old stuff, but thank you for calling that out, Tony. For a complete introvert, experiencing a new country should be established in Antarctica. That's funny.

Portugal's Quiet Charm and Expats

1:08:58 Galactic Spectator, that's really funny. Surprise, Portugal is quiet since Latins are known for being very talkative, expressive people. That's a really great point. I'd always thought that too about Latin culture, that it was very outgoing and expressive and talkative.

1:09:23 But I Googled a few years ago, the quietest country in the world, and Portugal is not as high up on the list this year. But it's still on there, so Portugal marches to the beat of its own drum when it comes to peace. And this surprised me too.

1:09:52 I do want to be very clear, Galactic Spectator, when I read, go to Portugal if you want a peaceful and chill place. I was like, what? I think about Mexico as a place I go to have a wild, fun, good time. And I think of the Iberian countries, Portugal and Spain, as influencing countries like Mexico and Brazil.

1:10:16 Brazil is known to have a very warm, outgoing social culture, but it doesn't talk about the quiet aspect. Maybe I could find the quietest countries in. Okay, here we go. So this one, well, this is a Portuguese website, but low crime rates, minimal threat, and harmonious relationships with other countries, even more so than Austria, Switzerland, or Ireland.

1:10:56 Really, really peaceful. And you know, I think too, some of it is that, you know, in Portugal, like a lot of young people do move abroad for different kinds of work opportunities. And it seems like young people in any country, if they're struggling with employment or wages, then it does lead to a little bit more unrest.

1:11:23 Whereas if those young people can move to the UK, I knew a Portuguese guy in America, he lives in Japan now, but his family left Portugal when he was young and ended up in Alabama. He ended up getting his PhD in math, and so now he's a math teacher.

1:11:42 But yeah, there's a lot of opportunities for young Portuguese outside of Portugal, and so maybe that eases some of the distress that would come from having a lot of young people that are struggling with jobs and things like that.

1:12:04 Yeah, I think Portugal is fantastic, Tony, especially like outside of Lisbon, and I would say outside of downtown Porto as well. I haven't been up to Porto yet, but I imagine it's got a lively downtown like all the European cities.

1:12:23 But, you know, being outside of the downtowns in Portugal, especially, I think you're fine. It's just really, I don't know, I was just surprised at how quiet it was and people weren't coming up to me on the street trying to sell me something. The restaurants were peaceful, the music was at a reasonable volume.

1:12:46 Things did close a little bit early, probably at like 9 or 10 o'clock at night, but not too early, you know, it wasn't like 7 o'clock or something like that. And this was in Faro as well. I imagine if you were in a suburb of Lisbon or Porto that was more quiet.

1:13:19 Lisbon, like I've heard Setúbal is pretty chill. I think you still have some of the convenience of the big city, but you wouldn't necessarily feel crowded like you would in the downtown area of Lisbon. You know, these popular districts like the Bairro Alto district that has become very popular for tourists.

1:14:12 Why don't I look that up? That's a good point. The Scandinavian countries rank really high. Spain is up there. I felt that way in Spain. I felt like people are pretty considerate. Argentina is of interest to me for sure.

1:14:40 Do you know says I lived in Batumi, Georgia during the pandemic. Got a business visa and was able to fly in November of 2020 because of it. Great place, nobody bothers you at all. That sounds really awesome.

1:14:53 Really chill and like you have plenty of personal space, and I've heard it's very business-friendly as well. I don't know if it's still the same, but I've heard you can easily get that one-year visa, that business visa. I think it's a few hundred, and you get one year's stay.

1:15:16 And I've heard it's a really interesting country, a lot of history there. I'm also a fan of a number of UFC fighters from Georgia or that have affiliations with Georgia, like Merab, he's a popular wrestler and the champion at 145. Ilia Topuria, he's half Georgian.

1:15:35 So I think it'd be interesting to go to the country that pumps out these really tough dudes. And I don't know if there's any female Georgian fighters yet, there probably are some that are coming up through the ranks.

1:15:49 But that's a good point, Tony. The Scandinavian countries did pop up. I will say due to their cold weather and their kind of tough immigration policies, they wouldn't be as favorable toward our needs. But Spain, you know, when I...

1:16:07 Why don't I share? Spain is a place I've been. The taxes are tough in Spain, so if you actually become a taxpayer in Spain, I've heard they are quite high. And so that's why a lot of people opt not to become citizens, but you know, even a part-time resident, like spending maybe three months of the year there would be really nice.

1:16:35 I don't know as much about Argentina, but a lot of these countries do seem more developed. I've heard good stuff about Poland as well from an expat perspective, that they tend to be welcoming and there's a lot of development. I know there's a lot of outsourcing of tech jobs right now to Poland.

1:16:58 But yeah, that's interesting that Portugal is not higher up on the list. Galactic Spectator says, wow, that is really interesting. I wouldn't mind living in a chill place like that, which has no beef with the rest of the world. Yeah, I definitely agree with that.

Georgia: Business-Friendly and Underrated

1:17:19 You just have the sense of peace, right? Like you don't feel like you're having to stress with that. You're not having to stress about that. Belo seems pretty introverted as well. Do you know says you'd probably love Georgia if you're extremely introverted. You can go to some places almost in the middle of nowhere, very beautiful, mountainous, and cheap.

1:17:54 All the food is organic. Man, that sounds amazing. Doom Hower, maybe I'll have to stop there on the way back to the States next year. I've been trying to pick a place that could serve as kind of an in-between, because it's really far going back to the States from Southeast Asia.

1:18:13 So if I have the time, I wouldn't mind flying to like Tbilisi or Batumi, staying for like a couple of weeks, and then doing the rest of the way back to the States.

1:18:30 Tony says, you're getting me excited about Spain and Portugal. Alex, yeah, Tony. And there's a channel, what's her name? I need to share the link really quick for you, Tony. This is actually a couple from Canada, and they spend a lot of time in Portugal. They go, they spend like every winter in Portugal.

1:19:05 Every winter in Portugal, so you might take a look at them and their channel, Tony. Because they recently retired, they're from the UK but lived in Canada for most of their adult lives. You might appreciate their perspective, but yeah, Spain and Portugal are super underrated. I think it's one of those situations where it would be hard to get a citizenship because they really cracked down a lot on people getting citizenships by investment. But for three months or something like that per year, I think they're great options.

1:19:37 I do believe they're both within the Schengen zone, so they will count toward that 90-day maximum stay in the EU. But you know, it may be a situation where maybe you go there during the summer and spend a few months there every summer, and then you're able to go on to other destinations.

1:20:03 Absolutely. Dohow says, absolutely, when you're easy to open a business, it's encouraged. The history is very thick, they keep everything, entire areas are out of a history book, zero tax on earnings. That's amazing, Dohow. Like, I, yeah, he says, I sold during the crypto cycle, 0% income tax. That's brilliant, Dohow. I have to look into that because I do have some crypto holdings that I have strong confidence will grow a lot in the future.

1:20:38 I was talked out of buying Bitcoin when I was a teenager by a well-meaning but not very bright, or let's say, not very insightful family member. And that's been a big regret in my life. But in the meantime, I bought some. I tend to buy more. That's the whole reason I want to go back to work in the states, is that I want to add to my crypto holdings. And then when I get my cash out moment, you know, I can put in my two weeks and fly to a place like Georgia and just get my big bag of money and plan the rest of my life.

1:21:14 You only have to be right once. Like that's the beauty of investing. Is once you win, unless you really make some dumb mistakes, you've kind of won for a long time. You can keep rolling your success into better, bigger, and better success. My ideal would be my crypto takes off, and I go full-time on YouTube and I'm able to give it the attention that it deserves and needs, because I feel like currently I can't do that right with my attention split up between trying to interview.

1:21:44 The good thing is, I'm in an industry that can be potentially quite lucrative, like being in tech. There's some potentially really big paydays out there for me, which I can parlay into investments that you know will grow and earn me more money in the future. But yeah, thank you so much, Dohow, for expanding upon that and sharing about your experience in Georgia.

1:22:05 I know Nomad Capitalist, I don't know him personally, I know of him through his channel. I know he has a lot of controversy. I'm not here to speak on his merits or demerits, but I do know he's been a fan of Georgia for a long time. And certainly, you know, I could see something like that being advantageous to people that do live that kind of travel, business person lifestyle.

Malaysia and Underrated Travel Destinations

1:22:29 Tony says, cost of living in Scandinavian countries is the highest in the entire world. Yeah, Tony, it was in Helsinki. I was shocked at the prices because I came from California and I was like, wow, these prices are even higher, or on par with the Bay Area, which was shocking because the Bay Area is extraordinarily expensive. And so to be somewhere else that matches prices was shocking.

1:23:03 Andy and culture shouldn't be overlooked for introverts. Culture, yeah, I agree, Tony. I think that the mountain people are so laidback and friendly, relaxed, keep to themselves. But they, I feel like, you know, there's a misconception. I don't think you feel this way, Tony, but I think sometimes people mistake introversion for maybe not being friendly. And I don't think that way at all. People were very like, smiling a lot at me in the Bandian regions.

1:23:37 And so they might not come out and say it, but you definitely feel welcomed as far as with smiling faces and people that are happy that you're enjoying their culture, their weather, their scenic vistas, their unique.

1:23:59 tax after 180 days like Thailand just implemented, but 0% tax. And Galactic Spectator says, awesome, smart man, Dohow. Yeah, I think so. Dohow is really ahead of the game, ahead of the curve. We have so much to learn from somebody like him. I appreciate you joining. I say him, that's an assumption, but, you're definitely appreciate your input.

1:24:20 Adding Georgia to my list. Galactic Spectator says, yeah, and you know that something like that kind of reminds you of having some tax-friendly policy is Malaysia, right? I went to Malaysia about five years ago and I loved it. I was like, oh, this is like super underrated. I mean, it's you're in Southeast Asia, so you have the hot weather, but you also have modern shopping malls. But because it was a former British colony, things seemed a bit more orderly in certain ways that was really appealing to me.

1:24:53 Like I felt like I could get around Kuala Lumpur really easily. The flow of things just seemed more familiar to me. I think Malaysia's underrated, and Georgia is probably similar in terms of being underrated.

Peru Travel Safety and Small Town Charm

1:25:10 A smallish medium city like Cajamarca, Peru, looks really peaceful. I agree, Tony. Like, I will say, Tony, the one thing I would be careful about in terms of rural Peru, and I'm not going to share it here, although it should be fairly easy for all of you to find, but there is an unfortunate story that I read about that happened to this couple in rural Peru. They were trying to do like a really long vehicle-based journey, so driving through South America.

1:25:43 And they got into an area that was not very safe. So I would say like certain parts of the Andes, especially rural areas, have some potential to be unsafe. If I find the link, I'll try to share it in the next live stream. It's not necessarily something I want to go digging for right now. Not going to say it's all unsafe, but I've heard there's some areas that are in the Peruvian Andes that you do have to be cautious about.

1:26:17 So yeah, some small towns like places like Puno, near Cusco, I'm sure fine, they're on the well-worn tourist trail. But some places that are really out there in the bush, I do think additional caution is advised.

1:26:37 THC 11335 asks, where are you off to next? Yeah, so great question, THC. I'm going to go ahead and pull up Da Nang here. Yeah, I have a flight booked for two weeks from today, flying to Da Nang, and I'll be in Da Nang for at least a month, but probably more like two months. Ideally, I spend two months there, then I'll go down to probably Saigon for about a month.

1:27:10 But you know, like I said, Saigon may be too big for me. I know it's going to be like Bangkok, and I watched a channel I subscribed to recently that went there and said it can be pretty overwhelming. So maybe I shoot for like two and a half months in Da Nang, and then let's see, Da Nang, and then a couple of weeks in Saigon.

1:27:42 Tony says, Nora, thanks for the tip. Yeah, they have such a like friendly demeanor, and they're, they really communicate ideas effectively, and they have like just kind of a pleasant voice. Both of them have pleasant voices. And yeah, yeah, I mean, they're starting to get recognized. It's kind of funny. They are starting to get recognized in the Algarve because they promoted a lot.

1:28:05 And I actually went there partially on their recommendation, just from seeing their videos, partially also on the Walters World recommendation, and I'm thrilled with that decision. It was perfect for a break from the corporate rat race, and just the Bay Area rat race in general, and just being able to go and chill out.

1:28:27 Yeah, Dohow says, cool. I haven't thought about Portugal in a while. I might try it again now that I'm older. I was 20ish. Yeah, definitely. Definitely let us know, Dohow, if you make it to Portugal. I thought it was really cool and underrated. It wasn't, you know, it was definitely a change of pace because I went there from London. So I visited London and then went there, and I was like, wow, this is so different. London is hustling and bustling, people are walking fast and in a hurry trying to get around, trying to get things done.

1:29:01 And here people are not in such a hurry. Even in the coffee shops, I was shocked because I noticed people were hurrying to get to the coffee shop in the Algarve, Faro, and then to get on their way to work. But then the people working in the coffee shop were like, ah, this is just a tourist that doesn't know how this works. And so they were very patient. I was surprised by that. They were very patient with me.

1:29:32 Tony says, when planning your FIRE, do you go by the 4% rule when your investments are at an amount where you can take out 4% a year and never come close to running out?

1:30:00 Yeah, Tony, I'm probably going to go by a little bit more conservative 3% rule. But yeah, I mean, you know, it depends on where I'm at with work. I mean, if I'm really just done with work and stressed out, like ready for a long break, I may go with 4%. But yeah, I think 4% or less is ideal for me personally. I can't speak to other people's needs or risk tolerance.

1:30:30 But yeah, and you also have to include in that too, like making sure you're setting aside money either yourself insuring or paying for an insurance bill. So I've learned there's a lot of surprise or unexpected expenses over the last year that I have to figure out how to account for. But yeah, I think that amount should be sufficient for myself.

1:31:09 Yeah, um, so let's see. Snow and Kur, they drive around the world in a van. I think they had trouble in Peru. I'm not sure if it was them. There's another couple, unrelated, that I can't think of their names, but yeah, let's see.

1:31:26 Let's see. In Peru travel, I'll just look up.

1:31:31 In Peru travel, I'll just look up the article. The article, um, you know, I can't, it's just not popping up. I don't know why it's not popping up. If I find it though, Tony, I'll be happy to share it with you. They named a really small village, probably not a lot of people are familiar with.

Tourism Impact and Travel Philosophy

1:31:54 Yeah, Doomar, I am glad you got out of there and that you're safe. Safety is definitely a concern anywhere we travel. A lot of people are like, 'Oh, how could you travel outside the US? It's so dangerous outside of America.' I'm like, even in America, we need to be cautious about our safety and well-being. We need to think about where we're traveling. Some places are much less safe than others.

1:32:17 So yeah, I'm glad to hear you got out of there. Tony says, 'From what I've heard, the locals are getting upset over tourism.' That's hearsay though. I've heard the same thing, like Doom Hower, that the locals are getting priced out, that the influx of tourism has been greater than what the infrastructure can handle. I did think that it, like, you got the sense that a fair amount of people were priced out.

1:32:48 Like, I don't know how else to frame it. When you go out, you see like, like I stayed, you know, not too far from the downtown area, and you definitely see like a lot of tourists relative to what the infrastructure is there.

1:33:29 Tony asks, 'Does anyone who watch Jorge Arteaga Travels? He moved from the US to marry a Mexican girl. He's a very simple guy, simple life, lives cheaply.' You know, I do watch him. He's got some interesting content for sure.

1:33:59 Yeah, I try to avoid politics completely, just because it's none of my business. Like, I don't have any agency in any of the places I go. I'm not there to interfere at all. And I tend to avoid criticizing other bloggers. I say a little bit occasionally, but I really have to be kind of pressed on it. Even then, I just don't think it's super helpful.

1:34:35 Like, for me, if I don't like a certain vlogger, I'm just not going to watch it. And I also don't have an axe to grind. Like, some people are pushing me to be more political in my videos. Like, I'm happy to talk about US politics because I am allowed to talk about that. I don't know that it's super helpful.

1:34:59 And I also, even though I know a lot about it or I'm educated about it, I don't know if it's super helpful to the audience. And I also don't know if it's the audience that I necessarily want to attract. I mean, if I go back to the US, I know I'm going to be stressed out, kind of unhappy, just to be totally transparent. I know I'm not as happy in the United States.

1:35:22 And so that might be a time where I make more attention-grabbing content, in part because I'm just trying to get over or trying to commiserate, I guess, with people that are stressed out in America. Personally, the only reason I really look at America these days as far as a place to go is just because of the high salaries. Other than that, I don't really have an attachment to the US.

1:35:49 I have some friends, but my friends are living their own lives. And I'm not the type of person, even though I'm unhappy with the greater system in the US or the stress of the work culture and all that, I don't want to be the type that counts on my friends to make me happy. I've never been that type, and I don't want to start being that way.

1:36:15 Like, 'Oh, I was so unhappy in the States, but now that we're all together, I'm totally happy.' I think that's putting too much pressure on people to please you or to try to make you happy. And I just don't think it's fair to your friends to have that kind of relationship. Just as I wouldn't expect if I had a friend that wanted to travel and I was not the traveling type, I would not expect them to stick around.

1:36:47 'Oh, don't travel, just hang out with you, hang out here in town, let's just stay in town, let's just do stuff in town.' Everybody's different and has to prioritize their own things. And like, I would love for some of my friends back home to come travel with me or to come visit me abroad.

1:37:07 If I intended to stay in Thailand, I have several friends coming in September to Thailand from different friend groups because they've been watching my content and my videos and my streams, and now they're wanting to come get a taste of Thailand and experience it for themselves. And I'm so happy for them, but I'm going to be continuing on in my journey.

YouTube Growth and Financial Independence Goals

1:37:24 And I don't want to extend my stay in Thailand longer than I need to because, I mean, if I could extend my stay in Thailand for three more months, maybe I would do it. They do require that I would extend for six months, and I'm not sure that I want to commit to another six months here. So that's why a big reason why I'm ready to go on.

1:37:51 Timing-wise, it's not ideal, but no, I mean, I just, I don't like zero-sum games. Tony, thank you so much for the Super Chat. I really appreciate it, or Super Sticker. I'm really sure what they're called, but yeah, thank you so much for the support.

1:38:13 Like, I don't think it's, I don't like to play zero-sum games, so I feel like with the vloggers that start the drama, they're trying to beat somebody. I'm not trying to beat anybody. Like, I look at it like I'm super fortunate to be able to travel abroad. I'm super fortunate to be able to have seen the places that I've seen. I'm not competing with anybody.

1:38:36 There's nobody out there that I need to be better than, or they're getting more views than me. I don't really care. Everybody has something to add to the Xack community or the digital nomad community. And I also don't like to box myself in.

1:38:51 When it comes to politics, I see myself as politically homeless. My personal ideas don't fit well into any group. I studied, I majored in political science in undergrad, so I thought I was going to be a lawyer, which will probably cost me a few subscribers. But I've studied it on a very deep level.

1:39:18 I get along with people of a lot of different backgrounds. I feel like when you travel the world, you can't be too rigid. You can have strong opinions, but they should be loosely held, and so you should be willing to change your mind. I've had so many things shock me and change my mind over the course of my travels that totally shifted my perspective.

1:39:43 If I felt strongly then, I don't know. The only time I get really bothered is when I get the impression somebody has an axe to grind and they're looking to start conflict. And so then I will try to just boot them from the channel because I do this because I enjoy it.

1:39:59 If I was doing this for financial reasons solely, naturally, you know, somebody putting time into content creation wants to be able to sustain it, right? I mean, I buy equipment for my channel, I purchase software for my channel. Obviously, traveling is not free.

1:40:21 But I don't expect to succeed on YouTube in the same way that I would in my career, like in my software sales career. Has a lot, just to be totally transparent, if I'm talking solely about the money, that's, you know, where there's a lot more opportunity.

1:40:39 And so yeah, this is for me, this is principally should be a lot of fun, just connecting with viewers that have a lot of insight to share with the audience. And yeah, so I'm kind of TBD as far as direction goes when I go back to the States. I still have travel plans in the future, like when I get vacation from work or when I hit my FI number and I can go traveling full-time.

1:41:06 But I want to maintain and kind of show like the incremental steps I take to get there because this will be helpful in the future if somebody is thinking about financial independence, retire early, the FIRE movement, they find out about living abroad, then they can go and check out that content.

FIRE Journey and Financial Independence

1:41:24 'Oh wow, this guy had just a standard corporate job and worked his way, earned, saved, invested his way into financial independence.' And these are some of the steps and the tips that I can take to get there. Yeah, that's a great question, Tony. How old do you think you will be when you reach FIRE?

1:41:53 So if things stay, the tricky part was I got laid off last summer, so I've been unemployed for one year now, unfortunately. On the good side of things is I did save a lot when I was working and invested some. Roughly speaking, I'm thinking late 30s will be when I hit financial independence. It may be sooner if something goes better than expected.

1:42:20 But I think that's kind of my rough time frame. Maybe mid-30s if things go way better than expected. But I try to be conservative on my estimates because I don't want to get ahead of myself. I don't want to hit 35 in about three years and not be there yet and be like, really unhappy.

1:42:45 Because I think a person has to develop appreciation for the process and the things that are very valuable in life. We have to earn with hard work, and investing is its own form of hard work, doing research, finding out which companies you feel more strongly about, reading financial statements, understanding their use cases through industry.

1:43:11 But yeah, conservative estimate around 40, so like 8 years from now. But it could come before then. And if I don't hit it by then, I'll probably be much closer to the point where I can fire, just by working toward it.

1:43:32 When I was last year, before I got laid off, in that year, I was able to save like about 70% of my income. So if I am able to maintain that, you know, save something like 70% of my income, then that will really push me there. And hopefully, we don't have another.

1:43:53 Hopefully, we don't have another down cycle in the next 10 years that will hamper me in that process as well. But yeah, that's kind of a rough estimate. If I go back to school, it's going to push it out further, which is why I'm trying to avoid going back to college. But I'm also having to do some research on it because it may be necessary for me to earn what I want to earn in the short term, just because the job market is cho- it's just kind of a confusing situation.

1:44:25 But that's my ideal goal. I'm very good about lowering my expenses in the states. I'm fine with living in not the best places. I'm fine with doing some amount of cooking at home. But I wanted to mix that with enjoying some time today because with the layoff, this was like a perfect time to come do an extended trip, knowing the industry is in turmoil and struggle.

1:44:53 Which, you know, if you're reading about it, like Synapse Bank, they're going through a lot of issues right now. I'm familiar with Synapse Bank through working in the fintech space. So, yeah, the goal is tentatively about 40. So, we'll see.

1:45:14 Who knows? Maybe I'll keep working on my YouTube channel after work in the states, then maybe it'll grow to a point where it's successful enough to reduce that time frame. But yeah, I think it's just helpful for guys who feel like it's just some faraway goal that they'll never get to. And it also provides some accountability.

1:45:36 What I really should be doing is posting a fund like when I get another job, posting a fund showing my financials, showing what I'm buying, showing the income, showing whether or not I'm hitting targets, if I'm in line with the goals that I'm trying to achieve. If there are any setbacks, like, oh, you know, I had to replace my phone, or I need to replace my computer, or maybe I sell my car.

1:46:07 That's something I'm thinking about in the back of my mind is if I get to a certain point, selling my car because a car is a big expense. And if I'm living in Northern California, if I'm in an urban neighborhood, then I don't really need a car. And cutting that expense out will save me several thousand dollars minimum per year, maybe even like three or four grand per year when you consider parking, oil changes, gasoline, registration, insurance.

1:46:37 And that's a big chunk if you think about it invested over time. And when I'm living in Northern California, I don't really feel like I have to have a car. It's nice, like I would take and go to the beach on the weekends or take it and go to some cities I haven't been to, but it's not my happiness isn't contingent on having a car because I'm happy in Southeast St. I don't drive at all over here.

1:47:05 So that's something to think about is like, you know, does having a car make me happy? It's convenient, but it's also stressful. Like when I got my car broken into last summer before I left California, that was stressful. I had to call and get somebody to come replace the window. Naturally, you feel violated. Somebody was in your vehicle going through your stuff.

1:47:26 So it can be kind of a hassle at times. Now, that's a non-issue in other parts of the US, but other parts of the US don't have that same job market that California has.

Renting vs. Home Ownership and Financial Planning

1:47:41 Even if Tony says, even at 40, you will have a great FIRE journey. I think that working towards and ultimately hitting FIRE can really boost your self-image and make you feel proud of yourself. It's something you earn through hard work, perseverance, etc., and then enjoying the fruits of your labor.

1:47:55 Yeah, Tony, I think it's so valuable. And you know, I really appreciate your support. Certainly, Tony, your support is very generous. It's helping me to get this piece of equipment that I need. It's already ordered and on the way, but little things like that, you know, help support the channel and help to create a platform to discuss this.

1:48:19 And thinking of it like as a funnel, right? On one end, you have guys that are financially independent. I imagine somebody like DoHow here in our chat. He's put in the work, he's grinded it out, he invested wisely, and now he's enjoying the fruits of his labor.

1:48:35 And then on the other end, the far other end, you have guys that are just starting to learn about this. Maybe they took a week-long vacation to Mexico. Maybe they got some dental work done in Tijuana, which was me a few years ago.

1:48:49 Beginning of 2022, I went down to Mexico to get some dental work done. And Tijuana was interesting. It was definitely rough around the edges, but it had character. It's a city with character. And I had great service there.

1:49:07 But, you know, so you've got this whole range of people. You've got people that are at the very beginning of their journey, and you've got people at the end of their journey, and everybody in between. And I'm somewhere in the middle.

1:49:17 And so showing people like, hey, I'm not somebody that's at traditional retirement age where I'm drawing a pension, I've got social security. But I'm also not a brand new, you know, brand new to traveling and totally unsure of where I'd want to go or what I'd want to do.

1:49:39 And I'm not a person who wants to stay in the US forever. Like I've spent, at this time, almost two years outside of the country. And so I'm convinced that this is the lifestyle that I want to pursue. This is the lifestyle for me.

1:49:52 And I think it resonates with people. And I think the growth of the channel shows that I just need to keep putting out more content, iterating more, and connecting with the audience more. Because, you know, there's the US has kind of got some challenges right now, and I think a lot of people want resolution in the short to medium term as opposed to the long term.

1:50:19 And I think some of that resolution can come in the form of, hey, why don't you go down to South America for three months? Or why don't you go try out this, you know, beach town of Mexico for six months? It doesn't necessarily have to be Southeast Asia or Europe, but even close by, I think it can be really interesting for a lot of people.

1:50:48 And yeah, it's a long-term thing, right? Very few people will earn enough money in one year to write to FIRE, but doing it over the course of five, 10 years is certainly doable. I mean, Jason, when he started his journey, Mr. Free at 33, and by the way, it's not sponsored or anything, I just think he's interesting and his story was inspiring to me.

1:51:09 But he started at like 27. He was like 30k in student loan debt and didn't have any money. He started at 27. He aimed to retire at 40. So it was originally called Mr. Free at 40. But then he built up his portfolio to around 100K and then he sold his blog.

1:51:31 Now, this is a thing that not everybody's gonna have. And I wouldn't, I don't think I would sell my YouTube channel because without me, the style of my channel, I don't think my channel really makes sense without me. But he sold his blog for, I think, 300K. And so with that, 400K, he had a he spent it on stocks. He had a 400K or so portfolio giving him 1,000 US per month.

1:51:54 And then he booked his one-way flight to Chiang Mai. And so he's been living in Chiang Mai ever since. I think it's been eight years or so. And he really inspired me. And I think, and he, like a lot of people would think, oh, he must have been like a lawyer or, you know, some kind of professional or whatever.

1:52:12 He described himself as blue collar, like he's working in an auto shop in Florida, doing like service, managing service for vehicles, like people needing to get their vehicles worked on. He started off, I think it was Chrysler, and then he moved up to more expensive models, Audi, the Audi brand. And he went from making like 40K a year up to 50K a year.

1:52:40 So he really scrimped and saved. He ate ramen a lot. He talks about how at work, people would joke with him and say, what are you having today for lunch, Jason? And he would say, I'm having mistake. But his interviews are fascinating. There are ones that I go back and watch every couple of years.

1:53:09 DoHow says, I prefer not to have a car in Southeast Asia. It's such a luxury to have other people drive you around for next to nothing. You don't have to park or worry about anything. See, DoHow, I feel the same way. I'm like, why would I want to drive a car?

1:53:22 When you travel in Southeast Asia and you look at the much lower expense, it's like I feel much, I feel less like a chump in Southeast Asia when I've got somebody else that's piloting for me, dealing with the traffic headaches, that's used to the pace of the traffic, that speaks the language, that knows, hey, this is a toll road, we shouldn't be on this one, or hey, this parking lot is employees only, or whatever.

1:53:52 You know, you don't have to think about all those intricacies when you've got a favorite driver. I know Michael Johnson, he joins us sometimes on our streams. He mentioned he's got a guy that basically functions as his driver. He's from the US like I am, but he's living in the Philippines, and he's got a guy that will come and pick him up and take him wherever he wants to go.

1:54:16 And that's so much better than having to, okay, did I do the oil change like whenever I go back to the US, I'm going to have to go do an oil change. Did I get the tires rotated? Did I replace the windshield wipers? All this maintenance. I mean, I find that in the US, people rarely talk about what I call the cost of ownership.

1:54:40 So I think this relates to the FIRE topic a bit, but we always talk about what's the purchase price or what's the payment, but we don't often talk about what does it cost to own that thing. So if we think about a house, we talk about what's the mortgage payment, but we don't talk about how often is the roof going to need to be replaced, how often do you need to paint, how often do you need to change the carpet?

1:55:03 Change the carpet, do you need to change the flooring? Do you need to pave the driveway? All these things add up and cost a fair amount of money, and they aren't necessarily taken into account. That's why I like to rent in the States. I know some might disagree, and it depends on the individual too, right? Some people inherit a house, some people purchased a home when home prices were lower relative to incomes, or when mortgage rates were much lower. But for me, I'd rather just like living in a rental where the landlord takes care of everything. I use the difference that I would be spending on home improvements or extra bills associated with the home into investments.

1:55:45 It could be different. Some people would like to rent their home out because they're unsure as to where they want to live abroad. They don't know how long they're going to be gone, and they figure, 'I'm going to rent my home out and then maybe in a few years, if I pick a place, then that might be the time at which I sell it or I just keep it as a rental property.' Overseas landlording, I haven't done it myself, but I imagine it could be a bit of a headache and cause some stress.

Travel Warnings and Personal Freedom

1:56:17 Great point, Tom Hower. I agree with you. Jinsa says, 'Alex, glad details for next move or sat. I appreciate your thoughtfulness charting out a FIRE path. I'll be visiting Bangkok next week. If you'd like, if you're still there, it would be great to meet up for lunch.' Yeah, hit me up. Next week will be my final week. Jinsa, feel free to send me an email. I'll throw my email, well, the email should be in the descriptions of my videos. It's the 'Help Alex Living Abroad' email. I need to change it though, because I'm no longer using the 'Alex Living Abroad' account name. I probably need to make like an 'Eastern Dreamer' Gmail to swap it over. But until I get there, yeah, 'Help Alex Living Abroad,' feel free to send me an email, Jinsa, and we can meet up and grab some lunch.

1:57:22 Tony says, 'I'm so with you on renting. Home ownership is like a religion in Canada and the US. People don't take into consideration the downsides and the pros of renting.' Yeah, Tony, you know, I've had to move for work. When I was a renter, that was a lot easier to move for a job when I didn't have to worry about selling a place or trying to find something to rent it out. I just packed up my car and went to earn that money. So yeah, super helpful to be a renter if you're a single guy, a bachelor. I can see why some people with families would prefer to own a home, but flexibility-wise, it's just so nice to be a renter and be able to move to a different city. It's also helpful with travel. I'm not calling up a property management company back home, 'Hey, is this fixed? Hey, is that fixed?'

1:58:25 I did own a property in Denver at one time, and I sold it. Not too long after I sold it, the HOA company there hired an outside firm to help manage the HOA. Bureaucrats ripped off the fund, they stole all the money people had been paying for the upkeep of the property and disappeared. I think she's still on the run. I don't know if she's ever been caught, but there are a lot of risks that come with home ownership that are not really... Basically, society and the government wants people to own homes, so they don't really tell people about the downsides. It's similar with college; society and the government want people to go to college, so they don't really talk about the downsides. Same with car ownership, same with corporate jobs, same with a lot of things. There's a vested interest to get people to kind of stay in their own lane.

1:59:23 People ask me, 'Why does the government tell people that these other places are bad with the state warnings?' I'm like, well, some of it is that they want you to stay there and stay in the system. Are there some dangerous places in the world? Certainly. But not everywhere is dangerous, and some people will find that their version of happiness is somewhere out there, just waiting to be discovered.

Taxes, Property Ownership, and Cost of Living

2:00:01 Tom Hower says, 'Yes, and property taxes. I was at the deciding point where I would need to buy a house in the US, and I realized I could just live in Thailand off of what I'd be paying on income tax every month.' Doom Hower, I mean, I was paying in California probably about $2,000 a month in income tax, just in taxes on my paycheck, not just income tax but also Social Security contributions. So, just in those taxes, you can easily live in Thailand on $2,000 per month. I don't even spend $2,000 per month. So, property tax, I look at it like you're paying a rental payment that you don't really fully own the property because you've got to pay this additional payment every year, and you can't go without making that payment. That payment goes up every year.

2:01:12 Tony says, 'I liked the Alex Your Broad handle.' Yeah, Tony, I would have stuck with it, but there's this other channel, he's got a really big channel that goes by 'Living Abroad,' and I didn't want people to think I was trying to steal his clout or thunder or something like that. It's a different style channel as well. But yeah, no, it's definitely a creative name. It's kind of got an alliteration type of feeling as well.

2:01:42 Jinsa says, 'Got it. Okay, great.' Awesome. Tom Hower, 'Man, California gets robbed. It's so crazy.' Yeah, property tax nowadays, especially because you have Prop 13 in California, so you've got people in California paying like $30,000 a year in property tax, living next door to people paying like $3,000 a year. People get their property tax rate locked in when they buy. On one hand, it's good because it helps out older senior citizens and retired people who would probably have to move if their property tax went up. You see that in Texas. On the other hand, it makes the cost of ownership out of control for a lot of people. You've got people that may be able to buy a million-dollar house but don't want to spend $30,000 a year in taxes just to own that house. It favors super-rich landlords that can afford to just sit on properties. There are plenty of empty storefronts all throughout San Francisco where people are just sitting on their property and not renting it out because the risk of bad tenants is so high that they're better off leaving some of these properties empty. There are a lot of absentee landlords in all the major cities, but San Francisco is a particularly extraordinary example of that.

2:03:14 Galactic Spectator says, 'Well, with the sky-high property prices, home ownership has basically become handcuffs for many people in Canada. Mortgage payments are now in excess of 50% for most people's paychecks.' Yeah, I mean, it is out of control. The prices are out of control. They're being used as investment vehicles for a lot of people.

2:03:44 Yeah, plus utilities, property taxes, maintenance costs, and mortgage interest. Average mortgage doubles the price you pay, plus your startup and moving costs. When you buy the house, you've also got to buy furniture. A lot of people immediately get to doing updates if they buy a fixer-upper, so they're buying paint, they're buying windows. Like when I sold my place, I only owned it for like a year. I had to get a window replaced because somebody broke a window throwing a rock, trying to break in. Fortunately, they didn't get in, but there's other things too, like things needed to be painted, some tiles needed to be improved. Stuff that unfortunately I never learned how to do, so some of that's on me. But yeah, the costs were out of control just to own a condo that was in Denver. I don't have any interest in dealing with the hassle. I'd rather just deal with some lower maintenance, maybe lower potential return, but lower maintenance type of things because you really have to invest a lot of your time and oversight if you're a property owner.

Affordable Housing and Remote Work

2:05:04 You've got rental properties, plus insurance. Insurance is the big one. If you're in parts of Florida or California, you can't even get insurance. In certain places, these insurance companies have figured out it's not profitable for us to ensure in some of these areas. That would be really stressful if you're a homeowner and you're counting on that. It may be required as part of your mortgage. If we're going to grant you a mortgage, you've got to have full coverage, which would then only allow for cash buyers. But then two, it's like if something happens and you lose it, that's awful, to lose your investment, to lose your property. So, it's certainly more advantageous right now to be a renter when you compare rental prices versus purchase prices.

2:05:57 For me, I know I'm not going to... There's one circumstance I will tell you guys about where it could make sense to buy. If I felt more confident about the remote job market, I would do this. There are parts of the Southern US and Midwest US where these towns are part of the Rust Belt.

2:06:14 These towns are part of the Rust Belt and they've been hollowed out. There's nobody really living in these places. I can pull up Missouri, USA, and there are parts of this state and parts of the Midwest in general, parts of the Southeast, where the populations are dwindling.

2:06:39 We've talked about population decline a bit on this channel, where the houses are super cheap. You can get decent houses for 50 to 100K, and maybe it would be worthwhile to get one compared to paying rent in California, where rent is still quite high.

2:06:59 But you know, it's probably not worth it if you lose your remote job and can't get another remote job, and you're back in the same problem of going back to California, back to New York, LA, you know, cities with a lot more jobs. So that's a real risk of some of these, 'Oh, just buy, just move to the South,' or 'Just move to the Midwest.'

2:07:18 Yes, you can get really cheap houses. I worked with a guy that was living in Cleveland with his family, and Cleveland, you know, not definitely LA or New York, but he was working in software sales and felt like his house there was equivalent to like one year's income.

2:07:39 So that's when I think it can be worthwhile. It's like, okay, I'm going to make enough to pay this off in a few years. But now, so yeah, most places it makes sense to just be a renter, like most places that are big job hubs: New York, California, even Texas. Texas has very high property taxes, so you're better off there.

Vietnam Travel Plans and Stream Conclusion

2:08:04 But yeah, any plans ahead for this week? I'll probably wind down shortly because my voice is starting to go. It's getting pretty late here in Bangkok, it's about 2 AM here. But yeah, feel free to chime in with any thoughts or questions or concerns. I'm going to hit the restroom, but I'll be right back, guys.

2:09:16 It's a lot to think about, it's a lot of planning to do. I think there's so much to think about when it comes to doing there. So much planning to do. I really appreciate all of you joining me tonight, or in the morning, or midday, depending on where you are in the world.

2:09:38 I'm excited about Vietnam, I guess. I guess I could talk about a bit about Vietnam before I wrap up. Vietnam has been on my list for a really long time. See you soon, Tony. Have a good one. I hope you have a wonderful rest of your Sunday, your weekend goes well.

2:09:59 And yeah, thanks so much for your support, Tony. But yeah, Vietnam, really excited about it. Flying out two weeks from today, I'll be landing in Da Nang. Running around Da Nang, hope to meet up with some subscribers. I think it'll be really, really interesting.

2:10:14 I've been looking forward to Vietnam for a long time. Only recently, in the last couple of years, I wanted to venture over there. My buddy Jesse, who's traveled a ton, has told me, 'Hey, you need to go to Vietnam while you're living over there.' So I'm going to go check it out.

2:10:30 But yeah, thanks so much, everybody, for watching. I'm going to go ahead and wind down the stream. I hope you all have a wonderful rest of your weekend, and I look forward to talking with you all soon.

2:10:40 As soon as my equipment comes in, I'll be able to start working on videos. Hopefully, that arrives in the next couple of days. But yeah, I really need to get some videos out, so talk to you soon.