Ready to hit the road...

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Before I left, I felt like I needed to escape for a long while. I seemed to have hit a rut and I didn't feel like I was getting anywhere at all. Work had become fairly tedious and I couldn't see myself really working in IT anymore. It was good while it was a challenge, but after a while you start to face the same thing day in day out, and the same people with the same problems. You'd get people getting a whole load of viruses, fix their problems and a week later come back with viruses again blaming you for not fixing it. No dipshit, you were just too careless and got the viruses again. Of course you couldn't tell them that, not in those words anyway. We had people who wanted us to work wonders for them, people come in with the stupidest problems, even one lady who would throw up if her fonts and screen resolution wasn't the perfect size. No, I had to leave all this behind to try and find the change I craved for.

It all started around four years ago, when my mate Andy and I were having a little chat. talking about money and getting car and house loans. I mentioned how rather than settle with all that I'd rather go travelling first, have fun while I wasn't tied down. And the irreversible spark was ignited. We went on talking from there, planning a big trip over to Europe. After a few months Andy piked on me, but by this point I had my heart set on my first trip. So I continued on, planned and set my first overseas adventure on its course and a year or so later I was on my way.

Now, it took a week or so to really set in, to realise what I was doing, what would set the new tone for things to come in my life. I was sitting near the beach in Monaco with a group of mates. It was about 9pm and the sun was setting on a beautiful day, the tempurater must have been about 25 degrees and I was sipping on a nice cold beer. At this point I wondered, what time is it back home? It must have been about 5 or 6 am on a Friday morning, and I realised people back home would just be starting to get up to conclude a long week of work. While I was chilling out, relaxing have the time of my life, people were slowly dragging themselves out of bed and trudging opn to work. And this was when I first realised how awesome travelling is. For the next two months I pretty much had the freedom to do what I wanted, when I wanted. At any given time I could just pack my bag, book a flight and head onto another place in the world without a worry. Then it all ended. Back home, working nine to five again, it just didn't feel right.

Towards the end of last year I had pretty much made my mind up that I was going to go on this adventure, leave it all behind and set out to conquer Europe. But out of curiosity I still checked out what other career paths I could find. An ooportunity popped up, a change into the telecommunications field that I thought was worth a shot at. Before I left to go to Vietnam and the Philippines I applied for the job, and got an interview. They were pretty keen on me and decided to give me the second interview before I left for the whole of January. I came close, real close to getting that job and putting this change I've taken on the shelf. But after the month I spent travelling, the fun I'd had I did have second thoughts about taking the job if I got it anyway. I knew sooner or later I would probably regret not taking this move to the UK while I still had the chance. I got a fantastic reminder of what it felt like on that day in Monaco. When in the Philippines, sitting on a beach in Boracay with my mate Bernie. The sun was setting and the temperature must have been about 25 degrees, beer in hand and some live music playing. Why would I want anything different?

Before I left I faced a lot of the same questions from the same people. Are you afraid? No. You're going to be by yourselfI couldn't do it? It's easier than you think. How long are you going for? Don't know. What are your plans? Don't know. How can you not have any plans, aren't you afraid? No. The whole point of this was for my own personal freedom from commitment. I didn't have any plans formed because I didn't need to. I was sure things would work out and so far they have. I didn't book any accomodation until the day before I left. I didn't start packing my bags until a few hours before I needed to leave. And guess what? It's all worked out fine. With my bags packed and a vague idea of where I was going, I was ready to hit the road.

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