Notes on Nomading
Dear readers,
If you find yourself constantly playing over the same debate in your head, about whether you should quit your job or climb a corporate ladder or buy an A-frame in the woods or join a polycule, you may be interested in what I have to say.
Your quarter-life crisis is peeking through the cracks.
And there are many reasons for that. Your rent is too damn high, and the student loan debate stresses you out. The stock market feels like a game for the rich and delusional, and your boss sometimes cracks jokes about AI doing your job better than you. It’s all terribly alarming – a real blow to the ole’ mental health. Perhaps you’re looking for a way out of this economic plight.
A promising, bright exit sign may look like a one-way ticket to Mexico City, or Bali or Lisbon or whatever digital paradise they’re hawking these days. And you can live like royalty there, if you’re earning in USD. You can afford an apartment with big windows, maybe even a balcony! You can eat lunch for $3! The weather is perfect all the time, and your stressors are gone.
But as your eyes begin to glaze from staring at your computer all day, or you’re craving iced coffee or struggling to make a doctor’s appointment, you might start to get a little homesick. Who doesn’t sometimes yearn for what they know and love?
So you’re left with two options: go home, or bring home to you. And you’re not going home.
So now, there’s a smashburger joint in the middle of Lisbon. And the local doctor speaks English better than Portuguese. The locals are scratching their heads as they pass by the restaurants and apartments they’ve suddenly been priced out of. You must remember, they are dealing with the same anxieties you were back at home – debt, AI, climate change.
But the difference is that they can’t run away.
So they’ll resort to calling you a colonizer, transplant, gentrifier, and probably worse. And those liberal, ethical values you once upheld feel called in question.
The truth is, we’re not meant to become neocolonizers in response to our woes at home. Unless we’re ready to learn the language, follow proper visa procedures, and generally contribute to society in our new home, we’re not ready to eat their resources for months and years.
“This is one of the major controversies of digital nomadism – namely, the potentially neocolonialist overtones of enjoying the fruits of a cheap, 'exotic' setting while creating an almost parallel economy and social circle.”
- Lauren Razavi, activist
But the future of work is digital. And more companies than ever are offering a subscription-based lifestyle, where you can hop anywhere in the world for the same price as your rent. Two questions arise:
How do I pursue a better life without leaving my community behind?
What does it mean to travel ethically?
These are the questions that I have pondered relentlessly for some time now. At 20, I wrote a book about ‘detourism’ and how to travel sustainably. At 22, I moved to NYC and reckoned with gentrification in my own city. At 24, I worked abroad in Costa Rica, becoming a temporary digital nomad. On top of it all, I’m a Pakistani immigrant, forever contemplating what my life would have been like if I stayed in the community in which I was born. Through my experience, I have arrived at a solution.
It’s called Embassee. Embassee is meant to help people swim sideways in the ethical riptide that is traveling these days, while also helping its members remain committed and devoted to their own communities. It does this in three ways:
Firstly, Embassee enables you to travel the right way. For 30 days, you will call a gorgeous property in a vibrant city home, living with a group of cool, built-in travel buddies. You’ll work together, get dinner together, and have the freedom to pursue your own itinerary.
Secondly, Embassee enables you to immerse yourself by learning your destination’s local language. You’ll be challenged by your peers to make quick progress, and you will be supported by on-site office hours.
Thirdly, Embassee enables you to share your stories with others. Like Anaïs Nin says, “We write to taste life twice, in the moment and in retrospect.” Whether through our curated chat, or our travel journals, we support your growth through expression.
While you travel, you won’t be contributing to transnational gentrification, and you’ll be actively communicating with locals in their own language. Like Mandela said, “If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language, that goes to his heart.” You won’t be a city-hopping tourist, and you won’t be a nomad overstaying your welcome. You'll be the Goldilocks of travel! Maybe not the best reference, but you get the point.
After your experience with Embassee, we want you to come back to your own community with a newfound sense of purpose, having undergone impactful growth with friends that will last you a lifetime. You’ll have a superpower – bilinguality – and a new perspective with which to view the world. Talk about a therapy dupe. And hopefully, you’ll have your own answers to stop the quarter-life crisis in its tracks.
See you there,
Samar
