5 Brutally Honest Things I Dislike About Travel (After 6+ Years of Living Abroad)
Lessons that can improve the lifestyle.
When I packed my bags and left the US in 2009, I had no idea how much that moment would transform my life.
But after living abroad for over six years across 3 different continents, there are some key things I don't like about it.
And these are important issues people rarely talk about, especially in the travel community.
In this article, I want to share the issues I run into to hopefully shed light on the problems, change your perspective, and offer ideas on how we can be better travelers. Good luck.
I Don’t Look Like a “US-Born American”
When I explain to locals that I’m “American,” they usually can’t understand how an Asian-looking person can be born in America (especially in Asia, of all places).
Hell, when I tell people that about half of everyone in Los Angeles is Latino, their minds explode.
But why?
It’s true.
I think a big part of that is because there’s a lack of minority representation among US travelers (i.e. the number of minority American travelers is not proportional to the number of minority Americans in general).
I wish more minorities could travel, but that’s not the reality.
Many of them would love to, but can’t. They can’t afford it. They can’t take time off from work. They don’t have access to travel hubs.
But if they could, I think it would greatly benefit the US—as well as the rest of the world.
Also, US media representation doesn’t help. It rarely shows an accurate depiction of the ethnicities in the United States since actors/actresses and scriptwriters are predominantly White.
As a result, the rest of the world takes what we give them and so it has a hard time understanding why (or how) Americans are anything but White (or Black).
98% of Photos Show Only 2% of Life
This is an inescapable fact.
BUT… I wish people were more transparent about their lives on social media. I think they’re afraid they’d lose followers or people would ignore them, but to me, I want people who are part of the ride (during the ups and the downs).
Inadvertently, this feeds into the "only share the best part of your life" problem that is so pervasive in travel.
As I've talked about before, a lot of these travel influencers make you feel jealous because—surprise surprise—they want you to feel jealous of them.
They want you to think that they are some amazing, larger-than-life person, but in reality, they're just a regular person who just spent a ton of money staging photoshoots so they can ride a motorcycle or horse on a beach.
Don’t fall for the trap.
There Are Bizarre Double Standards
Years ago, I read an article from an American family who sold everything, booked a one-way ticket to a European nation (I won’t name it, otherwise you’ll find the article), and “started their new life.”
Yet they didn’t speak the language, didn’t know anyone, didn’t have a visa enabling them to live, didn’t have a job, didn’t have insurance, or anything else of the sort.
Years after their move, they wrote an article that detailed how they got set up, how challenging it was to find jobs, and their complaints—but I was dumbfounded.
They were illegal immigrants!
They did NOT follow any legal way of arriving or follow tourist visa rules. They complained about “how hard it was to find a job,” yet they didn’t speak a word of the local language or have any right to work. It was insane!
Yet not one single comment in the article questioned their choices. They praised them for starting their “dream European life” yet didn’t even recognize the double standard that was staring them right in the face.
The double standard being, every year, countless people do the same exact thing—but they happen to be from Arab, African, or Asian countries.
And sadly, these people are NOT treated the same by locals or the travel community.
Would people call them “expats” or welcome them to the expat community?
Or instead, would people complain about the “migration crisis” and try to send them back to where they came from?
It isn’t fair, but that’s the reality.
There are also other double standards that make me scratch my head. For example, in the US, we're often very critical of ourselves because many of us only speak one language.
(By the way, that’s a strange narrative. If you're from a city with many immigrants, there are tons of second-generation Americans who speak at least two languages. Growing up in LA, all of my friends spoke multiple languages—Cantonese, Korean, Gujarati, Farsi, Spanish, Tagalog, etc.)
Yet if we go to popular tourist destinations that don't speak any other language except their own, we marvel at how sophisticated, cultured, and advanced they are.
Huh? So they're just as monolinguistic as us, but we hate ourselves and laud them—what gives us?
Please understand (but I'm sure some of you will still ignore this): I'm not criticizing these countries; I'm criticizing the double standard.
Many travelers only admire places because they're different, completely ignoring they’re a lot more similar than meets the eye.
It's the "grass is greener” in a nutshell.
There’s A Lot of Escapism
I run into a lot of American travelers, tourists, or “expats” (sigh) who left the US to escape all of the “divisiveness” and “political conflict” in the states.
Yet many times, they’re the most politically minded, fist-pounding people.
Real talk: Just because you can’t understand French, Khmer, or Portuguese, that doesn’t mean France, Cambodia, or Brazil doesn’t have internal conflict (and a lot of it).
There’s conflict and divisiveness all over the world.
You’re just switching the one you know for the one you don’t.
Look, I love Europe—that’s why I immigrated here. But I didn’t move here because “America is falling apart, it’s expensive, it’s dangerous, there’s too many homeless, blah blah blah.”
Every day, people come to Europe to escape war, genocide, poverty, and much more. But then I run into travelers who want to move just because their state went from blue to red?
Bravo.
Before I left, I wanted to make sure I wasn’t running away from something. I did years—years—of brutally hard self-work and introspection. I thought about my future, what I wanted, and what I felt in my heart.
Look, if you feel strongly about the first-world inconveniences you face, then bon voyage. But my best advice is this:
If you want to handle the emotional rollercoaster of long-term world travel or relocating to a foreign country, make sure you’re not “running away” from your problems.
Because, more often than not, those problems follow you.
And trust me, there are plenty of problems that wait for you in your new country. (It's not like becoming a citizen of another country is just that easy.)
Ultimately, it’s not the “problems”—it’s your opinion of them.
Instead, focus on the culture you want to immigrate to and how you can contribute to it, be a part of it, learn it, and embrace it—and not just hang out with the expat community, date the expat groupies (if you know, you know), and refuse to conform.
You Create A Lot of Jealousy
Few things bring out jealousy in others like travel.
Hell, you could buy a new car and get less flak or snark than going on your dream trip.
Thankfully, over the years, I’ve either distanced myself from people who were jealous or found friends without that insecurity.
But when you start, yes, you will see quite a bit.
It sucks because you’ll discover that the people you thought were your friends were only your friends under the condition that your life doesn’t become better than theirs.
You might need to have some tough conversations.
The only thing I’ll say is don't feed into this problem by being super arrogant or boastful, posting dozens of stories per day, gloating about how great your life is and how free you are, and rubbing everyone’s noses in it.
In that case, kindly cut that shit out because you’ll piss everyone off and alienate your friends.
Be humble and respectful. Don’t spend every phone call with your friends talking 90% of the time and telling them mundane stories. Their lives are interesting too.
Remember: You’re not “special” just because you took 1000s of pictures at some beach, castle, village, or rock.
You’re equal to everyone else no matter their job, number of passport stamps, and more.
Thankfully, that’s what I learned from travel, most of all.
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