I am 25 years old now and have visited more than 50 countries. I am not done with the university yet, but still, I have found many ways to discover four different continents. A lot of students, as well as adults, ask me, how did I do it? What kind of jobs allowed me to travel around? Let me sum up the jobs I have done so far. I thought it might be fun to look back and see my ‘career’ journey.
In the beginning, I want to say that in my teenage I wasn’t really sure of what I wanted to do and which career I want to pursue. I still don’t know it 100% or I would rather say that there are too many things I want to do. I also don’t recommend all jobs, some were difficult, some were underpaid, some were fun, but some not really. However, all the time I searched for some jobs, which help me to travel. These jobs are rather in an employment segment.
However, I don’t want to do a repetitive job and exchange my time for money anymore. At the moment, I tend to build your own online business, which sustains your travels and lifestyle. This can be anything from running your Youtube, selling products online or being a freelancer in photography or coding. There are so many options! But let’s see how my journey began!
Jobs I have done so far (at the age of 25) – chronologically
1. Walk dogs (Czech Republic)
Haha, don’t laugh – it was the first job I have ever done in my life! I guess I was like 8 years old and I created this business plan to walk dogs from our neighbourhood. However, we lived in the countryside where everyone just have a garden, therefore walking dogs was not the most lucrative job. However, I have seen some people doing it and I believe that in big cities this could work very well! Plus it very happy job most of the time!
2. Copywriter (remote)
I started as a copywriter when I was 13 years old and lasted almost a decade. I have worked for different kinds of media from regional newspapers to online agencies. Being a copywriter is truly location independent. If you want to start, I recommend contacting several media and pitching them your work or writing about something you are knowledgeable about. If you share your expertise, the editors can always correct your text since the content will be the most important.
3. Intern at Marketing and Sales (Colombia)
During the internship, I was responsible for translating multiple websites and communicating with customers as well as other companies. It was a great experience which taught me to do cold-calling and be more comfortable in business communication. It was my first real experience of a 9-5 job in a big city in Bogotá. Even though it was a valuable experience, I realized that this was probably not the path I want to walk on.
4. Animator (Tunesia)
After my high-school
5. Hostel Staff (Costa Rica, Panama) NOT PAID
This job was not paid, but it paid for my accommodation and food, which was enough for me when I backpacked Central America. I found a cool hostel on HostelWorld or Booking, contacted them and asked whenever I can help them out in exchange for a free stay. In Costa Rica, I actually did work a few hours a day, but in Panama, I literally had the best job ever. I was responsible for talking to clients in the hostel. Which I would do anyway! It was an amazing experience staying on an island in the Caribbean.
6. Language Tutor (remote)
In 2019 I searched for a student job, which would involve an international environment and would be flexible. Since I love languages, teaching them was quite a clear option for me. I started teaching English, German and Czech at the same time! This was after a couple of weeks very exhausting! Not only the preparation of materials but switching all three languages was demanding too! I ended up teaching Czech (my native language) to foreigners only. Thanks to the pandemic, it’s very common to study online and therefore, I have been doing this job for two years already and travelled to many countries while teaching. It is fun and all my students are extremely interesting! Some of them are my good friends too!
7. Data Entry (remote)
This job lasted only two months, but my good friend did the job more almost a year. Basically, it was a job which could have been easily done online anywhere in the world. This job was for me too repetitive and just energy-draining, while for my friend it was easily earned money. This was definitely a job which didn’t require any formal education, only a basic knowledge of English.
8. Tour Guide (Europe, South America)
I have worked several times for a few travel agencies as a tour guide. I started as a tour guide for an adventure travel agency leading a bike tour in Provence, France. Later, I did some school trips in Germany. During a pandemic, it was quite difficult to work in the industry and therefore I had a break. Lately, I got an offer to be an expedition leader in South America. In contrast to a tour guide, you lead a group for a few days or weeks. It is an almost 24/7 job which, however, doesn’t feel like a real job. You are paid to make people happy, safe and content with their travel adventures. I absolutely love this job. Being a tour guide is a great and fun job, but in my opinion too unstable!
9. Freelancer (remote)
I have been constantly doing some little paid gigs which include photography, videography, and writing articles. These are little things which don’t bring a constant flow of income, but I haven’t invested a lot of time into them recently. I never used any app like Fiverr or Upwork, but I know they might work very well!
10. Public speaker (Czech Republic)
11. Youtube
Late in 2021, I started to dedicate my time to my Youtube channel and it has paid off pretty quickly! I have shifted my content from purely travels to describing my Erasmus Mundus programme and apparently it has helped so many students! I started to monetize after less than four months. Less than two months after I received my first check. It is not a big sum which makes my life different, but it feels extremely great to be paid for something you love and you help others. Therefore, the year 2022 will be dedicated to Youtube more.
