By popular demand, I’ve decided to extend a travel series centered around the topic of building community or maintaining our need for social interactions when away from home. Community building is especially complicated when abroad, where cultures and languages vary considerably from our own. My guests today, veteran travelers with considerable expat experiences, are perfectly suited to discuss this topic.
Meghan Walker, a previous guest who writes at awaytofi.com, spent many of her formative years living abroad in Kenya and New Zealand. Her husband, Callan Cooper, is an expat living in the United States from New Zealand, where they met. Meghan and Callan joined me in my home in Colorado for a rare in-person interview, where we discussed in detail the beauty and challenges of international extended travel, careers, evolving travel philosophies, and financial tactics that can have you living a similar life much sooner than you think.
Topics Discussed with Meghan and Callan
- Recent travels and the decision to forego a move to Spain
- The practice of geoarbitrage: moving abroad to reduce costs of living
- Why Meghan spent so much of her life living abroad in Kenya and New Zealand
- Callan’s experience as an expat from New Zealand living in the US
- “Tall Poppy Syndrome” and the cultural differences in humility and self-promotion
- The difficulty in establishing deeper relationships as an outsider living abroad
- Changing travel philosophies
- The importance of staying put for deeper relationships and richness in life: “the rewards in being in one place for a while.”
- Why travel can be detrimental to building and maintaining strength and fitness
- Working while traveling
- Goals for Coast FI and how to reduce work commitments without full financial independence
- Changing mindsets on “how much you need”
- Logistical considerations of long-term travel if renting vs owning property
- Why Meghan and Callan have chosen to rent
- The ideal Coast FI lifestyle
- Part-time versus seasonal work
- Understanding the difference between passion and purpose and how climbing probably doesn’t serve both
- Why we don’t believe in retirement at any age
- So much more!
Get in Touch with Meghan and Callan
Callan’s van conversion company: Coyote Conversions
Other Episodes and Resources Mentioned
EP 44: Earning to Buy Time with Meghan and Jeff (A Way to FI)
EP 77: The Social Dilemma of Extended Travel (Jeff, A Way to FI)
EP 73: The Problem with Bucket Lists and How to Be Happy with Less
EP 74: Mini Episode: Is the Best Life Lived at Home?
EP 75: James McHaffie: From Bold Climbing to Novel Writing
EP 64: Jeff and Priti Wright: You Might Need a Sabbatical
EP 50: Key Pillars of the Meaningful Life
EP 68: What Happened to Frugality?
EP 2: Value Spending: A Damn Good Start
EP 67: The Real Cost of Home Ownership (and a Life Update)
Contentment: The Greenest Grass of Them All
Books
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