Comment by g_sch | Hacker News Reader

Comment by g_sch | Hacker News Reader

I'm interested in a lot of these responses because they don't reflect my experience - I wonder if that's the result of sampling bias (e.g. people with good travel experiences are drawn to this thread) or if I'm the aberration.

Granted, I didn't quit my job, but after graduate school I moved to Germany from the US and took a job consulting. For three years I lived in places like Berlin, Madrid, Split...etc for 3-9 months at a time. There were enjoyable things about it, sure, but I really underestimated how difficult it was to discard your entire social circle and start over. A few years ago I moved back to the US, in a city where a lot of my friends had moved to, and it was probably the most positive decision I've ever made in my life.

I also feel like my time abroad didn't "broaden my horizons" all that much, and I find myself skeptical about the claims that international travel makes you a better person. I think what you get out of travel is heavily based on how you decide to relate to places and people, and merely leaving your country does not guarantee this will change.

There's probably a strong interaction effect with charisma. People who have an easy time making friends tend to see extended travel periods as a non-stop adventure of fresh experiences. Whereas if you're more of an introvert who takes a long time to warm to people, it can be a protracted period of crushing isolation.

If you are an introvert traveling, I strongly recommend lots of reading. Bring a nice camp chair (I have tried several, my current favorite is the Helinox Sunset with rockers and a small camp-stool-turned-ottoman) and sit in the shady spots in parks. Find the best library reading rooms, museums, etc. and just read. Draw if you’re into that.

Negotiate this time with your extroverted traveling partners if necessary.

3-9 months seems long for the average American in terms of travel, but it really isn't long enough to gain a social foothold and enough understanding in the local language to feel a certain connectedness to the place. I absolutely think any travel abroad does broaden one's horizons, but perhaps not to the extent that it's touted in pop culture. I served in the US Peace Corps for two years, and the experience utterly shattered the person I was before, and re-formed me into someone far more understanding, compassionate, empathetic, etc. But that type of experience is highly focused with a great emphasis on cultural integration and language-learning.

I definitely agree that 3-9 months (especially at the low end of that range) isn't enough to feel sufficiently rooted somewhere, but one quick thing I would add is that I did all of this while speaking German fluently already, so my time in Germany at least was not consumed by trying to surmount any language barrier. I'm just someone who makes friends through my existing friends (instead of strangers), so starting from zero isn't something I do well.

Thanks for providing the opposite perspective, it's important to know that going abroad doesn't make your life magically better.

I am going to put in the most plain brutal way - if you're white (and good looking), you will have the most amazing time traveling internationally.

It is depressing but this is the cold hard truth.

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