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Author Topic: Are there any digital nomads out there  (Read 4129 times)

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Offline kai #2

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Are there any digital nomads out there
« on: March 29, 2017, 04:28:49 PM »
My job became 100% remote and as you can imagine I'm ecstatic. I'm free to go where I want but I have a questions. How far out of the timezone would you go and roughly how long would you go for? Central and South America are all pretty much in the same timezone but if I wanted to go somewhere else. What do you think

Offline robert angel

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #1 on: March 29, 2017, 05:07:01 PM »
As long as I could adjust my sleep patterns to fit the work hours, timelines, demands, expectations of where my clients are based, I can't see any difficulty. But if you have an equal balance of clients in parts of Asia and then the Americas, that'd be tricky. I have some dual timezone 'GMT' watches, My Alpina 4GMT is sweet Swiss watch and my Omega's another that quick sets and I can move and reference the bezel (Planet Ocean). Some watches will track 3, even 4 timezones simultaneously. But some time zones as mentioned above  are 12 hours apart, 13 during that stupid daylight 'savings' time.

More and more, USA businesses, especially Doctors and Hospitals that are doing work and billing clients 8AM to 5PM, are at 5PM  then sending the bills directly overseas, 12 time zones away, so they can be coded, and billed ASAP to the clients, Time IS money.


I've worked the 'swing shift', where the first day it's 8AM to 4PM, the next day 4PM to 12AM, then the next day 12AM to 8PM (big city, three edition a day newspapers 'back in the day') and despite being in my low twenties age wise and superb physical shape, I couldn't hang with that. Well, physically I could, but mentally, it just wasn't worth it, as I never felt I was really in synch long enough with the people I cared about.

I'd try instead to get steady work with time zones not too far apart. Switching between straight nights and days can actually work fine for me, as I get half the 'normal time' to hang with people who are 'night' or 'day' people.

As I've experienced you can otherwise push it, but you'll end up like a zombie if you're always shifting time zones even without traveling. It's weird, but even traveling between twelve time zones a bunch of times, the so called 'jet lag' has never really fazed me (well, on the return, coming back leg---if it's less than a week apart, a little bit sometimes, but never missed a day of work) but the swing shift sure did wipe me out after a while, probably cause I was bucking it, burning the candle at both ends....
Whether you think you can or think you can't--you're right!

Offline Awesome

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #2 on: March 29, 2017, 06:50:12 PM »
I hear Thailand is popular among digital nomads.  Your timezone would be dependent upon the time zone/s of your clients.  Do you need to be available for tech/customer support at certain hours?  Time IS money in that regard.  If you're asleep at 2am while your client needs your attention he's not going to be your client for very long.

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #2 on: March 29, 2017, 06:50:12 PM »

Offline Hector_Lavoe

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #3 on: March 29, 2017, 11:59:43 PM »
D-a-m-n....I am jealous!

Assuming your job is focused on serving clients in the Central or Eastern time zone of the U.S. there would plenty of great choices in Latin America.

If it were me, I'd put Panama City or Medellin high on my list.

Offline Elexpatriado

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #4 on: March 30, 2017, 07:39:20 AM »
Time zone doesnt matter (that much). When I was working, I worked overseas with clients, vendors or work share enginers and drafts peopl in UK when I was in Trinidad, in Canada when I was in Kazakhstan and Germany when I was in Russia (that was bad because of the German "holiday" mentality).


You just have to be prepared to get up early and stay late, and take some of the documents 8 to 12 hours behind.


The big thing now in the Oil and Gas and petrochem industries is to work share with India.


At first it starts off terrible, but eventually, they get the systems going.


But in the end , it is always, always better and more efficient to work with someone face to face.

Offline Gavan

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #5 on: March 30, 2017, 08:11:40 AM »
I hear Thailand is popular among digital nomads. 


Yeah, Chiang Mai Thailand is one of the most popular destinations for "Digital Nomads".


Here is an interesting list:


https://nomadlist.com

Offline benjio

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #6 on: March 30, 2017, 10:32:49 AM »
Time zone doesnt matter (that much).


Agreed. What's much more important in your field is probably a reliable, consistent, high speed internet connection. As absurd as this may sound, that's not always the easiest thing to find in some places in Latin America. Even in some major cities. My advice would be to find the best ISP possible in the region you want to live in and have at least 1 or 2 backups just in case. Bad storms can cause outages for days in places where you'd assume the communications infrastructure is much better than it actually is.

Offline Elexpatriado

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #7 on: March 30, 2017, 11:28:04 AM »

Agreed. What's much more important in your field is probably a reliable, consistent, high speed internet connection. As absurd as this may sound, that's not always the easiest thing to find in some places in Latin America. Even in some major cities. My advice would be to find the best ISP possible in the region you want to live in and have at least 1 or 2 backups just in case. Bad storms can cause outages for days in places where you'd assume the communications infrastructure is much better than it actually is.

I have had just as much issue in Canada on big projects with IT connections being extremely slow and causing massive inefficiencies and slowdowns.
 
The IT department doesnt like it very much when you send them an internal "trend" for manhours, cost and schedule, but it gets the message across.
 
The internet connection with UNE here in Manizales s pretty unreliable. But I jus use it for dorking around (like this) and occaisionaly to talk with my accountant and broker , or family .
WhatsApp is a great communication device for short messages. (Not for sending scads of data obviously) dont know why people dont use it in North America.
It is actually better thatn email for sending pictures and a lot of documents.of course depends on email server. I have Yahoo, and it sucks the worst.
« Last Edit: March 30, 2017, 11:32:18 AM by Elexpatriado »

Offline kai #2

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #8 on: March 30, 2017, 04:06:25 PM »
ea, I'm still here in Dallas. I have daily scrum meeting and what not and they all need to take place here est timezone. That's kind of what I was wondering. All BS, I was thinking about going to Panama City for a month or so in June or July. How will it work / visas, just I'm on here on vacation and work in the room until I'm done and go about my business?

Offline Hector_Lavoe

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #9 on: March 30, 2017, 08:37:13 PM »
ea, I'm still here in Dallas. I have daily scrum meeting and what not and they all need to take place here est timezone. That's kind of what I was wondering. All BS, I was thinking about going to Panama City for a month or so in June or July. How will it work / visas, just I'm on here on vacation and work in the room until I'm done and go about my business?

If you are just going for a month or two to check it out I wouldn't worry too much about it.

Panama does have something called the "Friendly Nations Visa" program which is meant to encourage foreign entrepreneurs to live in Panama.  The U.S.A. is on the list making it pretty easy for U.S. citizens; however, one catch is I think you have to invest a certain amount in a Panamanian business or work for a Panamanian company to get that visa.

I honestly don't know the details but you can try researching it. There might be other options that would apply to your situation.

One downside to Panama City is the cost of living is going to be a lot higher than other parts of Latin America. Still cheap from my perspective (So. Calif.).

Offline Awesome

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #10 on: March 30, 2017, 09:33:05 PM »
ea, I'm still here in Dallas. I have daily scrum meeting and what not and they all need to take place here est timezone. That's kind of what I was wondering. All BS, I was thinking about going to Panama City for a month or so in June or July. How will it work / visas, just I'm on here on vacation and work in the room until I'm done and go about my business?


Wherever you go, look for "co-working" spaces.  They're offices with t1/t2 connections that you can rent by the week or month that are mostly used by "digital nomad" types.  There are even housing roommate places set up geared towards that market.  It would be like a big house where you rent a room by the week or month that has a strong internet connection and your roommates are all basically doing the same thing as you.  Most countries allow tourists 6 months to stay in country without any visa, which is how long Colombia allows.  So, for example in Colombia digital nomads stay there for a max 6 months, then move on to wherever.  I've been hearing good things about Prague, Czeck Republic and I also hear Spain is surprisingly cheap and a lot of fun.

Offline kai #2

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #11 on: April 01, 2017, 02:58:51 PM »

Wherever you go, look for "co-working" spaces.  They're offices with t1/t2 connections that you can rent by the week or month that are mostly used by "digital nomad" types.  There are even housing roommate places set up geared towards that market.  It would be like a big house where you rent a room by the week or month that has a strong internet connection and your roommates are all basically doing the same thing as you.  Most countries allow tourists 6 months to stay in country without any visa, which is how long Colombia allows.  So, for example in Colombia digital nomads stay there for a max 6 months, then move on to wherever.  I've been hearing good things about Prague, Czeck Republic and I also hear Spain is surprisingly cheap and a lot of fun.


Great intel, I'm going to be looking into that for sure. Also as a minor update I'm still with my Mexican girl shes actually here now and I'm debating if I'm going to go back w/ here and stay for a month 2 :D

Offline Hector_Lavoe

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #12 on: April 02, 2017, 02:12:50 PM »

Great intel, I'm going to be looking into that for sure. Also as a minor update I'm still with my Mexican girl shes actually here now and I'm debating if I'm going to go back w/ here and stay for a month 2 :D

Ok, cool. I assume she came to the USA on a tourist visa? 

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #12 on: April 02, 2017, 02:12:50 PM »

Offline kai #2

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #13 on: April 04, 2017, 03:59:38 PM »
Ok, cool. I assume she came to the USA on a tourist visa?


yes she, did. It wasn't even that bad only the payment. I helped her pay for half. Right now she's in the kitchen making Tacos of Cecina :) But I still want to travel around a bit, she knows that. For me this is a dream come true and I have to make it happen lol


Offline Awesome

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #14 on: April 04, 2017, 09:25:05 PM »

yes she, did. It wasn't even that bad only the payment. I helped her pay for half. Right now she's in the kitchen making Tacos of Cecina :) But I still want to travel around a bit, she knows that. For me this is a dream come true and I have to make it happen lol

I see you living the good life!

If you're ever feeling saucy you can always come down to Caracas and check on your boy.  We're living la vida loca around here baby jaja!!

Offline benjio

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #15 on: April 05, 2017, 07:44:27 AM »

yes she, did. It wasn't even that bad only the payment. I helped her pay for half. Right now she's in the kitchen making Tacos of Cecina :) But I still want to travel around a bit, she knows that. For me this is a dream come true and I have to make it happen lol


Any Latina that's okay with you traveling to other countries full of even more beautiful, single Latinas and staying for a while is a keeper!!!!! THAT..is a dream come true!  ;D

Offline kai #2

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #16 on: April 07, 2017, 04:16:34 PM »
I see you living the good life!

If you're ever feeling saucy you can always come down to Caracas and check on your boy.  We're living la vida loca around here baby jaja!!


The situation is too messed up in Venvuela. Granted if the USD was to start going trough hyper inflation I'd [snip] bricks too

Offline kai #2

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Re: Are there any digital nomads out there
« Reply #17 on: April 07, 2017, 04:18:56 PM »

Any Latina that's okay with you traveling to other countries full of even more beautiful, single Latinas and staying for a while is a keeper!!!!! THAT..is a dream come true!  ;D


She has to trust me. There's no getting around that. At the tend I'm going to do what I'm going to do and there's no amount of fussing or crying to stop. but tbh, I'm not really looking, I just like and experience the culture. Not saying there isn't a possibility I won't meet someone else but it's pretty far removed for me atm. Also all women are crazy, and I've finally been able to take some of the crazy out of this one lol

 

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