Living in 61 plus cities across 120 plus “homes”. A prologue
38 months as a Digital Nomad
This is an outline of my 38-month-long Digital Nomadic existence. I have lived across 45 cities outside of India and 16 cities within India. I have lived in 120 plus “homes”. A home is defined as a place where I have spent a minimum of 4 days at one go.
Why?
Before starting my journey in 2019 I used to try to explore the web trying to find journeys of other digital nomads. What I would get however were the top highlights and not much about the decision making or thought process behind the why. Here I tried to organically lay out a casual bare bones structure of the journey as it was from a travel perspective and how it might look for you.
Looking back it feels like it was just yesterday. I struggle sometimes to recollect who I was before this journey began. Sometimes I wonder did I even change?
Will more people around the world do this kind of a journey? Absolutely! Are they doing it already? More than you can imagine.
The Beginning of Why
It all began in 2019.
I have always been a curious person. Curious about the alternate paths, hidden places, unique personalities. A lot of decisions in my life are taken basis “what else”.
I started questing that what else in my day to day existence. It was distracting. I had done my MBA, had some money in the bank. Yes I was on the path to make more. Maybe life changing wealth or maybe just enough to live a reasonable life. But the prospect did not excite me enough.
Don’t get me wrong. I wanted to embark on that path. I love technology. I love businesses. I love the satisfaction of successful business partnership or contract and will most probably enjoy deal making till the day I die. However I felt like I was on the brink. The brink of either going deeper into the path of success that comes with its own perks yet limitations in terms of personal freedom(In most cases) or absolute freedom. I wanted neither in the extreme. So I took a short life detour at the age of 29.
Your success ends up defining your own personal boundaries. Hence before I walked along that path I wanted to do something life-changing/broadening that I can only do when I have zero responsibilities. I was trying to think of ways to 1000x my personal net worth all the time. This time I wanted to 10x myself as an individual. Life was good but was curious to know what was out there and explore various sides to my own personality and emotional range.
Baseline thought
My perceptions are based on what people say or write. I had traveled before but had never spent unstructured months at a stretch just to observe society, meet new people, and local ecosystems(startups, professionals, artists, pandas) as you would call it “slow travel”.
I had been abroad multiple times before but I always existed in a bubble. A bubble of my friends or family or a things to do list. While I would travel, I was still the same.
Observing something new vs immersing and becoming a part of a new experience are two very different things. The latter is usually unpredictable, non linear and time consuming.
How much of what we believe and say is heresy and what % is the personally observed truth? How much time do we get to reflect on it while observing parts of the world that you have ever seen before.
It all starts in Europe — The first month of a 38-month-long journey
Had to start with the obvious. I mean who does not dream of backpacking across Europe?
Thats what I did. Spent a month across Italy, Hungary and Czech. I learn what everyone else learnt. Yeah. Its gorgeous and most cities are fundamentally the same. My parents and sister too joined me (or I joined them as they would put it) in Italy for a week!
So I back from Europe and sprung into action. Had just started a consulting assignment. Finished that, gave up my house in Bangalore, sold off any smaller assets that would tie me down and embarked ahead.
How do I decide where to go?
I wanted to start by going to countries which were extremely different from India. Always felt what is written about china is many a times biased. Wanted to test that assumption.
A month in China
I bought my ticket Bejing and then made my way down to Shenzhen visiting over 8 cities en-route such as Chongqing, Hangzhou, Xian, Shanghai, Nanjing. China was a revelation. A lot of assumptions about life in non democratic nations were quashed.
From doing the Huashan plank walk to attending gaming tech conferences in Nanjing, visiting the headquarters of Alibaba in Hangzhou, revelling in the night life in Shanghai (real sharks in a nightclub), to meeting countless founders and friends, had an exhilarating time. Even gave a talk on scaling Edtech startups in Chongqing.
China is light years ahead of any other city that I have ever been too. Its scale is hard to fathom. Regardless of what people say I feel that it is still under rated.
Above — Chongqing (Largest city in the world, disqualified due to technical reasons)
After a month in China, from my final city of Shenzhen, I walked into Hong Kong. Yes I walked into Hong kong wearing slippers and carrying my backpack. I looked so shady that I was held by immigration control for 5 hours, story for another day). In Hong Kong, attended the Rise conference and partied it up at LKF and had a great time over a week.
(Above)This is how I entered HK wearing slippers and PJ’s
After a super expensive Hong Kong, I made my way to Bali where I spent a month living as a Digital nomad and adjusted to am amazing island life. Lived across Uluwatu, Ubud, Canngu, Central Bali in the forests. Each city mentioned above has its own unique vibe with different activities to offer. An amazing Airbnb recommendation if you every choose to go!
Bali has one of the largest digital nomad populations in the entire world. You will find people peacefully typing away on their laptops in most cafes there. There are a lot of co-working/ co-living spaces there with people from around the world who have found remote jobs/own small ventures of various kinds and are living on the dollar arbitrage. Super remote work friendly there is strong wifi and 4g everywhere!
At the heart of it I am an island person. Its a good peaceful life of flavourful food, time by the beach and lots of Sun and open space.
After Bali I made my way through Central Java. From Mt Ijen which is a midnight trek up an active volcano to going into bat caves to Mt.Bromo, central Java has its own charm.
(Liquid Sulphur spewing out of Mt Ijen — Picture Not magnified)
Found a garage in the city of Malang that rented dirt bikes who also had a group of passionate bikers and I spent a couple of days combing 100’s of kilometres through forests and highways feeling the rush of a 120cc naked monster of a bike. You feel so alive!
Went into real bat caves and what not.From there made my way to Yogyakarta, parking myself there just to experience the interesting city that it is. Finally made my way up to Jakarta.
After Bali, I Spent some time travelling in south India. Made my way across Alleppey, Kochi etc. Out of the various cities in Kerala, I liked Varkala (a small cliff beach) the most and spent a couple of weeks there. It is hands down one of my favourite places in India and also has a nice surfing set up for beginners which I thoroughly enjoyed. For the uninitiated, I think Kerala is still one of the most under rated places in our country. Remote work potential there is massive.
After Kerala, I made my way to Singapore for some weeks. Spent my time meeting my friends and sitting by the bay observing the buildings and the wealth that it held. Even went for Halloween night at the Universal park! Midnight hand scooter rides across the city were certainly amongst my favourite.
Came back to india and then went to China again for the Unleash fellowship. Spent another couple of weeks there in Guangzhou(even spent some days at the canton fair — largest trade fair in China and technically the world) followed by Shenzhen. This time during the fellowship, observed the soft power that China had finally started to command especially with the UN.
Experiencing the Siberian winter
Came back to India, quickly bought winter jackets and boots and with only a 7kg backpack. (luggage limitations in Russian domestic flights) made my way to Russia for a month. Experienced the Siberian winters for the first time. Went to Murmansk and saw the northern lights there for the first time. It is the largest city in the world above the Arctic circle. Disclaimer — Everyone in Russia thinks Mithun songs is what all Indians still listen too.
Kazan, Nizhny Novgorod and the usual suspects such as St. Petersburg and Moscow. They are not kidding around with the cold!
(Above ) Murmansk and the northern lights!
Warm and kind I never faced any issue with any Russian other than getting pickpocketed on the Main Street in St. Petersburg.
Phase 2 — Transition from a vagabond into a digital nomadic existence
Came back from Russia, defrosted in Goa for a week and joined Bytedance and decided to stay in one place. Life had other plans. One month into my role , the covid lockdown happened and I moved to my parents place. Spent 4 amazing months with them.
Intra India travel opened up briefly and before the next lockdown could happen again I moved to Goa and decided to remote work. Wrote about why and what it looks like here.
Spent the next 7 months living there. Again, fell in love with the tropical beach way of life. Lived all across north and south Goa ranging from new age studio apartments to wooden huts by the Beach to Portuguese stone houses which were over a 100 year old! My modus operandi was to identify a beach and a find an interesting living accommodation near. One such month was spent in a 100 year old stone hut literally in the middle of dense wildlife surrounded by treehouses made by the amazing architect of Bhakti Kutir, a hidden sanctuary in South Goa).
Went through a lot of personal life ups and downs. Got reintroduced to Yoga. Fell in love with it. At this time unsurprisingly I was at my most unfit life phase. Rigid as a board, all the time backpacking carrying a heavy backpack for hours over long durations and with years of sitting on a desk, my back had started to complain. Maybe it was also the side effect of turning 30.
5 months into living in Goa, I felt I needed to add additional aspects to my digital nomad journey. Even after the semi retirement world trip and visiting a lot of places I still felt like a lot was missing. I decided to start doubling down on collecting life skills on. the way.
From a Digital nomad transitioning into a experiential digital nomad (Whatever that means)
I came to a decision. I will spend the next many months or whatever it takes to learn how to generate all the pleasure and satisfaction that I need from my own body. I will deep dive into various ways to move and train my own body in different kinds of environments.
It became my obsession. Wanted to learn how to generate dopamine, serotonin, libido, testosterone spikes and anything else but through my own individual actions without the need of any external substance.
Honestly had no clue how to do that.
Yoga had started to pick up for me personally. One day I woke up. Was sitting in the sun outside of this 100 year old hut where I was staying and wrote down the following:
Best case result of living in an Ashram and train to be a yoga teacher
1. I get to see what my body is capable of
2. I get to learn more about physical body and self from a Yogic perspective
3. I get to say that I lived in an ashram
4. I get to find ways to learn and go deeper into my meditation practice
5. I find ways to naturally make my body feel healthy.
6. I cut out all external distractions and go withinSo thats how I decided to become a Yoga teacher. Not to teach but to be able to learn the basics as well as a teacher for my own personal growth. For this I prepared intensively for a few months while in Goa to get my body ready to be able to perform at a level that was baseline satisfactory. It was a gruelling experience of a lot of physio and lifestyle corrections.
After getting my baseline fitness in place, moved to the outskirts of Rishikesh. Spent a month living in an Ashram on top of a hill disconnected by any road practicing yoga 7 hours a day! (5 hours of physical practice + 2 hours of yoga philosophy).
Pictures and videos of the journey on these instagram posts — https://www.instagram.com/p/CNO-lphMRsc/
6 days a week for a whole month. At the end of the journey I was a YTT certified 200 hour Yoga instructor. My body disintegrated and rebuilt itself during this process. It was invigorating.
The ashram journey ended and I spent the next few weeks in Mussoorie (a hill city). From there I made my way to the outskirts of Dehradhun where I was surprised to see a vibrant community of people. I had been reading about the decoupling of people from major cities. I experienced it. Even before corona happened people had started finding ways to earn a good living and live in smaller towns. I was surprised at the scale at which it was happening.
As a defence kid, I had already seen and travelled across India. I felt I had nothing left to explore in India. How wrong I was!
Travelling to places is like reading a book. You extract as much as you have within. The place, the people, the activities all evolve as you evolve.
Through a friend I came to learn about a course in Bir (A hill station also known for one of the best paragliding spots in the world). This course was on Nuad Thai (Traditional Thai Massage) . I was intrigued as it was taught by this highly regarded teacher. I had never in my life thought that I would learn such a skill and that is why I said yes.
Turns out Nuad Thai is actually an ancient science (2,000 years old) of the Thai people(originating in India) and comes from a lot of centuries of learning and evolution. That’s where my next 5 week road trip across Himachal happened. Took the car and drove out with the first destination as Bir.
It was a fascinating experience as it unlocked a feeling in me that I could learn anything in the world that I wanted to. I was capable of carrying a wide range of disconnected life skills. Travel where I want , when I want sensing the environment, learning from the people around me and pivoting my next destination accordingly
After the training in Bir, made my way up into the hills. Drove up to Old Manali and lived there for some weeks. Was amazing. Again had never enjoyed the stillness and beauty of a hill station without an agenda for such long periods of time. Used to climb up the hill to a cafe, look at the mountains and write.
Met people from across the country. So many young individuals on sabbaticals. ranging from 20 year olds to 50 year olds. All running away or towards something. For many its a transition while some embrace it as a way of life.
I started searching for what was the next life skill that I could learn.
I wanted to learn a sport this time.
So found this surfing village called Mulki which is near Mangalore. Packed my bags and moved there with a plan to train for a month.
However this time my body refused to cooperate with me. While I had become way more flexible thanks to yoga, my back problems came up again. I fell from the surf board a few times in shallow water and carrying the heavy beginners long board injured my back. I was bed ridden for 5 days in Mulki.
I still remember the feeling of helplessness and not having anyone who could fix me instantly. No medical support as such I still remember wrapping up my back with countless bandages and making my way to a hospital on a borrowed scooter 40 kilometres away which had an X Ray machine. Went through multiple natural therapies. Recovered a little and unfortunately had to close the surfing chapter for now.
So post Mulki, I went to Bangalore for a few weeks which turned into a month and a half where I extensively worked with a physio to nurse my back to a decent shape. Zoom calls and in person catch ups become so much easier here. One thing that I missed was the hustle around me that is still missing in remote working situations in most cases. Bangalore is electrifying like that.
By this time the International borders to a few countries had started to open up.
The Middle East
I had always wanted to immerse myself in the Middle East. So booked a flight to Dubai and lived in Dubai and Abu Dhabi for a month! November in Dubai is paradise and I was lucky enough to have some friends to show me around and play amazing hosts.
I was seriously impressed by the quality of life and community there. Dubai is finally attracting high quality individuals working on interesting projects across tech, finance, crypto and even art. All the conferences that I attended were packed with companies from across the world.
Came back to India and as fate would have it, I was back in Dubai a month later on a 3 month Crypto Ed-Tech project and dove deep into the crypto community there. Super bullish on the Middle East over the duration of this decade btw. Lived in a couple of nomad friendly hotels such as Rove and had a great time! Bullish on nomad friendly infrastructure and businesses. Will say it again. Dubai is a great place to spend a couple of years at the least especially if you are young especially in this decade. Made a reel on it.
Once the project got over I came back to India. By this time my sister who was stuck in the US over the past 3 years finally managed to come down to India. We spent a lovely month together in which we even did a 10 day Meghalaya trip where we self drove across the state as a family and experienced the beauty that Meghalaya has to offer. India truly is gorgeous.
Once the month was over, the next big move was ready to be made! My personal favourite! While I had been investing a lot of time and resources in my well being and fitness I still felt there was still one level that was meant to be unlocked.
Time to train to become a fighter!
Ever since I was young I wanted to learn a form of martial art. It fascinated me however I never found a good teacher or environment to learn in. Life happened and never got a chance to seriously train in it.
Over the past few years I had been hearing about Muay Thai training really picking up in Thailand. You can only guess what I did next. I packed my bags and spent the next 3 months in Thailand training to be a fighter, whilst training alongside some amazing professional fighters!
Here in Thailand, I went all out. I worked on an emotional, physical and spiritual level. Went deep into movement and Muay Thai. Trained with fighters and was really pushed to go beyond. The aim was to be able to last for 3 rounds of 3 minutes each. Trust me when I say this. In sparing/fighting you gas out in a minute as your body operates at a level of high atlert. Your heart beats faster than ever and you are as present as you could ever be. This sport commands absolute focus.
Training 3–4 hours every day, By the end of the 3 months fight training rewired me. I felt more confident and sure of myself and my emotions. I felt more in control. I started breathing moving and walking with more composure and calm.
You can see a lot of my training videos etc on my Instagram profile
When you get punched in the face you feel things that you cannot predict. Fighting trains you to be able to overcome your fight or flight response. It teaches you how to control your own emotional stimuli to a threat (Physical or otherwise). It was a life changer for me.
I noticed myself being able to maintain eye contact for longer and express my likes and dislikes better. A deeply intense experience it impacted me deeply at a psychological and physical level.
I spent a month in Koh Sa Mui and 2 months on Koh Phangan. Koh Phangan is by far my favourite remote work destination in the world. It is my personal paradise. Including the Ice baths! (Below)
A post shared by Saransh Dua (@saranshdua)
38 months ended once I came back from Thailand. I felt like I had been pushed to the boundaries of what kind of a life I could live personally.
Closing thoughts — I believe that everyone teaches you and spends all of their time on thinking how to make money. Very few however even know how to spend their money. Money is utility token that you most certainly need. However beyond a level if you do not know what to do with that token, its unfortunate and it can get wasted away. Spending money becomes harder as you age as the room to experiment goes down so you end up spending more on a limited set of things.
I spent these 3 years exploring to even see what kind of things would I even like to spend on in the future. What other aspects of life do I want to include into my daily life over the next 60 years. These were questions I was seeking answers to. There is no absolute answer. Its just that with time and exposure your internal compass becomes stronger and the decisions you make in accordance to it are the things that have a higher probability of leading you to a life that you can fully accept and live in.
Disclaimer — Skipped out on ALOT of details and smaller trips which were not a big influence or were not interesting or unique. Will write on various aspects of the journey individually but I really wanted to once write a synopsis of the whole 38 months of travel. Finally did it :D
Double Disclaimer — It would have not been possible without the support of my family. Every 3–4 months I would come back home for a week or two and switch wardrobes basis where I was supposed to travel to next. Many a times passports become an issue and I had to reapply. The Indian passport is certainly not a good one to have for someone who likes to travel alot. But you have to work with the cards that are dealt to you.