How we became digital nomads

in #travel7 years ago

A digital nomad is a term used for online workers who like to move from place to place. So first of all you should love to travel to become one of them. I've got that covered pretty early – my parents were started taking me on trips down to Black sea when I was about 3 years old – it was train trips for about 18 hours from my hometown and that was some of my brightest memories from childhood.

So when I was studying in a university and thinking about what I want to do with my life, I thought that it would be really cool to travel the world and have a blog or something. Then in the next couple of years I forgot about that and was just thinking about programming. I figured out that I want to make websites, because it seemed more interesting than “Delphi” or “c++” languages.

I found my first freelance project when I was scrolling through a social network VK – some guy was looking for a programmer for his website, and I thought that it's time to try! It worked out quite well and I got my first $300.

I met my future husband Artur shortly after that. A friend invited me to a bus tour to "Rock above Volga"- a famous festival in Samara region (about 16 hours drive), Rammstein was the headliner that year, it was awesome. And our bus broke down in the middle of nowhere. It took an hour to wait for some spair parts to fix it, so I had plenty of time to get acquainted with other passengers and thanks to that I met Artur.

Later that year he offered me to go to Thailand with him, and I thought – why not? It was our first trip to South East Asia, we spent a month there and after we came back to Russia we thought that we want to come back and become digital nomads in SEA. Artur was a web developer too (and more successful than me, hehe). We worked hard all winter and next spring we bought one way tickets to Bangkok.

Now we're already 3 years in SEA, a lot happened since that time, it was pretty easy the first year, but then russian currency (ruble) devalued more than 50 percent – and since we're making websites for russian clients, we had to look for additional sources of income. That's when we started to make photos and videos to sell on stock footage websites like shutterstock.com etc. It's not enough to live just from stock yet but combined with web development it's ok.

We spend most of the time in Thailand because it's pretty cheap, and damn awesome, of course. We lived in Bangkok enjoying the big, bustling city where you can buy anything you need, unlike tropical islands. And we lived in a village in jungle 10km away from Takua Pa town where we enjoyed nature and simple life. About $700 is enough to live in Thailand. When we manage to earn more than that, we travel to nearby countries.

We spent a month in Cambodia (when we were low on cash) and enjoyed wonderful beaches and cheap food in Sihanoukville cafes. And of course there's also ruins of Angkor – I think everyone should visit it even if you low on cash – find some way, it's amazing! By the way, have you seen those pictures of freelancers with laptop working at the beach? It's a nice way to show off, and it's too hot to work like that of course... But we actually had to do that sometimes when wifi went down in our guesthouse, because there was free wifi on a beach if you order some drink. 😆

And when we have more cash we love to go to Bali – it's one of our favourite places even despite that it's overcrowded already. This island have everything – beaches, rice fields, mountains, jungles and balinese culture with all of those temples they build everywhere makes it so beautiful! By the way, it's important to rent a place with kitchen there – it allows to save a lot on food 😏

Of course there's downsides to this lifestyle too, like being never sure about what's your situation will be next month, having difficulties maintaining long-distance relationships with friends and family back home, having to limit your belongings to a minimum of 1 backpack, etc. I could rant about that for a while, but who wants to hear that, right? 😉

Anyway, this is the kind of life that gives me an opportunity to share our travels here, on Steemit, and I hope you will enjoy that! 😊

All photos taken with Canon 550d and Canon 650d. Except the one with the rice fields - that one was taken with Sony a7s.
Stay tuned for more!
Next up - "Our trip to thousand-year-old ruins of Angkor"

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Very nice photos @anna-redhead. So much history and peacefulness within. Thanks for sharing! I'm following you now.

Thank you so much, @freeinthought! Followed back ;)

This is a dream my wife and I are working towards to. So this post is very inspiring. Keep it up and good luck guys. Wish you the best!


Btw, now my dream is to have stock footage selling as my main income - I heard it's possible to achieve in a year or two ^_^Thank you, @quocvietle! Good luck! I'm sure you'll make it :)

Yes, it is possible. Go for it! Best of luck!

Nice life! Followed

Thank you, @theswede! :D

This is really a great post Anna. Thank you, and looking forward to more.

Thank you so much! :)

Thanks for sharing your story and amazing photos. Digital Nomading becomes more and more popular every day and it is always nice to know someones experience in this scope. Future is now :)

Yeah, I'm always interested in hearing other digital nomads stories :D

SEA region is my favorite destination.
Looking forward for your post from Angkor.
Btw: my current avatar was made in Angkor Wat :-)


Your awatar looks so mystical, I'd love to make a video with a character like that in Angkor Wat :DThank you so much, @gtg! :D

Where's your favourite place in SEA?

I don't have any specific point in space. It's also about time and circumstances and friendly souls around.

Wow, what an interesting life. I am almost the exact opposite :) I have lived in the same state my whole life and worked for the same company for around 10 years now. I like it though. I will actually be traveling outside the country for my first time in a few months, to go to SteemFest in Lisbon, Portugal. I'm really looking forward to it :) Nice post.


I'm pretty sure that nomadic lifestyle is not for everyone and having that stability that you have is really great! I actually appreciate times of stability more now, and I think I'd like to move around just a bit less - like switching cities about 3-4 times a year maybe :)
Looking forward to your posts from Lisbon! ;DThank you so much, @timcliff! :D


I am happy for the both of you after reading your post :)Very nice photos @anna-redhead

This is awesome. I love the idea of the digital nomad lifestyle. I'm not sure I could do it though (the uncertainty from month to month at my age), but I love the idea. Thank you for sharing this insight into that type of life.
Looking forward to your angkor wat post :)


There's also other, less uncertain ways to be a digital nomad - like having a stable job where you just don't have to visit your office or something ;DThank you, @fiftysixnorth! :)

Yes, that would be nice! Unfortunately they won't let me do that at my work! I did have a friend who had that, he was a C++ programmer and worked entirely from home via skype. He just needed to have skype connected by 9am. This was very bad for him though as he was shy and this just made him even more reclusive. I think the privilege was wasted on him. It would have been used better in my hands! :)

I agree, you could show us so many awesome photos from all over the world! :D

Maybe one day I still can :) If I can build my steemit presence enough, hopefully I will be able to use it to fund trips to make more content for here! :) I have a long way to go though.

I'm looking forward to that! :D

Great post. I will resteem it for you.

Big up! Will be glad to meet you personally so if you're planning to visit Koh Phangan - contact me ;)

Thank you! :D I'd love to visit Koh Phangan too, do you live there? :)

What a great story, and Love those photos as always!

Thank you, @kuenok! Always a pleasure to hear from you :D

Nice article based on facts. Good work, keep on.

Thank you! Doing my best :)

Amazing! I am working my way to become a digital nomad as well so this was very helpful and inspiring. Thailand would be my starting point since I was there few months ago and I fell in love with Koh Phangan.
Thank you for sharing your story! :)

Yay, the more digital nomads the merrier! :D Thailand is a great starting point! It's still a bit hard for me to move from Thailand to somewhere else though XD

The great thing about being a digital nomad is that you can travel a lot and always go back to the place you liked the most. :D

That is definitely true! ^_^

Super inspiraring story! i would love to be a digital nomad, dont know how yet! not good with computers. but cannot stand the 9-5 grind much longer.
travelled for years but running out of ideas, i decided to start travelling soon again, saving money for it now, only need to find a way to keep me going.
all the best during your travels

Thank you, @heyitshaas! I also met a couple of nomads who was earning money by firedancing, imagine that! 😁 Maybe you can earn enough with Steemit 😉

haha i will start practising! see how far i get haha
On a more serious note, thanks for your support, will keep you posted about my decisions.
the world is to big and nice to stop travelling

Good luck! :D

Awesome!! I aspire to do this too :)

Looking forward to meet you on one of your travels :D

I am also thinking of moving to Thailand of Philipines for the winter. I have spent 4 months in Bali 4 years ago. That was unforgetable experience!

oh yeah, Bali is one of the best! what do you like most about it? :D

The first two months i loved it the other two months when i knew more about i hated it. Nature in the south is devastated and polluted to an extreme extent. It is very corrupt and culture distorted and commercialised to an imense extent.

oh I see... sad to hear that

Me too, i am sure used to be an amazing island back in the day. I will be sharing some photos from the trip i am sure.

looking forward to it!

awesome post fellow traveler - it will be nice following you! power on :)

Thank you, @travelmarcus! :D Following you too ;)