{"id":78644,"date":"2018-02-15T11:56:21","date_gmt":"2018-02-15T19:56:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/?p=78644"},"modified":"2018-02-15T11:56:21","modified_gmt":"2018-02-15T19:56:21","slug":"life-lessons-ive-learned-living-abroad-and-on-the-road-for-the-last-2-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/erickimphotography.com\/blog\/2018\/02\/15\/life-lessons-ive-learned-living-abroad-and-on-the-road-for-the-last-2-years\/","title":{"rendered":"Life Lessons I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve Learned Living Abroad and on the Road for the Last 2 Years"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dear friend,<\/p>\n

I want to reflect with you some life lessons I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve learned while living abroad and on the road for the last 2 years.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

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2016, I married the love of my life (Cindy) and then after a wonderful honeymoon in Mexico City (highly recommended), we flew out to Vietnam and lived there for about a year (8 months in Hanoi, 2-3 months in Saigon), and more time living on the road in Japan (Kyoto and Tokyo), then more time on the road in NYC<\/a>, Berlin<\/a>, Marseille<\/a>, Lisbon<\/a>, London<\/a>, and now here in Boston<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Here are some life lessons I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve learned:<\/p>\n

1. Living abroad versus traveling abroad<\/h2>\n

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The big thing was that while Cindy and I were living in Vietnam, we weren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t traveling much \u00e2\u20ac\u201d we pretty much stayed put in Vietnam, and lived there like locals, instead of moving around and traveling around.<\/p>\n

The first lesson I learned is that living abroad is a far more richer, more fulfilling, and more interesting experience than traveling.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Cindy
Cindy with kiss on eye. Shot inside hotel room. Saigon, 2017<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When we were living abroad in Vietnam, I actually had the opportunity to learn how to speak Vietnamese. This is because I was able to interact with local Vietnamese people everyday, and learned Vietnamese by necessity (desire to communicate with locals and joke around with them), instead of forcing myself to learn Vietnamese. By living in Vietnam for about a year, learning how to speak Vietnamese was quite effortless (meaning, I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t need to force myself to speak Vietnamese, it just came naturally). I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t take any Vietnamese courses, I picked it all pretty much from making small talk with taxi\/Uber drivers, talking with baristas at the coffee shop, and restaurant workers.<\/p>\n