FAQ

Colin and I have been planning our 6 month trip for longer than 6 months. We leave in 6 days and we still enjoy talking about our trip with people-friends, family, strangers etc. Often, we'll find that the people we talk to have been to some of the places we're going and it's fun to exchange tidbits, dos and don'ts, and must-sees about a place. However, there are a few questions that we do mind answering about our trip and that is why I'm going to outline the questions and the answers below. In order for our question to make it onto our FAQ list someone has had to have asked us this or told us this at least 6 times. I have also ranked them in order from the most often annoying to answer and often asked to the least annoying to answer.

Annoying Questions to Answer

How can you afford to leave for 6 months? Did you win the lottery or something? Is your husband rich? How can you survive not working for 6 months?

No neither of us won the lottery (we wish), neither of us have rich parents or an inheritance. We're not related to the queen. We didn't rob a bank. We probably make less money in our careers than you do. We've just saved up for a really long time. We also don't have a lot of expenses beside our mortgage. For example, we have no kids, we don't drive nice cars. Well Colin has a nice bike, but I bought my car for $6000.00 almost ten years ago. We shop second hand for most of our clothes. We don't have cable. I could go on and on, but I won't.

We also have a credit line and some great friends who are going to live in our house while we're away and pay our utilities. Yes, we still have to pay our mortgage while we're away. Yes, it will be difficult and we'll have to stick to a strict budget. This is why we're covering our accomodations by doing the following: couchsurfing, homestays, hospitality and hostels. We only have one hotel booked and that's because it's part of a tour package.

We'll be attempting to make a small amount of money during our trip, but we probably won't see this money until we get home. This is great, becasue we'll be broke when we get home and will be desperate for our cheques for $100.00 here and there. Colin will be working on his photography career and I'll be working on my part-time freelance writing career. We've both already been paid for our work by writing and taking pictures for local Alberta magazines this year (Vue Weekly and AlbertaVenture).

Are you going to get pregant on your trip? You're off work for so long you may as well do something with your time. "We don't want any souvenirs, just a baby."

First of all, the last time I checked, it doesn't take 6 months to get pregnant (unless of course you're having a hard time getting pregnant). For one average male and one average female, it would probably take about 10-20 minutes to get pregnant. Of course, it could probably be done in 2 minutes too, but that may also be known as a "mistake."

This isn't a second honeymoon it's a journey of traveling the world as a couple, learning about various cultures in Europe and Asia, staying with locals, eating like locals, and living like locals. As Colin says "Very few people have travelled on the Trans-Siberian train." We're taking the Trans-Siberian 12 day train ride from Moscow to Beijing.

So, for the last time, I'm not going to try to get pregnant on the trip and we're not going to name our child Bangkok Beck.

Great Questions to Answer

How many countries are you visiting?

13-14 we'll see what happens.

How do you feel about being away from your family and friends for so long?

It will be tough, but we'll manage. We have each other. We also have skype and email. We've done lots or research and have read a lot about culture shock and home sickness. We'll also only be in each country for 2-4 weeks, so if we don't like a particular place or don't get along with the kind strangers we're staying with we'll be changing the scenary shortly.

How did you get the time off work? Aren't you scared not to have the security of an income and a job?

We both asked our bosses for a 6 month leave of absence. We'll probably come back recharged and ready to take on anything in our careers. Colin has been with TELUS for 5 years and I have almost been with Haemonetics for 5 years. We'll gain so much life experience and this trip is something we've both talked about for a few years. We're not getting any younger and need to seize the opportunity to travel while we can. We don't want to work our lives away and then retire at 60, 70, or 80 with no money to travel and being too old to see and do the things we've always wanted to do. Just look at the sad Pixar move Up for an example of this happening.