Work While Traveling – An interview with David Hehenberger

Thanks to our partner Pioneer Transcription Services for making this transcript possible!

F:    Hi, guys out there.  This is Florian calling from the 4 Hour Workweek success stories website and today I have another great guest here on Skype on the other side of the world.  His name is David.

DH:    Hey.

F:    Hi, David.

DH:    Hi Flo.

F:    David has not really a 4 Hour Workweek success story to tell, but he’s traveling and working for about I guess four and a half years now and that’s the thing that Tim Ferriss also described in his book.

DH:    Right.

F:    So, David is a brilliant guest for our website and I have some great questions to him.  The first thing is, David, please introduce yourself.  Tell our users a little bit about yourself.

DH:    Okay.  So, my name is David and I’m 22 except most people think I’m a lot older like maybe I look order.  I’m not sure.  I’m 22.  I’m from Austria and what I did is basically after I graduated IT school.  We still have a compulsory military training in Austria, so I did that for a couple of months after graduating and then basically, inspired by reading the 4 Hour Workweek, I decided to travel so I just like booked a one-way ticket to Bangkok and that’s been about one and one-half years ago and basically I’m still on the road today.  So, I’m quite happy about everything.

F:    Have you been at home?

DH:    Yes.  So, I visited twice so far.  I went back before Christmas last year and this summer and actually I’m also going back in about a month for two weeks for Christmas because like the family always asks me, “Oh, please, please come back.”

F:    How do you feel like when you go home and you see your parents and maybe your sisters or brothers?

DH:    It’s interesting.  It actually feels normal like as soon as I go back and hang out with them it feels like I was hanging out with them all the time like it’s immediately like back to normal.  Yeah, it doesn’t feel like I just like 24 hours ago and maybe I was in Manila in Bangkok or in somewhere in Indonesia.  It doesn’t feel like that when I return to Austria.  So, Austria, it’s very cold in the winter like last December was very, very cold and last year I said I’m not going back next year for Christmas.  But I’m not, now that I’ve been in Asia for a year and the weather was always warm and hot and I’m actually looking forward to spending a few days in that like in the snow because skiing, but I think a few days is enough.

F:    Okay.  So, you’re a sunshine man?

DH:    Yes, definitely.  Like the weather is a big part of the reason why I’m in Asia.

F:    Okay, okay.  So, which countries did you already visit?

DH:    So, since I started to travel one and a half years ago, I started in Thailand.  That’s like a typical thing.  That’s like the one country in Southeast Asia that everybody goes to.  I’m almost like a backpacker.  When I started to travel I didn’t have like any income stream or any passive income business.  I just had a little bit of money in the bank, not much, a couple of thousand Euros and I just decided to travel into Thailand and went to Malaysia and to Singapore and then to the Philippines and then I basically got a job.  So, when I was in the Philippines, I read about like this internship.  It was called like Tropicl MBA internship and it was like an offer for an internship that you would stay in a hotel and they give you food and they give you accommodations and you spend maybe two hours or so a day five days a week to work for them and I applied for that and I ended up getting that gig and then spent half a year there.  So, back to your questions and besides the Philippines, I’ve also been to Indonesia, so those are the five countries that I’ve been to over the last one and one-half years and in general, I’m traveling but I’m not constantly traveling. So, I’m always like I’m staying in the same place for maybe a month or maybe three months or even half a year and then I move onto the next location.  I think it’s a better way of travel.  And you travel very differently when you are working by traveling than if you’re a backpacker.

F:    So, you go back home you can say when you travel?  So, at the moment you are in Bali, correct?

DH:    Yes, I’m in Bali right now.

F:    So, maybe next month you go to Thailand again and later you come „home“ to Bali?

DH:    Right.  Yes, so I think going forward for next year, Bali will be my home for most of the time, but yeah.  I already have a trip planned to Thailand in early February, so I’ll probably be in Vietnam in early February and maybe Philippines in like February, too.  So, I already have a bunch of trips lined up, but yes.  I think I’m going to spend most of my time here.  I think it’s a lot better for just like working and productivity in getting stuff done when you’re in the same location.  You also spend less money because you got like a real house and you are like kind of getting lost in the culture better.  You make local friends.  Yes, so that’s why I like that kind of travel.

F:    So, when you do a trip maybe to Thailand or so, do you work then or do you work when you are in Bali and then you go to those mini trips or so and just for holidays?

DH:    Yes.  I do work.  Depending on—Of course, I might work less than if I’m here in Bali right now.

F:    Okay, okay.

DH:    Like cranking all day, but yes.  I do work.  So, it’s interesting the way you travel when you actually have work to do.  It’s very different.  Of course, you do a lot less travel.  You have to stay in hotels where you have fast internet, like the way you travel is so different from being a normal backpacker, so yeah, but I do work while traveling, yeah.

F:    Which country did you like the most?  I guess it’s Bali.

DH:    It’s a tough question.  It’s a real tough question.  So, I can tell you which I countries I liked the least.  I’m not saying that I didn’t like them, so but I liked Singapore.  It’s a nice place but it’s just like a western city.  It’s nice.  Like, I enjoy going there for a day or so, but after that I’m ready to leave.  So, I think that it would probably be my least favorite and also Malaysia.  I’ve not been to Bonner [phonetic] yet.  I’ve only been to the Malaysian Peninsula and I still had a good time there, but come back to Thailand, the Philippines and Indonesia couldn’t really compete.  So, it’s really tough to say like which country I like best.  Thailand is awesome because it’s so cheap.  The food is amazing.  I love Thai culture.  So, Thailand is—The internet is really fast.  That’s another big plus.  And then the Philippines. it’s really interesting too because you go there and there are almost no foreigners and everybody speaks English and so it’s just a great place like, you go to a random island somewhere in the middle of nowhere and locals walk up to you and say, “Hey, what’s up?  How’re you doing,” in English.  So, that’s pretty cool.  And the Philippines also have some amazing landscapes like amazing beaches, amazing islands.  It’s great scuba diving there and then of course, there’s Bali.  Actually, I haven’t seen anything as of Indonesia besides Bali, but Bali’s great.  Bali is kind of like western-style restaurants and western-style hotels but still having like this tropical island life and Bali’s like—So many cool people come through Bali like so many of those like lifestyle entrepreneurs come through and that’s why I think to hang out with like when the people are doing interesting stuff and who are smart or like working how they are doing in the business.  I think it’s important too, so I just hang with those people, so that’s the reason I’m still in Bali right now.

F:    Is traveling your biggest dream ever?

DH:    I love traveling, so but like I said I’m not traveling that much at the moment.  I think that if you want to build something big like if you really like have like a huge project and you want to build something big, too much travel gets in the way.  I do love being an expert in Southwest Asia expert and I think working by traveling and working by like being an expert and being able to live wherever I want is definitely a dream come true for me.  I don’t know if it’s my biggest dream, but it’s one of my biggest dreams definitely.

F:    Okay, okay.  So, you know traveling while working is a dream not only for you but for a lot of entrepreneurs like me.

DH:    Yeah.

F:    And what are your tips?  How can a normal guy start out?  So, I mean, when I now I want to go to Bali.  What is important to know?

DH:    So, I think suffice to say it depends if you already have a business or not, so there might be some people who like have a business.  The business is generating a lot of money but they’re like kind of sitting in the office all day having a bunch of employees say and don’t really know like how to get out of there.  I guess in that case the best thing to do would be like to hire some right-hand man CEO style guy and like teach them and give them like performance-related bonuses and that’s actually what a friend of mine, what he is doing right now.  Like, he has like this business which is back in the United States and he now wants to travel more and be more flexible and he has to say his [unintelligible 11:30] just basically had been his right-hand man for a couple of years and he’s basically growing into the role of the new CEO.  Well, if you’re just starting out I think one of the things is like I mentioned before, I really believe in surrounding yourself with like-minded people, surrounding yourself with other successful entrepreneurs who are ready do what you want to do.  Like, you can learn so much and just like by hanging out.  Like, I hang out with entrepreneurs who have like awesome businesses every day and I think that makes such a huge difference and the other thing is to like just if you’re like starting and you don’t know what to do and you’re a bit unsure and it’s like you’re—It just like to go out and try something and fail, but you might not fail, but I think that the main thing is—And I had the same issue before, too.  Most people who want to build some kind of business.  They just don’t get started.  Like, they read all kinds of blogs and books and may buy information products, but they never really do anything and if you build something and even if it fails, like then you basically discovered a way that does not work and you can move onto the next idea and I think that’s so crucial is to just like, to just do stuff.  I think that’s the most important thing if you’re starting out and don’t really know what to do, just like try something and you can always iterate from there.

F:    Do you think that a big business is important to work and travel or do you think that a man who is now working 9:00 to 5:00 is still able to do that too?

DH:    No, I don’t think you need a big business.  But like, so you can be like a freelancer or a contractor or a very small business owner.  There are so many people doing the kind of stuff like living here in Bali and that are traveling.  You don’t have to have a big business like—I mean, if you really want to get out of your job and travel like—There’s a decent  chance, depending on what kind of skills you have, that you can just like find some freelancing contracting gigs that make you—I don’t know, maybe one and a half thousand U.S. dollars but just not that much, but if you come to Bali, one and a half thousand U.S. dollars gets you very far, and that’s like the first stepping stone, so then you’re in Bali.  You surround yourself with all the smart people.  You learn a business and then like a year later, two years later, maybe you launch a product-based business like Tim Ferriss recommends in the 4 Hour Workweek instead of just being a freelancer.

F:    So, how do you get your money?  How do you earn money?

DH:    So, I’m actually—Basically, I got contractor myself.  I work for this guy.  I mentioned that I applied for the thing called Tropical MBA one and a half years ago and I was like an intern there and then when my internship was up, Dan that’s the guy who just ended up hiring me and I’m still working with him today and it’s awesome.  I love it.  Like, we have this big house in Bali where I‘m right now and they’re recommending really quick projects and I’m learning so much but then his business partner basically built a company that is going to generate like $1 million U.S. dollars in revenue this year or within like four years and there’s like so much that I can learn from that guy, so I’m really happy doing what I do right now, yeah.

F:    Do you plan to get your own business running?

DH:    Yes, eventually.  I have no idea when that’s going to happen.  I mean, it might happen in three months.  It might happen in three years.  It might happen—I don’t know—Five years.  I feel like I have a lot of time and still a lot to learn, but yes.  Eventually I definitely want my own business.  That’s the end goal but for now, I’m really happy doing what I’m doing for Dan.

F:    Okay.  How much money do you need for your lifestyle or traveling lifestyle?

DH:    It really depends where you go, so let’s say you stay in Asia like I do.  In places like Thailand or Bali, $1,000.00 U.S. dollars really gets you very, very far.  There’s this place, Chiang Mai that’s up in the northern Thailand that just had a friend who came back from there and he said you can live on five hundred bucks there.  Like, you get a nice apartment with fast internet, like five megs down, eat out three times a day, go to the gym and you spend five hundred U.S. dollars.  So, you can live for really cheap.  It also depends like how you want to live like what’s your comfort level like.

F:    Of course, yeah.

DH:    Or do you want to stay in a nice place or do you want to stay in a local place?  So, I can honestly say I eat out three times a day and I eat healthy like, I’m doing the total [??? 16:45] diet thing, so I’m not eating much rice and starches and stuff like that.  So, if you eat the rice meals three times a day you’re going to spend less money than if you eat like broccoli and salmon, salad and stuff like that.  Of course, you’ll spend more money, but I think for a single guy with no responsibilities, that once you come up here to Asia if you make one thousand bucks from a business you can totally do it.  Totally live like easily, yeah.

F:    Cool.  Great.  That sounds great.  I should come out here.

DH:    Yeah, yea, you should come out here to Bali.  I’m sure you would love it, hang out with all the guys.  It’s amazing here.

F:    Oh, man.  I’m sitting here and Germany is a little bit cold and I’m just waiting for the snow….

DH:    Right.

F:    But I’m also a sunny boy like you and love the sun and the warmth of course.

DH:    Yeah, I mean, after that phone call I’m going to go for a swim in our pool and just like earlier today just as an example of what kind of cool people you meet here, I was hanging out today with like one guy who is staying at the house.  He’s like an economist expert and there’s this one guy who is like a SEO expert who he has like a supplement company and it’s like ranking for really tough medical key terms on the first page.  Then there’s this other guy who has been traveling for two years and like has been in business for eight to nine years who is like a affiliate sites and all kinds of stuff and he’s making a ton of money and like those are the people that I hang out with every day and I think that’s how you learn so much.  Yeah, that’s why I love Bali right now.

F:    Do you get support from your family?  Maybe I have a lot of interviews and guys out there who are always calling me and saying, “Yeah, I have a girlfriend, but she’s,” you know.

DH:    Yes.

F:    I think that traveling and working is all nonsense as well as the book of Tim Ferriss: The 4 Hour Workweek and so on and then I think that it is important to get support from your family.  Do you get any?

DH:    Yes, yes.  So, one thing that you just mentioned is like—It’s tough like relationships.  If I would have like a girlfriend back in Austria, like things wouldn’t work out like either like [??? 19:35] to get anymore and that’s one—So relationships are very tough when you’re living this kind of lifestyle. but of course, now like I just came to Bali and going to commit to Bali, I’m going to stay here for a while.  That’s a good setting to get a girlfriend.  But besides relationships, my family like my brother and my parents, they’re like all very supportive.  Of course, they are like, “Oh, don’t you want to come back to Austria?  It’s so nice here?”  So, they would prefer if I would stay in Austria, but they’re very supportive like and I think I’m very lucky because I talk to so many guys and they say, “My parents, they don’t really get what I’m doing.  They’re just thinking I’m wasting my time.”  So, I’m really lucky that my parents are so supportive.

F:    Okay.  What did your family say when you told them you were going abroad?  You said you had only a thousand bucks in your bank account and what did they say?

DH:    I had a few thousand bucks.  One thousand bucks would have been really tough.  But, the initial plan was to like for me to go to Thailand in April and to come back three to four months later because like I said, I didn’t have a business.  I didn’t have any money coming in, but my parents, they were—I mean, back then I just turned 21 back then and my parents were definitely quite a bit concerned about me doing that.  But yeah.  And then like once they found out that actually I’m going to stay in Asia like that I’m going to stay here for good and that I’m not just here in a couple of months trip, then of course, there was like the other reaction was like almost like a little bit shocked.  Like, when I told them about a year ago, less than about a year ago I think in November then I was like, “Okay, Dad.  I’m going to stay here for a while.  I might come back at some point, but not anytime soon.”  Yeah, I mean, my parents reacted like any parents would, like not that happy about it but they’re very supportive.

F:    Okay, cool.  That is really cool.

DH:    Yeah.

F:    What was your biggest challenge while working and traveling?

DH:    Well, the biggest challenge actually—Well, it’s probably not what you want to hear, but the biggest challenge that I personally had while traveling was internet connection.  Like here in Asia.  Thailand is good for most parts, but even in Thailand when you go like to the tourist islands like Koh Tao, I had like really, really bad internet connection there.  And then in the Philippines it’s slow.  If you’re in Manila or in Sabua, the big city in the Philippines, the internet is good, but like when you’re in some remote village and some remote islands, internet connection gets very slow to the point where it’s very hard to be productive and you might like—Something that could take you 20 minutes can end up taking an hour or so if the internet is slow.  So, that’s a big challenge and that’s a really big challenge that we had in Bali.  For some reason the internet in Bali is notoriously bad, but not if you have a house, like we set up some fiber optics connection and I think it’s the most expensive internet that you can get here, and it’s not even that fast.  You know, it’s like two megs down which is like, I mean, you’re back in Germany and you’re paying like I don’t know, about a hundred and ten U.S. dollars for two megs down.  In Germany, you probably pay 20 Euros for 10 megs down or something like that.  So, yeah, I would say that’s a big issue.  Of course, if you travel the other thing like the other problem when you travel by while working is to actually get work done because there’s always something going on.  Like, there’s always some party or like somebody wants to have a beer and then at the end of coming home at three in the morning and hung over on the next day or you want to go scuba diving but you have a deadline coming up.  So, yeah, I mean, that’s a real challenge, yes, but it‘s worth it.

F:    Absolutely.  You’re now working and traveling for one and a half years?

DH:    Yes.

F:    Is there any moment when you thought that, “Oh, man, I wanted to go home.”

DH:    Let me think.  Not really, like sometimes I was a bit unsure myself what I’m up to.  Like, sometimes I have phases where I’m like kind of into the bathroom and say like, “What the hell am I doing?  Maybe I should just—You know, just stopped with myself sometimes like, “What the hell am I doing?  Maybe I should just go back and get a real job,” but that happened very rarely.  Maybe that happened like one or two times since I even started.  So, yeah, I think if you’re involved in like a journey like that, you’ll definitely encounter self-doubt and your friends and your family are probably to a certain extent are going to doubt what you’re up to.  So, you can’t let the self-doubt from those thoughts.

F:    Do you think you are a lucky guy?  Do you think that you’re on „your way“?

DH:    I think yes and no.  I think in some ways I was definitely lucky.  First of all, like one thing that I realized by traveling so much here around Asia is how lucky anybody who gets born in a first-world country really is, like the kind of education that we get and the kind of social security and support that we get is amazing like, somebody who grows up in a third-world country like the Philippines or like Indonesia, they’re at a really big disadvantage compared to you or me.  So, I’m not saying they’re like doomed to live a shitty life.  I’m not saying that, but it’s definitely a lot easier like just starting in a first-world country, getting a first-world education and you have so much more possibilities.  So, I think in some ways that I definitely was lucky in a lot of ways like ended up getting this internship and working for this guy that I’m still working for today.  So, I think if I wouldn’t have met him I might not be in Bali right now, but I think in the long run I would still have made it because one of my favorite books by Felix Dennis, it’s called “How to Get Rich.”  It’s a great book, by the way.  Read that if you haven’t.  He’s like the self-made multi-millionaire and he has a whole chapter about luck in there and basically the bottom line in his opinion is luck is when opportunity meets preparation and that’s what definitely happened to me like.  I was prepared and then opportunity struck and now I’m here.  So, I think I would definitely have made it in the long run, but without some lucky coincidences.  So, yeah.  I mean, I wake up every morning and am like very grateful about what I’m up to and about everything that happened to me, but that said, yeah, luck has been preparation meets opportunity, so get out there and do something and then at some point.  If you try often enough you’ll get lucky at some point.  That’s my take.

F:    Okay, cool.  So, the last question is what is your personal goal for the future?  So, you said that having a business, I guess your own business.

DH:    Yes.

F:    This is your business goal?  What is your personal goal?

DH:    So, besides owning my own business, just for the next couple of years I’m going to stay here in Asia or like make a list to stay here in Asia.  Of course, something could always happen and I could have to go back if something goes wrong, but yeah, I would say right now like staying in Asia, eventually having my own business to keep making friendships with other interesting and smart people and to stay healthy like eat well, exercise, be in good shape, yes.  No crazy goals.  Well, there’s one goal eventually, but I’m giving myself a couple of decades to fulfill that goal eventually.  I want to go to space, but with the advent of private like tourist space flights over the next couple of years I think, I think that there’s a decent chance that in maybe 20 or so years it will be cheap enough and I will have enough money to go on one of those private space flights.  So, that’s like—Yeah, that’s like the big goal.  That’s a big goal eventually.  But I may need a couple of decades to fulfill that.  By then, it will probably be relatively cheap and there’s a good chance that I’d have enough money to do that.

F:    All right.  Cool goal, cool lifestyle, of course.

DH:    Oh, yeah.

F:    And that’s it.  I have no more questions for you.  So, if you wanted to say something else, do it now.

DH:    Sure.  Yeah, actually one question that you didn’t ask me now but you send me in the outline, like if I have any recommendations for somebody who wants like to get some kind of location of an independent job that I have.

F:    Yeah, yeah, of course.

DH:    Like working for some entrepreneur and actually it’s the best decision that I’m working on right now with Dan from the Tropical MBA.  That’s the guy that I work for, and it’s called Tropical Black Forest and it’s a chalkboard and we’re just launching that today and I think within the next week they’re going to have a couple of job postings on there from location independent entrepreneurs that are looking to hire interns that operate location independently so like they can travel and like to learn about business from them and I think they’re going to launch that today or within the next three days, so probably by the time that you see that interview, it’s going to be live.  So, check that out at tropicalworkforce.com

F:    So, it’s for me as well, so I can find a job and I can travel.

DH:    Right.  Yeah, right.  So, basically, it’s scaling the whole Tropical MBA and , so what the Tropical MBA internship model is that then his location dependent entrepreneur and he writes this job offers and he’s like, “Come to me.  Join me in Bali,” or you can work from wherever you want and you help me grow my business and I pay you and you learn about business from me and you live this better lifestyle and it’s great.  I mean, I learned so much over the last one and a half years and I’m really excited about us taking that model and scaling it, because there’s so many entrepreneurs who come to Dan and they are like, “I want to get my own Tropical MBA interns.  It’s like, I think I can offer them a lot—I want somebody like that who works for me and if they don’t have a blog or if they don’t have a huge audience it’s really hard to find people like that.  But, you have an interesting point that we know entrepreneurs who want to hire people like that and you have like make lists like e-mail lists of people who want to get a job like that.  So, I think that’s a really interesting opportunity and if you’re interested in getting a job like that check out Tropicalworkforce.com

F:    Okay.  That should do it definitely.

DH:    Yeah, and also for your listeners.  I think that could be really cool.

F:    Okay.

DH:    Yeah, that’s all I can think of.  Other than that, yeah, thanks for calling me.  Thanks for talking to me.

F:    Thanks that you had time for this interview and I hope I can see you live in Bali maybe in a couple of next months or so weeks, days.

DH:    Oh yeah.  Yeah, that will be cool.

F:    Thank you very much.

DH:    Okay.

F:    Okay, have a great time.

DH:    Okay, talk to you soon.

F:    Bye.

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