Hello, everybody. My name is Daniel Prince, and I'm the host of the Once Bitten podcast.
This is a podcast focused on Bitcoin. It's my mission to interview as many people as I can
around the different aspects of Bitcoin and help people understand exactly what Bitcoin could mean
for them and for their families and for their future. I hope you enjoy the show. Thank you so
much for listening. Hello everybody and welcome to this episode of the Once Bitten podcast.
Joining me today is Anuja from Travel with Bitcoin. She fell down the rabbit hole and
started her own company combining her two passions, traveling and Bitcoin. She goes
into the whole story so stick around for the whole episode. It's a brilliant journey and just
for those that are interested get over to travelwithbitcoin.com have a look around you can
book some tours you can also look at travel hosts this is cool and in the travel hosts you have
BitDriver so anybody heading to El Salvador can get straight in touch before you leave with BitDriver
and they're going to help you out with your whole itinerary where to go where not to go when to get
picked up at the airport take it to your airbnb or hotel or whatever all in bitcoin like this is
the kind of services that are now being offered and i think it's really important that we showcase
them and share them uh so go to the website travelwithbitcoin.com and i hope you find
something there that resonates with you and reach out to anuja if there's anywhere else you'd like
to go because she's always open to ideas. Now, before we get into the show, thank you as always
to the show sponsors, long lasting sponsors, Relai, R-E-L-A-I.ch forward slash Bitten. Download
the app today, use the code Bitten, save on your commission fees. They are an app where you can
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control of your Bitcoin. Anuja, who's joining us on this podcast today, she's also part of Club
Orange. Yes, shocked to know, I am sure, that somebody who loves travel would use the best
app in Bitcoin to find other Bitcoiners when she's on her travels. She actually works within
the team now after seeing an ad posted by Mateo, and she's working closely with a lot of the event
organizers all around the world where she is going to be curating little trips side trips but we get
into all of that in the interview but club orange is the shill go check it out there's a link in the
show notes you can go and download the link and join 20 000 bitcoiners around the world today
looking to connect then get to a conference ireland prague or btc hell all 10 off using the
code bitter enjoy this one with Anuja all right Anuja welcome to the show thank you Daniel I'm so
excited to be here glad to have you here and we got connected through Club Orange which was Orange
Pilap because you joined the the team there with with Mateo and then your name came up on my
interview with Brendan when he was talking about your trip to Africa and everything that he's doing
over there with the orphanage and the Bitcoin Circle economy. If nobody's listened to that
episode about Brendan and his work in Uganda, please go back and listen to it. It's so uplifting.
Brilliant story. But let's get the listeners up to speed with who you are, what you were doing
pre-Bitcoin? What was kind of just Anuja bumping along in Fiat Normie land? What did that look like?
Okay. All right. So pre-Bitcoin, which to be honest, Daniel, isn't that long ago.
I would still consider myself a bit new in the Bitcoin world. So prior to Bitcoin,
I was at a corporate job. I was there for about seven years. So I am, this was back when I was in
Canada. So originally I'm Indian, parents immigrated to Canada when I was super young. So I was raised
there, you know, went to school, university, found my first job at Microsoft, which was like a dream
come true for sure. Nothing to do with like coding or anything. I actually suck at like anything
related to programming, but it was more on the sales side. I'm like definitely a people person.
I want to be customer facing. I want to build relationships. Like those are things that really
excite me. And so I found my way into sales and absolutely loved it. Started off in kind of more
of the technical aspect. So implementing software and SaaS services for our clients and then went
into pre-sales and that was my career evolution trajectory as you may call um and then COVID
happened and my husband and I realized that you know there has to be more in this world
than being in front of our screens and working our jobs and I think it got to a point that we
were both very comfortable with our lives which is totally fine but we realized that if we just
stay put for a few more years we're gonna have a really hard time leaving Canada and seeing what
else is out there and the two the one of the main things that both my husband and I really connected
on when we first started dating was traveling and our love for like seeing the world and exploring
so we worked on a plan to take a sabbatical and we saved up made up this crazy plan and this idea
that we wanted to do this. And it just kept pushing. We just kept pushing it back because
it's a pretty big thing to do. And it, you know, impacts all aspects of your life, right? Like
career, you have to quit your job, got to sell your home, got to sell your car, you're away from
your family, it affects your health, your just everything. And so we pushed it far enough. And
then one day my husband's like, that's it. We're booking a one-way flight and that's our timeline.
and that's what we're going to work towards.
And I think one of us needed to do that.
So we did that and this was August of 2023,
a year after we got married.
And then since then, we've been on the road
and that's when I would say my journey
into Bitcoin also started.
So pre-Bitcoin, Anuja was corporate,
took this time off to travel the world.
My husband really wanted to see
how Bitcoin was being adopted, grassroots level.
And so that's how I got into Bitcoin because I saw it happening. I'm a very much like if I see it in front of me, if I talk to people about it, definitely not like read books, podcasts, you know, do scroll on X that just didn't work for me.
But yeah, I'll stop rambling. That's kind of the story of pre Bitcoin and Ultra.
wow uh right i get a question because what you you did the thing right uh especially as
an indian family going to live in canada you did the schooling you did the university
you got the degrees you got the dream job parents are very happy and proud
then oh my god yeah we're leaving we're selling everything and i'm resigning like how did that go
okay so I'm not gonna lie I was super scared to tell my parents even though I'm like a grown
30 year old woman with her own life you know I was terrified because of you know you don't want
to disappoint them right like they gave up everything that they had you know almost 30
years ago now or 25 years ago let's say couldn't even speak the language really left everything
that everyone and everything that they have known moved to this foreign land to give me and my
brother a better education of course a better life for them as well but they've made a lot of
sacrifices right like all my grandparents do and families do so I just didn't want to disappoint
them but honestly I remember breaking the news to them I took them on this like beautiful walk
out in the nature got them all calm and then I dropped the news right and they were actually very
supportive you know one of the things that always like it sticks around is you know we're just so
happy that you can do the things that at this age in your life that we could have never even thought
about doing or we never had the option to do and so very supportive they definitely questioned us
quite quite a bit in terms of like what are your plans after what are you going to do after
they're still questioning us
because it's been two and a half years
and we're still kind of on the road
but similar to my husband's parents
my husband name is Sintosh even his parents are super supportive so thankfully both our families kind of get it and yeah they been they been okay with it so far that amazing you know that
they it's the difficult conversations that uh stop people actually taking action on this because I
know a lot of plebs listening to this that they're stuck in their fiat job maybe they've stacked for
cycle or two and they're eyeing the exit door they just sit there dreaming of leaving their cubicle
and you know bitcoin's just got to get to xyz number and i'll be able to throw it all in and
go sail off into the wind and everything will be fine and uh there's no magic time moment or number
like there just isn't and i totally agree with that and i would love your perspective too because
I know you and your I'm assuming your wife at the time you guys were married already okay so you
left at 22 that's pretty okay for you to leave and what were your plans at that time was it more
to travel to go somewhere else what were you guys planning on doing 22 wow you're going back a long
time now the late 90s uh that was that was a job opportunity for me uh in in Singapore so I've been
extended a few job opportunities in Singapore which uh I ended up well consulting Claire and
saying well how would this work if I took this job you know long distance relationships never
going to work and I just don't want to you know take it she's like well I'll come with you okay
well that was easy let's go love that didn't even need to convince her ready yeah and that turned it
and it was supposed to be like a two-year contract but like everything you get there you make friends
you make a network your career starts cementing you become better and more efficient at your job
and you're more well respected.
And there's just way more opportunities
outside of London where everybody wanted to be
and it was dog eat dog.
And so, yeah, it became very easy for us to stick around
and that turned into 15 years living there
and four kids.
So, yeah.
Oh my God.
So you were in Singapore for 15 years?
Yes.
Wow.
Well, I've never been to Singapore,
but I've always heard phenomenal things about it.
So that must have been incredible.
it was an incredible time as well because the city like the actual cbd the central business
district was a quarter of the size it is now like you saw some incredible growth yeah so all right
so you're you're now you've been doing the thing right the kind of nomad digital nomad like
four-hour work week kind of life trying to figure something out uh i guess you had an idea you'd
have to make some kind of income along the way. What did you try? Okay, so I would say for the
first year, our mind was pretty set that this is a sabbatical. So we did go with the intention of,
you know, traveling and seeing what is out there in the world. So I'll be honest, for me, it was
all about like the travel aspect. And my husband at that time was probably eight years. No, at that
time it was like five to six years deep into his like big quinn rabbit hole right and it's like the
cup like a typical story you hear where you know the husband is going like super deep and technical
obsessed and the wife's kind of just like can you shut up like I don't want to hear about it
like because you know what it's not even that I didn't like okay I am a tech like I'm an engineer
I was in technology like I I did understand it but I just didn't see the craze around it at that
time. You know, I just, I still saw it as like, it's an investment. It's a good way for us to make
more money. And that was because most of my circle at work or my friends, that's how it was perceived.
Right. Oh my gosh. There's this really funny story where my husband was crazy enough at one point
because he was sort of sick of doom scrolling on X when it came to Bitcoin. He said, you know what?
I've had so many conversations, but they're all virtual or remote. And he's like, I want to have
conversations with real people what do real people think about bitcoin and i'm like okay where
is this going so he decided he was gonna get a whiteboard and write down like ask me anything
about bitcoin and just go to streets we were living in calgary at this point so west part of
canada um go around to different streets and just hold the sign to see how people react and honestly
I was like, you are kind of crazy for doing this. And I remember at one point he was on the same
street where I used to work and I would take like my clients up for lunch and things like that. And
I'm just like literally praying. I'm like, please do not be on my street today. Cause then I have to
explain to my, either my coworkers or my clients, who this person is, why he's holding the sign,
you know, make sure they know he's not trying to scam them. But yeah, he was, he was that obsessed.
So that helps kind of paint a picture of like the extremes that we were in at that point.
So for him, the sabbatical was, of course, on the travel side, but he was really interested to see Bitcoin adoption outside of the West.
And both of us had decided that we wanted to go to Africa because it was a continent that we both haven't touched and we just really don't know too much about it.
but he had made some friends online. Like Brendan is definitely a friend that they connected online
on Twitter. And he's like, I got to go meet my friend. And so we're like, all right, we're going
to do this. We are going to start our travels from Egypt and we're going to make all make our way down
to South Africa. And we stayed mostly on the east side. So we covered about 10 countries,
but we did it by bus because we're like, we're already getting adventurous. Might as well
continue being more adventurous and that's how I learned how gigantic Africa really is
and the existing map like the marketer projection is like completely off like it is huge like
going from one country to another I think we would be on the bus for like 16 plus hours
it was insane um so as we're going through our travels um the first thing that hit me
was when we were in Egypt we spent about two months in Egypt and when we first landed there
Daniel um we went to the bank we got you know we had we had USD we got Egyptian pounds right
and then we met some locals there and they're like no don't go to the bank because I will give
you more Egyptian pounds for your US dollars. And to me, that was the first time I've experienced
like a black market rate for a currency, where you're not just watching it on TV and seeing
what's happening. Like these people are literally telling you this in front of you. And then you
just you're hearing stories of like, how many of their savings just have been slashed, you know,
and over a couple of months, and the whole concept of like purchasing power and, you know,
good money versus bad money and like all of that it just kind of hit me all at once
and made me want to look into the history of money and it kind of actually made me curious
to learn more like why is this happening in Egypt and how much longer until it happens
in Canada or in parts of Europe where maybe we don't see it as much we don't feel it as much
right um so that was my first little like shit like this is this is bad um and then we
continued traveling and we went to east africa and then in uganda and you know in kenya i saw like
literally like street vendors you know on the side accepting bitcoin and that kind of made me
realize all right like how are these guys here accepting this you know currency what does this
mean um why are they doing this and so learning the whole concept of like circular economies and
now I went from you know thinking bitcoin is just like this sort of investment or a way to make
money to actually seeing it as money so kind of the concept of like store of value to medium of
strange and honestly the more I spoke to people the more it made me want to learn about it so that
that was kind of like my orange pill journey that like I kind of took the orange pill myself with
some help from my husband but and I think this goes for a lot of people that are sort of new
in this space like many times we'll try to like like overwhelm them with information and go read
this listen to this go read this book and sometimes it's just as simple as like helping them see it
you know helping them have a conversation with a real business owner or someone that has gone
through issues and problems and why they're accepting bitcoin or how they see bitcoin
i think those real conversations give you a perspective that i just really don't think
you'll find on the internet at least that's my opinion but okay so i know i didn't answer a
question about how we started making money or how we were going to like make money on the road.
But that was through my journey into like Bitcoin, right? So once I was on board, I was like, yeah,
I want to go see more communities. I want to talk to more people. I want to find businesses
that I can pay in Bitcoin that will give me an experience because we're still traveling. We want
to do all the hiking and the safaris and the whitewater rafting and whatever that, you know,
Africa has to offer. We want to do it, but we want to find businesses that we can pay in Bitcoin with,
which obviously is difficult, right? Like we're going niche of a niche here. And yeah, there's
BTC maps. There's all of that. But again, it's open source. Some of it is not verified or some
of it just doesn't exist. So we're reliant on word of mouth a lot. We, you know, message someone
like we let Brendan know that okay we going to Rwanda Who do you know in Rwanda Like that in the Bitcoin space that we can connect with that might know a business that we could pay in Bitcoin with right So it was quite a lot of like
shuffling around with people that we knew.
And so now this is about 14 months later,
we are in South Africa
and we wanted to end our trip with,
I don't know if you've,
have you ever heard of Vipashna?
No.
Okay.
it's like it's a it's a meditation technique or it's like a meditation theme but ultimately it's
a 10-day silent meditation with like no phone you can't you you were gonna do this
you yeah we did you didn't talk about bitcoin for 10 days you and your husband oh my god
okay so it was funny because in our heads we're like how bad can it be like
10 days of no talking and this will be a perfect way to end our trip we can reflect and really like
you know think through everything that we went through and we saw and we experienced
and we go there and like second day in and I am literally freaking out because it was so
hard like I feel like that not talking was okay you eat very basic meals wake up super early and
all of that but it was the eight hours of sitting down and actually learning how to meditate
that you know can I ask you a question are you being led through that like do you have to
sit completely still are you able to move like you know it's very hard for me to envision
no no you can move and like look nothing is mandatory right like the whole concept of this
is because you wanted to come and do this and their teachers are there to help you guide you
and their goal is that you finish the 10 days right so there are teachers there that kind of
guide you through every day so every day you learn kind of a new technique or have to
evolve a technique that they've taught the day before they talk you through it and it's just
like a constant like I don't know I don't even know how to explain it but it's not like you're
just sitting there silenced the entire time they are talking and they're helping you so you kind of
Can you talk back? Are you able to like clarify or ask a question?
Like no words leave your body for 10 days.
So they have office hours.
So technically between lunch from like 12 to 1, you can go ask questions.
But you can't be there and be like, hey, what's up?
Like, no, it's like, what is your question?
This is the answer. Get out.
Like you're not meant.
the whole point of this is so if you when you stop talking your brain can actually be silent
so you can meditate so that was super interesting and I've never felt this before which is why
I know it sounds crazy trust me but like I this is why I would recommend that people go because I
think it was on my third day or fourth day where my brain actually went quiet and I thought something
was wrong with me because I'm like my you know um it's a call my like my mind is not running you
know like things are not just popping up it's actually quiet and that was such an amazing
feeling and since I've left I've not felt like that like honestly I haven't felt that before
or since I've left I haven't felt it again you know but anyway so that during that 10 day of a
lot of reflection. That's where the idea of travel with Bitcoin was born, okay, ultimately.
So we're like, hey, we were crazy enough to do this. We know there are other crazy people that
will want to travel with Bitcoin, that will look for experiences that are worth spending Bitcoin on.
So why don't we build something that can make it easier for these travelers, right? So initially,
was supposed to be just a marketplace where I wanted to put together like all businesses that
accepted Bitcoin that are tourism related globally. I really wanted to highlight the community leaders
so all the circular economies and the amazing work that they're doing on the ground. So if you are
going to let's say you know El Salvador or Guatemala you can actually connect with the
community host and they can take you around and show you around the merchants and what's going on
in their community um so it started off as a marketplace and the whole way i was going to
monetize it and this has not happened by the way i just i evolved or i changed very quickly
um but the the way we were thinking about this we're like well shit we gotta monetize this like
we gotta make money um and so we're like okay let's focus on the value first let's like get
everyone like you know let's get our hosts together our communities together let's you know
So the way we would charge or monetize for this, and even at that time, I took some inspiration
from at that point, it was Orange Pill App, but like the membership model, right?
Where it's like, okay, so I want to make it so exclusive that if you're a business, you
want to be part of this network where you get to access other businesses so you can
like converse and share ideas and learn from each other.
We would do like monthly meetups, you would do monthly webinars and things like that and
give value back to this community.
And then I would eventually charge for it if you wanted to be part of the network.
But then I quickly changed that because we were going to attend Africa Bitcoin Conference in Nairobi.
And I was like, you know what?
I like bringing people together, right?
Like I like doing travel things.
I like bringing people together.
I'm a people person.
I'm like, why don't I do a tour the day before the conference?
because people are coming from all different parts of the world.
And Nairobi is the only city where you can actually do a safari in the city
because in all other places, you have to travel at least five, six hours
to go to the national park and do a safari.
So Nairobi actually has a national park within its city, which is super cool.
So I was like, all right, I'm going to do, you know, safari,
some amazing local food, and then we're going to go see Afrobit,
which is one of the largest slums in Africa which is in Nairobi and they have over 40 small businesses
that except I think even 60 now something like that that except Bitcoin which is really really
amazing to see so that was kind of the day that I had planned and then I ended up getting like a full
safari vehicle of people that wanted to do this and I was like shit this is travel with Bitcoin
because they get to experience something and none of them have been to a safari before so
seeing them experience it was really fantastic um and I was like okay well this is something like
these people just paid me in bitcoin my first I remember the first time I got stats and I was like
shit this feels good um and then so that was when my head was like just going with ideas because I'm
like there's so many conferences that happen and we had planned to attend a bunch the year after
so I'm like I'm just going to plan a bunch of tours and events around these conferences
and this is what I'm going to do. So that's how, yeah, that was a very, very long answer. So I hope,
yeah, that answer. No, that's awesome. So yeah, you mentioned orange pill app and it reminds me
of what you told that that story that you told about your, your husband going out with the
whiteboard standing on the street corner, like, you know, orange pill app fixes this, right? You
The rebrand to Club Orange.
So for all of the lonely Bitcoiners out there
that are in the same position as your husband
who are just sick and tired of...
It's, look, Twitter, X, whatever you want to call it,
now Nostra, they're great for hanging out
and getting into conversations
or dunking on PhD economists or whatever else.
But at some stage, you get sick and tired of doing that
and you just want to go hang with real people.
Exactly. And I also have found that when I was doing some of these tours, doing conferences, that people don't just want to talk about Bitcoin either.
Like they want to hang out with like-minded people. Like I want to hang out with you, but I don't want to just talk to you about Bitcoin.
Sorry, I'm going to cough. So I'm just going to put myself.
Yep.
Quick water break, listeners. No problem.
and I'm just just uh yeah get some water okay I won't even edit that that's far too much work
yeah um sorry I guess I was I'm too chatty so I gotta in between um but yeah exactly we were
saying like you know I want to hang out with people like in the bitcoin space but I don't
always want to talk about bitcoin either like for example the fact that I don't know how you guys
left and started this whole life and you know raised amazing kids traveled did I think homeschooling
as well a little bit right like just even the whole concept of that like I'm so interested by
it because that's something I would like to do or I'm like open to exploring and doing but I feel
like if I were to share that with my I'll say non-bitcoiner friends just to make it easier
I just feel like they'll have a hard time understanding that where you know a lot of
people I've met in this space they get it they understand it without me having to justify it or
explain it and that's why I love this space and love meeting people in this space which is why
you should go on Club Orange and make some new friends 100% have you been back to Calgary much
or at all over the last couple of years so not Calgary but we have our family is in Toronto
um so we go back often to see them we went we were just there for all of december and a little
bit of january we usually try to go there during december during holidays and spend time with our
family and friends well the reason i ask uh your friends your family your old peer group your colleagues yeah that that a difficult you have changed so much in the last two years and this is something
bitcoin has struggled with because you go through this metamorphosis in your metamorphosis in your
at the soul level really like everything about you changes and you people people say bitcoin
holds up a mirror to you it shows who you really are and it helps you become the person that you
were supposed to be uh that might sound all a little bit cliche or woo woo to those listening
for the first time or it hasn't happened to yet but believe me it is real so how how how have you
found those interactions and those conversations um not easy um and you know what that that is such
a good point because when I do speak with my friends and my extended family I almost don't
share a lot you know I almost stop myself from you know sharing what our plans are and sharing
why we're doing this because to your point like I don't know if they will get it you know I don't
know if they'll understand it and I've also gotten to a point where you know I don't have to explain
myself to the people that are kind of like in my outer circle but if you're close to me then even
if you don't understand it you're going to support me and I think that's where I am with most of my
friends and family they're like okay they're on this journey you know they've definitely seen me
change in some ways I'm still who I am but the way I think about life and how I want to live as
you know how I want to like grow family and you know where I want to have a family all of that
it has changed um and they're honestly kind of they're very happy about it they're like listen
like you went through this whole journey and this is who you are you have more clarity on what you
want and I think that's a that's a big part about leaving something that you are so used to like you
know you're constantly on this like autopilot of like living your life which is fine that's totally
fine nothing wrong with that but I think once you take yourself away from that into a completely
different environment you definitely get more clarity on like okay what it is that you want in
your life how you how you want your mornings to be and your evenings to be how you want to spend
your time and your weekends um so all of those things that I try to share back with my friends
as well when I see them um sometimes I think it's like a little cringe but I'm like this
this is what would you say if you look back at the old Anuja what would you say would be
the the big that what's the one thing you've changed your mind on the most you think that you
if you look back you think how on earth was was I ever gaslit into believing that or why would I
think that that was the way you know society was supposed to work or is there any one thing
so many things but the one big thing and honestly I still struggle with it a lot
So I would love your input on this as well, Daniel, is, you know, prior to leaving, you know, doing the sabbatical, I found that my identity was very much tied to work.
You know, I got a lot of validation from work. Obviously, there is like the financial component to it.
You know, you're you're you are who you're top like the five people that you are constantly around.
and four out of those five were work people for me and so I just felt like everything that I had
to do or thought about or did was somehow tied back to work and so I will like I remember the
day I quit my job like I cried so much because I did love my job but I know that I had to do this
you know and then when we were traveling we would be in some of the most beautiful places
and actually doing things that I wanted to do.
But I still felt this like, I don't know what the right word is,
but because when you tie your self-worth to work,
and then now that work is taken away, you're like, what am I doing?
What is my value?
You know, I'm not being productive.
So the aspect of productivity has not completely changed.
And this is so timely because I was having the same conversation
with Santos yesterday I was like I love that to me productivity isn't just about you know how many
sales call that I make or how many emails I finish or you know the typical things that you have to do
yeah my KPIs exactly well I'm under my quota or all of that um but now productivity I'm not saying
there is still some aspect of that because you know there's there's all these amazing ideas we're
working on I'm working on some awesome stuff with Mateo so I want to do you know and help you know
get people together in the space ultimately that those are the things I'm working on but
you know productivity for me is very different now it's like shit I didn't touch my phone before
9 a.m today or for this whole week well like I actually turned my phone off at 9 p.m and did
something else and was not on a device like those are all things that I find I find more like as
productive now than how I used to like value myself before and I think that's been a really
big change and I still kind of struggle with it so I think it's like a process you have to go through
um but yeah what are what are your thoughts on that well I was just uh I just picked up a copy
of my book and I was trying to find where I wrote about this um oh yeah because uh the identity you
know the identity crisis basically oh yes exactly you suffer that yeah I remember it took about two
or three weeks before it really set in because I'd had up until that point like an 18-year career
so a two or three week break your your monkey mind just thinks you're on a holiday right with
the family and we were in a different country and it was a swimming pool and there was a beach
nearby so all is fine but then like your little monkey wakes up one day like 14 to 18 days later
and starts clashing the symbols like what the fuck who am i like you know what are you doing
exactly that is such a good way of putting it and that's that's how it went for me as well
and for you I mean you have like 18 years like that's like your mind is so used to doing
what you were doing those 18 years right so how how did you overcome it like what was your
so then then you have that um you have those those moments where it gets amplified well you
meet new people and the first the first question is and then you realize how society is shaped is
oh so what do you do and then it's like oh let's discuss our labels you're like oh
i don't know what to say oh my god i like i'm so glad you're saying this because yeah like i
remember that year we were traveling people asked what we would what we're doing and i'm just like
fuck i'm not doing shit i'm just traveling which again like you know you worked hard to take
to you know i'm not gonna say retire but you know to take time for it right you worked hard for it
you planned for it you chose it so why do we feel so freaking guilty of sharing that like we don't
do something like we do what we want to do i don't know it's it's it's so i mean this that's
the success story the success story is i just quit my job because i'm in a position where i can
to travel with my family this is going to be at least a year maybe two i couldn't deliver that
for whatever reason because i was so conditioned to delivering you know i'm a foreign exchange
broker i you know work in singapore and blah blah blah blah blah blah because there was so much
but then when you realize as well another thing uh once you've stepped away from it and i think
that took a little bit longer it's like oh shit i was just playing a game the whole time i was being
someone else I would wear six or seven different masks a day I would have a mask for my boss a mask
for my each one of my colleagues a mask for my each one of my customers during like the period
of work hours then you go out and you've got to go to the cocktail parties or maybe there's a dinner
or maybe there's a networking event or you've got to go to some corporate maybe there's a golf day
or something and it's so exhausting because you're never you and it was now all of a sudden you're
away from all of that and you rediscover you and at the same time I was around my wife and the four
kids all day long so nobody was used to that as well and so now I'm I've got to share in the
parenting decisions which you know that didn't happen before and you you have contrasting styles
obviously the kids weren't used to having me around and uh everybody was going through their
own coping stage because they're not going to school anymore uh claire's not running them
around and doing all of that kind of crap and dealing with um the the housework and the running
of the house and that that's been taken off her table work was taken off my table you know that
And there were six of us.
And everyone's got an extra personality.
Yeah.
So is this when you guys left Singapore to travel then?
Yeah.
Okay.
And you guys traveled for how long as a family?
Almost three years.
it was about two and a half years in total wow that's inspiring man with four kids
and they were aged eight six and the twins were three when we set off oh my god oh we have twins
oh cute okay so did you guys was it more like hey we're gonna be in this one place for like
three months kind of a situation or how did you plan out your we started we we fell into the
sharing economy into home swapping and uh we we have uh hang on my camera my camera might
switch off a second but i'm still here okay uh so we had a um we had a property that we bought
uh in kosumumi on the it's a small thai island and bought that 20 years ago
right so we had the house it was up for rental it was part of a rental pool and whatever else
it was working good enough and so i just put it on a home swapping site and that's when people
started approaching us from all over the world and we're like oh my goodness we've just driven our
cost of travel like the cost of accommodation has just gone down to zero uh this is crazy so we just
started putting together the requests and each time we got a request we would okay where is that
fine we can fly into there we're still six hours from where we need to be so let's find a home swap
in that area so we'll spend a week there then a week at that home swap and then we would just
sometimes we would be in one place for a week other times for two weeks uh country wise we
went to australia for three months new zealand for three months and we were just hitting home
swaps wherever we could get them uh america and the us uh sorry the us and canada for three months
uh europe yeah yeah that's that's a lot of change though like the fact they're changing homes every
two weeks oh it was exhausting it was great fun yeah i mean we don't have kids it was just me him
and two backpacks and even then i was like every two weeks i'm like this is a lot of work so yeah
I can't imagine. Honestly, like that is phenomenal. It's very inspiring. I love meeting and seeing families that do this because it gives me like that motivation that, you know, hopefully, you know, we do want to have kids and have a family that we don't have to stop doing what we're doing.
they can continue and you know you of course you can you tell me if this is right or wrong but i
feel like when you travel kids learn so much they adapt to so many situations and things
languages and right they play they get to play with all these kids from different parts of the
world and i just i can't comprehend how much growth you know they go through in those years
versus like staying in that one place like you just learn and you learn differently i guess right
yeah so that's called world schooling is what uh that would get labeled uh so you would have
world schooling or unschooling would come under that um homeschooling is more you you would
probably be stricter about following a curriculum or something whereas if you just completely fully
unschool or world school it's like whatever happens during the day is our teaching and that's
our learning and you just embrace the experience and you can obviously you can set things up like
we would do goodness knows how many museum visits or park visits or historical monument visits and
that was the lesson for the day and that was just how we did it yeah and yeah but the the difference
that you see in the kids is not that they're going to retain the knowledge any better but it just
completely blows open their minds and their intellectual curiosity they want to learn
whereas in a school setting or even if more of a stricter home school setting if you bring in
textbooks to the kitchen table expect minds to close down like it's not gonna happen
that's just not the way humans are built to learn i mean the traditional what like the traditional
school system it was meant to at the at the time of i don't know when it was you know the the whole
concept of school and getting people to be like machines in uh industries really right like i'm
saying the concept wrong but you understand what i mean that was what school was supposed to be and
now we're not so it's like the school systems have to evolve and i think a lot of them are
trying but I can't imagine how hard it is with AI and just like technology and the digital world like
man being a kid right now is where it's an interesting time for sure it's
putting kids in these institutions I mean it's yeah it's really bad like people people uh you
know they scratch their heads oh mental mental health this mental health that you know it's going
through the roof um it's like yeah are you surprised like really have you seen what kids
go through i mean we all went through these uh education systems and you're piling pressure
on children to perform and i still love the sir ken robinson quote um when and he was talking
about like the rise of adhd and add and uh the questionable um process of diagnosing the child
and then you know giving them the medication to come like it's right it's a dark dark area to go
talking about uh and he said don't be you can't you can't expect to sit an eight-year-old down
in a classroom filled with forced socialization with 29 other people and forced to do low-grade
clerical work for seven hours a day and not expect them to fidget like you know it's just
insanity yeah and you made a good point like there is all this pressure for them to perform
in school and now i'm just thinking about it for kids there's that pressure but now there's this
pressure to also perform somehow on the social media side too right like we didn't have that
growing up right like yeah I'm sure it was different for you too but like I only got a
flip phone in grade 12 I was almost in university like just social media just wasn't something I was
worried about or you know how I looked on social media or what to post or who's saying what about
like it just wasn't a thing it was so freeing so it is and that's a scary part for me because
you know sometimes I have trouble putting my phone down so then I'm like if I do have kids like
that would be tough because you have to be a role model and you have to also be practical
and realistic right so yes you know you're going to be on your phone they're going to see you on
your phone but yeah I don't know it's it's a struggle I don't know how you guys do it with
four kids but whatever you're doing it's a struggle it's it's a struggle it really is
because they're addictive we know this right that's what we tell the kids all the time like
you are being controlled by your phones as I as am I and as as your parents but we we understand
that this is happening and listen to Jack Cruz
and listen to the Daylight Computer guys Tristan and Jan and they tell you how these things are designed to but they won listen i even got the then if you follow zarusty on uh on twitter uh who does he he tests all the electromagnetic fields of all
of these devices that the kids are wearing and he shows videos i even bought the i even bought the
thing to show them with their own like eyes he's like right look how much emf non-native emf this
is pumping into your body like the airpods and all this kind of stuff it's just relentless
yeah i should probably stop using my airpods then definitely
okay like well so what am i supposed to do if i'm in a cool working space
right yeah like either i have to listen to people chat around me or have some music
so are there alternatives you gotta go air tubes so why are your phones are better
um but you're still running copper wire straight into your ears so this these are air tubes
uh so the last part the last little bit there there's just an air tube so the sound just travels
straight through the air tube straight into the bud and you just sit there with them in and you
can tune out or tune into your calls so i'll send you the link afterwards you know thank you so much
this just makes me think like we as humans are so funny we create all these gadgets and shit to make
our life efficient and then we realize it's freaking ruining us so we're like let's create
alternatives to fix these things and yeah that's uh that's yeah you know oh yeah sorry i was gonna
say and this is the thing about bitcoin and bitcoiners uh and you said it earlier you might
want to like hanging out with bitcoin is freaking amazing but you might not just want to talk about
monetary history every minute of every every day you might want to get into the other little
random topics that you've been learning about because because bitcoin has set you free uh to
a certain extent it's not set everybody completely free but i guarantee you it's freed up most
people's uh certain time and certain time intellectually stimulated again and you just
can't stop learning and then when you brush up against these people whether that's still on
social media or if you get to a meetup or if you get to a conference and you start meeting people
in real life and they're talking about one of these little gadgets or the blue light blockers or
uh goodness knows what else there's so many different areas of interest art yeah the big
bitcoin art magazine that's just dropped like you know i didn't think i'd ever be reading an art
magazine but now because it's a bitcoin magazine i've read it cover to cover it's absolutely
incredible it's such wow i print brilliant piece of work um put together by just a bunch of plebs
for their love of each other's work and respect and the time and effort that's gone into it
i didn't think i'd be discussing art artwork well okay you know what this makes me think so
let me get your thoughts on this because one of the things that i want to do with child with
Bitcoin this year is try to focus more on like intimate type retreats where it really is about,
you know, taking a break from your fast paced, you know, digital life that you're typically in
and getting away from all of that in like a beautiful space. I haven't figured out exactly
where or which countries, but you're going to be with like-minded people because it is still in the
Bitcoin space, but we're doing things like yoga and breath work and, you know, things that really
calm our nervous system down, just like learning things that maybe we sometimes don't prioritize
when it comes to wellness. And again, I haven't thought exactly about the format of it, but I have
a good friend who just finished his breath work certification, also in the Bitcoin space, and
he's going to be going to the Vegas conference and so am I. So we're like, why don't we try to do
a beautiful retreat somewhere you know near the canyons or something like that and see if people
would be down to attend something like this and especially after the craziness and chaos of like
Vegas and the conference people might just be down to do that what is breath work could you explain
what that is so okay I haven't been certified he has so I can't explain on behalf of him but
it's really just apparently we have forgot we have forgotten how to breathe properly we do a
lot of like shallow breathing we're not inhaling like as deep as we should be and exhaling for as
long as we should be there's all these like concepts and techniques of like how to breathe
properly and all of these things if done on a consistent basis are supposed to be really good
at decreasing like you know any diseases and you know diseases related to your brain or your heart
and things like that again I don't know all the scientific kind of things behind it but that's why
I would have because he's certified in it but that's the idea right it's like learning about
concepts that we're very fast to neglect because we're like breathing I do that every day like I'm
sure I know how to breathe. But yeah, that's really the idea. It's like disconnect, you know,
take time, reflect, learn something that you might not learn otherwise, and spend time with people
and not just talk about Bitcoin, but spend time with people that share, you know, the same values
as you in a beautiful place. That would 100% get filled out, I'm sure. Okay, cool. So I'm going to
put you down at first if i was coming if i was coming to the conference i would hit you up it
sounds very very interesting and already does kind of resonate and make sense that uh yeah if you were
to be breathing properly in air quotes um surely that just means you're getting more and a better
volume of oxygen into your body and your cells and voila like you know that that should be that's
not to my wife and i have fallen down like the sauna rabbit hole at the moment and i'm sure my
nordic friends are like yeah whatever dude like you know we do that all the time like yes exactly
but yeah the benefits of sauna are supposed to be really great as well right yeah and is that
is that like an everyday thing or we've been doing it weekly but it just makes sense you just sweat
out a lot of crap there's a reason your body sweats and uh yeah get rid of all of those uh
toxic impurities right huh there's so well i mean i feel like it's a it's a natural sun
so i don't think i have to go but yeah it could be well yeah it definitely works in
the colder countries but and and then you look across uh all of the different continents and
the different for millennia the different things that people have been doing and like if you look
at uh traditional chinese medicine or that's literally just crushing up herbs and roots and
making teas well okay we forgot to do that and yeah acupuncture people are going to tell you
acupuncture is just a load of pseudoscience and we're like i don't know man it seems you look at
a map of an acupuncture of uh of the body and the points and you know i've definitely uh felt
um positive results from from acupuncture and then you have pressure and then you have meditation
and then you have yoga and then you have all of this kind of stuff like that stood the test of
time these aren't these aren't fads that were you know like being kicked around in the 90s
Like this is something that's been going on.
I mean sometimes some things will be a little bit trendy just because they like oh this is a new thing to do But you right Like it not something that has just come up now It been around for years There science There you know obviously proof that things work
And this actually makes me think, right?
Like, we're almost just like going back in time in some ways because we've come so far.
And now we're like, wait, are we forgetting all these things that our ancestors knew that
we're like natural organic or you know things related to our mind and body that like we don't
do anymore like i mean for for god's sakes we get ai to like write our texts and emails like we're
like not even thinking hard anymore which is scary to think like if this keeps progressing
like we're just gonna get stupider and stupider i know we're gonna get efficient yes i i understand
all that but I don't know there's definitely a dark side to this which I don't like to think
about too much but yeah yeah you'd like to think that people are saving time to then pick up books
or better themselves in some way that's the positive way to use this these tools or are they
just using it whilst they're sat eating their Doritos on the sofa watching the rerun of some
box set that they've already seen before exactly which is really tough not to do because it's so
readily available and you're like well now I have something a tool that's making my day job much
more easier and faster you know do I want to spend my time you know learning something or am I like
screw it and then you just get into this really bad habit and pattern so
rolling tick tock yeah all right let's let's end this on the the idea then that um you're gonna be
uh is the idea follow the conference scene to a certain extent and put on side events or
trips and do you want anyone in particular
so um case because last year we had planned on going to a lot of conferences doing the tours
combined with the conferences made a lot of sense but this year we are planning not to travel as
much and so there's a couple of things that I want to do ultimately the vision is bringing people
together in real life right and giving them and creating a space where they feel relaxed and calm
to connect and actually make genuine friends, not surface lover friends. And I think that's the one
big thing I found in the tours that I have done is like seeing people meet for the first time,
connecting, and then hanging, they hang out or they talk or they become friends after. And I
think that's amazing. That's what I want to do while giving them a new experience. So there's a
couple of things that I'll be focused on. So one is the retreats that I spoke about.
um that one does surround conferences a little bit but I I'm hoping not to do too much hopping
around so I'll probably do I'm probably going to plan to do one or two retreats um and then
I would like to do um like take over being the partner for specific conferences for their
satellite events so now that we're seeing because there's so many conferences and they're typically
happening in new cities and countries the conference organizers obviously want the guests
to get a gist of you know their culture and music and food and so they want to put a lot of amazing
side events together so if I am able to help them set that up that would be another kind of
stream that I would be working on. And my last one, which I haven't acted on yet,
and would love your thoughts, is Bitcoin company offsites. There's a lot of Bitcoin businesses and
companies. And most of the workers are remote and in different parts of the world. And you got to
come together at least once or twice a year, right? And typically, right now, that's usually given to
just someone random on their team. So here's the budget, go plan and come back to us with ideas.
But I would like to put together a few packages of what's available, give them some cool ideas of
places or countries they've never thought about. So they can actually genuinely see how Bitcoin is
being adopted in different parts of the world, you know, get a cool experience for their team,
but also make sure there's enough time for them to do their strategy and their meetings and all
of the team things that you need to do so it sounds like a lot but those are the three buckets
that I'd like to focus on and just evolve based on where the demand is what people really need
where they need help um yeah that's that's it and really ultimately even across all three the
vision is bringing people together like that is the one thing that I'm holding on to so which is
what obviously attracted you to Club Orange and what Mateo has built and did you want yeah the role
there exactly and so Club Orange so the role there it was actually my husband who saw the application
that Mateo had put out and this is when we're back in Canada and he's like hey look at this
and I read the application and I'm like director of events cool name I'm like all right you know
Orange Pearl app, Club Orange, I already know the app. I didn't know Mateo at that point, but I loved
the role because it was about helping grow the events platform. It was about working with conference
organizers. It was about bringing Bitcoiners together in real life. I'm like, this connects
with what I'm doing already. And I think that's also what resonated with Mateo when we first met
is what I'm already planning on doing. And there's just a lot of synergy. So yeah, I get to do what I
love with Mateo and through Club Orange I also get to meet some awesome conference organizers
that then also become you know potentially leads for the travel side that I'm working on so
a lot of great work and collaboration there um yeah I'm very excited for everything that
Club Orange is building we have over 700 events on the app we have over I think in general there's
like over 70 conferences that are happening this year which is crazy to think about so many side
events and meetups and we're genuinely seeing that people are putting in effort to meet in person
they want to meet in person right like you're already seeing and that's only going to increase
so that's what we're going to be building for 100 and now you'll be able to even buy the tickets
via the app directly in Bitcoin
from your own in-app wallet as well.
It's just becoming stronger and stronger
and more and more people are joining.
And literally like your one-stop shop, right?
Like we don't, we want to create such an experience
that our members don't have to leave the app
to do anything, right?
So you want to find a merchant nearby,
you want to get a coffee,
you want to see who's there, events,
buy your tickets send someone's that uh sats whatever it is that you need to do create invoices
even now as well for something that you may you may be selling as a small business so in terms of
the feature list it's it's never ending even i can't keep up sometimes i have to be like mateo
like when did you roll this out you know it's been incredible yeah it's they build yeah they
build and as soon as they found like the vibe coding my goodness the the building just never
stopped we went from just having a dm having chat messages to having uh phone messages to having
uh now full-on face calls and then tap to zap the face zaps and then voice messages like it just
It growing really quickly See this is a good example of using AI efficiently because we using AI to help with the future rollouts
but it's only making the app better
and making people connect better.
So that's a good example of how it should be used.
So I love it.
All right.
So final question.
If you had one last orange pill left to give to somebody,
who would you give it to and why oh wow if i had one last orange pill to give to somebody
and who would i give it to oh my god i don't know that's a
i feel like most of the people daniel in my life that i care about i have spoken to them
about this to one extent or another so it's hard to say who
I really don't know how to answer that that's a tough one um well you know what I'll say this
and I'll knock on wood if and whenever you know I have a kid they would be the last one that I would
gladly and happily pass that orange bill down too well i hope that happens as well that would be
uh amazing we need we need more bitcoin families more bitcoin kids yeah it's uh it's great to see
it's actually that's one of the things having done the podcast for for so many years having seen
so many of the people that i would see on twitter back in the day now having you know little kids
around them or you see them in the conferences and they bring their kids with them he's like wow
this is crazy I mean Katie the Russian perfect example when I met Katie uh in some of the chat
rooms and and Twitter and whatever else she she was well she was still single at the time like
now she's married she's got she's growing the family like crazy sharing the experience come
on the podcast a couple of times talked about home birthing and all of that uh yeah it's just
great to see these these families uh build in front of your eyes yes exactly i love that well
it was so nice to come with you um i had a great time so thank you so much for having me daniel
thank you for coming on but please where can people find you and your work and if they want
to come on one of the trips what's the best way to reach out or if they want to add value in any
way if they've got any ideas they want to share yeah i'm always open to collaborating love working
with people so you can find me on x it's travel with bitcoin my website travel with bitcoin and i
won't put my email because they're probably gonna forget my first name but best would be website or
x and all my contact information is up there and it is pretty easy to remember travel with bitcoin
But funny enough, based on all the research that Mateo did about rebranding, one of the things was like, don't make the name too obvious.
And I'm just like, oh, shit.
Literally as obvious as it gets.
But no, I'm not worried about rebranding or anything like that.
But it was just funny because he went really deep into his research.
He did.
He talked about it on the pod.
So is it travelwithbitcoin.com?
Correct.
Yeah.
that was available wow okay i'm so glad as soon as we did the meditation retreat the first thing
no no joke the first thing we entered our airbnb we bought the domain
that's the first thing we did it was available at that time so i'm thankful we did that
well uh and another yeah you should get if you've not chatted with hondre already from uh
airbtc that'd be a great uh collaboration you know what i have messaged them and we have spoken
at conferences but at that time um the the ideation was still an idea it wasn't really
executed so that's a good reminder i will go and do that yeah and i think and of course you're on
club orange so that's just under your name yes that is just you can find me on yeah anujra and
you will see yeah thanks perfect well thank you for coming on and hopefully we'll get to meet at
some point in real life throughout the year if not next year but it will happen and uh well i'll
chat again with you soon on one of the orange pill app update calls and find out what mateo
shipped in the last three weeks i know right like another five things yeah okay cool thanks daniel
have a good one you too take care
well thank you everybody for listening like i said at the beginning of the show here if you've
been inspired by what Anuja has built, TravelWithBitcoin.com is the place for you to go and check out.
They have tours up there available. Obviously, we talked about the ones today that are featured,
you know, the one through Africa. They have Experience Lugano as well. I'm just looking at
the site right now. Experience Goa and Experience Colombia. So if you're heading to any of these
places then reach out reach out to anuja or if you are running a tourist business reach out to anuja
and say hey like we will accept bitcoin we want to accept bitcoin get us on your site let's get
connected and let's just keep building this out together so uh thank you to anuja i'm really
not long in the bitcoin space but already building already adding value to the network and this is
like I've said a hundred times, maybe more, number of people go up. That's what we're talking about
with Bitcoin because that metric doesn't go down. The number of people is going up all the time.
New ideas are coming all the time. New passion is coming all the time. New skill set is coming
all the time. New value add is coming all the time and it will just keep compounding and then
the ripple effects of those actions of those people will just forever grow forever grow and
it's just incredible to be a part of this and help people like Anuja get their voices heard get their
projects out there in front of your eyes and ears and now the steps that you need to take are
reach out or be inspired to go start your own thing really appreciate everybody really appreciate
excuse me, everybody listening.
Looking forward to releasing a couple more shows.
We're getting very close to number 600.
That's been a wild ride when I think back
to when we started this in January 2020.
So thank you everybody for listening.
If you're new to the show, sorry, but not sorry.
You got a huge backlog,
but I'm sure you'll find some incredible content in there.
All the guests have been amazing.
finally another shout out
relay
r-e-l-a-i
dot c-h
forward slash
bitten
thank you for the support
over this
last
five years
pretty much
been there the whole time
five and a half years
I think even
Julian and the team
over there
I've watched them grow
from
a two or three man team
into what they are
today
fully licensed
with the Mika license
here in Europe
serving
many different countries
many different individuals
and businesses
helping them acquire Bitcoin
and helping them with Bitcoin education as well.
So get over to relay.ch forward slash Bitten.
Download the Relay app and start stacking.
Use the code Bitten.
And Bitbox as well have been alongside this podcast
almost as long as Relay.
I really appreciate the work Douglas and the team are doing over there.
Please self-custody your Bitcoin.
Go check them out.
Bitbox.swiss forward slash Bitten.
Use that code Bitten for 5% discount.
and I'll catch you guys on the next show.