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Visiting the World, as a Geek?
Han Onymous asks: "In nine months my contract as a research assistent at my Alma Mater will come to an end. It will not be renewed, I don't want it to be anyway. But outside the economy is too ill to welcome me. I am young. I am healthy. And I want to see the world before I've got the wife and the kids and the double mortgage. I have no money saved, and I don't plan to save some until then. What can a skillful geek (electrical, electronical and software engineer, speaks three languages fluently) like me do to see the world. Volunteer ? Working for a multinational with exchange programs? Something with no connection at all to the tech world? Please share your experience."
Join the peace corps.
You're looking for "Engineers Without Borders":
here a few of their addresses:
http://ewob.colorado.edu
EWOB USA
http://www.ewb-isf.org
EWB CANADA
http://www.isf-france.org
EWB France = Ingénieurs sans Frontières (ISF)
There are lots of other local and national EWB groups, a google search should find em.
Try geek corps or Engineers without borders or if you're Canadian you can apply to Net Corps.
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An aside:
You're going to be old and infirm someday. Don't believe the lies that you'll actually be able to live off of your government pension (since it started as a senior-vote-buying measure, and will end when it runs out of money or leads to huge defecits once the boomers all retire), because you will be screwed. The first thing you should do is go and buy this book, then read it. Follow its advice.
Once you have a secure financial base, go ahead and explore the world, get married, etc. Do whatever your heart desires, but do not get started without some money saved away for your retirement, or you will be screwed when you're older.
Back to the question at hand:
If you really speak a variety of languages, see what it takes to get a work visa there. Often it's a lot of work, but it can be really fun to live somewhere for a year and do whatever it is you're skilled at doing (good non-tech ones are teaching english, cooking, bartending, etc). You can't just go to a country and work there legally unless you have a work visa, so be sure to get that squared away first.
Another thing to do would be to save up money, and backpack across Europe (or somewhere else that's population dense). It's fairly easy to do, there are plenty of youth hostels, and transportation between locales is cheap if you hitch-it. Heck, if you're feeling daring, you could even try to do it while carting along a small appliance.
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The worlds largest student organisation. AIESEC is a global network of 50,000 members across more than 83 countries and territories at more than 800 universities world-wide.
AIESEC facilitates international exchange of thousands of students and recent graduates each year. Whether in a paid traineeship or as a volunteer for a non-profit organisation, their experiences abroad will undoubtedly affect them forever.
Behind everything we do is our mission: to contribute to the development of our countries and their people with an overriding commitment to international understanding and co-operation.
Over the years AIESEC has evolved into something that is spirited with endless energy. We, the young people who run this organisation have a hope for something better in the world, and this is a hope that AIESEC tempers with a practical approach.
http://www.aiesec.org
Working as a bartender? A merchant marine? A volunteer? The Peace Corps? Bah. Forget it.
Just go.
Bartender/ski lift operator/au pair/whatever: Go to a fabulous country, have no time to do anything, and get paid next to nothing doing crap work!
Merchant Marines: Little known fact - today's modern container ships only take a few hours to offload - this means that ships spend as little time as possible in port. If you like taking weeks to get somehwere, and spending literally a few hours there, this is they way to go!
Peace Corps: Heh.
Volunteering: Well, you're VOLUNTEERING!
Bottom line is that many of these things are over-romanticized.
IMHO, the best thing to do is to get a backpack, put a change of clothes, a sleeping bag, a tent,
and a towel in it, buy a plane ticket to somewhere, and go.
I was in Turkey at a youth hostel once, and encountered a Dutch guy who was in the middle of a backpacking trip. He started of hitching in the netherlands, had gone through russia, mongolia, china, vietnam, thailand, india, pakistan, and iran, and had just gotten off of the train in eastern Turkey. He was washing washing his spare clothes - a change of underwear.
It doesn't take much money, and you can make a game of trying to find work to supplement your trip. A few thousand will keep you going for months if you're frugal, and you don't have anyone telling you what to do! If you don't like walking, and want to go fast, bring a bike.
Most of all, just have fun and enjoy the experience.
I lived and worked in London for four years, 3 years in various levels of IT for various IT departments all around the city. For those that had the experience, contracting rates could go as high as 1000 Pounds/day (mainframe programmer). Americans can get a 1-year work visa, countries in the Commonwealth get 2 years or more if your parents or grandparents were British citizens.
For up to date details go to or write to your nearest British consulate or embassy.
The are lots of other countries that offer work visas as well, look in the travel section of your bookstore for ideas on working overseas, they'll have names and addresses to contact.
Height: 38U, Weight: 0 Newtons, Eyes: #0000FF, OS: Gray Matter 1.0 (Alpha)
AIESEC is the world's largest student run organization, setting up work exchanges in 87 countries. They usually have a real demand for people with a background like yours. You won't be paid a lot of money, but you will get an amazing cultural experience.
Every civilized country in the world has Working Holiday Visas that allow young people to visit their country and work. The "young" bit is a subset of the range between 16 and 35 and the time they allow you to work is somewhere between one and three months with some odd requirements. For example in Australia, you can visit for up to a year, but can only work in any location for up to 3 months and only 6 months out of the year. The idea of these is to allow visitors to earn enough money so they enjoy their travels but to be restrictive enoungh not to displace local workers. The work that people on these visas get tends to be the kinds of jobs no one else wants but with computer skills, you should be able to find something.
The US of course only has these visas if your a Saudi even though they would be a major help to the depressed travel business. If your in this age group, maybe its something you should write your congresscritter about because they are making lots of changes to the immigration rules.
Most places also have Youth Hostels. These are cheap places to stay and they can range from small private rooms to a more typical dorm with several bunk beds in a room. In a big city downunder, it will cost you about US$10 a night. Other places can be three times more (London) or $2 nite (Bali last month). Its a great way to meet people. Some of my geek friends even meet their girlfriends while staying at yough hostels. The typical traveler will pack up all their stuff in a backpack and just go from place to place and find work when they can, see the differnt places, meet lots of people and then keep on going. Its a great way to spend a year or so.
I spent 4 years in the Navy, 3 of them living on a ship.
On the ship, we visited Alcupulco, Panama, Hong Kong, Singapore, India (forget the port name), Newcastle and Freemantle (Australia), Abu Dhabi and Dhubi (United Arab Emirates), Oman (again forget the port name) and several US ports.
Most dangerous port I've been to: San Diego - where we had one of our guys shot at a night club, and a couple others mugged.
Never never never smoke crack before geometry class!
I did the peace corps thing after college. And I'd recommend it highly. If you have the chance, jump at it. You'll see and do things you'd probably never encounter otherwise and you'll learn a lot. Some employers will discount it as will some grad schools - but others will look on it as a big plus.
For pictures of my experiences, see my site. You'll notice that I brought my laptop with me and was able to apply my geek skills by teaching computer classes on the side. You can find more stories about my geeky life in the Peace Corps here.
When I left Ghana for good in August 2001, I still wasn't yet ready to return to the life of a software developer, so I immediately applied for a job as an English teacher with Nova, the largest private school in Japan. As some here have suggested, this is another great way for geeks see the world and learn skills that don't require electricity. For anyone thinking of that route, I've written some tips on deciding whether to join Nova.
Trevor
Like AIESEC mentioned above, IAESTE is a great exchange organization: International Association for the Exchange of Students for Technical Experience. Find the US site at http://www.aipt.org/subpages/iaeste_us/index.php
I got a summer exchange internship in Norway over 20 years ago with IAESTE, and met many current friends that were there with both IAESTE and AIESEC from around the world - that summer in Bergen alone there were exchange students from these organizations from France, Denmark, Scotland, USA, Canada, Nigeria, Yugoslavia (that was then), Greece, Turkey, Indonesia, England, Ireland, Italy, and probably more that I can't remember.
Enjoy!
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I am the original poster. Thanks for the many answers. Too bad I could not participate more actively due to hours incompatibility between US and EU. At first glance it will take ages to read everything. One thing I noticed is the frequent mention of the Peace Corps. I should have told that IANAUSC. I am not an US citizen. No peace corps for me.
BUNAC has work programs for young people in all sorts of countries. http://www.bunac.org/
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