There are moments in a humble online copywriter and translator’s career that catch you completely off guard. Last week was one of them.
I was deep into proofreading a client’s book draft about the early years of the internet, the kind of meticulous work that pays the bills between translation projects. After the author’s preface, I turned to the opening chapter.
There, staring back at me from the text, was my own name. Not as the proofreader, but as the subject. Ramon Stoppelenburg. Letmestayforaday.com. The Dutch “digital adventurist” who had embarked on what the author called “a revolutionary global journey.”
For a moment, I forgot I was supposed to be checking grammar and fixing typos. Instead, I was reading about my younger self, the guy who, over TWENTY FIVE YEARS ago, created a website that would become what UNESCO now recognizes as Digital Heritage. The same person who had relied entirely on strangers’ kindness for accommodation, documenting every day with photos and stories that somehow captivated a global audience. I had lots of hair, too!
It’s surreal, seeing your past life described as “groundbreaking” and “pioneering” when you’re currently focused on ensuring proper comma placement and smooth sentence flow. The manuscript described how Letmestayforaday.com had “laid conceptual groundwork for later social networking and hospitality platforms”, words that make something I lived through sound almost mythical.
This is the peculiar intersection where my professional life sometimes collides with my personal history. One day I’m translating technical documents from Dutch to English, the next I’m proofreading books that happen to mention my own digital adventures. It’s a reminder that in our interconnected world, the lines between our various identities, past and present, subject and editor, can blur in the most unexpected ways.
The irony isn’t lost on me: I’ve gone from being a “trailblazer in demonstrating the internet’s potential for real-world adventure” to someone who ensures other people’s words about internet adventures are properly spelled and punctuated. đ
But maybe that’s just another kind of digital adventure, helping to preserve and polish these stories for future readers, even when one of those stories happens to be your own.
My name is Ramon, I originate from The Netherlands, and I started calling myself a serial entrepreneur.
Friends would say I do weird things, as I don’t ever wish to get stuck at an office or in an urban rat race, and because I always come up with something great. Not all great things work out, but that’s okay. You fall, you stand up and brush off your knees. Then you go again.
When I was young, at the start of this century, I had created one of the first social networks ever, as I managed to travel the world for free thanks to people who invited me over through a website I created for myself, which I am not allowed to mention here.
Thankfully UNESCO made this Digital Heritage to be preserved forever. Trust me, I use that fact more than having a CV. (It inspired the folks to create Couchsurfing more than it did one Zuckerberg, I presume).
Then I ran a bar/restaurant for years, and wrote a book, while hosting a travel show on Dutch NPO Radio 1, when I wasn’t doing long-distance expedition reporting for Columbus Magazine or Max Models.
After living in Cambodia for over 10 years, where I ran three small community movie theaters in its capital city, produced vegan cheeses, hosted a radio show on the local radio and started a healthy dinner box delivery service, I moved to Tbilisi, Georgia, where I ran an alcoholic cupcakery, then to Casablanca, Morocco, only to end up in the quaint town of Almada, just south of the Tourist Central Station called Lisbon, in Portugal.
Darn, Portugal is beautiful, affordable and delicious! Except during its winter months, so that’s when you can find me in Sri Lanka.
Currently I am mostly active as a dreamer, massage therapist, copywriter, translator, social media assistant for old Fortune 500 men who can’t figure out how their phone works (they exist!) and am an online marketing advisor. In my free time I organize climbs up Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania.
Trust me.
Please pursue your dreams, even when they find themselves far away. Actually living your dreams is the most gratifying reason to be alive.
As Time Goes By: Two Impressive Months in Casablanca
After seven restless months in Georgia, where life as a digital nomad didnât quite take off, I landed in Casablanca, Morocco. Not because Iâd spun a globe and jabbed my finger at it, but thanks to an unexpected invitation from American friends Iâd met years earlier in Cambodia. They offered me the chance to recover and recharge, fully at their expense, in their spacious villa nestled inside a secure expat compound on the grounds of a large American school.
I arrived on February 9, 2022, with just enough funds to bring along my ever-traveling-along cat, Fifty Shady, via Paris. The villa I stayed in had three bedrooms, a giant kitchen, and a huge lounge with a giant television. The family was generous and welcoming. There were daily breakfasts, hearty lunches, and dinners that either involved someone cooking up something, or all of us hopping over to the nearby Morocco Mall for American-sized McDonald’s meals or pizza delivery. Comfort food, comfort zone.
But that compound wasnât Casablanca. Not really. We were on the outskirts, in a suburban ghost town-in-the-making â a future Moroccan Riviera still under construction. Even a walk to the beach was off-limits due to cranes, fences, and bulldozers. It was a fascinating place to be, but culturally sterile. And while I was grateful to my hosts, they had little interest in Morocco itself. Their world revolved around the campus and the Morocco Mall. I, on the other hand, was itching to see what lay beyond the compound walls.
Enter the “Petit Taxis” and Dating Apps
I started exploring the city the way many expats and broke nomads do â by taking local âpetit taxis,â battered old cars shared with strangers, sometimes even chickens. You flagged one down along the main road, climbed in if there was space, and tossed a few dirhams at the driver when you hopped out. Cheap and delightfully chaotic. Or Iâd use Bolt, the Uber alternative, which cost a bit more but gave me the illusion of control.
But navigating Casablanca wasnât just about geography â it was about people. My American hosts werenât much help there. They worked all day, didn’t speak Arabic or French, and had little desire to dive into Moroccan culture. And while I love wandering solo through neighborhoods and parks (Casablanca has incredible parks, by the way), I wanted some real connection.
So I turned to Tinder and Bumble. I wasn’t looking for love, or anything spicy (this is Morocco after all), but for connection. Conversation. Company.
And surprisingly â it worked.
Dates Without Kisses (or Even Handshakes)
Meeting locals through dating apps in an Islamic country turned out to be the perfect way to ease into the culture. Here, a “date” meant coffee or dinner in a public place. No touching. No hugging. No kiss on the cheek. At first, I didn’t even know if I was allowed to shake hands. Public displays of affection? Strictly off the menu.
And yet, I met some wonderful women. Not romantically â just real, curious, kind people. They were eager to talk, share, and help a foreigner discover their city. One of them, Asma, even took me on a spontaneous trip to Marrakesh. We wandered souks, dodged mopeds, and drank mint tea in chilly courtyards. She loved her country, but like many young Moroccans I met, she dreamed of leaving it â for France, for Canada. âAnything is better than here,â she told me.
Many of them were over 30 and still lived with their parents â perfectly normal in Moroccan culture but also a symptom of economic stagnation. Jobs were scarce. Opportunities even scarcer. They confided in me, not just about Casablanca, but about how it felt to live in a society caught between tradition and modernity. Between beauty and limitation.
Tea, Couscous, and Culture Shock
I had expected food to be a huge part of the experience â and it was, though I had to discover it on my own. My American hosts barely looked at Moroccan dishes without suspicion. When I pointed out couscous in the supermarket, they grimaced as if Iâd picked up a can of dog food. So I took local advice instead, and dined at hidden gems like the traditional restaurant Le Cuisto, often guided by my app matches.
I also went to the movies (everything dubbed in French, of course), walked endlessly through French-colonial streets lined with palm trees, and soaked up the sun in vast, well-kept parks. Casablanca had the elegance of a tired starlet â still graceful, but worn around the edges. I was falling for it. Asma even took me to see Marrakesh!
But even here, I couldn’t escape moments of absurd culture clash. Once, a local woman invited me and a university professor to a rooftop bar. She arrived 15 minutes late and was nearly denied entry. The doorman took one look at her â alone, unaccompanied â and said, âWhores are not welcome here.â A woman entering a bar solo? That made her suspect. We argued, she was let in, but the damage lingered. Casablanca was modern â but only to a point.
Time to Move On
As the end of my 90-day visa approached, a month-long Ramadan loomed â and with it, a full cultural shutdown. Cinemas, cafes, and restaurants would close, and Casablancaâs already slow pulse would nearly flatline. My hosts suggested I do a quick visa run to Lisbon. And honestly, they had me at “Lisbon.”
So I packed up, got Fifty Shady vaccinated and vet-approved, and booked that flight out. I was sad to leave, but the timing was right.
Casablanca had given me exactly what I needed: rest, kindness, long walks, and a deeper understanding of Morocco â one date at a time.
In one of my previous lives I was a big boy publisher, publishing two different monthly magazines.
I was 14 (yes, I had hair).
We are talking about 1989-1991, before I went to hi-jack the newspaper of my high school.
This young publisher had to expand his wings and traveled all the way to the town of Independence in Oregon, USA, where I was under the mentoring wings of former FDNY firefighter-turned highly awarded photographing journalist BILL BONGIORNO (who sadly passed away way too early in the late 90’s) for an entire hot summer of 1991.
It was there where the young staff journalist JOHN OLIVER interviewed me for the local paper Sun-Enterprise.
This might pop up in my upcoming book “WHAT THE HELL DIDN’T YOU DO?!”
Click on the image below if you want to see it large.
This month marks the end of my first 8 months as a person who only works remotely, doing only online jobs through Upwork.com. That’s where 100% of my income now comes from. Last year I had lost all my savings and was covered by a few friends and family for a few months and slowly climbed out of the rubble.
 So, in no particular order…
The 10 most important things I have learned about working in the online gigs world:
1. Clients (people, businesses or agencies) post their jobs with their budget and you send them a proposal with your rate. Of course there will be many other people bidding a lower rate and most cases these people get the jobs so the client saves money. But stick to your professional expert level and stick to your desired rate. Once the clients find out cheap labour means bad quality rush jobs, they knock on your door. You get paid by the hour (and thanks to a nifty time tracker from Upwork or entered manual hours) or by project (milestone).
2. Get your business profile right. Itâs your business card to anybody you send a proposal to. Be in your client shoes. They get the job proposal from you and might click on your profile on Upwork.com. What they read about you is what they get. Be straight to the point, professional and make them want to pick you for the job. You can always add a link to your professional website if you wish to elaborate more on the services you offer. But keep the client impressed: even your website has to be solid professional too.
3. There is no right or wrong answer on the number of hours you need to work. Sometimes it takes 75 hours one week and 30 the next. The following week I work only 4 hours. The most important thing for me was generating income, also for the long run.
4. Burnout happens when you lose control, not when you work hard for long periods of time. Be organised, arrange your time slots, get those bloody yellow post-it notes in your face.
5. Self-care through nutrition, exercise, down-time (doing nothing!), unplugging, etc. is a MUST. You are not a robot and you can’t go on forever. Do something totally different for the same time you “work”. Go to a gym and get a workout done. Turn your favourite song up loud and dance in your living room (nobody seems to do that at an office).
6. If you don’t have a solutions-oriented mentality, you likely won’t enjoy working online through Upwork gigs. “You” are the structure and all resources are available online.
7. Don’t hang around folks who say something like “can’t be done” or “why would you do that stuff?”. Go find people that accomplish difficult things against all odds and who keep on trying and keep going. Find people that inspire you.
8. Toxic clients can destroy your culture, so get rid of them immediately. You are nobody’s slave: end the contract when things take a weird turn or the communication goes off rails while you did your utmost and professional best: take the loss and cut it from your life. And breathe again. That clears up.
9. Stay active online. If you stare at your screen and wonder why nobody wants to hire you, you should quit and get a real job. Like what ordinary people do. But no, we are special people living a special life and doing special jobs. Send in those job proposals â even daily and even when you have ongoing gigs â for anything you could handle. Clients need supermen like us!
10. It’s hard to plan things in advance as jobs come random. I spent plenty of time daily to send in job proposals for any job I could handle and get job contracts offered in return. But suddenly that doesn’t match the planned long weekend out. Make the choice: cancel that weekend or work during that weekend away? Will I miss a solid $800 income or will I enjoy time with family or friends? Decide what you need most at that time.
11. Don’t ever burn bridges. We all make mistakes from time to time. If you do, apologize. Make things right. You might lose an unhappy client. I could tell you about that one time with that loony Fortune500 CEO that was my client and he was a total – but I don’t. Stay humble and friendly. Your personal brand and your network are the most important things you have.
So how is it going for me as a remote worker at the moment? Boy, did things improve! I started rather empty handed, with an empty profile and no reviews, client feedback or recommendations.
Persistence paid off and Upwork gigs became my real life job, which I can schedule whenever I want, wherever I want. And it is finally paying off too.
With Remote Work I donât mean you working from your way cheaper Caribbean cabin with approval of your boss in New York City. I mean it more the digital nomad way: you can work wherever you are or wherever you want to be. You only need a laptop and a sturdy internet connection. And a bank account to receive money on.
I have always done freelance jobs for over 15 years. As an independent social media specialist I started with applying offline or with actual office visits. Laying out plans or basically offering my services. With moving to the tropics from 2011 I had to depend fully on the internet.
Thankfully the internet grew along and more and more platforms came up helping me pave a way to work online and get paid for the work I did. Online jobs not only gave me flexibility with my time but also allowed me to make my dream of living wherever I wanted come true.
And yes, when I lived in the Netherlands I needed to make at least âŹ3,000 per month to pay the mortgage, insurance premiums and pay a ridiculous amount of tax on everything I earned. Moving to a country where the monthly costs are not even exceeding âŹ1,000 took away a lot of hassles!
It’s not for everybody, of course. But if you seriously crave (and actually can) leave your current rat race life behind and Just Go, go for it. The world has enough people that are totally happy with the security of a huge fixed salary, their house with rent or mortgage, marriage, kids and being home in time for dinner. They really wonât miss you either.
While building a freelance career from zero can be tough, finding remote work (where you can work for a company location independently) doesnât have to be hard. There are plenty of remote job sites offering fully remote full-time or contract-based positions.
2018: My office in a hostel in Ella, Sri Lanka.
With that said, the internet can be an intimidating place. When I signed up with some platforms, I thought I would never survive this way. Look at all these people already going for these job offers! And they might be so much better than me! And look, their rating on their profile is going through the roof and I have nothing yet! Thatâs where I kept going. Everybody had to start at that same beginning. I scored jobs, I earned money, people rated me 5 stars and that earned me more jobs!
Below I have collected the 26 best job sites I have ever come across, with some additional information on each so you can find the best one for your needs. Some I use myself, others I have ran away from quickly.
I either got work from these sites, helped or referred others, or have colleagues who got long-term work from trusted companies through these job boards. Did I miss anything new and not listed here? Send it in the comments at the bottom of this blog.
Your remote income is only an app away.
For remote working freelancers: Upwork.com.
Upwork is an American platform, used to be known as Elance in the past. Upwork connects businesses (the clients) with independent professionals (us freelancers) around the globe. It is the world’s largest freelance talent marketplace and thatâs why I put it on number one. You can send a proposal to any job you see available. You get paid by Upwork once the job is finished and the client is happy.
Everybody starts at the beginning. And when I signed up I was a novice with no experience or rating on that site. I still proposed to job offers and slowly raised my rates. It took me six months to make a four-figure income per month through jobs I scored through Upwork. www.upwork.com
For Startups, Mostly US-Based: AngelList.
AngelList is basically like Match.com for startups, helping them get connected to both investors and employees. Youâll find 1000s of jobs here at some of the BEST startups around the world. It is very user-friendly and allows you to browse jobs by location, role, technology, and salary. Try this if you want to work at a start-up. www.angel.co/remote
For Creatives: Authentic Jobs.
This site is best for creatives. Enter âremoteâ in the location box and youâll get a list of full-time and contract-based (freelance) job opportunities for writers, designers, and other creative professionals. https://authenticjobs.com/
Blockchain Jobs: Cryptocurrency Jobs.
This site is the hotspot for finding blockchain jobs, cryptocurrency jobs, Bitcoin jobs, Ethereum jobs or, DeFi jobs. Absolutely not my niche, but worth a mention on this list. Filter for âremoteâ in the location search block and get a whole list of blockchain jobs with startups for engineers, designers, customers support, sales, and marketing. www.cryptocurrencyjobs.co
Europe Based: F6S Jobs.
This site is focused on startups in Europe. Itâs a home for founders and startup programs with thousands of jobs. www.f6s.com
For Contract-Based Jobs: Freelancer.
Freelancer is one of the worldâs largest marketplace for freelancing and crowdsourcing. On this site, you can find work in software dev, writing, data entry, design, engineering, sales/marketing, accounting, and legal. www.freelancer.com
For Designers and Developers: Gun.io.
A site for full-time freelancers in software development, UI/UX, design, project management, etc. Based on your skills, the Gun.io team hand-matches you with clients. www.gun.io
For Freelancers: Guru.
Guru is a marketplace for employers and freelancers to connect, collaborate and get work done on a contract or one-off basis. www.guru.com
For Freelancers: Hubstaff Talent.
This site is a hub for remote startups, software companies, agencies, and e-commerce businesses looking to hire freelancers. Great place to find one-off projects and contract-based work. https://talent.hubstaff.com
A HUGE Job Board For Just About Anything: Indeed.
One of the biggest sites for job seekers where you can find pretty much millions of jobs online. Enter âRemoteâ in the Where search box to access the list of remote job offers. Tip: You can set up job alerts to be notified by email whenever new jobs match your criteria. www.indeed.com
Diverse Job Board For Everyone: Jobicy.
Categorized remote job board with a diverse range of roles from sales and marketing to finance to programming and design. www.jobicy.com
A Curated Collection Of Job Boards: Jobkit.
A collection of job boards that you can filter by category (creative, freelance, remote, startup etc). Click on âRemoteâ to view remote job boards. www.jobkit.co
For European Tech Pros: Landing.jobs.
A European online marketplace for folks in the tech field. www.landing.jobs
For anything: LinkedIn.
I suppose you already heard about LinkedIn unless youâre hiding under a rock. But did you know itâs not only for finding 9 to 5 office jobs? LinkedIn offers several remote and freelance positions as well. www.linkedin.com
For Freelancers: PeoplePerHour.
Online marketplace for freelance work and services. Itâs like Fiverr, where you can set up your skills for anybody who needs to book them from you. www.peopleperhour.com
For Interpretation, Transcription and Translation Professionals: ProZ.com.
This site is the leading source for finding freelance translation, transcription and interpretation jobs. It took me over one hour from registering to get everything set up an once it did not accept my US bank account for payments while living in the European Union, I gave up the idea of ever working with ProZ. www.proz.com
For Latin Americans: RemoteCo
This site is dedicated to connecting SMEs to remote workers in Latin America. www.remoteco.com
For All Things Remote Work: Remote Co.
Remote companies, remote workers, remote work articles, online courses, remote jobs, career coaching and so much more for remote workers. www.remote.co
Diverse Job Board For Remote Work: Remote Ok.
Categorized high-quality remote job board with a diverse range of roles. Roles range from sales and marketing to finance and legal to programming and design. www.remoteok.com
Diverse Job Board For Remote Work: Remote Work.
Categorized high-quality remote job board with a diverse range of roles. Roles range from sales and marketing to finance and legal to programming and design. www.remote.work
Diverse Job Board For Remote Work: Remotive.
A robust job board for roles in about every industry. You can find work for every niche, including sales, finance, design, and tech. www.remotive.com
For Developers: TechMeAbroad.
TechMeAbroad only lists jobs from tech startups and companies offering visa sponsorship. Find the job of your dreams, in the country of your dreams. www.techmeabroad.com
For Anyone: The Muse.
Enter âRemoteâ in the Location search box and select âFlexible/Remoteâ to access a wide range of remote and location-free jobs in any field. www.themuse.com
For Developers, Designers and Finance Professionals: Toptal.
Exclusive network of the top freelance software developers, designers, and finance experts in the world. And when I say The Top, they mean the top 3% best of them. They provide access to top companies, a community of experts, and resources that can help accelerate your career. www.toptal.com
My bilingual friends love using this site to find remote translation and one-off projects. Interpretation, transcription, and translation freelance jobs. The siteâs design will bring you back to 1995, so donât be afraid to slowly take it all in. This ainât 2022 anymore, Toto. www.translatorscafe.com
Huge Remote Database For Anyone: We Work Remotely.
One of my go-to favorites. On this awesome site, you can find remote (fulltime) jobs in marketing, design, programming, customer support, DevOps and sysadmin, copyrighting, business/exec, and management. Companies pay already $299 to post one job on it, so that seriously raises the bar for everybody. www.weworkremotely.com
You can leave a comment on this blog if you scroll down.
I’m fully vaccinated and got boostered last week. No, I don’t know “what’s in it”. Neither this vaccine or the ones I had as a child. Nor do I know what’s in the 11 secret herbs and spices at KFC.
I also don’t know exactly what’s in Ibuprofen or Tylenol — they just cure my headaches & my pains.
I don’t know what’s in tattoo ink, botox and fillers, or every ingredient in my soap, shampoo or deodorants.
I donât know the long term effect of mobile phone use, or whether or not that restaurant I ate at yesterday REALLY used clean foods and washed their hands.
There’s a lot of things I don’t know.
I do know one thing: life is short. Very short. And I, personally, still want to do things. I want to travel and hug people without fear, and find a little feeling of life “before”.
Throughout my life I’ve been vaccinated against many diseases. Measles, mumps, rubella, polio, chickenpox, hepatitis, pneumonia, influenza, rotavirus, tetanus, pertussis, rabies, yellow fever, typhoid and cholera. My parents (and I) trusted the science.
And bummer, I had a fit with typhoid for a few months in my life. No fun. It was like all the Dengue I had, times 10. It was a variant I wasn’t vaccinated against.
I’m vaccinated. Not to please a government. Or the lady at the store next door. Or to get a Green pass on my app.
Not to make other people do it. But I don’t want to not to die from Covid-19, clutter a hospital bed if I get sick, not able to hug my loved ones, have to test myself routinely and live my life in fear.
There was a loud banging on my door this morning. My neighbor from next door. A rather big-sized, older Georgian man. He was red faced and pointing to his throat with panic. Within five seconds I was Heimliching behind him. With success, because he left a piece of a bar of granola on the floor.
Fifteen minutes later we were having coffee at my place and we try to understand each other. He doesn’t speak a word of English and I don’t speak Kartvelian. He walked back to his apartment, came back and handed me a box of granola bars. He doesn’t need them anymore.
So this is the GOODBYE CAMBODIA post as I left the country on August 13, 2021. I thank everybody who has ever supported me on this almost 12-year journey. An utmost colorful chapter in the book of my life.
Thank you for your connection here, your dedication in Phnom Penh, your time to escape to the most comfortable movie theater South-East Asia has ever had, and your desire to see it grow into what it became.
Kolyan Keth now runs the Foodoo – The $5 Gourmet Dinner Box project, which I founded when I saw the need for dinner box deliveries three years ago. My pride and joy for better bread baking in Cambodia, Sandwich Heaven, is passed onto the hands of the highly professional Khmer managers. I keep the secret recipes for my vegetarian nut cheeses by The Nutcracker with me (I can always restart such production elsewhere again). The Phnom Penh’s English Book Exchange with a collection over over +1250 English fiction books has moved to Botanico Wine & Beer Garden.
My latest project, the literary magazine The Quiet Reader, will always stay an online project with the world’s most beautiful short stories by new and emerging authors. But imagine a Best Of-book, one day. To be continued…
The Flicks Community Movie House is closed forever and the venue has been stripped bare. What an enormous joy and connection with the community that job gave me. I don’t think I will ever meet that many people as through an operation like that.
I am so happy the ceiling plates did not fall down in the last weeks, the projector lamp didn’t die, the AC only needed one final re-gas, nobody fell through the termite infested floor planks below the carpet — so it can all nicely collapse on its own, in peace.
Living in Cambodia allowed me to travel and experience the different cultures in Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Indonesia (where the earthquake tremors gave me some serious PTSD for months), Singapore, Malaysia, but also further away in Japan (which is “the most beautiful woman I have ever met, but I have no clue what she’s saying”), South Korea and China.
Thanks for all the memories, drinks, the foods, foreign friends visiting, the laughs, the journeys, pub quizzes, bike rides, brunches, beaches, sports, islands, and the many celebrations that made it all too unforgettable for the rest of my life.
Cambodia surely has its ups and downs and I have had my share (and enough) of all tropical diseases you can throw at me (I will tell you about that unforgettable typhoid experience for a few beers), but they are experiences nobody can ever take away from me.
There is a expression going around that if you can’t handle yourself (or a business) in Cambodia, you can’t handle yourself anywhere else and I see a good sense of truth in there.
Cambodia is a weird, sometimes baffling, but other times a true magical kingdom of wonder – that will always keep you wondering (and bribing the relevant ministries).
I am moving on, pursuing my dreams and passions. It’s time for a new life elsewhere.
To cite a recent fan mail: Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. THANK YOU.
Update: I returned back to live in Cambodia in March 2025. More about this later.
In was the summer of 2009 and I was living la dolce vita in Rome, blissfully unaware that the world was about to change.
I’d escaped my hometown Amsterdam for a week-long Italian adventure, taking the night train to Milan before continuing south through the rolling countryside to the Eternal City. My accommodations? A couch in the outer suburbs, courtesy of a generous young Italian couple who didn’t just offer me a place to sleep, they welcomed me into their world.
While they worked, I played the tourist with dedication. Vatican City, the Pantheon, pizzas, and the mighty Colosseum. Being the history nerd I am, I probably visited all 19 basilicas. But mostly, I did as Romans do: I ate gelato. Constantly. The summer heat demanded it.
Evenings were magic, music sessions with my hosts, impromptu gatherings with their friends, drinks that stretched late into the warm nights.
Then came an unexpected gift. One of my hosts worked security at concerts and invited me to join her at a major stadium show. The headliner? Tiziano Ferro. “He’s Italy’s Michael Jackson,” she explained. “Our biggest pop star.” I recognized the name from his Dutch radio hit that summer.
My ticket in was simple: help manage the wheelchair section near the stage. What followed was pure joy, thousands of voices singing in unison, the energy of Italian pop at its peak, and me learning lyrics in real-time.
After the show, I found myself in the stadium’s underground areas, waiting for my host to finish her duties. That’s when everything shifted.
A text message. Then another. Suddenly everyone had their phones out, faces changing from post-concert euphoria to shock.
In 2009, we couldn’t instantly check BBC online, news traveled through calls and text messages.
People stood in disbelief.
Some began to cry.
The night that had started with Tiziano Ferro, “Italy’s Michael Jackson”, ended with the news that the real Michael Jackson was gone.
We returned to that suburban apartment and did what people do when the world tilts: we played music, shared stories, drank wine, and stared out windows into a night that suddenly felt different.
Sometimes the most ordinary days become extraordinary, not for the reasons you expect, but for the moments when personal joy collides with collective loss, when a perfect day in Rome becomes inseparable from the day the King of Pop died.
In 2020, I was among the final 50 candidates out of a total of 2,400 applications for NASA’s astronaut candidate program. I didn’t make it to the final 24 candidates. No other Dutch person either.
I am an individual.
And I take everything seriously. Except myself.
I cannot control how I am perceived, only how I am presented.
So I dance like everyone is watching and I donât give a shit.
Without me, Iâve got nothing.
So when times get tough,
I choose downward dog over downward spiral.
I eat eggs and bacon in the morning, do push-ups before bed time, and âLook hotâ is always on my to-do list (right before âGo out into the world and kick some assâ).
I can get what I want.
But I canât get it alone.
So I pull over to ask for directions. I never turn down a free lesson in anything, and when life gives me lemons, I find someone who wants lemons and sell them at a premium.
I am bullshit-intolerant, because lying only complicates everything.
I assume that assuming is a bad idea, and that trying to change people is not my job.
I am replaceable, but I bust up my ass to make sure itâs not so obvious. I never give up, I never give in, and when somebody makes me really angry, I do fifty pushups. (That will show âem).
While I know that most people donât bite, I know the ones that do are usually worse off than me.
So I help strangers carry heavy things.
I never let anyone ruin my day and if I have time to judge someone, Iâll judge myself.
I am not for everyone and everyone is not for me.
So, I just do me,
one day at a time
and see what happens.
Tea, Couscous, and Culture Shock
