What is this website about?
This website is all about me and my work. Hello, nice to meet you!
I have a lot to share.
What is your favorite band or musician?
Growing up as part of Generation X, I was immersed in my older brother’s music—Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, Michael Jackson, George Michael, Bon Jovi, and the Dave Matthews Band blared from his hi-fi stereo system. Later, I fell in love with the commercial European dance music of the ’90s, a passion that endures to this day. After a stint as a “just-play-everything” DJ, my musical tastes have only broadened.
What do you listen to when writing?
I usually write in silence or with the ambient buzz of a coffee shop around me. If I need non-distracting music, I turn to Portishead, pioneers of trip hop. Their easy, chill sound is perfect background music, simmering gently as I write.
What is your favorite movie?
My all-time favorite is “Field of Dreams,” starring Kevin Costner as a corn farmer who builds a baseball field on his land, inspired by W.P. Kinsella’s book “Shoeless Joe.” Having managed movie theaters in Cambodia, picking just one favorite is tough. “Stand By Me,” based on a Stephen King short story, and “The Goonies,” the first movie I saw in a theater, are close seconds. I also have a soft spot for “The Lion King” and “La La Land.”
When you were little, what did you want to be when you grew up?
I vividly remember wanting to be an airplane passenger when I was in kindergarten. While my classmates dreamed of becoming firemen, policemen, or bakers, I imagined traveling the world. My teacher, Miss Silvia, told me that wasn’t a real job. If only she could see me now, flying around the world for a living.
When my parents introduced me to their typewriter, I was captivated. Before I could write, I was typing away, thrilled when my mom recognized real words in my random letters. Later, when my brother got a Commodore 64, my first question was if I could type on it.
What languages do you speak?
I speak Dutch and English, and I studied Spanish and French at university. I also learned Khmer in my 7th year in Cambodia. It’s never too late to learn a new language, and I hope to improve my Portuguese as well!
You lived in Cambodia. Was it hot and sunny with loads of palm trees?
Yes, it was always hot, around 35 degrees Celsius (95F) every day. The heat varies between dry and humid—dry heat feels cooler than humid heat. I lived in Phnom Penh, where colonial villas were being replaced by Chinese-funded high-rise condos. The last palm trees near my house were cut down in 2018 for new developments. After the pandemic, much of what I loved about Cambodia changed. The expats I depended on for my foreign film theater business had left, and tourism dwindled. Chinese expansion made even weekend getaways unnecessary, replacing natural beauty with expressways and development projects.
Then you moved to Georgia in 2021?
Yes, but that didn’t really work out. So I moved on to Casablanca, Morocco, which was impressive, but not really my thing. Then I continued to chase my dreams and ended up living just south of Lisbon, in the quaint little city of Almada, between the big bad touristy city and the great beaches. Loving it. Except in winter, so that’s when I evacuate myself temporarily to the beaches of somewhere tropical.
Do you have pets?
Yes, I do! I moved to Cambodia with my then 5-year-old cat, Piri Piri, who lived to the age of 10. Over time, I adopted several other cats, including lost kittens, street rescues, and drop-offs, and at one point, I had 10 cats roaming around. Currently, my calico cat, Fifty Shady, has been my travel companion. She joined me from Cambodia to Georgia, then to Morocco, and now to Portugal. Her passport is almost full!
What is this blogging thing you do?
I was one of the first bloggers in The Netherlands, starting at the end of the previous century. Back then, we were all exploring what we could do with the internet, and we primarily blogged about interesting things we found online. It was very nerdy, and people often wondered why we would even put a picture of ourselves on our homepages. Later, some began blogging about their personal lives, and we joked that they were “lifeloggers” instead of bloggers. This shift changed everything, and now it’s completely normal to have an entire website dedicated to yourself, with everyone sharing photos on social media.
When I started traveling around the world on the hospitality of strangers worldwide, I blogged about my travels and the people I met on my website. At its peak, my travel blog attracted about one million unique visitors per month. If I missed a day of writing, my Hotmail inbox would be flooded with at least 3,000 messages from people complaining about the lack of updates.
Currently I blog little, as social media platforms took over the spot for daily posts, thoughts and little stories. You can still find a personal blog on this website, on my Dutch website and I post travel related stuff on SomebodyHadToDoIt.com.
What is the one thing you regret?
I’ve accomplished a lot in my life and experienced few failures, so I feel proud and happy with how things have turned out. My regrets are minor, mostly involving relationships that didn’t work out or opportunities to pursue loved ones that I missed. But hey – that’s just part of life.
7 more questions were answered in the Phnom Penh Post of July 12, 2012:
(captured from behind the current paywall at the PPP)