Preserving Memories: Traveling as a Form of Archiving
00:00:00.000 | - I want to go and pretend for a moment
00:00:02.280 | that you have no followers.
00:00:04.040 | No one knows who you are.
00:00:05.080 | - No one knows I am.
00:00:05.920 | - No one.
00:00:06.740 | And you're traveling.
00:00:07.580 | - Yes.
00:00:08.420 | - And I want to know,
00:00:09.240 | one of the things I think you're most well known for
00:00:11.360 | is building community and meeting people
00:00:13.720 | and connecting the world.
00:00:15.240 | How would you go about doing that from scratch
00:00:16.960 | if you were in a new place, a new culture, traveling?
00:00:20.400 | - I love traveling.
00:00:21.540 | And I happen to have been not famous
00:00:24.640 | for like 27 years of my life, okay?
00:00:27.000 | So this is just a recent phenomenon,
00:00:28.800 | like five years old, right?
00:00:30.520 | So I know how it's like to travel to like 30, 40 countries
00:00:33.060 | without nobody knowing me.
00:00:35.080 | But I found out that the best way to travel
00:00:40.080 | is to go to hostels.
00:00:43.220 | And I like strategically now,
00:00:45.640 | when I didn't have money and when I had money,
00:00:48.440 | strategically would go to hostels
00:00:50.320 | and I would check in in a hostel,
00:00:51.720 | ideally at a dorm, not at a private room,
00:00:55.160 | because you want to have like these random interactions
00:00:57.860 | with people that end up leading to friendships,
00:01:00.560 | let's go explore together.
00:01:01.920 | And then I would spend like a crazy amount of time
00:01:04.720 | in the lobby of the hostel
00:01:06.440 | in the hopes of just like randomly meeting somebody.
00:01:09.960 | And then you just need that one person
00:01:11.860 | that's also in a very uncomfortable position just like you.
00:01:14.960 | And both of you decide,
00:01:16.240 | hey, let's go explore this country together.
00:01:19.040 | And when you have one person, it's easier to find the third.
00:01:21.760 | And when you have three, it's easy to find the fourth, right?
00:01:24.160 | So it's all about getting that one partner
00:01:27.180 | to want to explore the country with you.
00:01:29.540 | And so every country I went to,
00:01:31.420 | I would literally just go to the hostels to make the friends
00:01:34.420 | not to stay at the hotel.
00:01:35.820 | I don't care about staying in the hostels,
00:01:36.980 | just to make the friends.
00:01:38.060 | - So you'd go to a hostel,
00:01:39.220 | potentially even book a room and not stay in it.
00:01:40.980 | - Yes, I did that before.
00:01:42.220 | - Because I imagine sometimes
00:01:44.540 | if you were traveling with your partner,
00:01:47.180 | what would you do?
00:01:48.180 | - Oh, so the second tip
00:01:49.340 | is to not travel with your partner.
00:01:51.060 | - Okay.
00:01:51.900 | - Yeah, so when I started traveling
00:01:52.900 | and I have never enjoyed traveling with a partner
00:01:56.000 | if you are trying to make friends.
00:01:57.920 | So the minute I became sort of self-sufficient in a way,
00:02:01.400 | like I started traveling with a partner,
00:02:03.600 | but I find it actually really important to travel single.
00:02:06.480 | - Okay.
00:02:07.320 | - Is that, do you agree or disagree with that?
00:02:09.640 | - No, I think it depends.
00:02:10.920 | My wife and I love to explore places together.
00:02:13.520 | So I have that kind of player two
00:02:15.760 | to go on these trips with.
00:02:16.600 | - But you're never gonna get player three.
00:02:18.320 | - Yeah, sometimes we went-
00:02:20.800 | - It's gonna be weird as a third wheel.
00:02:22.160 | - Well, we went to South Africa
00:02:24.180 | and we wanted to explore by car and we were cheap.
00:02:27.900 | And we were like, well,
00:02:28.740 | a car holds more than two people, so what do we do?
00:02:30.540 | And we met these two Swedish guys
00:02:32.700 | and the four of us together bought a tent,
00:02:35.260 | rented a car, bought four sleeping bags.
00:02:37.980 | And we drove around for three weeks
00:02:40.300 | through Namibia and Botswana and Zambia
00:02:42.940 | and South Africa as a team of four.
00:02:45.820 | Those two player twos.
00:02:46.780 | We didn't find the three,
00:02:47.660 | but we found the three and the four together.
00:02:49.740 | But they were both single guys.
00:02:51.380 | They were not in a relationship though.
00:02:53.120 | - That's interesting.
00:02:53.960 | - We had a third and fourth wheel to our-
00:02:55.180 | - Third and fourth wheel.
00:02:56.140 | But that is significantly harder
00:02:57.660 | than if you were by yourself, correct?
00:02:58.920 | - Totally.
00:02:59.760 | But your strategy seems to be trying to engage with
00:03:02.460 | and meet people who are also traveling.
00:03:05.460 | How do you try to engage and meet people local
00:03:07.180 | to the community and learn more about their culture?
00:03:09.700 | - Yeah, so I found that school networks
00:03:13.560 | were also very, very helpful.
00:03:15.080 | So I graduated from Harvard
00:03:16.220 | and the alumni network is really global.
00:03:18.500 | And Harvard people tend to stick together
00:03:20.620 | because they think they're better than others.
00:03:22.460 | So I hope no one's listening to this.
00:03:26.400 | But so I try to check local Harvard clubs.
00:03:30.740 | And if I know a friend that is from that country,
00:03:33.020 | like on Facebook.
00:03:33.940 | You know, remember the time of the social graph on Facebook
00:03:36.700 | where you can just search who are my,
00:03:38.500 | which one of my friends is now in Botswana
00:03:40.900 | or lives in Botswana.
00:03:41.820 | And you'd get a couple of people
00:03:43.140 | in every one of these countries.
00:03:44.740 | And that's really all you need.
00:03:45.900 | It's all about getting the hook.
00:03:47.560 | The one person that will open the doors to you
00:03:49.980 | for to meet the next 10 people.
00:03:51.780 | That's how I think about it.
00:03:53.600 | So I just find the hook in the first two days
00:03:55.580 | and then the hook takes care of everything else.
00:03:57.180 | They find me the next 10 people.
00:03:58.300 | - Do you ever find the hook
00:03:59.300 | just like at a bar, at a restaurant?
00:04:01.100 | 'Cause I think that's what people assume.
00:04:03.700 | They assume I'm gonna go to a bar
00:04:04.860 | and I'm gonna randomly talk to a stranger
00:04:06.580 | and now I'm gonna go on a adventure.
00:04:08.260 | - That's how you find the hook up, not the hook.
00:04:12.060 | - Okay, okay.
00:04:12.900 | - So I found it very difficult to meet people at a restaurant
00:04:15.300 | 'cause you're sitting down the whole time.
00:04:17.300 | How do you meet people at a restaurant?
00:04:18.900 | Or a bar or an event like that?
00:04:21.500 | Maybe not a restaurant.
00:04:23.380 | - Yeah, no, I had no success in this.
00:04:25.420 | - Okay.
00:04:26.340 | Is there something every time you go to a new country
00:04:28.280 | that you try to make sure you do?
00:04:29.980 | - It was by nature of my job,
00:04:31.940 | but I try to make videos as much as possible
00:04:34.740 | of every place I go to.
00:04:36.000 | Because I found that when you travel,
00:04:37.620 | you're making so many memories,
00:04:39.040 | but you'll forget these memories
00:04:40.340 | if you don't take videos of them.
00:04:41.780 | So really, for me, travel is a form of archiving.
00:04:46.780 | Literally, I feel like I have my camera with me at all time
00:04:48.820 | like memorize, memorize, memorize, memorize,
00:04:52.140 | 'cause you wanna not forget this experience.
00:04:54.460 | So that's how I became a video maker
00:04:56.820 | and traveling video maker.
00:04:58.380 | - How do you make sure you're not just living
00:05:00.300 | behind the camera when you're traveling?
00:05:02.120 | - I am living behind the camera when I'm traveling.
00:05:03.700 | Who said I'm not?
00:05:04.820 | - Okay, okay.
00:05:06.220 | - Do you make content when you travel?
00:05:08.140 | - Almost never.
00:05:08.980 | - Almost never?
00:05:10.340 | - I make content about the travels.
00:05:12.720 | So I'll go to a country,
00:05:13.660 | come back and talk about the experience.
00:05:15.300 | - You're kidding.
00:05:16.140 | - But I'm not making them...
00:05:17.620 | I mean, I made a video once in a country
00:05:20.100 | talking about how I got there,
00:05:21.840 | but I don't know, I wanna be there
00:05:24.460 | and I don't wanna be distracted
00:05:25.900 | from wandering around and seeing things,
00:05:29.460 | thinking about, "Oh, what, I gotta go record this thing."
00:05:31.700 | For me, that seems like it'd be overwhelming.
00:05:33.320 | - Wow, that's interesting.
00:05:34.620 | Well, I guess you and I travel differently.
00:05:36.180 | We should start to travel together one day.
00:05:37.620 | - I would like to see what that goes.