You're short on cash. Your conscience is calling. You're tired of two-days-and-the-next-train-out. Whatever the reason, you want simply to stay - and work. Yes, work, has four letters, but it's no four-letter word. Working and volunteering abroad give you deeper insight into foreign lands. Sure, you might actually break a sweat, but along with a paycheck, you'll earn a wealth of good stories.
A HELPING HAND: First, decide whether you want to a real, paying job, or if you'd rather volunteer. Though both open doors to the local culture, one pays hard currency (for real responsibility), the other pays in karma points (and is usually more flexible). Volunteering sidesteps almost all visa hassles, but many organized programs require participants to pay up to $2,000 for a couple of weeks. That fee not only covers your room and board (usually) but, more importantly, goes directly into the community you'll be helping. Setting up a position in advance is fairly straightforward; you'll find everything you need in this article, on StudentTraveler.com, and on www.volunteerabroad.com. You should, of course, choose a program that matches your goals, but also you should also have realistic goals. You can't change the world singlehandedly, and you shouldn't necessarily want to.
WORKING FOR VACATION: To find work, though, the most important thing is to actually show up. Most jobs, and virtually all under-the-table jobs, are found by quizzing friends and contacts, and by scouring the local market in person. Still, if you want to plan ahead, check out BUNAC (www.bunac.org), which organizes work permitsfor England, Australia, and a handful of other nations.
ASTRONOMICAL EXPERIENCE: Our staff has had enough collective work-abroad experience to reverse a small nation's unemployment crisis. We've cleaned a Swiss chateau, modeled in China, bathed sea turtles in Mexico, stargazed where Galileo taught, tended bar in Saigon and Sydney, and taught English in the jungles of Sumatra, and never once did we look at our watches and complain, "Is it quitting time yet?" Or if we did, we kvetched in Serbo-Croatian.
From all this back-breaking labor, we've culled 15 jobs and volunteer positions that you can get right now. You may not end up busking the streets of Madrid for the rest of your life, but you will learn that anwhere there's work to be done, there's a paycheck or a thank-you note with your name on it.
Student Traveler's Officially Subjective Ratings
CA$H: None of these jobs pay like investment banking, so the scale's relative. Are we talking enough to pay down college loans - or to buy a new backpack?
KARMA POINTS: How much actual help did the volunteer experience provide to the community?
PERKS: Free food? Free plane tickets? Free ski pass?
WORK HOURS: Ranked from one star (air-traffic control) to five stars (boss's kid).
JOB MARKET: How easy is it to find work? As simple as finding a good croissant in Paris (five stars) or as finding a good croissant in Ulaanbaatar (one star)?
LANGUAGE BARRIER: Ranked from one star (competence in English) to five stars (fluency in Basque).
PEACE CORPS: SERIOUS VOLUNTEERING, SERIOUS AWARDS
Walker works in a center for out-of-school youth and handles kids' troubles, anything from theft to drugs, rape, and murder. "I am their only education source at the moment," says Walker. "I provide English, math, and some science tutorials for the boys." Hundreds of other types of jobs are available through the Peace Corps, from medical assistance to local business development to engineering projects, all depending on the community needs. "It isn't easy," he adds. "It is frustrating. The work isn't saving the world, but it is rewarding." Peace Corps workers get paid just enough to cover housing, food, transportation, and little else. Walker pulls in about $150 a month, but there is also a $6,075 stipend after two years service.
Unless you're married (which makes it a bit more difficult to get placement), you would be living abroad alone, sometimes hours from your fellow Peace Corps volunteers. Oh, and you don't get to choose where to live. If you're accepted, you'll be offered a placement; you can decline it to wait for another, but there's no guarantee of a second offer. The two-year commitment is breakable, but you'll lose the incredible respect that having Peace Corps on your resume will garner.
KARMA POINTS *****
TOUR GUIDE: IF YOU LEAD, THEY WILL FOLLOW
Somewhat strangely, it doesn't take much more than enthusiasm and street smarts to get a job. At Contiki Holidays, says marketing manager Lauren Yacker, "we will take a non-experienced candidate with the right personality and train them to be a tour manager." Trained to do what, though? "Your job, as the leader," says the Website for Australian-based Intrepid Travel, which runs small, adventurous trips through Asia and the Americas, "is to make sure that it all happens according to plan, as smoothly as possible - or to come up with alternate arrangements if something goes astray."
It takes a certain kind of personality to handle not only the normal stress of foreign travel but to assuage everyone else's anxieties as well - and help them have a fantastic trip. In interviews, tour operators weed out applicants who can't handle this intensity with questions like this one, from Intrepid:
Q. You're leading a group of 12 passengers on a three-day trek in a remote hill-tribe area in Thailand. One of the group falls and breaks their leg, and needs to be evacuated. The rest of the group needs to continue on or they will miss their connecting train and flights home. You're out of mobile-phone range and can't call our ground manager in Bangkok for help. What would you do? How would you meet all the group's needs?
Though you might find under-the-table work in some backwater village, leading tours for a respectable company is a real job, with all the benefits and drawbacks of formal employment. Luckily, jobs are available everywhere tourists go. In fact, Jacquie Burnside of Intrepid says the company is currently looking for leaders for their new European tours (www.intrepidtravel.com/employmenteurope.php). They also have an ongoing recruitment program, with bases in Thailand, Vietnam, China, and India. Contiki Holidays (www.contiki.com) hires only U.S. citizens to lead trips in North America, from Hollywood to the Grand Canyon and the Big Easy - but unless you've got dual citizenship or can arrange your own international work visa, they won't let you work abroad.
CA$H **** Salaries range from about U.S. $20,000 to $45,000 - not great, but you'll probably save a bundle. "Tour managers typically live on the road," says Contiki's Yacker, "so there is no need for an apartment, car, or other 'permanent' expenses."
AU PAIR: ARE KIDS YOUR TICKET TO TRAVEL?
Lindsey Walsworth of Shreveport, Louisiana, spent the summer as an au pair, or live-in nanny, in the small village of Shefford in Bedforshire, England. Her charges: a 4-year-old and an 18-month-old. "I entertained the kids, made breakfast and lunch, and tidied up whatever messes we had made that day," she says. "I wasn't required to do actual cleaning, but some au pairs are. I really lucked out with the family, and we turned out to be good friends. They've asked me back for next summer, and I'm absolutely going to go."
The secret of nannydom is in a single phrase: "live-in." Food and shelter - the fundamentals - are provided, and Walsworth got extras like transportation, museum admission fees, and train tickets. And that was on top of her particularly generous salary of about $200 a week.
One useful Website, through which Walsworth found her job, is www.greataupair.com. The families ultimately arrange the visas with the au pairs, but this and other placement services provide the initial contacts. Registration is free, and it's possible to arrange work quickly; with a membership fee, you get more detailed control over job searches and placement information.
CA$H **** "I was paid a reasonable amount of money considering I had no rent, travel fees, or grocery bills," Walsworth says. "I kept two great kids and got to experience England in a way that the sightseeing tourist can't even imagine. It was like being paid to have a meaningful life experience."
Founded in 1997 to further the sea-turtle conservation effort, Kenya's Watamu Turtle Watch (WTW) offers a volunteer program that works to educate the local community and to aid the turtles themselves. Marisa Meizlish, who spent a month with the program, explains that "volunteers primarily work in a sea-turtle release program - when turtles get caught in the fishermen's net, they know to call the program. We then go to the fish landing site, take biometric data and a skin sample, and release the turtle back into the sea. We also did nest monitoring, which often drew crowds from tourists."
While some volunteer programs can cost a lot, WTW is relatively cheap: £500, or about $850. "We chose this program," says Meizlish, "because it was somewhat affordable, it was for a full month, and we were working with turtles, locals, tourists, and government officials from day one. We got to live right in the fishing village, eat local food in a mud hut for lunch everyday, and learn very quickly about marine ecology, Kenyan rural life, and how NGOs operate in the third world."
KARMA POINTS ***** "I learned so much during the month - turtle biology, marine ecosystems, Kenyan village life," says Meizlish, "and while my work certainly contributed to the success of the program, the work began long before me and will continue long after."
TEACHING ENGLISH ABROAD: INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE AMBASSADOR
Because every country across the globe, from the third world to the G-8 needs English teachers, salaries can vary wildly, with Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan at the top end paying $2,000 to $3,000 a month. Compare that to what Todd Sulchek received at Nanjing University in China: a lowly $35 per week. But considering the cost of living, he says, "it was enough to live comfortably - my apartment was paid for already - eat out every day, and travel when and where I wanted. . . by hard-seat train."
When you look for openings on ESLcafe.com, it becomes clear that the most popular spots are South Korea, China, Taiwan, Japan, Thailand, Indonesia, Vietnam, Russia, Poland, the Czech Republic, Saudi Arabia, UAE, ait... The list goes on. Another good online directory is www.esldirectory.com. But if you'd rather have some really useful TEFL training, check out the placement and training programs at www.LanguageCorps.com, www.TEFLInternational.com, the Association of Teachers of Japanese (www.colorado.edu/ealc/atj), www.GlobalTESOL.com, www.englishfirst.com and www.I-to-I.com.
Just remember, you're not too far removed from being a student yourself (if at all), so treat your English students as you wish your professors had treated you.
CA$H * to **** Depends on the country.
HOSTEL STAFFER: WORK WHERE YOU SLEEP, IF YOU LIKE TO SLEEP WITH STRANGERS
For Steven Grin, this revelation came to him during a night of drinking and reminiscing with friends about their travels. "We decided that we would create the perfect hostel - for travelers by travelers - and from there we set out to actualize this dream," he says. "We found a perfect home nestled in the Sacromonte overlooking the ancient Alhambra palace." Before long, the Rambutan Hostel (www.rambutangranada.com) opened to all travelers coming to Granada, Spain.
Unless you start up your own hostel, it might be easier to just find a job in one of the many that already exist. David Weber, for example, hung around the Al Arab hostel in the Old City of Jerusalem so long they made him start cleaning up not only his mess but everyone else's too.
CA$H * to ** "Unless you're running the place like I did," says Grin. "However, starting up the place wasn't that big of an investment. People are truly surprised at how little it cost, especially split among four people."
FARMING IN AUSTRALIA: RUSTLING CATTLE IN THE OUTBACK AND PICKING VEGGIES
Joanna Burnet, who heads up the VisitOz program (www.visitoz.org), says it's as easy as filling out an application and getting a four-month visa. VisitOz charges $1,450, which covers your first eight days in Australia, three of which Burnet recommends spending on the beach - to get over jetlag - before starting a five-day training session on the farm. The program even lets you work your way around the country. Every Thursday, you get a list of employers; it's up to you to choose who to work for.
CA$H *** The cost of living in Australia is significantly lower than in the U.S., so normal starting wages are about AU$300 per week.
UNITED NATIONS INTERN: DOING YOUR PART TO BRING THE WORLD TOGETHER
Her advice: Look into particular U.N. agencies that interest you (e.g, peacekeeping or disaster relief) and find the names of people to send your résumé to. You'll most likely end up in Geneva, Paris, Rome, or New York.
KARMA POINTS *** "My work was more bureaucratic than working directly 'in the field,' helping children," says Dewan. "Still, it was quite fulfilling to know that I was involved with an organization that does significant work to improve the lives of children around the world."
STREET PERFORMER: WELCOME TO THE FRATERNITY OF THE STREET
Being a street performer isn't for most people, but it does blend adventure and camaraderie, shell games and off-tune songs. Some travelers consider it the ultimate insider thrill. "It requires a real performer's spirit, the ability to fight hunger, and a good hat," says Musheigan, whose mother taught him to carry a beat.
Musheigan's time on the street, however, taught him that "two people are better than one for hustling. One plays, and the other one 'hats.' The hatter is real magic - even if your music stinks, a good hatter can make you rich. The best hatter I ever worked with was in Galway, Ireland, and was known as Moe, a crazy teardrop-tattoo Scottish bloke, fresh out of prison and totally brilliant. He had a smile and an aura that would bring people from across the street just to put a coin in the hat. 'Help!' he'd yell. 'Help! I've got five wives and 22 kids, three cats and a blind dog. Can you spare a coin?' Moe was good at hatting, but also was a heavy drinker and drank away most of what we earned."
When Musheigan played drums with a friend from Madrid (Natalie the fire-twirler), his take-home tripled. "I learned if you want some coin, you really have to perform. If you can eat glass and shove a five-inch nail up your nostril at the same time, then do it."
Despite his overall optimism, Musheigan warns that there are hard days, lots of them, with little money and too much attention from the police. But the good days, when you've got the city dancing to your groove and the coins are jingling - they're really good.
CA$H ** Depends on two things: how good your act is, and how good your hatting is. "When I began, I made $5 a day," says Musheigan, "and by the time I got good, I was making $200 or $300 a day."
TRAVEL WRITER: GUTS AND GLORY - GRATIS
The are no geographical constraints for travel writing. Whether it's your hometown paper or an expat magazine in Singapore, your adventures and experiences can find an outlet. Pick a publication you know and love, get to know its style, then request its submission guidelines. Submit only detailed, relevant story ideas. For more information, check out www.travelwriters.com. Rolf Potts, a fantastic young travel writer we interviewed in our September/October 2003 issue, has a wonderful series of interviews with three dozen top travel writers on his Website at www.rolfpotts.com/writers/index.php. And you can e-mail jeff@studenttraveler.com for this magazine's submission guidelines.
CA$H *
FILM EXTRA IN JAPAN: HOLLYWOOD, BOLLYWOOD, TOKYOWOOD. DOESN'T HAVE THE SAME RING, DOES IT?
By his reckoning, Weber has been "in crowds for commercials, a paid foreign audience member for a Japanese pop star's show, a German thief, a friend to a murder victim for re-enactment shows, and a crazy scientist and masked fiend in a music video." The job can be a nice break from your regular job, but it isn't always glamorous. "Sometimes I've just sat around for hours on end," he says, "but I welcome the break from English teaching. Getting to play other characters and seeing yourself on TV is definitely an experience."
The best places to look for extra work are in the Monday edition of Japan Times, www.jobsinjapan.com, and Metropolis Magazine, a free English weekly.
CA$H *** A day-long shoot gets you 15,000 to 20,000 yen ($120 - $150), but the check probably won't arrive for two months.
BARTENDER: DRINKS, MONEY, NIGHTLIFE - AND CLEANING UP AFTERWARDS
"The money is definitely not enough to pay off student loans," warns Birkenstein, "just about enough to keep the bank account from going backwards." Of course, your own drinks are often included, which can be a substantial savings if you're fond of Guinness or slivovitz. If the bar attracts a lot of Americans and Canadians, you're in luck - they're good tippers, Birkenstein says.
In Europe, the best places to find bartending work are: southern Spain, tourist cities in Italy, the Greek isles, and anywhere in the Alps that caters to skiers and adventure tourists. According to Birkenstein, you should look for countries where people don't speak English well; you'll be an exotic commodity. Still, you've got to have skills: drink-slinging, mop-swinging, and trash-taking-out-ability. "Showing up is 90 percent of the battle," Birkenstein says. "When I worked in Austria, I said to the bar owner, 'Do you ever hire anyone for two weeks?' And he said, 'Sit down and I'll give you an interview.' Then he said, 'Can you start tonight?' I said 'Yes.' He said, 'You're hired.'"
CA$H **
HAND MODEL: GEORGE COSTANZA, I'M NOT
CA$H * "Professional hand models in the States can make three grand per sitting," says Jeff. "I made more like 50 bucks for a couple of hours."
FURNITURE MOVER: YOUR HOME ON YOUR BACK, AND OTHER PEOPLE'S TOO
Simmermon found a job as a furniture mover (removalist, in the technical lingo) in Perth, Australia, by just asking around. One connection led to another, and before he knew it, he was helping Perthlings move all over the city. "You can get paid to move furniture in any country where moving is a *****," he says. "Last I checked, moving sucked worldwide. Maybe Aborigines and nomadic tribesmen in the African desert would rather move themselves, but otherwise, positions are open."
But don't think it's all brawn and little skill. As Simmermon points out, "Interested removalists must have a high tolerance for heat and lifting, be able to curse very, very quietly in front of customers, and not mind the hours accidentally extending way beyond five o'clock. This is not a job for the lazy or the hungover, although many furniture removalists are both."
CA$H **** AU$10 to $15 an hour. "It's not much," says Simmermon, "but cash in hand after a hard day's sweating for the wealthy, the poor, and the all-too-recently divorced feels real good."
WEB DEVELOPER: BRINGING THE WORLD WIDE WEB TO THE WORLD
"Cambodia is a great place to look for work because of the extremely lax regulations regarding expat workers - along with extremely lax regulations for just about everything else too," Candelin says. "All it takes is the purchase of a $25 business visa instead of the $20 tourist visa." Neighboring Thailand and Vietnam are both relatively difficult to find legitimate jobs in because of work laws; Bangkok, especially, is full of Webheads. Underdeveloped Laos, on the other hand, is still a good bet.
Though it's possible to find work in advance, Candelin recommends just showing up: "The opportunites multiply with each new contact you make. There a few local papers here with Internet sites: the Phnom Penh Post, and the Cambodia Daily. The other alternative is to start something new - in Phnom Penh, there is a new bar opening every four or five months."
"Things just happen differently here," Candelin adds. "Meeting at 3 p.m.? Not if it's raining. Next week is the king's birthday? Wednesday and Thursday are days off? The only thing to do in these situations is to grin and bear it. But that's why I came to a country like this in the first place, right? To see how it works here. Or doesn't. Or might. I've been here for one year and I still have no idea."
CA$H *** Candelin makes about $1,400 a month-more than enough to live well. He warns, however: "Don't expect that foreign companies will pay more than local ones - often, if you get a job in-country, you are considered a local hire, which can mean local wages. This is particulary true of NGOs."
WANT MORE JOBS AND VOLUNTEER POSITIONS? THE BONUS LIST
Illustrations by Matt Dujnic
We've asked the experts (or so they call themselves) to gauge several factors for each volunteer position or job:
Want a two-year job working for peanuts in a third-world country? If so, the Peace Corps (www.peacecorps.gov) is for you. Mike Walker, from Kansas City, who is currently volunteering with his wife, Heidi, on Guimaras, a small island in the Visayas region of the Philippines, says he would do it again in a second.
PERKS *** Lots of language and cultural training.
WORK HOURS *** You work as much as you want.
HIRING MARKET ***** With a college degree, says Walker, you are eligible. "But our whole application process took nearly 16 months. There are lots of medical requirements and interviews. Lots of people don't make it in, but we think it is because the process is long and a little complex, not because they get denied."
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY ** The Peace Corps will teach you the language of the country you're assigned to.
If you've ever yearned to herd vacationers through Mexico City, or if you know so many cool spots in Beijing that you suspect people might pay you to show them a good time, becoming a tour guide is not a bad idea.
PERKS ***** "Free food, travel, most expenses are taken care of," says Yacker, "and there's tons of free time to hang out and enjoy the surroundings."
WORK HOURS *** "The hours can sometimes be very long and a bit tedious," admits Burnside, "but also tempered with time to develop local friendships and explore the regions you have chosen to call 'home.'"
HIRING MARKET *** Competition is fierce because, well, these are pretty cushy gigs. But if you've really got the skills to be a tour leader, there's a space for you somewhere.
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY *** You'll lead tours in English, but the fact is, the job's an international one. Every operator has a mix of clients from various countries. The more comfortable you are with other languages, the better.
PERKS **** "By living with a British family, I was really immersed in the culture. I can watch BBC comedy now, and I actually get the jokes. And I'm understanding a lot more of the subtle things in Harry Potter."
WORK HOURS *** Five days a week, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. "It wasn't terribly taxing. During preschool and naptime for the kids, I actually got a bit of free time."
HIRING MARKET *** The good news is, there's a market for native English speakers. Unfortunately, many families don't want Americans. Don't get discouraged - send an e-mail to a family you like and show them you're good with kids, whatever your passport says.
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY **** In England, English is fine, but if you want to work in, say, Italy, you should learn some Italian.
SAVING SEA TURTLES: IT'S NOT ALL BIG GAME IN KENYA, AND TURTLES ARE MUCH EASIER TO HANDLE
PERKS *** "Our house was 200 meters from the beach, as was the office."
WORK HOURS *** WTW is laid-back. "You're expected to want to be at work but given all the time you need to explore Watamu - taking time off for diving, snorkeling, and swimming during the day, taking a long weekend for a trip."
HIRING MARKET *** WTW gets volunteers months in advance, but Meizlish says there are always cancellations.
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY ** "Kenya is an English-speaking country," says Meizlish, "and although most of the fisherman you will come into contact with only speak Swahili, you can learn what you need to know to get by."
Teaching English is one of the cornerstones of the international job market. Hell, it's the center column supporting a massive workforce. But is it for you? If you're a native speaker, it might just be the easiest way to live and work abroad in a full-immersion environment. Though many countries require teachers only to have a college degree and be native English speakers, more competitive markets, such as Europe, may require TEFL certification (Teaching English as a Foreign Language).
PERKS **** South Korean jobs usually include airfare, housing, and bonuses. Great benefits in the Middle East, too, with housing, long vacations, and airfare back home. There are intangible perks, too. "As a teacher of college students," says Sulchek, "you have the inside track to Chinese people and families. Many of the students will be from the area, so they are likely to invite you to their homes for dinner and to meet their family."
WORK HOURS **** "Four to five hours per day should be the max anywhere," says Dave Sperling, who runs ESLcafe.com.
HIRING MARKET ***** In parts of Asia, getting is a job is easier than learning to use chopsticks, but Western Europe is more competitive, with often required certification and strict work-visa regulations. Dreaming of Provence? Try a placement program.
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY * First and foremost, you need to speak English, not the local language. In fact, the local language is often forbidden from classrooms. Still, knowing Khmer in Cambodia can't hurt.
Remember that amazing hostel you stayed at, the one in the reconstructed castle on the beach where they played reggae all day? While you were paying to stay there, other people had the same experience - for free! How'd they get so lucky? Well, they had jobs.
PERKS ***** Free food, alcohol, housing, and an endless flow of new friends.
WORK HOURS ** As an owner, Grin worked long hours, but as an employee, Weber had an easier time. "As a cleaner/laborer," he says, "I sometimes worked four to six hours of heavy labor. As night assistant, it was eight hours of relative ease."
HIRING MARKET *** "Basically," says Weber, "if you stick around long enough and ask to clean, you can get hired, provided there aren't too many workers."
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY **** "Out of the four of us who ran the place," says Grin, "we had about 10 languages. There would be times where everyone in the hostel was French-speaking, and you can imagine what that is like if you don't speak the language."
If you've got a serious sense of adventure or you're just willing to get down and dirty in the Outback, you're pretty much guaranteed a job. There are over 200 farm jobs available at any given time: You can work with cattle, sheep, or horses, drive a tractor or bulldozer, put up fences. And if you feel the need to stay clean, there's always domestic farm work like child care and teaching.
PERKS ***** There's always free food and housing, and sometimes you can even land free travel.
WORK HOURS *** If you're paid by the hour, you work as much as you or your employer wants, with one or two days off a week.
HIRING MARKET ***** "With VisitOz," says Burnet, "we guarantee work. With anyone else, you take your chances, and there is 40 percent youth unemployment in our cities and on the coast."
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY *
International intrigue, global politics, sublime chocolate. Not a bad combination for Sabina Dewan, who took an unpaid volunteer position at a branch of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, this past summer. The U.N. might seem like the perfect job for someone addicted to learning about the world, but it's a real job, with deadlines and pressure. The benefits are real, though, and for Dewan, who interned with UNICEF, well worth the hours she put in.
PERKS **** "Geneva is a beautiful place with a number of music festivals in the summer," she says. "The only drawback is that Switzerland is quite expensive."
WORK HOURS ***
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY **** French and Italian make getting around easier, but Dewan says she "did just fine" with English alone.
One day, finding himself short of dinner money, Dave Musheigan put his skills to good use: He set himself up on Las Ramblas, Barcelona's famed busker walkway, and began pounding his African De'Jembe hand drum. He ate well that night.
PERKS ***** Faces, streets, festivals, squats, parties, friends
WORK HOURS ***** Your hours are your own, but remember: Summertime means it's time to get paid, so work hard or you won't eat in the winter.
HIRING MARKET *** Competition is serious, so you'd better be good-and so should your hatter.
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY ***** Learn to ask for money in as many languages as possible.
Travel writing (and photography) has an effort-to-paycheck ratio comparable to Siberian coal-mining. Some travel Websites won't pay anything for your work, assuming a Helvetica byline will make you forget that three grand you spent following migratory goats outside Baku, Azerbaijan. High-end magazines like Travel + Leisure pay significantly more, upwards of $1 per word, but are near-impossible to get into as a budding writer. Writing for a guidebook company also pays minimally. That means a whole lot of words to cover a three-month jaunt through Patagonia. But if you don't need to live off your writing income, you can defray some of the costs of a trip you're going to take anyway. Successful travel writers have published books, newspaper columns, and magazine articles - but they spend far more time researching, writing, editing, and fact-checking than they do tromping through jungle ruins or lounging in posh European chalets. (Read our interview with travel writer Tom Bissell, page 12, about his new book, Chasing the Sea.)
PERKS ***** Perks are the whole point of being a travel writer: Not only are there press trips (often completely subsidized by host countries) but, when someone asks why you're sea-kayaking around the Mediterranean, you can say, "I'm working."
WORK HOURS *** Wandering through the Louvre and diving at the Great Barrier Reef might not seem like work, but taking notes, interviewing sources, shooting professional-quality photos, researching background information - all of that is definitely work.
HIRING MARKET ** It's not hard to get published (www.virtualtourist.com and www.igougo.com turn your journals into Internet guides). It is hard to get paid. And getting a guidebook gig or National Geographic assignment? Good luck. But we all need goals, don't we?
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY * You don't need to know more than English, but you need to know it well. But as with all travel, the more lingo you speak, the more you can discover (and eventually write about).
David Weber has done many things to pay the bills. One thing he knows, as all veteran travelers do, is that you need to have a unique skill, and exploit it. Sometimes, however, simply being an American is enough, especially in Japan.
PERKS **** Getting to see yourself on TV.
WORK HOURS *** Some shoots can take up to 16 hours.
HIRING MARKET **
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY *** For most jobs, all you need is English, but Weber says, "Having Japanese ability is a major plus, as many directors don't speak much English."
Brian Birkenstein is a tour leader for Trek America, but one of his first jobs abroad was a little less legit, though it had a glamour of its own. Brian poured frothy beers in Salzburg, Austria, and quenched the thirst of bar patrons in Lagos, Portugal, while they listened to fado music.
PERKS ***** Employers know most backpackers are just looking to extend their holidays, not start a career, so they'll usually give you free food, board, or drink. But not always.
WORK HOURS ** Bars stay open late, and you have to clean up afterwards.
HIRING MARKET ****
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY ** Your selling point is that you speak English, and so do the patrons. Still, when selling sake to salarymen, it doesn't hurt to say dozo.
Before our editor, Jeff Booth, got his hands on this fine publication, he modeled them for a computer-chip ad campaign in Singapore. Okay, so this is not something you should count on when you need to scrounge up cash for the next train to Bangkok, but there is an important lesson: Unexpected jobs are everywhere, and impossible to plan for. Check youth-hostel bulletin boards for help-wanted notices; the local classified ads often have opportunities. Some of the funkier jobs we've seen include: nude modeling for art-school students, English tutoring for Japanese housewives, coaching a high-school girls' softball team, and assistant to a kangaroo shooter. The hand-modeling offer came from a photographer who needed a white guy's paws for a photo shoot, and put a notice up at the local hostel.
PERKS ** "I became friends with the photographer and her boyfriend, got some leftover shirts he was getting rid of, dinner, and an invitation to play ultimate Frisbee over the weekend." The biggest perk, however, is putting "hand model" on your resume.
WORK HOURS ***** "Two or three hours and I was done, and my hands weren't even fatigued."
HIRING MARKET * For hand models (it's an elite profession, of course), but probably *** if you count all the other oddball jobs you might find.
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY No stars, obviously. But it helps to know ASL.
After a few weeks (or months) on the road, your funds will inevitably dwindle. You have, however, picked up an invaluable skill: hauling your probably too-heavy backpack up temple stairs and down Andean trails. Why not do what Jeff Simmermon of Richmond, Virginia, did - get paid to carry things?
PERKS ** Do you like spying on other people's lives? This is the job for you. "Ask the right questions and listen more than you talk," says Simmermon, "and you'll hear loads of great stories."
WORK HOURS *** You'll often work longer than planned, but if you think of it as extra time to exercise it helps ease the pain of staying after 5 p.m. - again.
HIRING MARKET *****
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY * Just be able to understand, "Put that on the truck without breaking it."
Gordon Candelin's had his share of travel jobs, but leaving on a moment's notice to be an art director and Web developer in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, was still a bit of a surpise. A good one, of course, even if it took some getting used to.
PERKS *
WORK HOURS **** With around 42 public holidays per year, Cambodia is a long-weekender's dream. Candelin, however, works for a Singaporean-American company. "They try and make the U.S. work ethic stick," he says, "which can lead to often hilariously frustrating situations - such as rushing to get a project done for a client, working overtime, working weekends, only to find out the day the project is due that the client has left to the provinces for two weeks because of some obscure holiday."
LANGUAGE PROFICENCY * In Cambodia, English is it.