Global Nomadism & Entrepreneurship: Building a Life on the Move

[0:00] Hello and welcome back to another episode of Put the Guidebook Down, the place where we talk about travel beyond the Pinterest boards and bucket lists. Today I am joined by someone who actually lives the life most people only talk about. Meet the founder of Supercharged Studio, a UX brand and web design agency, and who has also launched Nomad Wildheart, a travel-inspired apparel brand, whilst navigating how to work, create, and stay curious with two international home bases. He's been to over 40 countries, and with these two businesses has a full passport, needless to say. Welcome, Niv. Thank you for joining me.

Thank you for having me, I'm so excited to be part of this.

Yeah, I've been following your content on Instagram for a while now, living vicariously through it, so I'm so glad we get to have this episode to really jump into it and learn more about your backstory and what led you to living this dream lifestyle.

No doubt, I'm really excited for this conversation, and just to dive in a little bit deeper and have a good conversation that allows us to share these different aspects of our lives.

Yeah, awesome. Well, today's episode is all about global nomadism and entrepreneurship — really what it means to be a digital nomad and have a life on the move. So jumping right in, what does it actually look like to live life on the move while building a brand?

Oof, that is such a good and a general question, but I think it ties down to intention, why people want to do this, and I think that's what really drives me. So when I think about what it's like, it's what I pictured it to be, because one of the core pillars of a life like this is freedom and design, and how you want to build it. So I feel like everyone's life looks different depending on their goals for their personal life as well as their professional career and how they navigate all of that. I think the answer changes from person to person, but for me I think I've got a lot of fulfillment in my personal life, as well as the ability to be a serial entrepreneur on the move, be anywhere, everywhere. But at the same time, with my background as an immigrant, it allows me to maintain two bases in a really efficient way where I feel like I can positively contribute to both of those.

Yeah, I really like that. And in some of my previous episodes we talked about this — I don't want to say label, but we tend to assign "travel influencer" to people. What does that mean for you in differentiating between the stereotypical label and someone from your background and all your experiences as an entrepreneur and a digital nomad?

Good question. I don't think "travel influencer" really means anything to me personally. I would never really call myself one. I mean, I like the word content creator, it feels a little more approachable, authentic to what I'm doing. But at the same time I kind of look at it more like a hobby than anything else — I don't look at it as a career choice, but as a byproduct of this life I built for myself. And it seems like a lot of other people are also interested in it, and I'm really happy expressing those sides of me and sharing it with the world. So that's how I kind of view it.

Yeah, so being a content creator, then, we'll stick with that instead of saying travel influencer. In our episode last week we talked more about content creation and this ability to notice more deeply. So how do you balance documenting your experiences as a content creator with actually living them, and maintaining the authenticity behind everything you produce?

So I feel like my content creator side, or this documentation side, came out when I first started solo traveling. When I went on my first solo trip, that was this kind of feeling where it's like, I have no one to share these experiences with. And that put me in this mode of, wait, there's this thing called social media, I can start posting these experiences there. And I started doing that, and I was getting a lot of reactions and people were talking to me a lot, and I felt like social media really helped me manage the whole solo travel aspect of things, and kind of find an online community who relates to it, to share those experiences. So when it comes to documenting all of this, I think when it comes to solo traveling, I usually look at it from a perspective of, if I'm going somewhere, do I just spend a little bit more time, dedicate maybe 10 or 15 extra minutes looking at it through a little bit of a deeper lens, to capture it the way I want, and what kind of stories could I tell through that? I feel it's different when you're traveling with people, because then you don't have that much extra time, you've got to cater to everyone's needs. But being a solo traveler it's a little bit easier doing that. And I feel like when I'm traveling there's always this lens I have in my head where it's, if my life was a documentary, or if it was a movie, what would it be like, and how do I make my decisions that way? And it's kind of fun when you're imagining it like that, going through this main character energy — that really helps you document and tell your story a little bit better, and also enjoy it a bit better.

Yeah, I really like that, that's a first for me, taking a step back and thinking about it as a documentary. I think it goes back to what you're saying in terms of storytelling, and that's always been very interesting to me as well — when we first started talking about this I was telling you, the whole idea of amplifying people's stories and experiences and the storytelling side of travel, so I'm going to have to try that next time on my next travels, think about it as the documentary side and how it's going to be perceived by me and those watching it.

100%. Because then you're really dabbling into storytelling mode as well as being the director at the same time, and with our phones in our hands, it's so easy to do that now.

Yeah, for sure. So then, because we have this easy accessibility with technology, what does a typical work week look like for you? Since you're doing content creation, you have your phone always or almost always, so you're always able to create content — how do you find balance amongst all of this?

I usually structure my weeks in a way where my Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays are my dedicated workdays — that's like my traditional nine-to-five day, where I've got all my meetings scheduled together, and I'm sitting down at a cafe or co-working space or in my Airbnb, just powering through work. The other days — let's say Tuesdays and Fridays, which are typically workdays for other people — I look at those as my no-meeting days, and now if I work or not, that's my choice. And then same with Saturday, Sunday — I feel like as an entrepreneur you're never really switching off, it's part of your identity. So I look at Tuesdays, Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays as my flex days — if I have an hour free before lunch, or half an hour extra at a coffee shop, I'm going to sit down and work there, or even before bed or after waking up, whenever I can squeeze in work I'll squeeze it in. But work isn't the priority necessarily on those days — maybe it's exploring, maybe it's a museum, maybe it's a hike. So those are my days where I can prioritize whatever I want. But Mondays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, like today — it's a really busy Monday, so it's a dedicated workday for me.

Wow. Do you feel like you really adhere to that schedule, or do you sometimes feel it moving depending on how busy you get with work?

Yes, I mean, I think in theory it is kind of difficult, but I've kind of put that as a non-negotiable for myself. And if I get meeting requests for Tuesdays and Fridays, sometimes I'll take them, but otherwise it's like, no, can we please do Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays — because if you're batching all that work together, it's so much easier to get it done and to be in work mode, and then use the rest of the days to be in more travel or free or explore mode. But the temptation is always there, because right now what's going on in my head is, wait, I could be at that museum right now, or I could be chilling by the sea, why am I not doing that? But then it's always that reminder that I have to keep working to keep living like this, because you have to do both. And I feel that's one thing people tend to miss — they think you're always traveling, but no, there is this side where I'm sitting in front of my laptop for eight hours doing nothing special — I mean, my work seems special to me, but not from a traveler's lens.

Yeah, which I think is going to get closer into our other segments about the behind-the-scenes side of what is in the content creation that's being put out on social media. I know when I was living in Moldova and doing the blog writing for Rambling Adventurista, the temptation was always there to just start writing, wanting to get into the computer and just start working — but then I forgot, I'm in a new country, I need to experience it as well, so then I can write later.

It is a balance between experiencing and creating, no doubt.

Yeah, for sure. Of course, traveling full-time isn't just a lifestyle, it impacts the places you're going, working, visiting, and that's where we kind of have to include some discussion about travel ethics. And this is something that, with Kultura Travel, this podcast, and even just more of my personal interest in sustainable travel and tourism, what that looks like now as the world reopens up to more travel potential — the ethics of being a foreigner or expat, remote worker, in places with maybe lower costs of living or who don't have that tourism structure — I feel like this is getting tied to a lot of content creators and people who consider themselves travel influencers in terms of living in those regions while doing their work. Talking about this side of being a global entrepreneur and all the work you do, what are some things people don't consider before they just move abroad to work remotely?

On those lines, you're absolutely right, because I think as the years have been passing we've been seeing a lot of cities and these global hubs of travel and tourism starting to complain about rising costs. I think they call out some — Bali, Medellín, Barcelona, Lisbon — the really popular ones, that the locals are starting to find unaffordable because of the rising tourism, and also digital nomads, definitely. But when you look at a situation like that, I feel like there are four parties to always consider. One, the locals. Two, the tourists — us. Three, the business owners who are profiting off the tourists. And fourth, the governments that are kind of controlling the system. I feel it should always be the government's number-one priority to protect the locals; however, there are cases where they completely ignore it, they just haven't thought of it as a priority, and they've thought that bringing in so much tourism, at the cost of everyday people's loss of living, drop in culture, kind of losing that, is worth it — and I don't think it is worth it. And I feel like as travelers, whenever we notice these sorts of conflicts happening, I think it's best to stay away, or another solution is to visit during off-season, when the stress is really not there — because also, as a traveler, why would I want to visit somewhere in high season when I know it's going to be completely packed, prices are going to be through the roof, no one's going to be happy? Like, let's say I'm going to try to visit Venice in, I don't know, September, August — I know it's going to be packed, I'm going to see more people than monuments — so just stay away from those kinds of spots during high season, travel at a time of year when it's off-season. And next is also try to support local as much as possible — pick that local coffee shop, or when you're going through a description on Airbnb, you can easily tell if it's going to be managed by an agency or one of those big condo buildings that are just dedicated for travelers or long-term digital nomads. Look for those guest houses that are run by people who use words like, okay, welcome to our home, or my wife and I will help you stay here, etc. So there are things you have to notice at all times, and as travelers, as tourists, I feel like we should always be the best possible guests, and if you're noticing the tension in the house that's inviting you, that the locals and the government and the business owners are fighting, why would you want to enter? So those are places you start avoiding. And I feel like locals usually lash out on tourists because it's really hard for them to speak to their governments about that, because of whatever sort of black box, non-accessible communication they've got going on — and I get it, it's their form of protest, and they've got all rights to do so.

Yeah, you hit my next question as well, in terms of what are some of the signs and cues that people in general, not just people going the digital nomad route, should look for in making those bookings and travel decisions. I like the point about visiting off-season — I think it's also good, as you said, because it's going to be less crowded, but we also find prices are better, because some of the locals relying on tourism can then have that income still there when you're going off-tourism-season. But I'm not going to get full into the ethics of it, because I know, as someone who lives in Indonesia, everyone always goes, oh, Bali — I'm like, no, no, no, I didn't go that route, I stayed somewhere else. And actually my whole research was about what laws are in place for Indonesia's government for supporting culture preservation, language preservation, with the increased support and drive for tourism, and I was shocked to learn there are none. So this was the whole point of my research, how the government can find ways to take action with this to make sure the tourism is still sustainable and ethical, and the locals can still live there, and it's not just becoming a foreign spot within Indonesian culture for all the digital nomads. As you said, it's a lot to unpack — there's a lot of cues and words we can choose as travelers to help do our duty or role in making ethical tourist decisions.

That is true, especially in a case like Indonesia, or even Bali specifically — you're seeing the government selling land to foreign investors, so at that point it's like, who do you hold responsible? Because your government is acting against your own interests at that point. So I feel like, of course, everybody has to be involved, but I don't think the business owners who are profiting off are really held to that standard. But again, as consumers we need to ethically also consume the kind of services we need. And to the point, I think alternative destinations is something awesome to think about — why visit Barcelona, try visiting another area in Catalonia or Spain that you could enjoy. Or instead of Bali, go to Lombok or something like that, check it out — this is to spread that tourism out, which could get equal, if not better, value. And also don't always go to the digital nomad hotspots — there are other places that are calling you, or countries which have set up digital nomad programs to attract people, and they're absolutely calling for that. So that's another way to look at it, and alternative travel is always fun — right now I'm in Tunisia, and that's a really underexplored country, so I love exploring those hidden gems, and in a great way I'm also using my platform to tell other people about that country, to help bring that sort of attention over here, so that's how I'm looking at things as I begin to travel more and more.

I love it, this is why I was like, you've got to come on the podcast, because we're all about putting the guidebook down.

No pun intended, but that's so true, because one thing about Tunisia, for example, on the lines of putting the guidebook down, is I could not find enough information on the internet on what to do, and I was like, I just have to come here and wing it and speak to the people here and see what's up.

We're going to have to have you back on for an episode about that, because my whole episode last week was about just going out and talking to locals and then going off and figuring it out from there.

That was me last night, with a bunch of five people I was hanging out with out of the blue. I love experiences like that.

It's the best way. We'll do a follow-up episode about this and you can share about your experience. But ethics aside, building a life across countries forces you to rethink who you are as a person, your role, where you want to be, and how you make decisions. So we're going to shift a little to talking more about how living across cultures, for someone like you who has two international homes, shapes your creativity, identity, and business mindset. So how have different cultures shaped who you are as a person, the content you create, and the business choices you've made along the way?

Okay, so to answer that one, we'll have to scroll back to identity, because I think that is so important to me, especially from my immigrant roots. I was born and raised in India until I was 18, and the way I look at that is, if I'm a tree, India is the roots. And when I was 18 I moved to Canada, and those are kind of like my branches. So India was the life that was given to me, and then Canada was the life I built as an adult. So I think those two have shaped such an important part of my identity. And then after that, when I started working in Canada and had the ability to start my business, that gave me the opportunity to become a digital nomad, and in doing so that's where all these other cultural experiences come in, in addition to those two bases built in my life.

So when it comes to these business choices and cultures affecting it, I feel like the number-one way that's affected my career is through creativity and technology. If we talk about creativity, I always like to use different cultures as inspiration for the design projects I'm working on — for example, we were building a brand identity for one of our clients, and we really tapped into Uzbekistan's architecture, the way they do their patterns, to come up with different sorts of brand patterns for the clients we're working with. We were doing packaging for a sustainable small business for handicrafts, and we took inspiration from Portugal's dominant orange color scheme. I had two clients in the green-tech space, so I looked at my photos and experiences in Panama, because they preserve their biosphere so well, and I looked at those colors, the way they did that, and took inspiration to create branding and different brand guides out of those. So that's one way I try to use these cultures to make business decisions and up-level my creativity and design game.

But in addition to that, even from a tech perspective — let's take a look at Uber. In North America we're using Uber, but if you hop over to Southeast Asia, it's all about Grab. Then you go up north to Central Asia, it's all about Yandex. But right now, North Africa, where I'm at, InDrive is really popular, and what's really cool about InDrive is how it's adapting to the local customs of negotiation — it's not like you request a ride and surge pricing kicks in and gives you your price, over here you put the price of the ride, and then other drivers will be like, okay, will you go for this much, this much, this much? So you're negotiating on the spot, and that kind of taps into how technology adapts differently through cultures — I find that really cool. But also, ride-sharing is one thing, payments is another — whereas in the US it's like you give your card, sign on the check, manually add the tip, but in a lot of places it's Apple Pay, but in India and China it's usually you scan a QR code to pay. So at the end of the day everyone's paying, but through different uses of tech — so I feel like seeing those sorts of patterns helps me take inspiration from them and better the way I do my designs and build technology.

Wow, that's so cool, just in terms of using the color palettes and the design work you've done. But I never thought about InDrive as that — I used InDrive in Morocco with my friends who were living there, and they were explaining it to me, and I never fully understood what you just explained. I was like, oh, you like bargain, okay, fine, that's different. But now it makes sense, the way you explained it, in terms of the cultural way people would normally haggle in a market over there — it's doing the same thing with rideshare, wow.

Exactly, exactly, and that's what I find so cool — it's how different countries provide the same service in so many different ways, just because they're adapting to that culture, and I think that's really cool.

Yeah, wow, I learned something new, I hope you guys are learning too. But okay, so then has travel ever forced you to rethink your values, since we're coming from the business side? Let's get more personal — how has it influenced your values, or maybe opened your mind up to things you previously didn't agree with?

Okay, that's a tough one, because I haven't given that immediate thought, but I feel like travel in general makes you a more open-minded person, because you're meeting people from different backgrounds, different cultures, everyone's got different stories, and I feel like to really tap into the true essence of being a traveler you have to be open-minded, you have to be a good listener, and you have to be a good guest, because someone's welcoming you into their home, and you have to think about it that way. But when it comes to questioning my beliefs or values in terms of how you do things — for example, while in Moldova, I've always been one who grew up in the suburbs, I always drove myself everywhere, and then in Moldova they have more of this unique approach to public transportation — hitchhiking is still a thing there, maybe you take some buses off the side of the road — so my perspective was always like, oh, that's not safe, you shouldn't be doing that. But then that's the norm for them, so I had to adapt and adopt that into how I get around the country.

Oh, 100%. I feel like in that way this is just bringing me back to a conversation I had with my mother a few years ago — growing up you're always told, don't trust strangers, be safe, and that's really applicable for the most part, but what my mom was saying is, Niv, you're traveling so much and I constantly see you hanging out with strangers, how do you do it, I could never do it, how do you feel safe about it? And my counter to that was, of course, there is a one-out-of-ten chance or whatever the stats are that it's going to be a negative experience, but should I deny myself nine positive experiences for that one negative experience? Everyone's had a bad experience every now and then, but those nine positive ones are so good that it really puts things in perspective and puts your guard down when you're thinking about those things. But also, when you're looking at aspects like hitchhiking, that's something I tried maybe two years ago for the first time, in Albania, and that kind of blew my mind, because we did it once, and then that very day, a few hours later, we're like, we've got to do this again. So yeah, it definitely opens you up to new experiences, trying new things, and adapting the ways of traveling as you go about it, because if you're rigid in the way you're traveling, you're not going to grow at all. And I always look at traveling as A, outward, you're experiencing the world outside of you, but B, you're experiencing this whole world inside of you that you didn't know existed, and travel kind of opens you up to that.

Yeah, for sure, the character building that comes with travel, and I love the whole spontaneity and trying something new that was maybe not in the original itinerary, because those are the best memories — like, as you said, the hitchhiking, you're like, we've got to do it again. Not to make a plan, 100%. I think we need to reclaim that energy, because we're getting a little too set into our itineraries.

You think so? I don't know, most people I'm speaking to, I've kind of always encouraged them to try something new, and for the most part they haven't — really, even through so much of the content we're consuming on social media, a lot of it is the unplanned stuff that tends to attract people, and these moments of serendipity, or just content creating itself happening everywhere around you, as opposed to planning everything, and I think that is beautiful.

Okay, well, that gives me hope, then — maybe in backpacking a lot of people I'm meeting now are more spontaneous, but maybe the first-time travelers or newer travelers are the ones staying to itineraries as a safety net to get started.

And I would recommend that also — I feel like when you start getting comfortable to open yourself up, that's when you do it. I mean, always keep that in your head, but if you're a first-time solo traveler, yes, please plan as much as possible, because it's one less thing to worry about. When you're ready and comfortable to wing it, open yourself up to that.

Love it. So then how do you stay grounded and connected to a community, or the communities you're in, when you're constantly moving?

So they're all my base communities of India and Canada. India for me is family, friends, the people I grew up with, etc., and then Canada is the community from the business friends I've built myself, moving there for university, building my business, professional connections. So I try to spend my summers in Canada, and then I try to visit India maybe for two, three months here to maintain those connections and community. And I think something that really taught me that was, at the age of 12 I went to a boarding school, and that boarding school was maybe five, six hours away from home, so I'd only come back home maybe four months of the year, so it kind of taught me to maintain these different home bases very early on. And then I went abroad for university to Canada, and that made me realize, okay, I have to push this into another gear — I have this community in Canada, then I have this community in India. And then I started traveling, and it taught me how to tap into these local communities I'm coming across. So I feel like there's always a travel community wherever you go, and travelers are always helpful and supportive to each other, but at the same time there's also a local community that's welcoming travelers, and what could you learn from them? I think that's as easy as having conversations with your cab driver, your tour guide, your Airbnb host, anyone you're interacting with. And also attending local events — when you go for a cultural event, spend an extra 10 minutes and ask questions, get to know them better, be curious, and I think that's a wonderful way to get connected with the community. Attend events, I feel like Meetup is such a great app to tap into that, language exchanges is such a wonderful way to share your culture with others. So those are some ways to go about that.

Yeah, I resonate with a lot of that — most of the way I travel is through language exchanges, so a community is always there, but you're also able to create your own community as you go, which is the great side of travel. All right, and we have one more question, more when it comes to being a global nomad entrepreneur, since that does come with its own set of business challenges. We already talked about the pressure of maybe having to be on all the time, how you manage that, and the ways you draw inspiration from your own travel into your businesses, but are there any failures or pivots that have taught you a lesson with being a global entrepreneur?

I feel like entrepreneurship is all about failure and how comfortable you are with that, and I think I was recently talking to a bunch of entrepreneurs, and I had this realization where it's like, as an entrepreneur, most of these are failures, and you're looking for those, whatever, 10 awesome days in a year, or that one awesome day in a month, and that's going to be your big win. So if you look at it that way, it's all about taking the punches and growing as an entrepreneur. But when you're looking at it as a global entrepreneur, it's like, how do you tie travel into that, and what lessons can travel teach you about entrepreneurship, or what can entrepreneurship teach you about travel? And I think a lot of it is about being on your feet — how do you navigate quickly, how do you think about problems that are thrown at you in ways you could navigate as A, a traveler, and B, as an entrepreneur — because I mean, we've all been there when a flight's been cancelled last minute, or you're not able to enter a country, but at the same time it's very similar when a contract falls through, or one of your employees just quits on you — it's like, what do you do at that point? So I feel like being a global entrepreneur as a digital nomad, sometimes you've got to manage both of these problems together. So yes, it is something — you pick your own battles. I feel like being a global entrepreneur, I've had the luxury to pick those battles, I've built that sort of base for myself where I can, versus a lot of people who cannot, because they've got a lot of other things going on, and this is a choice I've made. But I feel like if I need to prioritize one, at that point I think I would prioritize my entrepreneurship more than my travels, because, again, that's what allows me to travel. I always say, pick a job that you love that allows you to live a life you love — look at that as your end goal, because at the end of the day life is worth living, and your job is what you do most of the time, so you better love that as well.

Wow, I love that, I think that line is just such a good way to end this episode. I think it really summarizes a lot of what we talked about today, and maybe how we should look at digital nomad entrepreneurship, being global with everything. So I want to thank you so much, Niv, for bringing such honesty and depth to a topic that is often maybe too romanticized, or gets a different label underneath, "travel influencer." And to everyone listening, I hope you learned something, because I definitely did — but to remember that global nomad isn't just about cheap flights, the most trendy cafes, or maybe just what are the best packing cubes to buy on Amazon. There's a lot more layers to it. So thank you so much, everyone, for listening — I want to make sure to give a shout-out to follow Niv, on Niv Travels on Instagram, and Kultura Travel's website for anything Niv. Anything else you want to add before we close out?

No, not really, it's just been such a wonderful time having this discussion across all these different topics, so thank you for having me here.

Thank you so much, thank you to everyone, and stay tuned for our next episode. Thank you.