This post is from staff writer Sierra Black. Sierra writes about frugality, sustainable living, and getting her kids to eat kale at Childwild.com.
The other day I was walking down the street when a young man approached me and asked directions to the nearest Tube Station. I live in Boston, not London. Our subway is called the T. I happened to be walking to the nearby station myself, so we walked together and got to chatting about travel, since he obviously wasn’t from around here.
The young man was from London, it turned out, and had spent the summer traveling around the United States. He’d done it on the cheap. Five weeks of travel had cost him under $800 for food, lodging, and transportation.
How had he done it? By staying open to adventure. This young man and the friend he was traveling with had spent the summer hitchhiking, couch-surfing, and swapping odd jobs for food and shelter. And they’d had a great time.
In the fifteen minutes we walked together, he told me about the woman who drove them from Nashville to New Orleans. She was a trucker who taught them how to build a quick shelter using only a tarp, and they camped outdoors with her along the highway.
I also learned that he’d spent the past week helping a friend move into a new apartment in my neighborhood, and that they’d furnished the place almost entirely with found items from the street.
Clearly, this was a fellow cut from the same cloth as my own frugal heart. We talked about ways to save money for a few minutes. His bottom line:
People spend money to have ease and convenience. If you’re willing to sacrifice those things, you can travel, or live, very cheaply. The trick is to find ways to enjoy your life and save money.
For my newfound friend, this meant finding adventure. By taking the roads less traveled, he was able to do more than save money. He got to experience America the way he wanted to: in the homes of people who live here, rather than at resorts and hotels. He was going home with vibrant, unusual stories about his time here. Those are experiences he couldn’t have bought.
This kid didn’t spring into frugality out of nowhere. He was inspired. England has a robust population of squatters: people who choose to live in abandoned buildings. Many of them have jobs, or attend school. They just choose to live in empty buildings instead of mainstream housing. It’s a strange but thriving subculture.
My companion wasn’t a squatter himself. “I could never do that,” he said. “But I’ve learned a lot from them.”
He’d observed this radical community and taken elements of their lifestyle into his own. He wouldn’t want to sleep uninvited in abandoned buildings, for example, but he was happy to couch-surf for an entire summer, sleeping on floors and sofas rather than in hotels. Likewise, dumpster-diving was a step too far, but knowing people did it had made him brave about asking restaurants for day-old food that was about to go off.
He certainly wasn’t traveling in luxury, but he was having a great time. And he wasn’t going into debt to do it.
You don’t have to be a footloose young traveler to adopt this frugal mindset. Last year, I participated in Katy Wolk-Stanley’s No-Heat Challenge. She wanted to keep her heat off until November. Fine.
I bailed when it snowed in mid-October, but I live in a colder climate than Katy (who lives in Portland, near J.D.), who cheerfully pushed on through. Later, I discovered a community of people living in my area who use no central heat at all. They live year-round in unheated warehouses and artists’ lofts and farmhouses, using only space heaters and stoves to stay warm.
I can’t imagine ever doing that. I’m a delicate flower, and I spent my childhood in Tucson. As soon as the temperature falls below 60 degrees, I start whining mournfully for summer.
But paying attention to how the no-heat crowd lives helped me use less heat last winter. Between the major changes we’d made — like replacing our 40-year-old oil furnace with a new high-efficiency gas furnace — and our lifestyle shifts, we were able to cut our heating bill by hundreds of dollars per month. That savings made a huge difference to my ability to pay off our credit cards.
Whether you’re looking to travel to exotic places, change careers, or just keep your house warm this winter, there’s always somebody taking a more radical step than you are. Watching people who go beyond your own comfort zones can be inspiring. We can’t all be vegans, but we can all try to eat less meat. Most of us would never want to become squatters or dumpster-dive for our dinners, but seeing others do so can be an invitation to examine our own lives.
Where are you swapping cash for conveniences you don’t really need? Is there some radical change waiting to be made in your life? A baby step that you can take towards it?
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This article is about Choices, Consumerism, Frugality
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Rosa and I gave up conveniences in our younger years and saved a lot of money by doing so. We still live a frugal lifestyle, but as we’ve grown older, we’ve become more willing to spend for comfort. What was all of that saving for if not to buy comfort in old age?
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lol, I encounter so few other Jaime’s that now I’ll have to post my last initial.
I love the gist of this article – that other people’s extreme choices can shake up our complacency and help us think of alternatives to the status quo. It’s not advocating particular actions per se, it’s encouraging people to consider extreme (to them) ways to save money. I would liken it to the forwards in Amy Dycyzyn’s Tightwad Gazette. She said the main purpose was to spark people’s creative thinking, not just provide an xyz list of things people can do to be frugal.
That said … as a woman, I would never hitchhike except in dire need. Just doing a quick google search, I found an FBI report that forcible rape (excludes statutory rape and other sex offenses) was at about 56.6 per 100,000 female inhabitants. And I found on Amnesty International that a woman is raped every 6 minutes in the US. It’s never the woman’s fault, but I do my best to reduce the risk of being a part of these statistics. No amount of financial savings are worth it to me to experience the “adventure” and savings of hitchhiking.
Funnily enough, I did once pick up hitchhikers when I was about 19. It was a small group – two young men and 1 young woman, plus two dogs. The dogs and woman made the decision for me because I felt that made them more trustworthy (irrational yes, but that’s what I thought) and because I wanted even just the 2 hours I drove them to the next town to be with someone who wouldn’t try to hurt them (her).
I think people are by and large better than all the paranoia swirling around. It’s really not that hard to exercise realistic caution rather than livng your life in fear. Hitchhiking is, in my opinion, on the other side of the line and I would never feel like I wasn’t an adventurous person because I didn’t find it safe enough to use recreationally.
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I’m also inclined to agree with Sarah J. (#47) moochers. The couch, the free car ride, etc. While people may willingly let you “use their generosity”–remember it cost the car owner to drive that car. Did he contribute to the gas?
Anyway, I’m not entirely sure he should be working odd jobs…as a tourist, I don’t think he’s supposed to be working at all. I know I sound like a spoilsport, but, if we’re going to do this kind of thing, I think it should be strictly by the laws of the land where we are.
There’s a fine line between been a moocher, bum, and happy-go-lucky person out for adventure. Each person will have to decide for himself where that line is. Others may disagree. While I willingly help others as needed and we’ve certainly kept many people in our home over the years, the attitude of someone who can see how little he can spend while trying to live off others’ generosity doesn’t do anything for me.
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@50 “Despite what your local news reports, not everyone is a murderer or wants to kidnap your children.”
Not everyone has to be a murderer or kidnapper (or more likely a thief or rapist). Only a few people do. And, as #46 said, when you’re little and female, it’s a lot easier to be taken advantage of than when you’re big and burly. One of my grandmothers died from complications of a thief breaking her hip when she was walking in an unsafe part of town. I know plenty of folks who have been mugged. It happens.
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@48-Michelle, yeah when I wrote that I didn’t mean it in an extravagant way. Sometimes its better to pay for an affordable hotel than to take wild risks such as hitchhiking and staying with strangers.
I’m not paranoid, but in this world and age you can’t be too careful. I still have to disagree on the hitchhiking, its just dangerous and no one should take that chance. You never know what you might encounter, no one thinks they’re going to end up being mugged, murdered, raped, etc.
No one thinks that its going to happen to them but it does when people aren’t careful. Its not paranoia, its about taking care of yourself in a dangerous world. Oh and I’m not living my life in fear, but at the same time I have to protect myself.
btw, sometimes people take it for granted that they live in a safe world, sure the chances of being mugged in Omaha is much less than NYC, but at the same time, I don’t want to take that chance. I practice safety. I guess I care more about safety since I’m a woman but you know what, given what they do to victims in this world, I have a right to be very careful.
In seconds, you could be taken to a remote location, tortured and killed. This is the world that we live in, oh and btw, the prison population in the U.S. is larger than any other country in the world. So you guys may make fun of those of us who are against the hitchhiking, but look at the world.
You need to be careful. I don’t understand how people can sit here and argue against safety, I don’t worry about people attacking me when I go out into the world, but when I do go out, I do make sure that I don’t take stupid risks.
Again, its not living in fear, its not paranoia, its using your brain, taking care of yourself, and being a responsible human being for yourself and your future.
Oh and just because you’re a man doesn’t mean you’re safe and can take wild risks that endanger your life, look at what happens to strong men all the time. I have to look at the world realistically. Man or Woman everyone must take care of themselves.
The people who argue pro hitchhiking argue for it because nothing bad has ever happened to them, but just because it hasn’t happened doesn’t mean that it won’t if you aren’t smart.
Sorry for writing a novel, but I feel very strongly that people must be wise and practice caution when they go into the world. Never put yourself at risk for the sake of frugality.
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btw is Sierra a baby boomer? The baby boomers grew up in an entirely different time, they grew up in neighborhoods where kids were allowed to be kids, where they didn’t have to lock doors, where neighbors trusted each other, etc.
My friends and I have been in situations where men in cars have followed us after we got out of our high school when we were teens, and btw this has happened to us in middle class suburbia.
We were teens in the late 90s, this is why I am very concerned, when you get scared like that, where men follow teen girls for no reason, there is a right to be concerned. So I am speaking from experience.
You just can’t take chances, and no we didn’t wear clothes that were skimpy, we’re not those type of girls. Btw, this happened to us separately, we weren’t hanging out together when this happened to us, but its still scary that it did.
So yea I do have a reason to be concerned. And while there are many good people in the world, given that in the U.S. the population is 300 million, and that the entire world population is 6 billion (I think), there are plenty of people who seek to do harm, and who are bad people and have no remorse for their actions.
Once you have a situation where you were followed for no reason, its always there in the back of your mind, and your brain becomes very alert to the what ifs, what can I do to make sure to be safe, its a hard thing to turn off after you have been through that.
There is a reason why I’m cautious and its not because I just pulled it out of thin air, I’ve had little scares and those were enough to make me guarded.
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Convenience is more about affordability than living cheap. People only chose to live a certain lifestyle because they have no other option.
I’m sure if those squatters had access to proper housing they would decide to live in.
On the other hand, if I decide to care about the environment (yeah right), I would rather go for the efficient and less heating approach.
So it’s rarely about convenience and low cost, but more about personal circumstances.
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I’m a gal in my early 30s who in my teens/early 20s lived and traveled similarly, including hitchhiking, to the Brit guy described here. I was part of a punk, do-it-yourself community that valued frugality and in(ter)dependence… Luckily I was never hurt or threatened during my adventures, though after being picked up by a few sketchy drivers, I decided to buy my own car. Hello, responsible adulthood!
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Also, there was a related article in the NY Times a few months ago on squatters buying their own homes in Buffalo, NY: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/06/magazine/06Squatters-t.html Might be interesting to some of you.
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After finishing school, I took some time off to travel around Australia. I learned a lot about stretching my money as far as I could. Sure, I indulged every once in a while, but I realized that I was living on less than I was when I was back in the U.S. It wasn’t that things were cheaper, I was simply cutting out the luxuries that I’d become so accustomed to back at home. My travels actually taught me how to better manage my money and live substantially cheaper.
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I’m going to put in another vote for the ‘I’m so frugal, I let everyone else spend their money on me’ opinion. And the – it’s great that I’m risking life and limb to save some $$$. I’m all for immersing oneself in the local colture, eating at local places, seeing things from a local perspective instead of staying at just the resort areas. HOWEVER, I wouldn’t put that above my safety. I appreciate that the point of this article is to look outside the box, to see ways that you have become accustomed to spending a certain amount, but the example of this ‘adventure seeking’ (the guy you’ll hear about on the news and say – of course he got into trouble, look what he was doing) freeloader is poor at best. And the whole – ‘I traded work’ sounds a bit sketchy. Would people be so supportive if they found out instead of some adventure seeking traveler from London ‘trading work’ he was a Mexican illegal ‘trading work’. What exactly is the line between the two? Is it country of origin, presumed social class? Either way – nobody is paying taxes, and since I pay a lot of taxes, it bothers me when other don’t.
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A woman travelling like this would be assaulted in about 5 minutes. No thanks.
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My landlord pays my heat and controls the temp. I wish he would try the No Heat Challenge. I’m sweaty and miserable all summer long and the second the weather gets tolerable, he cranks up the heat so I’m miserable for another month or two until it’s cold enough that my apartment is comfortable with the heat off and the windows open. I sit there with my windows open while blizzards rage outside – it’s completely ridiculous.
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I see a number of men here who are pretty sure the world is a mostly safe place and people who wouldn’t hitch hike like the fellow here are letting the media lead them by the nose or something into thinking bad things will happen if we aren’t cautious.
Can I ask, would you encourage your daughters to just get into strangers’ cars? Would you really tell them it’s not that dangerous, that most people mean well and you think the adventure would be good for her?
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Regarding all this safety talk, it all boils down to analyzing comparative risk levels and deciding what works for you.
Safety, after a certain level, starts to fall under the law of diminishing returns. You can add a lot to your safety by avoiding the truly risky things, but you can’t remove risk completely. You can drop your risk of an automobile accident substantially just by not driving while drunk, but it takes giving up driving, riding, and being a pedestrian on public roads to avoid all risk of it, and still an airplane could drop flaming out of the sky and land on your house.
You just look at the costs and the benefits of any course of action and decide what your risk tolerances are and what you’re willing to do to limit them. For some people, hitchhiking is too risky; for others, the risk is negligible. It has to do with how they view that risk, and how they weigh it with the benefits of taking that risk, the costs of avoiding it, and what they can do to deal with the worst should it happen.
My own preference is to be proactive about reducing the consequences, rather than reducing the risk. Things that reduce the damage roll, so to speak. Martial arts or a self-defense course won’t change the odds of either being picked up by a rapist or killer when hitchhiking, or being abducted by one, but they might change the risk profile of the encounter itself. In automobile racing, the cars and safety restraints and protective gear are all designed and built from the perspective that accidents are going to happen and the human in the car has to be protected from them.
I’m fond of five-point seat belts, and full-body motorcycle armor, and being reasonably confident that I can handle myself in a fight. I’m more fond of knowing how to get myself un-lost than I am of google-printout maps with directions, and more fond of knowing how to pull out of a fishtail on an icy road than I am of my (dubious) ability to judge what speed guarantees me traction in a progressively-worse sleetstorm—and knowing how to pull out of a fishtail serves me not only when I misjudge but when the driver next to me misjudges and slides and bumps me.
That’s my risk-tolerance profile. And my risk-tolerance profile is fine with driving out with a radio to look for tornados and report them to weather services, but balks at swimming near the intake drains of swimming pools. And my risk-tolerance profile would probably result in me attacking a mugger who has a knife because I’d rather trust my skills than his intentions, but hitchhiking is out of the question because I’m shy and the prospect of going up to people and asking for a ride freaks me right out. And my risk-tolerance profile says I don’t ride a motorcycle without armor, but I do ride a motorcycle.
And that works for me. Your mileage may vary, and that’s as it should be.
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Just to throw in a note on Couchsurfing, at least from couchsurfing.com. Not mooching, it’s an exchange that comes around in a different way than it started. I host people that come through my town, they leave a reference that I’m not a crazy person. This happens for everyone in the system. I’m traveling around and looking for a host, I read the references that other people left them and see if it’d be a good fit. Only once in 5 years have I had a missmatched request (they had kids, I don’t have a kid friendly house) and never had a problem in my own travels.
As for hitch-hiking, how many people have considered a CL ride-share? ever think about how close those two are?
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I’m a young woman and I proudly hitchhike. I’ve never had a bad experience. The one time I had a bad experience with a creepy man, I was walking, not hitchhiking. Should we stop walking anywhere? No. I have been in two car accidents and been injured. Do I stop driving a car? No. Life isn’t 100% safe and isn’t meant to be. Live your life, don’t lock yourself in a boring apartment and watch it go by through the window!
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Karen,
Just because you never had a bad experience doesn’t mean it isn’t likely. You are lucky that nothing ever happened. I know that most people are good, but I’m not putting myself in such a vulnerable position. I hope nothing ever happens to you, but by saying nothing has ever happened therefore you think it is safe enough you are using flawed logic.
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