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7 awesome places to travel with inspirational photos

7 awesome places to travel with inspirational photos

by Mark on September 7, 2010 in Outlook

When I wrote the Daydreaming of amazing places article, I wanted to share a number of other places than I’ve had super strong urges to visit. So, I’ve found some cool photos and in no particular order they are……

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Vienna

Daydreaming of amazing places

by Mark on September 7, 2010 in Outlook

The very first DVD I ever bought, back when Virgin Megastores used to sell more chewing gum than they did DVDs, was Ronin. This classic 90s action movie, starring Robert De Niro and Jean Reno, is one of my favourite action films of all time. Aside from the epic car chases, sweet gun battles and awesome twisty plot, there is one short scene where a guy asks Vincent (Jean Reno) where he knows him from. “Vienna” replies Vincent in an intimidating, yet soothing French accent. “Of course!” replies Sergi.

Those five seconds of cinema may not seem like much to anyone else on this planet, but for whatever inexplicable reason that alone has started a snowball of intrigue in my mind, towards the Austrian city. In short – Vienna – it just sounds cool. And that alone makes me desperately want to go and visit.

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That ‘London Baby’ feeling

That ‘London Baby’ feeling

by Mark on September 5, 2010 in Mark's Travels, Outlook

From September 2008 to May 2009 I lived in a town called Farnborough which is around 35 minutes by train from the centre of London. I lived here because it was 3 minutes away from where I worked, but I regretted not living closer to London and braving a longer commute.

London is one of the most unique cities in the world, and boy is it something to behold. I’ve visited the place dozens of times over the years so I was a bit numb to the ‘London baby’ wow factor. The only exception was on one of my last nights out, in May 2009. I was walking across the river Thames to Waterloo station. It was about 6.30am on a Sunday morning – did I mention London is good for partying? I look to my right and gaze upon Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament.

Despite having walked past these building literally hundreds of times over years there seemed to be something special about this this time. It was a few days before I left for the first leg of my trip and knowing I wasn’t going to see them again was playing with my emotions. I was genuinely sad that I wouldn’t get to appreciate them, despite barely taking notice of them in the past.

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badass

455 days on the road – The good, the bad and the badass!

by Mark on August 22, 2010 in Outlook

As I sit in Terminal 5 at London’s Heathrow Airport, I’m left to ponder the last 455 days of my life. How the hell did I get here?

I quit my 9-5 career job almost 18 months ago now without too much of a plan. All I knew is that I didn’t want to be an Insurance Project Manager for the rest of my life – kids stick to being astronauts or firemen, seriously!

I return now to the UK with a part-time job that I really enjoy and where I can work from anywhere in the world. I have started a business with a friend that has serious potential – I feel 100times more confident about this one than any other business venture I’ve tried. What I have “achieved” in that sense I feel is not important, though it is inevitable what everyone will ask. That’s ok, it’s something easy to explain and tangible.

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Visit Every Country In The World

Visit every country in the world

by Mark on August 1, 2010 in Outlook

One of my major long term goals in life is to visit every country in the world. I’m not sure when I decided I wanted to do this. It was more of a gradual feeling that I got as I began to travel more and more. A guy from India recently completed this task in the shortest time ever (6 years) and did it on an Indian passport.

Fortunately, I have a UK passport and thus more travel freedom than any other nationality in the world. Where US citizens have issues with countries like North Korea of Cuba, UK citizens are generally fine. Furthermore, I do not need to a visa to visit the majority of countries in the world so this makes things even easier.

The task of going everywhere is still very tough. There are a lot of countries to visit! Actually the first hurdle is to work out how many countries there are in the world. The common view is that the number of United Nations members is the number of countries. This is not really true.

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USA-Scotland

When people ask “Where are you from?”

by Mark on June 19, 2010 in Outlook

In The Four Hour Work Week, author Tim Ferriss describes how he hates being asked “What do you do?”. He goes on to talk about how having an unusual lifestyle and business makes it difficult to answer that question. Well, I have a similar problem but for a different question. It is one that almost everyone I have ever met has asked me. Instead of printing pamphlets, I’ve decided to write a blog post on the subject of where I’m from.

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