borat

Entrepreneurial musings – I am a champion!

by Mark on November 12, 2010 in Outlook, Work

I’ve always been an entrepreneur at heart and I have always known, unmistakably, that when I grew up I wanted to own my own business. The most common question people would ask me when I said that was “Doing what?”.

I never really knew how to answer this. While it’s true that I didn’t have a clue what kind of business I wanted to run, I didn’t really feel like it mattered. Judging from the various enterprising schemes I ran as a kid, I could have ended up doing just about anything. Fortunately, I haven’t ended up as a Pokemon card distributor or a DVD pirate.

For those who don’t know, I’ve been playing around a lot with internet marketing techniques as a way to make money from various websites I own (this being one of them). I’ve had a lot of failed attempt and thousands of hours or work have yielded little results. Until now that is.

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minimalism

Being a minimalist rocks…. sometimes….ok, always!

by Mark on October 22, 2010 in Outlook

A couple of years ago, my work relocated me from to another town. This meant finding a new apartment and moving everything I owned. I had so much random stuff that it this became a real headache. I was resolved to throw away all the old junk I had amassed over the years.

Alas, once I arrived at my new place, I simply put it all in the closet and forgot about it. Then, one Sunday evening after doing the laundry, I ran out of coat hangers. I removed an old shirt that I hadn’t worn in years and was about to put it in a storage box. Then it came to me. Why not throw it away, I would probably never wear it again. So I did.

This began a chain reaction of events that lead me to throw out half of my wardrobe, as well as many electrical goods including a full stereo system. If I had been thinking ahead I could have sold everything on ebay or at least given it to a charity shop. However that night I was so determined to get rid of this stuff that I simply threw it all away. Despite knowing throwing hundreds of Pounds worth of stuff away, I felt awesome!

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Aussie Farming

This is my tractor, there are many like it but this one is mine

by Mark on October 13, 2010 in Mark's Travels

A few days later I arrive on the new farm, it’s a little bit different in that this is a family run affair. The dad (80 years old) was on his 2nd or 3rd wife (49 years old) and they have a 17 year old son and 15 year old daughter. The also have a rather eclectic mix of aunts, uncles, half cousins and god knows what else spread around the nearby countryside. Hey, maybe it gets lonely out there or something.

It’s worth mentioning that the parents pulled their kids out of school permanently so they could work on the farm. Even then, I wasn’t really judging them – it’s their life after all. The other seasonal workers were pretty cool and we had a pretty good laugh. One the second day I got asked to reverse a truck round a corner. I gave it a go, but was a bit to heavy on the clutch or something and the “old c*&t”, as he affectionately would become known, had a bit of a hissy fit.

For the next couple of days I sustained a torrent of verbal abuse…

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beach

Why I decided to quit my job and travel the world forever

by Mark on October 8, 2010 in Outlook

September 10th, 2007. It’s 10.30 am and I have been official employed for 90 minutes. I had finally made it through onto a graduate program at a Swiss Insurance company. After countless applications, numerous interviews and tests, I had secured a job and was finally on my way towards a solid career. Everything in my life had been leading up to this.

Every school exam paper, every university lecture, every extra curricular activity was designed and focused on putting me on the working ladder. Depending on your point of view, you may even consider this a fast track position to the top. The world was at my feet and all I had to do was start walking.

So why did this feel so horribly wrong ?!?

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flat bed economy

How to get a free flat bed in Economy Class on any flight

by Mark on September 25, 2010 in Travel Hacks

Do you find difficult to sleep sitting upright in an airline seat? If you have ever had three, four or even five seats all to yourself, you will understand what a difference an empty row can make to a long flight. Imagine being able to sleep flat on a 7ft flat bed in Economy Class. Some people just get lucky and end up with nobody sitting next to them on a quiet flight. This article will show you how to get lucky every time, and wind up with a whole row of seats all to yourself.

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My new home – Why Budapest is remarkably awesome!

My new home – Why Budapest is remarkably awesome!

by Mark on September 20, 2010 in Mark's Travels

Budapest, a city that isn’t exactly world renown, became my new home last week. I have to say that so far it is my favourite city in the world (yes even more so than Hong Kong). Aside from being super cheap, very modern and having awesome architecture all around, a few points really stand out for me.

The first is that Budapest is far more cosmopolitan than I had imagined. People from all over come here to work and to study. Additionally, most young people speak great English and you can get by very easily without knowing Hungarian.

Super fast internet is another. My landlord barely uses the internet but the basic package he bought is faster than the fastest connection you can get in the UK. This is great news for me as I spend most of the day working online.

At night time, Budapest holds a truly epic secret…

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