From Bangkok to Vienna: travel stories of Mint & Max

in #introduceyourself6 years ago (edited)

Hello Everyone! - Sawaddee ka! - Hallöchen!

PA153630.JPG

About us
The viewfinder is a project of two friends, lovers, soulmates, or call it whatever you want named Mint and Max. They've met in February 2016 when Max traveled to Bangkok to visit his sister where he coincidentally gets to know Mint, an architecture student at Chulalongkorn University. After one month of tears (joyful and sad) and sweat (a lot of secrets were hidden that time), Max was supposed to leave but instead just canceled his flight and stayed a while longer. Now the year is 2018 and the two traveled to quite some places and went through quite some adventures in Thailand, Switzerland, Germany, Austria, Hungary and some other occasionally weird but always wonderful places. Sometimes together, sometimes alone, sometimes just connected over a small display on each other's phone. Mountains got climbed, rivers swam through and parties celebrated. The time is now, and both are separated again: Mint is in Bangkok and Max in Vienna, but the wild journey goes on.

PB281239 copyy.jpg

So what can you expect from our blog? For sure there's gonna be a lot of travel and adventure stories. Wild tales about punk festivals in the Lithuanian wasteland, sneaking through Berlin subway tunnels, lonely nights wasted at gas stations just to find the next hitchhike ride, wild camping in a polish forest with street dogs around your tent, creepy Couchsurfing or hostel experiences and the lively loneliness, you feel when you are a bit tipsy in a strange city, where you don't know anyone and everything seems possible. Beside the foolish hobo stories (mostly Max), there's gonna be some more intellectual posts about art and architecture, where to search for cheap but awesome food, taking you through vintage stores in Vienna, or even a short weekend getaways from Bangkok (mostly Mint). Maybe there's also gonna be some more personal posts about how it was to date with different cultural backgrounds or also some critical thoughts about how the mass tourism from the west affects Thailand, but we will see. Let's jump to our personal introduction.


Mint

P9282856.jpg

Hiii Everyone!! my name is Mint, a 22 year old girl. I am a half Thai Chinese - my grandfather fled from China during the world war but don’t expect me to speak Chinese though (haha). I live and grew up in a city called Samutsakorn which is about 40 km away from inner city Bangkok.

Last year, I graduated in the field of architecture (woohoo!). Studying architecture really helped me to be patient and be hardworking to accomplish some thing. The semester before the last I did an exchange program in Switzerland which gives me a totally different aspect of studies and also in life. Right now I’m working full time, not what I wanted the most, but it is okay for now. I know you’d probably think I am finishing uni at such young age but this is the most common thing in Thai society, we go straight to uni after high school.

000028.jpg

My parents always take me and my brother for a trip abroad since we were really young and this really widened my world. It always gives me thrill to be somewhere new. I remember how much I enjoy doing High School exchange or summer trip abroad. Now my kind of travel changes a bit I got to experience with hitchhiking and Couchsurfing (thanks, Max, felt safe with him), all these hippies stuff and I really enjoy it. I have been in total to 34 countries and I am grateful for that. Due to my short-term memory, I document stuff. And since I travel so much I just started my travel blog and I would appreciate it if you check it out at https://www.facebook.com/thewanderdaze and www.thewanderdaze.com

IMG_6880.jpg

I enjoy traveling so much sometimes I pretend to be a tourist in my country. I am aware that foreigners love to come to Thailand: that it is nice, it is a paradise, food is awesome, living is cheap, and people are super friendly… Yes, I appreciate that of those who appreciate Thailand but sometimes I am angry with some tourists who came here just to party, be drunk, trash the ‘paradise’ , destroy the beach and simply leave. I hope sometimes we all care more.

IMG_4300.jpg

Besidessss, I am a happy person. I enjoy photography and creating imagery. I also love plants as I think it brings spaces to live (random). I have a dream of building my own camper van and live in it because I like the idea of being able to travel anywhere and any time. But unfortunately, Thailand is not the best place to do so (not a lot of parking space, safety), weather, etc..so maybe I’ll have to wait for my undestined future.

1.png

here are some of my favorite photoshop work

I came across steemit because Max told me about how interesting it is. We also see it as a project we do together that would in a way keep us connected. I will be writing mainly about traveling and food, or even about relationship if anyone is ever interested so don’t forget to follow us @theviewfinder and I look forward to hear your opinion!

PA220046.jpg


Max

DSC02903.jpg

My name is Max. I'm 24 years old and grew up in Chemnitz, which is located in East Germany. After high school I've moved to Vienna to work for an environmental youth organisation as part of a gap year. I always had a good relationship to my family, but moving away after school was a necessary and a long-planned step for me. The limited possibilities in my small hometown just frustrated me and I wanted to achieve independence and self-determination to grow as a person. I've learned a lot useful stuff in my first months alone in Vienna: how to overcome fears and loneliness for example, but also how to cook, do my laundry and fix my bike (very essential in flat Vienna). Living in a shared flat with ten people at that time really helped me to find friends in the new city and to figure out, how to live in a bigger community with lots of different characters. We even adopted a small cat called dog.

DSC02965.jpg

P1071867.jpg

After one year I've moved to another shared flat due to some problems with the landlord. Around the same time, I also started my studies of journalism and communication sciences, which I plan to finish this summer (fingers crossed!). It took me a while since I didn't spend too much time in Vienna the last three or four semesters due to longer stays in Bangkok and Bern, traveling and work (If you wanna read some of my work for Vice magazine you can check it Here, Here or Here, unfortunately only in German).

PA203781.jpg

Traveling and adventure stories will probably take a big part in my written content, since it was one of my main activities within the last years to just grab my backpack and leave through the front door, as soon as I had some free time from work or studies, sometimes even in spite of ongoing obligations. Driving with a bus in the beginning early evening twilight to a unknown destination or standing on a lonely road with my thump up in the middle of nowhere; sleeping in a dense forest under a cloudless starry sky, in a crowded noisy hostel room or a squeaky tight couch of some Couchsurfing host; these were the senses I was chasing after when I broke out of my everyday life, and still is though. So far I've been to 37 countries and I'm thankful for that, because I know, that it is a huge privilege to travel while others have to work hard to get their family through, are in danger of wars or famine, struggle everyday to find a shelter and just because they where born in a different part of the world with a different kind of passport.

11949574_1044393082267946_743671753_n.jpg

Sometimes I'm angry how this world works, then on other days, I'm just sad. When I was younger I was a passionate idealist with a strong will for social justice and political change. I thought things will change if you just keep hope and believe in good, but I saw many of my friends losing the battle against windmills for justice and social balance. Sometimes I'm a bit disillusioned with no idea how to make a change. That's why I want to use steemit as a platform to address some critical topics, besides the travel and adventure stuff, maybe just as a relief for myself, but maybe others are also interested in this kind of topics, we will see.

Sorry to end this post on a bitter note. I didn't plan to write it like this and rather just happened in the process of writing. Maybe because it was something I had in mind a while already.

IMG-20170713-WA0012.jpg

Sort:  

Impressive intro :) Resteeming it for some extra publicity! Great to see more Austrians join!
Liebe Grüße, @theaustrianguy

Hey @theaustrianguy, thanks for resteeming and the nice welcome:) Greets from Vienna!

Welcome to Steem Community @theviewfinder! As a gentle reminder, please keep your master password safe. The best practise is to use your private posting key to login to Steemit when posting; and the private active key for wallet related transactions.

In the New Steemians project, we help new members of steem by education and resteeeming their articles. Get your articles resteemed too for maximum exposure. You can learn more about it here: https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@gaman/new-steemians-project-launch

Servus aus thailand 🇹🇭,
so eine interessante Geschichte!
Aber ich glaube, dass du einen falschen tag verwenden hast. Tag thai ist leider nur für Thailänder und hier wird nur thai geschrieben. Für die internationale Sprache , soll du tag thai thailand verwenden, da sind alle internationalen Streemians unterwegs.
Also viel Spaß noch😊

สวัสดีค่ะ
แท็ก thai มีกฏอยู่นะคะ อันนี้เป็นของชุมชนไทยเราต้องเขียนภาษาไทยกำกับด้วยค่ะ แต่ถ้าคุณไม่อยากเขียน คุณก็ใช้แท็ก thailand ได้คะ แต่จริงๆแล้วคุณก็เขียนไทยได้นะ ในโพสต์ก่อนยังเขียนมาเลย.
ทุกคนในชุมชนไทยจะปฏิบัติตามกฏนี้นะคะ คุณคงจะยังไม่รู้.
ขอบคุณค่ะ😊

สวัสดีค่ะ ขอบคุณที่มาแจ้งนะคะพอดีเพิ่งทราบวันนี้เหมือนกัน เขียนไทยได้ค่ะ :) แต่ตอนแรกเข้าใจว่าแท็ก thai เกี่ยวกับคนไทยอะไรแบบนี้ พอไปเห็นโพสต์ของคุณ @tookta มาเลยเก็ตละ ยังไงก็จะเปลี่ยนเป็นแท็ก thailand นะคะ
ขอบคุณที่แวะมาอ่านค่ะ : )


Welcome to Steem @theviewfinder.

Do read A thumb rule for steemit minnows - 50:100:200:25 for starter tips.

Spend time reading Steem Blue Paper to know how Steem blockchian works and if you still have any queries ask them on our Ask me anything about Steemit post and we will try to answer that.

All the Best!!!

Good to have you guys here, looking forward to your upcoming content, I wish you a very nice day, enjoy it as best as you can, upvoted & followed! ✌

Hey @sqruffy, thanks for your nice words! We wish you a pleasant day too. It's also good to see some other people form Vienna on Steemit :D

Servus auf Steemit 👌

Hey @flurgx, ein freundliches Servus zurück von Wien nach Sarleinsbach :)

Hey! Sau cooler Blog!
Extrem geile Bilder!
Sobald sich meine Bandbreite wieder einigermaßen erholt hat und ich wieder irgendetwas machen kann... werde ich auf jeden Fall ein bisschen bei euch durchvoten, supporten. :)
Grüße

Hey @luegenbaron! Danke für deinen Support, das Bandbreiteproblem kennen wir auf jeden Fall auch gut :D Scheint, als hätten viele Minnows anfangs damit zu kämpfen.
Alles Gute für dich jedenfalls und liebe Grüße zurück:)

Ja, das Problem taucht eben vor allem so lange auf wie man noch keine eigenen 15 SP hat.
Die Auslastung der Bandbreite kannst du auf steemd.com/@username nachschauen.
Der Community ist ebenfalls aufgefallen, dass die Bandbreite mit der Aktivität und allgemeinen Auslastung der blockchain steigt und sinkt.. ^^
Werde aber demnächst auch noch einen Post schreiben in dem ich die Tipps sammel, welche mir am Anfang am meisten geholfen haben. :)
Grüße

Hey @luegenbaron, ja ein bisschen hab ich mich auch damit beschäftigt, zuletzt ist es weniger aufgetreten, also hoffen wir mal auf das Beste :D Bin auf jeden Fall gespannt auf deinen Artikel darüber!

Hey there guys, I'm Oatmeal Joey Arnold, and I love your photos and I play guitar too and I love to travel too and was in Hawaii, Vietnam, Disneyland, Seattle, New York. You guys are fun and lovely. Welcome.

Hi @joeyarnoldvn, thanks for your warm welcome. Always a pleasure to meet a fellow musician and traveler, seems like you've been to some really beautiful places. Good luck to you and stay safe on your future trips:)

Hallo @theviewfinder, herzlich willkommen auf Steemit.

Wenn Du Fragen zu Steemit hast, oder Dich mit anderen deutschen „Steemians“ austauschen magst, schau einfach mal auf unserem Discord-Server https://discord.gg/g6ktN45 vorbei.

Unter dem folgenden Link findest Du einige Anleitungen, die Dir den Einstieg in das Steem-Universum deutlich erleichtern werden: Deutschsprachige Tutorials für Steemit-Neulinge: Ein Überblick

Welcome to steemit @theviewfinder. Join @minnowsupport project for more help. Checkout @helpie and @qurator projects.
Send SBD/STEEM to @treeplanter to plant trees and get an get an upvote in exchange of your donation (Min 0.01 SDB)
Upvote this comment to keep helping more new steemians
Send SBD/STEEM to @tuanis in exchange of an upvote and support this project, follow for random votes.

Your Post Has Been Featured on @Resteemable!
Feature any Steemit post using resteemit.com!
How It Works:
1. Take Any Steemit URL
2. Erase https://
3. Type re
Get Featured Instantly � Featured Posts are voted every 2.4hrs
Join the Curation Team Here | Vote Resteemable for Witness