Would you like to write a travel blog?

It’s easier than doing a real job.
Just follow this simple guide.

 
1. Do / see something interesting.

This is actually the most difficult part of the whole process.
Travel the world looking for blog-worthy experiences.
Try to make sense of unfamiliar, bizarre and occasionally hostile cultures.
Eat beautiful looking food that makes you violently ill.
Hang around in greasy hostels, stand on roadsides hitchhiking in the rain and eat stale bread hunched inside your tent.
Smile.
Eventually, if you wander around the planet long enough something unexpected / colourful / naked will happen right in front of you.

 
2. Photography.

Fumble for your phone and try to get a picture of what’s happening.
Usually you will be too slow and get a picture of what happens after the interesting thing is already over.

 
3. Procrastination.

Three or four days after the interesting thing happens, think about writing a post about it.
Look at the photos. Process the photos on maximum contrast. Everything looks better / tastier/ less bacteria infested in high contrast color.

 
4. More procrastination.

A week after processing the photos, think about starting to write the post again.
Have a few beers.
Rearrange the photos.
Get drunk / stoned.

 
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5. Writing.

Get out your phone and (try to) write the first sentence of your post.
Realise that Google keyboard has transformed the sentence “the city is buzzing with energy on the first day of the festival” into “the dog of letter which embryo on the gogo fan of the girlish”.
Think to yourself that ‘Google Keyboard’ is a badly named product. It resembles a keyboard in appearance only. A better name would be ‘Google Finger-Fuck-Cryptic-Crossword’.
Flip the bird at your phone.
Realise that making obscene gestures at a phone is childish and pointless.
Take a deep breath.
Delete the incorrect sentence and carefully retype it one character at a time:
“The city if burping while energy on the fruit day in the farcical…”
Take another deep breath.
Spit on your phone.

 
6. Editing.

Re-read your three paragraph post that took four hours to write with Google Finger-Fuck-Cryptic-Crossword.
Realise that more than half of it is sarcastic gibberish fueled by fatigue and culture shock.
Carefully edit out the more offensive racist comments, and delete the vicious invective about scammy taxi drivers.
Realise that after editing out all the offensive and politically incorrect material your three paragraphs have shrunk to three sentences.
Add six extra photos to pad out the story.

 
7. Upload.

Smile benignly at the waiters in the café where you are using free WiFi. They are giving you dirty looks because it’s after closing time and you are still sipping the same cold coffee dregs you bought four hours ago.
Your phone battery is on 11%.
Move to a table near a power outlet and stealthily plug in your charger.
Read over your post one last time.
It sounds like it was written by a schizophrenic game show host, but at least the xenophobic resentment is at minimal levels now.
Take a deep breath, skull the coffee dregs and hit the ‘publish’ button.

 
8. Hustle.

Whore yourself on social media.
People spend half their lives scrolling through Facebook. They may as well read your essays about hitchhiking with sociopaths instead of just ‘liking’ cat gifs.
Wait with bated breath for any reaction from the interweb.
3 likes and 2 shares.
Realise you should probably leave the racist sarcasm in next time if you want your stuff to go viral.