Lisanne works from Asia for a Dutch employer

Not from the beach with a coconut, but 95% of the time behind a desk in a bedroom. And I’ve never been more productive. I am Lisanne, 35 years old, married and mother of a daughter (5 years old). I have always loved to travel, both with my husband and later with our daughter joining us. Southeast Asia has always been our favorite. It was my first destination alone (when I was eighteen), the first destination together with my husband and also where the long trip with our family went.

Great effort to land in the Netherlands again

When we returned home from our first long trip through Asia, we took a long time to get used to “home” again and really land. In the Netherlands more and more things started to bother us. We felt we were mainly busy working and constantly rushing to keep our family life going. A huge contrast to the trip we made together when our daughter was 1-2 years old.

Vacation is very different from daily life when working remotely.

Now we also know that a vacation is something very different from daily life (incl. working) abroad. Still, it kept pulling and we wanted to experience that “normal” life abroad just right. Better to try something that might not be quite it after all, than to always keep thinking ‘what if…’. So we decided to ‘just’ take our chances!

Talking to my employer and arranging a lot

I’m a (Marketing) Data Analyst, a job that content can be perfectly remote. I had been doing that for years during covid and I wasn’t in the office much after that. So I deal with analyzing data, but then translate this data into insights and areas for improvement that an organization can move forward with. The latter is often done in meetings.

I started the conversation with my Dutch employer. They were not eager for me to work remotely for a longer period of time, understandable, but in the end they wanted to give me the opportunity to do so for 8 months. It took some effort to arrange everything. With my contract with HR, with all kinds of security with IT, but in the end it all went smoothly.

Completely in my own work bubble

I personally loved working online from abroad! I could get totally absorbed in my work and, because of the time difference, was not disturbed by anything or anyone for most of the day. I have never been as productive as I was there. Of course, you do miss some of the social contact with colleagues (although we are used to Teams from the covid time) and especially the chats at the coffee machine. So you have to be able to cope with having a little less social contact in that area, online is different. You also need a large dose of discipline to actually do something when all your colleagues are asleep and you are in a beautiful place.

Not working on the beach with a coconut

We visited Thailand, Vietnam and Indonesia during this trip/workcation. Out of these eight months, I did find one photo of a somewhat nice workplace. I must honestly say that 95% of the time I was just sitting in a bedroom at a desk. I do have work where I need my full focus, so I was really in my own bubble and during working hours was not at all concerned with the nice environment here. So in my case, it was definitely not a stereotypical image of working on the beach under a palm tree with a cocktail or coconut in your hand.

I often went to work first thing in the morning and worked long days. Then I could spend most of the day focused on my work (I like that) and towards the end of the afternoon, when Holland went to work, I could have some meetings with colleagues. Because I made such long days, I was able to have extra long weekends and go out with my family. That balance worked very well for me, but everyone has to find their own way in that. In any case, I loved the flexibility.

Work-life balance while traveling

Of course, if I went out for lunch, a walk or even a swim, I was immediately in a completely different world. That made it easy for me to forget the content of my work, which I had more trouble with in the Netherlands. For me, the separation between work and private life therefore felt greater here than in the Netherlands. And what’s extra nice is that in Asia you don’t have to worry about shopping, cooking, cleaning, etc. and therefore have much more time to spare, even when you’re working.

I was one of those people who was always finding inspiration for new trips, planning them extensively and always looking forward to the next vacation. I thought ‘create a life you don’t need a vacation from’ was a beautiful statement and that’s how this remote working life really felt, while I had continued to do the same work as in the Netherlands. I got so much energy from the quality time together, more rest, the lovely people and of course the warmth and sunshine. We did go on vacation to Australia in between. This was at the top of our bucket list, so we didn’t want to miss that opportunity now that it was only a 5-6 hour flight from Asia.

My tips and advice on working remotely

Another great piece of advice: if you can dream it, you can do it! Just go try it if you really want it. I know it’s cliché and not always easy, but if you want something badly there is often a way around it. If, like me, you have work that could be done (mostly) remotely, take the plunge and have a conversation with your employer. No you have, yes you can get. And there are also all kinds of online platforms these days where you can find other work that you can do remotely.

Of course, not everything is all roses, including here. As you may understand if you have read my story, I and my family liked it so much that we have now left for Thailand indefinitely. We knew in advance that this would not allow me to keep my salaried job. I follow my own advice from above, so we took the plunge anyway. To be continued!

You can follow me on Instagram: @lisannerijnders