Mabuhay!

(Welcome in Filipino)

Today marks the day you will start discovering the world, with me!

And who am I? Long story short, my name, is João Pedro or Juan, John, Joe, Shuo, Joaozinho, Joseph, Jean Pierre, JP, Pedro, Peter, and many other variations that you, my dear readers, came up with since you started getting to know me, all around the world.

I’m with you on this one! A name with a consonant and 3 vocals it’s quite hard to pronounce, especially with that little wave on top of it. Kudos to who got it right!

On with it, I’m a 27 years old Portuguese male, with a master degree in Architecture. Lived in Lisbon, Portugal for 23 years, in Graz, Austria for 1 year, in Istanbul, Turkey for half a year and I’m “currently” living in Zurich, Switzerland.

After working for 2 years in Zurich I decided: OK, time to stop wasting my life, seated on a chair 8 1/2 hours per day, 5 days a week. Time to go on and discover whatever else is out there! A World trip for half a year, sounded quite about right, after checking logistics and putting apart the basic fear instincts I booked my tickets, packed my 40L Quechua backpack, and on with it together with my shadow.

The original title of this story was, in Portuguese, “Uma Aventura nas Ásias e nas Américas” which roughly translated went by as “An Adventure in Asia and America”.

It ultimately changed for The Portuguese Traveler, since my aim is to continue this journey and discover die ganze Welt. As of a start, I will tell you the story of this 6 months adventure that I’m going through, around South East Asia and South America.

The first part has already passed so I will try to mix gently both parts, the Asian one, with countries’s best of’s and where to, and not to go, best food, hostel recommendations, perks and feats of traveling solo and the reports of a journey in America Latina, con mucho calor, amistades, borracheras y locura!

A small glimpse of what I will try to visit and experience starts with Tango Argentino in Buenos Aires, with a lot of asados and fernet, World Rally Championship in Córdoba in a local way, glaciers in Patagonia, ancient Pre-Colombian cultures, from Perú to México, coffee tasting and learning salsa in Colombia, diving in Playa del Carmen and the cenotes in México or the Big Blue Hole in Belize and if the time is enough why not Darwin’s Galapagos islands!?

For the first introduction, it’s about it. I hope you enjoyed my clumsy writing, without, hopefully, many orthographic mistakes and see you in the next post.

If you have any recommendations or questions hit me up!

If you wish to see my daily adventures faster than waiting for my posts here, I also have an Instagram account that goes by the name @the.portuguese.traveler that you can follow.

Hasta Pronto,

The Portuguese Traveler

P.s. If I notice a big demand on a Portuguese version I’ll promptly translate everything.