A Manchester woman has revealed how she walked out on her life in the UK to travel the world despite having no plans and very little money - and how she managed to travel across 16 countries over 3 years on a budget of £5 per day.
Erica Pham, 27, felt like her life had hit a dead end after graduating from university and starting work in a nail salon. She explains that, on a whim in 2018, she and her boyfriend Terry, 29, decided to both quit their jobs, pack up their lives and start travelling the world with no plan, no budget, and no tickets booked.
“We had both talked about our dreams of travelling the world but never made any plans, " she says. "One night I just said ‘today’s the day’ and we packed everything we had into our little hatchback, quit our jobs and took what little savings we had down to Dover without even booking a ferry”.
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Erica, of Collyhurst, and Terry arrived in France at 4am the same night without having booked a hotel, and spent the next 2 months driving 5,500 miles before scrapping their car in Athens - all while limiting themselves to spending £5 per day.
Erica says: “We stayed in £3 hostels or made friends along the way who would pay for our meals or let us stay with them - one night we even slept on a train station floor in India surrounded by rats.
"It actually felt nice to only think about where we would stay that night and not worry about existential things like what I wanted my life to be. We were driving with no direction or plan, we’d just stop when we found something interesting so I could take pictures.
"When we scrapped our car we gave anything we couldn’t carry to a homeless guy. We hopped on a train to an airport with our lives in our backpacks”.
After spending time working and volunteering in India, the couple found their way to Australia with £100 left between them, where they stayed with Terry’s family while they saved up money to get back home. "We surprised my partner’s dad by arriving in Australia for his 50th Birthday," she siad.
"We were kind of like ‘surprise! We’re staying with you indefinitely because we’ve run out of money’”. After spending two years in Australia and working in nail salons and as a door-to-door salesperson, Erica found her way back to Manchester in mid 2020 during the pandemic where her boyfriend was an essential worker.
The couple also visited France, Monaco, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Albania, Macedonia, Greece, Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia and Turkey.
Erica says: "When we were in Europe we spent around 20 euros a day but once we started moving to other places we survived on £5 a day. As volunteers in India we stayed with people for free and would only spend £30 a month for the two of us as we were looked after entirely by the charity we worked for.
"We helped teach English to the children and we helped to initiate a project to start up a local library, among other community projects. We stayed with the principle of the school and his family members.
"In other countries we found rooms or hostels for £5 a day and would eat street food. It would be cheaper if we just turned up instead of booking anywhere. Sometimes we would not spend anything and then we would treat ourselves to a £25 hotel which felt like the most luxurious thing ever. In total our output was around £5 a day."
For the first 15 countries the couple volunteered but in Australia Erica took paid work as a salesperson and also did bar work, worked as a nail technician and on a farm. Terry spray painted cars on a working holiday visa.
During this time, Erica started painting some of the things she’d seen on her travels and found a natural affinity for art. “I had started sketching while I was in Australia and it snowballed from there once I was back in the UK.
"I was painting all the nooks and crannies where tourists don’t usually go and it made me feel like I was revisiting everywhere I’d been. Each painting tells a story and holds a fond memory for me”.
Erica now works out of an art studio in Collyhurst, where she paints her pieces full time. She describes herself as "a contemporary creative with a love of exploring the corners of the world and the depths of the soul."
Erica said the whole experience was character building and made her realise "how little we actually need." She says: "I knew if I could sleep on train station floors with rats in India then I can be OK - it has inspired me to follow my dream of being a painter."
Erica is now planning to move to a new studio in Chinatown in the city in a few months and pursue her career further. She says her travels gave her the impetus to make a go of it.
She says: "My boyfriend and I said we needed to do it while we are young and said that then if we go back and live a mediocre life at least we have had that experience - but there's no way after you have had an experience like that, you can just go back. You want to pursue your passion, your career and your creativity. You are more fearless."
To see Erica's work click here or insta: @ericapham.art
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