-
Notifications
You must be signed in to change notification settings - Fork 0
/
working-remote-vicky-lai.html
180 lines (134 loc) · 9.83 KB
/
working-remote-vicky-lai.html
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176
177
178
179
180
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">
<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1, shrink-to-fit=no">
<meta name="description" content="">
<meta name="author" content="">
<link rel="icon" href="assets/images/brand/favicon.ico">
<title>Office Unbound</title>
<!-- Bootstrap core CSS -->
<link href="assets/css/bootstrap.min.css" rel="stylesheet">
<!-- Custom styles for this template -->
<link href="assets/css/custom.css" rel="stylesheet">
<link href="assets/css/blog_post.css" rel="stylesheet">
</head>
<body>
<script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/3.2.1/jquery.min.js"></script>
<script src="assets/js/template.js"></script>
<div class="bg-color">
<div id="modal-partial"></div>
<!-- Navbar Start-->
<nav class="navbar navbar-toggleable-md navbar-light bg-faded" id="nav-partial">
</nav>
<!-- Navbar End-->
<section class="jumbotron jumbotron-fluid text-center blog-header" id="vicky">
<div class="container">
<p class="lead text-muted">
<div class="image-avatar blog-avatar">
<img src="assets/images/avatars/vicky_lai.jpg" alt="100%x200" width="120px;" class="avatar-1">
</div>
<h1><strong>Vicky Lai</strong> </h1>
<p class="lead text-muted">Living as a remote developer in Southeast Asia.</p>
<div class="row blog-post-details text-center">
<div class="row job">
<i class="fa fa-briefcase fa-lg" aria-hiden="true"></i>
<p class="blog-post-details-title">Developer</p>
</div>
<div class="row job">
<i class="fa fa-globe fa-lg" aria-hiden="true"></i>
<p class="blog-post-details-title">Southeast Asia</p>
</div>
<div class="row job">
<i class="fa fa-calendar fa-lg" aria-hiden="true"></i>
<p class="blog-post-details-title">Freelance</p>
</div>
</div>
</p>
</div>
</section>
<div class="container">
<div class="row">
<div class="col blog-main bg-color">
<div class="blog-post">
<h4 >What are you working on and where are you located? </h4>
<p>I'm a freelance developer. I'm mostly around Southeast Asia these days with my time split between Thailand, Singapore, and Japan.</p>
<div class="float-right">
<img src="assets/images/extra/vicky-pool-phuket.jpg" alt="" width="500px;" class="float-right rounded thumbnail">
<p class="caption text-center">Poolside workspace in Phuket, Thailand.</p>
</div>
<h4>How did you end up working remotely?</h4>
<p>I previously held a position as Chief Operating Officer for a startup that moved to Kuala Lumpur. I was able to do some traveling and really fell in love with the warm weather and the variety of experiences that Southeast Asia offers. After a few years I decided the startup wasn't a good culture fit for me, but I wasn't interested in moving permanently back to North America - or permanently anywhere, for that matter. </p>
<p>While deciding where to set up shop next, I started living out of a single duffel bag. It occurred to me, why stop? Since then I've been truly nomadic - home is wherever I set my pack down next. It's a pretty good life.
</p>
<h4>Where is the most interesting place you’ve ever worked from?</h4>
<p> Interesting is relative so it's difficult to pick. I did some coding aboard the Shinkansen (bullet train) in Japan while going 300km/h, wrote some blog posts in the back of a Nissan Xterra as it drove through Monument Valley in Arizona and Utah, and most recently made a web app or two on a rooftop in Mongkok, Hong Kong, <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-11-03/the-busiest-place-on-earth/3611032">which in 2011 was said to be the most densely populated place on Earth</a>. So there's those.</p>
<div class="row">
<div class="text-center">
<img src="assets/images/extra/vicky-tokyo-garden.jpg" alt="" class="img-fluid rounded">
<div class="caption">
<p>Working by a garden in Tokyo, Japan.</p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<h4>What time zone do you keep?</h4>
<p>Remember how I said it can be difficult to answer some pretty simple questions?</p>
<h4>What are the largest challenges you've encountered?</h4>
<p>It's difficult to answer some pretty simple questions like "Where do you live?" and "What's your home address?" You wouldn't think it matters all that much until you try and open a bank account. It can be pretty tricky when trying to work with institutionalized systems that expect you to fit in the same cookie-cut life structure as most stationary folks. To give a concrete example, I had to shop around for a bank that would even consider opening an account for a non-resident person.</p>
<div class="row">
<div class="text-center">
<img src="assets/images/extra/vicky-roost.jpg" alt="" class="img-fluid rounded">
<div class="caption">
<p>Using the Roost stand for a portable workspace.</p>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<h4>What gear do you use on a day to day basis?</h4>
<p>I definitely have a few things that I find essential! </p>
<em>Editors Note: Vicky has a great collection of her favorite gear on her site.<a href="https://vickylai.com/blog/top-5-digital-nomad-essentials-i-use-every-day/"> Check it out here.</a></em>
<h4>Do you have any advice for anyone thinking about going remote or just starting out?</h4>
<p>Go for it! There's a lot of remote work out there. Working remotely isn't for everyone, but the one thing that can make or break your success at it is your own level of discipline and self-motivation. There's no one looking over your shoulder or encouraging you to work - and that can be a good or bad thing, depending on your personality and work style. </p>
<blockquote class="blockquote"><em>"Working remotely isn't for everyone, but the one thing that can make or break your success at it is your own level of discipline and self-motivation."</em></blockquote>
<p>I've found a routine that works for me - I find I'm the most able to concentrate in the morning, so I tackle the toughest project of the day as soon as I'm up. I'll usually work for four or so hours, then take around a three hour break. Depending on where I am I'll go sightseeing, cafe hop, or have a swim and lay out by a pool. Then I go back to work for a few more hours. It makes for a sustainable work schedule and I'm able to be very productive. You'll have to figure out what works best for you.</p>
<h4>What’s next for you? (Location, remote vs office, etc.)</h4>
<p>I have no plans to go back to a stationary lifestyle - I find the opportunity costs at this point in my life to be far too high. I think the traditional model of working hard and saving up until you retire is pretty limiting. I'm setting myself up to basically be permanently semi-retired, which for me is a much more natural way to live. </p>
<p>I'm hoping to swing through North America in the summer and maybe check out Europe for a while - but we'll see. I tend to make a lot of last-minute travel plans - my last country change involved tickets booked two days before the flight. Options are power! Anything could happen.</p>
<hr style="border: dashed 1px;">
<p>You can find Vicky on her personal site at <a href="https://vickylai.com">VickyLai.com</a> or on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/vickylaixy">@vickylaixy</a>.</p>
</div><!-- /.blog-post -->
<!-- Newsletter Start-->
<div id="newsletter-footer"></div>
<!-- Newsletter End-->
<div class="fb-comments" data-href="file:///Users/chrisfrantz/Documents/Sites/Remotive/blog_template.html" data-width="1000" data-numposts="10000"></div>
<!-- Bottom Cards Start-->
<div class="container-fluid card-container" style="max-width:1000px;">
<div class="row">
<div class="card-deck">
<div class="card item" id="wade-foster">
</div>
<div class="card item" id="priscilla-kim">
</div>
<div class="card item" id="harry-guinness">
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
<!-- Bottom Cards End-->
</div><!-- /.blog-main -->
</div><!-- /.row -->
</div>
<!-- Bootstrap core JavaScript
================================================== -->
<!-- Placed at the end of the document so the pages load faster -->
<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/tether/1.4.0/js/tether.min.js" integrity="sha384-DztdAPBWPRXSA/3eYEEUWrWCy7G5KFbe8fFjk5JAIxUYHKkDx6Qin1DkWx51bBrb" crossorigin="anonymous"></script>
<script src="assets/js/holder.min.js"></script>
<script>
$(function () {
Holder.addTheme("thumb", { background: "#55595c", foreground: "#eceeef", text: "Thumbnail" });
});
</script>
<script src="assets/js/bootstrap.min.js"></script>
<!-- IE10 viewport hack for Surface/desktop Windows 8 bug -->
<script src="assets/js/ie10-viewport-bug-workaround.js"></script>
<script src="https://use.fontawesome.com/b3fea647cb.js"></script>
</div>
</body>
</html>