Well, here goes it’s finally here, the family gap (half) yaaar!
Thought I’d kick off with a little FAQ about us…
- Who are you guys?
We are a family living in Ballyhamas in South London. We’ve been planning this trip for literally YEARS as our (bored of hearing about it!) friends and family will attest to. It’s me, Ali, Trenton and our kids Charlotte (age 9) and Henry (age 6, nearly 7).
2. How are you doing it?
Good question — like I said, we’ve been planning this — probably since Charlotte was born, Henry for sure. Originally we were going to go for a whole year but quite frankly covid home school freaked us out too much, haha! So we netted out at six months, and the timing — we figured better to start the school year and leave halfway through. Hope they get some education under their belts 😉
In terms of being able to do it, Trenton sold his business in 2018 to enable us to hit the road without worrying about working on the go etc. I have finished my job at Franklin Fitch, a recruitment business. It was a tough decision but it was important for them as a business to have someone take over, new ideas and all that. Although I’m amazed at how much I’m missing work — so slightly regretting not taking up the offer of a sabbatical! But it’ll be good for me to push myself outside of my comfort zone and I don’t know who I’ll be when I get back. Maybe a full time home school teacher, haha!
Trenton, on the other hand, runs a training and coaching business (www.teamsterka.com) and has made his programmes end (the day before we leave, eek!) and then he’ll pick it up again when he’s back. He works with two other colleagues who will be continuing the business.
In theory we won’t be working at all. However, T needs to work on the book he wrote (aka a rewrite LOL) so we’ll see how that pans out with ONE Chromebook between us all.
3. What’s the route?
Egypt, India, Nepal, Thailand, Japan, Indonesia, Borneo and Tanzania.
4. How did you choose the route?
Originally we were going to go to Mexico and travel down but we decided some places were a bit dodge with kids. And then we went back to the drawing board and thought where have we always wanted to go. Let’s follow the weather and let’s try places that are all really different from each other.
5. What kind of places are you staying at?
Good question — a total mixed bag depending on the country set up. Mostly guest houses/ Small hotels in Egypt, India and Nepal. Japan is more Air bnbs and so on. But we are definitely doing it on a budget. A step up from a hostel! (We are actually staying in some hostels in family rooms). We are also constrained by needing to have family rooms so we don’t need to split up too much.
6. How are you travelling?
Planes, trains and automobiles! In Asia there are more planes — Indonesia is HUGE! Trying to do trains and buses where we can (they are an amazing way to see places and culture).
We are doing what is known as “fast travel” in World schooling circles. A few nights in each spot, rather than a few weeks. But our itinerary is very flexible so we will see how we go.
7. What are you most excited about?
All of it — we are massive travellers at heart. We met in Japan, doing the JET programme and went (mostly) overland through SE Asia via the trans Siberian and Russia.
8. What are you most afraid of?
Ha ha — mainly spending 24/7 with the four of us! Trenton gets his energy from ‘doing’, I get my energy from quiet, Charlotte gets her energy from TV and Henry from kicking a football around the garden. T and Charlotte are night owls and Henry and I are morning larks. So it’ll be an adventure to learn how we all roll along together. I actually think it’ll be like lockdown, which was similar but without the AWESOME things to see and do!
9. What about home school?
DID WE NOT LEARN OUR LESSON FROM COVID??!! Yeah, this!
Bit scary BUT we are going to focus on English and Maths. The kids teachers have been GREAT at sharing syllabus subjects and websites where we can basically find lesson plans. We are going to keep up with homework via Teams.
We will all be writing diaries every night to document our time. I’m hoping this will be a cool, mindful thing to do but the reality is the kids may hate it! I recently found my gap year diaries and it’s such a great memory to keep. It will help if they can stick stuff in like postcards.
Apart from that, we are using VPN to access things like BBC Bitesize for subjects, like the Egyptians! I’m a huge Geography/ History geek so I’m in charge of those subjects, Trenton in charge of English and Maths.
We are going to spend the first few days in Egypt talking about *how* they want to home school. Our plan was to run a bit every day (no holidays). But they are different styles of learners — Charlotte might want to smash through loads so she can have a day off. Henry may be more wriggle and squirm for any kind of learning!
We are keeping chilled about this, we’ll find our jam and the kids know this isn’t a giant holiday, they do need to keep up.
Team Mossy on the move 