After spending two months traveling alone through Thailand and Vietnam in early 2024, I went to Japan to meet a friend. I was excited, but within days, traveling with someone else felt more stressful than being on my own.
For months, I'd made every decision myself: when to wake up, where to eat, and how to spend the day. I could change plans on a whim. Suddenly, every choice involved another person.
After months of solo travel, apparently, I'd become terrible at compromising.
Just a few months earlier, I'd been laid off from a job that hadn't made me happy for some time. I'd wanted to quit after a year and spend months traveling around Asia; losing my job simply sped up that plan.
Within four months, I sold my furniture, found someone to take over my lease, and boarded a one-way flight to South Korea in April 2024, unsure when I would return home.
I'd traveled alone before, but never for this long. I'd never felt I had to wait for someone else to see the places on my bucket list. And, for the first time, I wasn't squeezing travel into PTO or college breaks, or planning a short trip around friends' schedules. I had months ahead of me — and no one else's timetable to consider.
At fir...