How you Know you Have Been Traveling For a Long Time
12
Oct, 2025
Is one of your habits to live or travel overseas for an extended period of time and then return to your home country? If so, then you can probably relate to these habits. And, of course, these are all true stories from my past 5 years of extensive traveling around the world. I can’t really say where I’ve called home lately, as I’ve been on the move all over for so long. And trust me, I’ve got plenty of stories to tell…
Unusual Toilet Habits
Your mom/roommate/friends keep wondering why the trash bin in the bathroom is always filled with toilet paper.
Yes… you know you’ve been traveling a while when you instinctively toss toilet paper into the bin instead of flushing it—even after returning home. Old habits die hard when half the world’s plumbing can’t handle TP.
I once forgot and kept apologizing to my friend for “clogging the pipes” even though she lived in New Jersey and her house could survive a hurricane.
When Your Passport Looks Like a Book
Your passport is filled to the point that you had to get extra pages added for all those visa runs you did.
Nothing screams “I live out of a backpack” like a passport thicker than a paperback novel. I once got grilled by an immigration officer who flipped through my passport like it was a deck of cards, asking, “So… why were you in Cambodia… three times?”
Food Cravings Gone Wild
When you come back from your travel overseas, you hoard food like it’s nobody’s business and your family/friends think there must be a food shortage overseas since you ordered three main dishes and a dessert at Chili’s and downed it within 10 minutes. Sadly, Chili’s tastes pretty good after not having American-manufactured food and processed cheese in such a long time.
No shame. I once inhaled an entire large pizza and a dozen mozzarella sticks after a year in Southeast Asia. It’s not that the food abroad isn’t delicious—it’s that after a while your tastebuds scream for comfort grease.
Rediscovering the Joy of a Good Shower
A clean shower with water pressure never felt so good and you will NEVER not appreciate your shower. (might be specific to Southeast Asian countries)
I remember the first time back home standing under a steady, hot shower and thinking: This is luxury. After months of dribbly bucket showers, a real shower feels like a five-star spa treatment.
Fun fact: in parts of rural Asia and Latin America, showers might just be a cold bucket of water and a plastic scoop. You learn fast how to be efficient.
When Stories Don’t Translate
You tell your friends/family about all the things you saw and experienced, and they stare at you blankly. Then you realize they’ll never get it.
You can try to explain watching thousands of lanterns float into the sky during the lantern festival in Thailand, nearly getting stuck in a tuk-tuk strike in Sri Lanka, or discovering secret noodle joints down Hanoi alleys… and your friends’ eyes glaze over. Once, I tried telling my cousin about a monkey stealing my mango lassi in India. She replied, “Oh… cool.” End of story.
But that’s the thing—you’re not crazy, there are just some things you have to experience to understand.
Rethinking the 9-to-5 Life
6) You realize very quickly that you do not want to work for the “man,” and rent, car payments, and medical insurance are much cheaper overseas, so you get the hell out of dodge.
You’ve sat on beaches in Bali with digital nomads earning a living while sipping coconuts—and suddenly a cubicle sounds like medieval torture. Many of us become travel junkies because we realize a simpler, freer life is possible.
I once met a guy teaching English in Vietnam who saved more money in a year than he ever did working corporate back home. And he never wore a tie.
(Check out Nomadic Matt’s guide if you’re thinking of ditching the office life, too!)
So if you’ve experienced any of the above or have any other funny examples to share with us, please feel free to comment below! Always looking forward to hearing our fellow travelers’ stories. And remember: “We travel not to escape life but for life not to escape us.” Happy Travels!
Thanks for the blog. I definitely experienced 5). In the first week or two, I also felt my body was at home but my mind was still with the group I traveled with. Meeting people was another benefit when traveling on Globe Drifters arranged trips. Happy travel!
The struggle is real! It’s sometimes hard to get back into the swing of things back home and accurately describe your adventures so that people “get it”!