Adventurepreneurism 1.0.1
(Or, how not to paint yourself into a horrifying survivalism corner)
It’s no secret that we’re throwing in our day jobs (and, in a way, our careers up to this point) to embark on a life of adventure. And I’ve talked already about the price we’re paying for freedom.
On the list of other things we’re throwing: caution to the wind; the occasional tantrum as The Unexpected occasionally but violently stomps on our haphazardly laid plans. And hopefully a leaving party. You’re invited; Beijing’s a fun place to party.
This leaves us with two options for survival. One is to plunge into a 24/7 viewing diet of Man vs Wild in order to study and emulate everything Bear Grills ever did to show the Wild who’s really boss. But we’re just your average guys, and eating rhino beetles, drinking our own urine out of snakes (yes, it’s a thing: check it out if you think I’m making it up), and rowing bathtubs 22 miles — as naked as the day we were born — just aren’t appealing long-term lifestyle choices for us. We might live, but could we live with ourselves?
So it’s plan B. Teach ourselves how to become “adventurepreneurs”.
Please don’t Google this term. We were all, “High 5! We’re the most brilliant men that have ever been brilliant! Thomas Edison ain’t got nothing on us!” when we invented the word. Then Google, modern life’s most unapologetic Debbie Downer, told us that: a) it’s been in use for 47 million years, and b) it’s most famously used in reference to a particular male prostitute. To which, after 2.6 seconds of deflated alternative-searching, we responded with “Fuck you Google.” To be fair, Google was unfazed, going on to supply us with “words that rhyme with entre-” … “contrapreneur”, anybody? (Hint: also in use; also negative.) “Mantrapreneur”? Come on Google, we’re not goddamned hippies! So yeah, fuck you. We’re gonna be adventurepreneurs and proud of it. And no, selling our bodies isn’t on the list of survival options. Yet.
So what does it take to be an adventurepreneur in Southeast Asia? According to our interpretation — and just as we “invented” the word, we’re inventing the meaning — it requires the following:
- an objective;
- some strategies that deliver the objective;
- a suite of tactics that put those strategies into play;
- resources — which, in the case of Southeast Asia, include the capacity to post content in both English and Chinese;
- a story, with angles that engage people like you;
- a brand with which you and other interested people (Chinese nationals and Westerners alike) can identify and — hopefully — feel some connection;
- a metric fuck-ton of content;
- some typical entrepreneurial qualities: commitment, persistence, flexibility and a die-hard optimism in the face of all the things that will go wrong. Some of them badly … Though hopefully not so badly that rhino beetles become a staple part of our diet.
As we put all of this together we’ll share with you how we’re baby-stepping-cum-Eval-Knieval-catapulting into our own adventurepreneurship [ad]venture. After all, we’re hoping that you might feel inspired to embark on your own adventurepreneurial journey, and we don’t want to be responsible for a spate of human urine-related snake tragedies.
