Tips and motivations for money savings: Travel with loved one

The first half of the year is over. The other half is just starting. One of my resolutions for this year is to save more money. I recognize that in order for me to save more, I must have a steady income stream. I may get it from my regular job, stipend from scholarship, online earnings, research and writing works, and tutorial jobs. Once I have this steady income stream, only then I can save money from my income sources.


We all have our own reasons why we need to save. In my case, I want to travel around Europe with my loved one. That is not at all a bad motivation to save some money.

I have three strategies to achieve my goal of saving more. One strategy is to cut my spending without compromising the necessities and some indulgencies of my own. I have identified various expenditures that can give me automatic savings if I dissuade myself from them. First, lunch meals are quite expensive at the university cafeteria. I can ask my host mother to prepare lunch for me or I can prepare sandwiches once a week. The potential amount saved for this is $50 a month or $600 in a year. Second, I will bring bottled water from my house to spare me from buying beverages at the cafeteria or elsewhere. Savings for this can be $15 a month or $150 in one year. Third, I will rent or borrow DVDs for movies to do away with going to the theaters. This will also lessen my transportation expenses of going to the movies. Estimated savings can reach at $10 a month or $120 in a year. Fourth, I will not drink more than two canned beers. It is good that I don't smoke but I can minimize it if I do. Approximate savings for this can be $10 monthly or $120 in one year. Fifth, I will use more the internet for its various free online services such as newspapers, SMS, messenger, banking, paying bills, and entertainment. Out of these things, the savings can run as much as $60 monthly or $720 in one year. Thus for the first strategy, it can make me save $145 monthly or $1710 in one year.

Another strategy which requires a rigid discipline is to have a buy-nothing or spend-nothing day in a week. So there will 48 days without spending cash out of the 365 days in one year. This will enable me to save about $500 in one year.

The last strategy is to open and maintain a bank account. There will be a fixed monthly deposit in the account to build up the savings while earning a decent interest. Estimated account balance at the end of the year is $3000.

All in all at the end of the year, the approximate savings due to these strategies will give me $5210. That is not bad for the first year of my personal savings build-up. Of course, for the next year, it will even be bigger and more. I will be on my way to an early, comfortable and worry-free retirement years.

But hey, I want to travel first, free of financial worries. See you around.

Look up, look far, and look beyond

                                                                                     Look up!
When I was a kid, I learned to pay respect by extending my hand to hold the person’s hand and knocking that hand on my forehead while bowing. In my culture, the gesture is called “bisa” in Bikol  or “mano” in Tagalog. It is customary to bow and say “po” to the elders.

Bowing in many cultures is a sign of respect to elders. Then, colonialism bastarded the meaning of bowing as submission and sign of inferiority, regardless of age. So it was common sight to see local elders bowing to young foreign colonizers. Another notion on bowing is that it is being connected to humility (I am no worthy, plus bow! as popularized in a certain movie). It is exemplified when one is praised for doing excellently (magaling or maorag in Bikol), and usually that person will bow and denounce the praise as untrue (hindi naman o tsamba lang). I say this is not humility, nor respect. If we truly respect our skills, ourselves, and capabilities, we will not bow; instead we will look up and say, “thank you.” That is humility. That is respect.

Look far!
At times, we are so concerned of our territory. Animals as we are, we do establish our territorial dignity. We feel attached to wherever we are situated. This is shown when someone says something bad to our place, we feel offended. We build our world around that place where we are. We take pleasure and contentment in the familiarity and ordinariness of our place and people. This can be observed in the locations where students normally sit. Day after day, they will be comfortable sitting in one location. It is like the movies of our favorite actors or directors, our favorite food, our close friends. Because they are familiar, we repeatedly take refuge in the psychological continuities of our stories and boundaries of our world.

Are we missing something? For some, they believe they don’t miss anything. But I will argue that we do. We deprive ourselves of the spatial extension of ourselves, of seeing new things, of discovering, of being surprised, of detaching, and of course, of failing. So many things to learn, to do, to think, and with all those things, we can be assured that there are many more out there. Can you see them?

Look beyond!
Unknowingly for us, there exists a horizon where other people live. And when we know about that horizon and the existence of others and their differences from us, we feel scared. We are intimidated by the knowledge,  sight and sound of the uncommon. It is OK. At least, we know that we are not alone, and we are not the world.

Let me take your hand, or take my hand.. Let us together look up…. look far… and beyond