Victoria knew from an early age that she wanted to leave her native Russia and live and travel abroad. In 2013 she made that dream a reality, first by working as an au pair in France and Italy, and ending up as a remote worker for an Italian company.

Most Memorable Location-Independent Experiences
The most memorable was to actually become location independent! I really didn’t expect it. I used to read blogs and admired all those people who did it, but couldn’t believe it was ever possible for me.

Once I stayed overnight at a Couchsurfer’s place, and among all the endless books he had in his huge library, I picked up a book that wasn’t familiar to me back then… The 4-Hour Work Week.

I had only one night to read as much as possible, and the next morning I wrote an email to my boss, as an experiment, asking if I could stay out of office for a while longer, doing my work remotely. It was the first step, and it worked out perfectly well! Soon after applying several more tips that Tim Ferriss shares in his book, I was flying to Morocco with a remote job in my pocket. So unexpected!

Biggest Surprise along the Way
No cheese in Moscow!

Some time ago, in Moscow, you could get literally any imported goods, and mostly of quite good quality. Not nowadays though!

I don’t follow the news, especially politics, and never took the “sanctions” from the EU to Russia too seriously as long as it didn’t touch me personally.

I was on my way from the Philippines to Morocco, with a three-day stopover in Moscow. Being cheese addicted, imagine how much I was craving for real and delicious cheese after four months in SE Asia. I was dreaming to spend all those three days just eating cheese!

But in Moscow I only found half-empty shelves in the supermarkets, partly filled with Russian cheeses, which can’t be called cheeses at all. That was really such a disappointing surprise!