Greetings from Buenos Aires, Argentina!. I'm Mariano, a 24 years old guy, studying an IT degree and working as a programmer. I work 30 hours per week at a small business(5 guys) and I enjoy it most of the time. I live with my parents, who are in a good economical situation, they've a childcare institution which is going pretty well. I enjoy living with them and with my younger brother, I don't have the desire to live alone right now. I don't enjoy studying at college, so I'm considering getting the intermediate degree(mid 2011) and then dropout. In Argentina there are great public universities, and I'm in one of them, so I spend almost no money, not considering time.
This allows me to save a lot of money, my expenses are: some food(walnuts, almonds, honey and things like those), padel playing(for those who don't know, padel is a sport like tennis but the walls can be used in the game) and going out(~2-3 times a month). The money I save is invested in the fields and other places.
So after some insightful reading(thanks to the one who shared the Emerson's essay) I thought about what I really like to do right now. I've made the decision to finish the exams to get the intermediate degree while I work and save/invest the money. Then my plan is to keep going college 2 or 3 days per week, quit my job and start my pseudo retirement plan.
I call it pseudo-retirement because as you can see I'm not really retired, but this situation gives me the opportunity to experience it a bit. Some things I'd like to do in my pseudo-retirement phase are:
- Keep programming. At this time it's the thing I most like to do for a living, I don't really know if it's my passion. I'm going to try to build something great, something really helpful for the society I live in.
- Write a blog.
- Keep playing padel. It's a great exercise and also very fun. I imagine playing it every day.
- Getting into music or painting, or the two.
- Learn to grow my own food.
- Begin studying something to become a personal trainer.
- Meditate.
They're a lot of things I think, right now I'm doing almost all of them but not with enough intensity.
I'm also thinking in what to do to have an income. Maybe I could do some freelance programming work(I have contacts) and it would be great to work as a personal trainer part-time, helping people feel better but I'm not prepared and I won't be in the next year.
Well, I guess thats it for now. I really love the blog and the forum, I don't agree 100% with the early retirement extreme style but a lot of ideas are really helpful to me. Thanks you for reading my post and if you like to give your opinion or advice, I'll really appreciate it.
PD: My native language is Spanish, sorry for the horribly mistakes I might have made in this post. Getting better at English is one of the things I want to improve.
My story and pseudo-retirement plan
@mfalcon
Your English seems pretty good to me.
It sounds like you are basically living the ERE life. I'd just continue the status quo and invest/save as much money as possible. I'm assuming that Argentina has a national health care plan so you are WAAAAY ahead of most Americans in that regard.
A quick question though, do many, or most, Argentineans look down upon ERE practioners as lazy?
djc
Your English seems pretty good to me.
It sounds like you are basically living the ERE life. I'd just continue the status quo and invest/save as much money as possible. I'm assuming that Argentina has a national health care plan so you are WAAAAY ahead of most Americans in that regard.
A quick question though, do many, or most, Argentineans look down upon ERE practioners as lazy?
djc
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Robert Muir
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George the original one
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An ERE story if I've ever heard one, even if you don't follow the whole plan!
Your written English truly is better than half the Americans who were educated here in the USA. Apart from living in Argentina, your written English is good enough that I don't think we would have suspected you didn't speak English as a first language.
Your written English truly is better than half the Americans who were educated here in the USA. Apart from living in Argentina, your written English is good enough that I don't think we would have suspected you didn't speak English as a first language.
Wow, thank you all for your responses!. I really appreciate it.
@djc
I think Argentina is similar to USA in a lot of aspects and early retirement is not the exception.
@Robert
Learning another language is a great thing to do as long as you enjoy it. One reason I'll improve my English skills is to have the possibility do some freelancing work for other countries. Here in Argentina 1 dollar equals 4 pesos(our currency), the buying power is not 1:4 but it's close to that ratio.
@il-besa
I'll do it mi friend. Sure my needs will change as time passes, but it's nice to have a (flexible) plan to guide you.
@djc
I think Argentina is similar to USA in a lot of aspects and early retirement is not the exception.
@Robert
Learning another language is a great thing to do as long as you enjoy it. One reason I'll improve my English skills is to have the possibility do some freelancing work for other countries. Here in Argentina 1 dollar equals 4 pesos(our currency), the buying power is not 1:4 but it's close to that ratio.
@il-besa
I'll do it mi friend. Sure my needs will change as time passes, but it's nice to have a (flexible) plan to guide you.
@mfalcon: Argentina? I'm a big fan of Maradona and the football team 
I know you didn't ask, and probably don't care much for the game either..but..well...you know. And,as far as language is concerned, it's always descriptive that finally prevails over prescriptive. The rules are not really as important as some people make them out to be. It's only when you'll need to make a living out of it, that you'll need to abide by them, just like it is with any other job: it doesn't matter what you think is right, you just do what you're told. So, maye it's a good idea to learn the prescriptive way better, especially as you plan to use it to make some money freelancing. But anyway, I honestly think if Cormac McCarthy can get away with it, it really must not be that important!
I know you didn't ask, and probably don't care much for the game either..but..well...you know. And,as far as language is concerned, it's always descriptive that finally prevails over prescriptive. The rules are not really as important as some people make them out to be. It's only when you'll need to make a living out of it, that you'll need to abide by them, just like it is with any other job: it doesn't matter what you think is right, you just do what you're told. So, maye it's a good idea to learn the prescriptive way better, especially as you plan to use it to make some money freelancing. But anyway, I honestly think if Cormac McCarthy can get away with it, it really must not be that important!