My name is Daniel and I spent the summer traveling and doing things for redditors. I slept on the floors and couches of complete strangers and never spent more than seven days in a given city. AMA

Have you ever had a dream that that, that you um, had, you, you would, you could, you'd do, you w-, you want, you could do so much, you, you'd do, you wanted, you want him to do you so much you could do anything?

Can't say that I have, no

How did you manage to sneak in faps?

Oh Reddit...

Going to a boarding school taught me the importance of the occasional long shower.

Where did you go?

Canada

"You and me have seen everything to see. From Bangkok to Calgary."

Oh wow. Well that's a depressing theme song.

I was really glad I was able to meet you. :)

I wanted to let you know... I have since been able to go out and visit my Dad (recently!) and he is doing much better considering everything. My sister and I visited and helped him move all my mom's stuff out of the house and into a storage unit. I think this was really therapeutic for him even though we were all sad.

Anyway, oddly enough, I thought about texting you a picture when I was there. It totally skipped my mind until I saw this thread.

If you're ever in Seattle, the next coffee/beer or whatever you like is on me :)

Sincerely, Awkward turtlegirl aka Poppycorn :)

Oh! ...since this is a question thread... what are you doing now that the adventure is over?

Hanging out at home and prepping for school. Normal things.

What was the scariest part about doing this for you? Any regrets?

It was a little scary hoping on a plane not being sure where you were going to sleep that night- but it always worked out. In Huntsville my host took me rappelling down a cliff which was scary because my life was literally in the hands of someone I had known for a day.

No huge regrets, although I wish I had some experience in film so I could have taken better footage.

Maybe you can talk the airline into hiring a cameraman to follow you around and get good film?

There's a lot of time between now and then but I'm sure I could find a film major (or at least a hobbyist) with similar benefits. Especially if I could use reddit as a human search engine :P

Film Student here, hit me up in 3 years, I'll help out

Heck make it next summer if you want, I'm free for like 4 months then

See? That was easy

Gotta love this place, quick question, does your free airplane transport allow me to come along? I don't think I could possibly afford almost daily tickets.

But no seriously, next time you're planning a trip remember, I would really enjoy documenting it, I just need to get some good equipment first

Can't take others with me, sorry :/

At any point did you feel like packing it up? Like it was too much work? I can't imagine traveling that much myself!

I took a couple of 'breaks' where I just stayed with friends and mostly just hung out for the week, which helped keep me energized. Although I did get sick after Huntsville and went home for a week.

What was made you laugh uncontrollably?

What was made you ask?

Staying with so many 'strangers' and eating unfamiliar food, did you have a hard time finding opportunities to fart?

Didn't really come up as an issue, no.

Sorry to disappoint

[deleted]

Hard to pin down one highlight but Valve and feeling lost in rural Thailand come to mind

No I did not.

Because I'm an indecisive person I'd make a post on reddit make others vote on where to send us.

What was the most surprising thing that happened on your trip?

People offering me the use of their cars. I feel like I'm a fairly trusting person but that boggles my mind.

Do you think you'll get a chance to do this again? What would you do differently?

Might be able to do it again next summer, but I have to talk to the airline first.

I'd want to put a lot more planning and organization into it. I could spend a few months contacting volunteer organizations in some of places I can go and have more things set up ahead of time where I could just pop in and volunteer somewhere for a few days.

I think it'd be really cool to have a subreddit or website where people could vote weekly on where to send me.

There's a lot of people with similar benefits (like Zajoba) and I'd love to see roaming bands of us in the future.

I too have flight benefits, and am prone to leaving my job due to a case of under-employedness.

That sounds like a great life-experience. We could start a revolution

Added to the list

I'd like to volunteer for this as well.

I have flight benefits thanks to a family member.

Added to the list

Are we all hippy, cat loving, techie geeks with a hard on for science?

You are all 28 year old males in the tech industry

Who was the most memorable person you met? Are you planning on meeting up with anybody you met again?

Met a lot of memorable people :p

Hueypriest, Tasteless and Artosis, and various start-up people come to mind though.

No concrete plans yet but I've made a lot of friends this summer and will most likely go and visit some of the same people again.

edit: I just remembered this homeless redditor who came to a number of meetups while I was there to play board games. Didn't get much a chance to talk to him but he seemed like a cool guy.

What did you do with Artosis and Tasteless? :o

Got signatures after the Code S final.

So were you there for a redditor and just decided to go to the GSL or did you go specifically for Tastosis?

Was there to see the GSL and some redditors wanted signatures

Where was the best food?

Korea. Everything I ate there was amazing.

Thailand was good too but I didn't have as much of an opportunity to experience food there.

So... uh, what kind of things did you do for redditors exactly?

I washed a car. Helped people move couches. Weeded some gardens.

So most people didn't ask for anything in return? There's a lot of names on your poster.

A lot of those were people I met at various meetups

How did you pack for a trip like this? Did you just have some basic staples and continually wash them?

What was your favourite part of the Stampede?

Had a 'home base' in SF with supplies for any environment I could fathom that I swapped stuff out at whenever I passed through.

The most drunken people with cowboy hats I have ever seen wandering the streets at 2am

What was the most difficult task you were asked to complete?

Moving a couch up a spiral staircase in Denver

PIVOT!!!!

This came up in the other post but I still don't get it...

Don't have any questions, but if you do this again next year, you owe me a trip. ;D

Yeah, sorry 'bout that...

Story. Now.

I was going to spend the last two weeks of July trying to hit up Europe, South America, and Africa with Sebguer (he's got similar benefits), but I got a severe toothache and had to call it off.

How did you get the money for this?

How much did it cost?

Was it worth it and would you do it again?

Had some money saved up and spent under $2500 this summer, not including iPhone + filming accessories.

Would absolutely do it again.

Wow, that is actually really good for the length of time you've travelled. I guess you slept at other redditors' houses?

except for two nights in bangkok, yeah. Stayed with some friends in a few places (Chicago and Denver)

What made you decide to go through with this?

I thought this was the last summer I'd have this kind of opportunity and wanted to make the best of it.

Was there ever a point where you immediately regretted a decision? As in you felt unsafe, the task was much more difficult than you anticipated, etc? Also, you're an incredible person, and I think if every person did something like this, even once in their lives, amazing changes could happen in this world!

Not once. I was a little bit worried while trying to get to the school in rural Thailand when the directions said if I had reached the Sai Yok Yai waterfall I had gone to far. As it turns out there were five different 'Sai Yok ___' watefalls between Kanchanaburi and Sai Yok Yai School.

As someone who is navigationally inept, that would probably send me into a small panic. Was it the destination that drove you to venture all the way to Thailand to do a favor for a stranger? Or was it the favor itself?

I was in Seoul at the time and wanted to go somewhere else in Asia before crossing back over the date line. Teaching English (if only just for a day) seemed too cool to pass up.

Did you teach through an organization, or just a random redditor? Could you share a link on how to get involved, for those of us interested in doing something similar?

A redditor clued me in about it and gave me very detailed instructions on how to get there. I just showed up. That particular school gets english teachers coming and going every few months.

Which city surprised you the most upon arrival?

Denver was a lot prettier than I had imagined.

did anyone try to rape you?

Not even once! Can you believe it?

How was Edmonton? I've lived there my whole life. :D

Was able to arrange an impromptu meetup of about 20 people which was neat. y'all are sociable

Any close calls?

You know, like "yeah, yeah, it's in my basement... down there. you first."

None this summer. While the upside is I didn't get murdered the downside is a boring AMA

Are you a Starcraft fan now?

I'm more into the modding scene than the pro scene. But ST_Squirtle all the way!

First off, you're awesome and I'd love to switch lives with you (at least just the summer part)

Anywhere you wish you could have stayed longer? Either to help more people or just because it was an awesome place?

Was this different from what you expected to be or basically how you expected your summer to work out when you started this?

Oh, and what did you bring to each place? Just clothes and money or did it change depending on what you were planning on doing in that city?

Thailand. My trip there was very tightly scheduled and if I had just one more day I would've been able to get this coffee cup for this guy which was one of the reasons I flew to Thailand to begin with.

What happened was more or less what I expected :P Although I didn't quite expect the level of generosity offered by the people I met.

I left a large suitcase full of clothes at my sister's place in San Francisco and swapped out clothes whenever I passed through. I arrived at each place with just a backpack.

What was your favorite city you visited? Which ones do you want to go back to?

Really enjoyed Seattle. The weather, coffee, beer, and people were all fantastic.

I'd like to go back to Thailand to spend more time there, and back to Australia during their Summer.

"Bowties are cool!" -eleventh_doctor_who :)

I remember you! Met you in New York, signed right above the reddit alien in the bottom corner. What's it like traveling through space and time (albeit fixed about Earth and only in a non-wibbly-wobbly-timey-wimey sort of way)?

Was that at your apartment? Shhh, don't tell them that I'm really Inspector Spacetime