Finding contentment in slow travel

Singaporeans are looking for meaning in their travels, going beyond eating, shopping and sightseeing in favourite destinations in Japan, Malaysia or South Korea.

- Venessa Lee

Ms Eileen Soh, 35, used to seek foodie experiences abroad.

In Mexico, she zoomed in on street stall tacos raved about by American YouTuber Mark Wiens. She has tried jellied eel in the United Kingdom, which she describes as being "like agar agar but with a fishy smell".

However, the six weeks she spent in Taiwan and Indonesia in 2023 changed her perspective on travel.

"The idea for my sabbatical was to learn languages," says Ms Soh, a senior analyst at Mastercard.

Ms Soh, a habitual solo traveller, arranged these trips, and others since, through Workaway, an online platform that facilitates cultural exchange.

Individuals volunteer their time and skills to their hosts in exchange for lodging and meals.

In Keelung in Taiwan, she helped translate blog posts and brochures from traditional Chinese to English at a social enterprise. Its founder had left her lucrative tech job and went without a salary for two years to start this tour agency.

Ms Soh says just two weeks immersed in a Mandarin-speaking environment helped her "read Chinese newspapers so much faster".

In a similar attempt to improve her Bahasa Indonesia, which Ms Soh spoke cursorily, she then went to Sungai Penuh in Sumatra to help a local tuition business for three weeks.

Ms Soh was drawn to the hospitality and spontaneity she encountered.

She got acquainted with a woman who had never left the village but spoke English with an American accent, learnt through repeatedly watching episodes of 1990s hit sitcom Friends.