I want to make money this year (and learn the guitar)

April 24, 2009 3:09 PM

I want to spend a year or so making money and practicing guitar...separately that is. How should I do it?

I want to make some money to save for travel. I also want to learn the guitar (already in the process) I don't have much holding me down at the moment. I am currently in New York City but would (and I imagine would have to) move anywhere. I have a BA in Video and Media Arts.

Since I really enjoy travel (I just got back from a month in Asia) I thought of teaching English abroad but as someone with no teaching experience and minimal foreign language skills, can I get a job that will be worth it considering I don't think I want to be a teacher later in life?

I don't think the Peace corps is right for me because 27 months is too long and I don't think I'd like all the bureaucratic government stuff you have to do. While I like the idea of volunteer type things, I really need to be making money right now. The idea of a fire lookout is exciting but I don't think I am qualified for that.

Basically, I'm willing to go anywhere, do most anything, and I can live pretty cheaply. I just want to have a little time to practice guitar and and have a chunk of change in my pocket at the end so I can travel.

So what should I do?

posted by saul wright to work & money (7 comments total)

There are alternatives to peace corp.
posted by bigmusic at 3:15 PM on April 24 [1 favorite has favorites]

Move to Los Angeles and go to the Musicians Institute, if possible, while you work and save money. I know several people who did this, and they are all a million times better at guitar than I am (and I consider myself to be very good).
posted by The World Famous at 4:31 PM on April 24

I'm currently abroad in Munich and I definitely know of some people who are living in Germany and teaching English. I heard the pay wasn't too shabby. Doesn't help much on the guitar end except you should have time to yourself.

I don't know about how to go about it personally, but it's doable.
posted by JauntyFedora at 6:05 PM on April 24

Sounds like you have 2 goals: (1) making $$ to travel; (2) learning guitar. The ideas you have (teaching ESL or Peace Corps) will get in the way of those goals as both of those experiences will be such a drastic change that they will take a lot of your time (they would be great adventures to experience in their own right).

My suggestion is to focus on your goals: if you truly want to make $$ AND learn an instrument fluently, you don't need to drastically change your life, you could do it right now. I think it's a matter of discipline. You can rapidly improve musically with an hour or two of practice a day while saving money by not wasting time. I fear that you'll set yourself up for failure by trying to do so many ambitious things at once.
posted by sfkiddo at 9:21 PM on April 24 [1 favorite has favorites]

How good are you at guitar? I made some decent bank in Rome back in '05 as a street musician and hostellier. MeMail me if this interests you and I'll talk more.
posted by The White Hat at 9:42 PM on April 24

yeah, I've really just started at the guitar, so I'm not at busking levels yet. I know I don't need to change my life to learn the guitar and whatever I end up doing this next year, I am going to practice the guitar. I just thought that if I was teaching ESL or something, I might have more motivation. Mayb not. Anyway, ignore the guitar, I guess. Just what the hell should I do with my life?
posted by saul wright at 8:21 AM on April 25

If that's your question, then here's what you do:

Pick someplace that seems interesting to you and has high demand for ESL teachers. Brush up on that country's language through whatever means you can (Classes if you can, if not, livemocha.com is a nice immersion study tool for vocab & sentence structure). This should give you a decent baseline through which to get around and to be an effective ESL teacher.

Plan ahead and find something in advance, perhaps by networking through an English-language site in the locality you wish to travel to.

Do you want to go to something more developed or more 3rd-world? Either is possible but you really need to figure out what you want.
posted by JauntyFedora at 4:41 PM on April 26