I was born in the city of Leiden in The Netherlands in late 1976. Not that I had a lot to say about that these times, my mother simply sought only the best hospital in the Netherlands to deliver  her little curly boy.

A few weeks after my birth me and my family emigrated to Indonesia, where I attended an Indonesian kindergarten. They had a great swing!

In 1981 the family landed, after traveling by camper van through Australia and the United States, back in the Netherlands and settled in a quiet, boring and terribly remote peasant village near Rotterdam. The one thing I kept asking my mum: “When are we going home again?” We never did.

After attending high school in Rotterdam, I signed up for journalism school in Zwolle in 1995. This new and exciting step meant living in a student house and entering student life!

Was this where it went wrong?

During my studies, I preferred organizing massive school parties – with a comedian, a band and a deejay and about 400 students attending – over actually studying for my oral exam for Spanish. I began a student magazine with some friends and even started a little media company with some of them, called EGO Media Partners (We were as good as we were modest, back then).

After six years of ’studying’, I had seen enough of Zwolle and pulled out into the world.

From 2001 to 2003 I traveled through eighteen countries without spending or making a penny. I did so through the internet, via  my own www.letmestayforaday.com project. The British Sunday Times appointed me “Internet Personality of the Year” in 2002. During my travels I wrote columns for Dutch newspapers – include Sp!ts – and had a segment on radio 3FM where I spoke about my latest adventures.

After this massive trip I wrote the book Letmestayforaday, how to travel the world for free (in Dutch) and I decided to, from that moment on, only do things I like to do.

I guess that is when it finally went wrong.

So I managed a pub in Zwolle, was a deejay, became a certified relaxation masseur and I still travelled regularly, though now paying for it.

I decided to finally  fully embrace the grown-up world finally and I made myself available as an all-round freelancer. In the recent past, I worked with companies named BNN, the ANWB, TRAVEL Magazine, Publishers Nijgh & Van Ditmar, HCC, Transavia.com, UWV, TNO, DHL , Loyalis, Foreign Media Books imprint and their Trademark, Agis Health Insurance, TakeCareNow!, Columbus Magazine, et cetera, et cetera. Check my references-page for all their names. It’s scary long, actually.

I then lived in Amsterdam for six years, but exchanged this city for the tropical life in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

This is where I now still work as a self employed blogger, creative marketing producer, internet consultant, speaker, model, occasional actor, photographer, travel writer, tour operator, radio host, owner of a movie house and massage therapist.

Oh, and I do an excellent Santa Claus at year’s end, too!

You get the idea, I do what I like: I only do fun stuff.