TravelswithCharie

Glenworth Carbonell-Antolín Dalisay at the Carnival in Trinidad and Tobago UPDATE: Glen Dalisay completed his quest to visit all 193 UN recognized sovereign countries, two permanent observer states, Taiwan and Kosovo on September 13, 2025! He is the first male Filipino to do so. Congratulations! About Glen Dalisay Glen Dalisay is a nurse who was inspired by his father to travel the world at a very young age. His dad told him to see the world before ever settling down and gave him a secondhand globe which he studied for hours and wondered what it would be like to be in these foreign lands. Dalisay never thought it would be possible to see every country until he became a travel nurse and decided to do a trip every month. Starting with Europe and the Americas, he then slowly traveled into Asia and the Pacific, and finally to Africa. He now sees himself finishing this goal he never thought was possible. But he won’t stop there. His love for exploring, learning and meeting new people will c...

Bernadith Barrientos in Geiranger, Norway Where and when was your first trip outside of your home country?  Taipei was my first destination outside the Philippines. It was in 2018, a year full of blessings for me. I can say it was the best year I’ve had. I got the chance to travel with friends in Taipei. I feel very lucky and blessed to be able to see, explore and enjoy some of the tourist attractions in Taipei like Shifen waterfalls, Taipei National Palace Museum, Taipei 101 and their famous Sky Lantern.  What is it about traveling that appeals to you the most? Beautiful scenery, immersing myself in a country’s culture, experiencing new things and gaining new friends while traveling appeals to me the most. Whenever I am in a new place, I take it as an opportunity to explore an entirely different side of myself. Blending with locals is one of the most satisfying feelings.  How has working in the cruise industry helped you achieve your travel goals? Working in the cruise i...

Dr. Reysa Alenzuela at Loket Castle in Czechia   Where and when was your first trip outside your home country? It was in 2004, I went to Hongkong and nearby provinces of southeast China i.e. Guandong, Guangzhou and Schenzhen. During that time, Filipinos didn’t travel as much as we did a decade later. I was relying on the travel agency and joining the bus tour. But since I was a first timer, that was the most I could get for an experience. As expected, the bus tour brought us to those jade museums where we ended up buying unnecessary things. I remember we were also brought to a factory of leather products. That was my first vicarious experience of a different culture - the tour guide told us about legends of the five goats in Guangzhou, how people love tea in China. It was the first time I bargained by only using a calculator. That was pretty much a superficial experience but my love for travel grew from there. I became curious about different cultures. What is it about traveling...

Michael Alfred V. Ignacio Where and when was your first trip outside of your home country? My first trip outside of the Philippines, alone, was when I left for Spain to take up my masters degree, back in 2002. I resigned from my work in San Miguel Corporation in Manila to pursue my degree in international business at the Universidad de Alicante in the Valencia region. Looking back, I actually do not know if I would be as brave now to do the same thing all over again. I enrolled in a course where the medium of instruction was purely in Spanish, armed with only my high school Spanish from St. Pius X Seminary and my own self-study a few months before I left for Spain. For the first two months, I could barely understand a word of what the professors where saying in class with their dizzyingly fast Castilian Spanish, and I thought I would fail my subjects ... until I realized, even my classmates from Latin America also had about the same challenges in comprehending the professors. After abo...

Hazel Borres Apuhin skydiving in Dubai What inspired you to travel? I am often told that I got this itch for travel from my grandfather. I haven’t met him but he was once known as “the man with a sea fever” and was featured in a local newspaper in 1970’s when he and my two uncles tried to sail to America in a wooden outrigger. They were unsuccessful and found themselves on Taiwan shores, pretended they were fishermen that were carried out there by a storm. I was always inspired by my grandfather's stories growing up and I know he lived a great life and I thought to myself that I wanted my life to be well lived and different from others too. While in my teens, my mom used to tell us her experiences in the various countries she lived in and how different their culture, their food and people’s mindset in these countries were. This also fueled my curiosity and thought to myself that I will be traveling and seeing the world someday. What is it about traveling that appeals to you the mos...