When I turned 29 I thought I’d use the decade deadline to encourage me to do some things in life that I would just let slip otherwise. Everyone knows the power of a good time limit for productivity. It was a 30 before 30. Well, I just celebrated my 30th birthday- so how did I do? Would I recommend this? And what do I do now I AM 30?

Goal 1: Meet my niece

Of course, yes.
My niece lives on the other side of the world, and hasn’t been here for a whole year yet. This was always going to happen as long as my plane made it to the Uk over christmas, which it did. Hooray. She’s my first niece and she’s beautiful. Here’s a blogpost about it. Completed. Good start. 1/1.

2: Take my countries visited total to 20.
Yep.

Got this one done over Christmas and New Year too. I needed to get from 18 to 20 to complete this challenge. In January 2019 I added Austria and Czech Republic to my tally and they were both great holidays with great friends and experiences. I started writing a rundown ranking of these 20 countries if you want the long version . Hopefully I’ll get round to writing some more of these because I was enjoying it. Completed. 2/2.

3: Finish my current Spanish textbook
Si.
My Spanish still has a long way to go and I hardly aced the B1 exam my teacher set me, but it has been very useful to actually study the grammar that I otherwise trip around. My fluency is much better than my accuracy in Spanish because I’ve spent so long resting on the fact that I can get by just fine. I’ve made some good progress this year though, even if there’s still a long way to go. Completed. 3/3.

4: Visit 3 new places in Bolivia
No. I only visited 2: El fuerte and Cochabamba.

I should have gone after this goal a bit more to be honest as there are a couple of villages close to Santa Cruz that I would have counted as new places. On the plus side, this goal was partial motivation to check out Cochabamba which was the biggest gap in my understanding of Bolivia. As of now there’s no one place in Bolivia that I feel I have to go to to understand Bolivia a bit more. If you’re unfamiliar with the country, Bolivia has lots of tapped and untapped potential. There will always be new adventures to seek out somewhere off the beaten track in the future perhaps. Partial completion, but it doesn`t count to the tally. 3/4.

5: Jump out of something big
No. Didn’t even try this one.
I like the idea of doing a parachute jump or a bungee jump but not enough to invest in it just yet. I heard about the potential back risks of bungee jumping and the various levels of security/safety in doing extreme sports in Bolivia and put this on the backburner. Maybe one for the future. 3/5.

6: Run 8km in 40mins
A sweaty yes.

I count this as a yes, but full disclosure I did change this goal to make it achieveable. The original goal was a 45 minute 10km but that was made by someone who had no idea what he was talking about and what his body is able to do. I was allowed to do this 8km in any way, and this was on a machine in a gym, so running purists probably have a valid argument against this being valid or whatever, but for my purposes I have to say I was very proud of this achievement. After doing a few runs where I would really tire around 4k, this looked like a difficult but doable challenge. I worked on it for just under a month, getting a bit faster or going a bit further each time and then the week before my birthday I ran the 8k in 39:45. You know what really helped? Getting more than 7 hours sleep and a solid breakfast on days where I would try this. I’m reasonably fit and active but sustaining the pace was tough so I was really pleased with this. 4/6.

7: Own a bike and use it
Yes.
I bought a bike from a friend who was leaving Bolivia and it doesn’t have (much) dust on it. Santa Cruz isn’t cyclist friendly, but I do ride it to and from work sometimes, a bit on the weekend, and had a great day when the city shut down cycling around on my bike. 5/7.

8: Go on a long long horseride
No, sadly.

I did take a horseriding lesson with my mum while I was in the UK because I really enjoy being on horseback, but I haven’t done anything since. You can do this in Santa Cruz but it’s down by the river where the horses aren’t particulalry well looked after. When I lived in Tanzania I was on horseback a lot and basically I set the goal wanting this feeling again, rather than doing it for the first time. That probably explains why I prioritised other goals. Perhaps I’ll find a decent opportunity to spend the best part of a day in the saddle in some beautiful countryside on a holiday in the future. But no, this revisit will have to be in my 30s. 5/8.

9: Play a set of 7 songs in Spanish
Nope.
I should have got round to this one to be honest, but let it slide. In the run up to my birthday I played too few gigs to add one or two songs each time. I do have around 7 songs I could sing in Spanish if the lyrics and chords are in front of me, and there were a couple of Spanish karaoke tracks that I would now consider go-tos, but the goal was to know these lyrics and music and be stage ready. I played 1 (Flaca) unassisted at my most recent gig however that’s as far as this has got. I’m not counting this as complete yet. 5/9

10: Translate one of my songs into Spanish
A lenient yes, this one.
After I got to the end of my Spanish text book last month I asked my Spanish teacher if she would help me translate one of my songs. I chose “I See You” (for anyone who knows any of my songs) because it was originally written in Bolivia. I’m still toying with the idea of whether the rap sections should be in English or Spanish because there are some rhythms and concepts in there that just get bent too much if I edit them, but the singy parts? Yes, they’re ready. I haven’t played it live yet, but I really enjoyed putting this together and learning about the different challenges that Spanish and English-speaking lyricisits have. This could be the start of a bigger translation project as there are many more songs from where that came from. Let’s see. 6/10.

11: Learn “Big Love” on the guitar
Yes, but not very well.
This is the acoustic version of Fleetwood Mac’s Big Love, a song that you should go and listen to right now if you haven’t already. Yes, I did play this. Yes, I had to work on it a lot. Was it good? Well, the singing was fine and the guitar was passable in my much more basic, but recognisable, cover. I was pleased enough with it given that I’m an ok guitarist and this definitely sounded a level above how I normally play (even though the ceiling is still very high up!). Counts though. 7/11.

12: Sing “Cult of Personality” onstage
Not 100% in the way I had hoped, but I’m calling it a yes.
I originally envisioned singing this with a band if I’m honest, but that didn’t happen because I couldn’t motivate enough people with instruments. It’s an amazing song but not considered popular enough by the bands I play with to bring out onstage. Still, it’s now become my new favourite solo karaoke songs and I’ve sung it a couple of times, full pelt to a solid “hey yeah that was pretty good!” reaction. It’s got so much power behind it and it’s so much fun to sing, lyrically and melodically. 8/12

13: Read the Lorca Trilogy in Spanish.
No.
That’s Boda de Sangre, Yerma and La Casa de Bernada Alba. Erm. No…..You’re about to see a theme here with these upcoming reading challenges….the theme is that I didn’t do so well on them. At least now I own these books so that’s something, and I did have a few lovely lunches going through the first half of Bodas de Sangre but I was way off completing this one before I turned 30. 8/13.

14: Read “The Idiot”
Frustratingly, no.
I put this one book as a goal by itself deliberately. I’d been recommended it so so long ago by a now passed friend who said it was brilliant. I’ve started this book several times in the….10? years I’ve owned it. I’ve taken it to China, Italy and Bolivia with me but what always happens is that I read and enjoy the first 200 pages, and then I put it down and forget about it. You know what I did this year? I read the first 200 pages, enjoyed them, then never went any further. Perhaps a version of me in my 30s will do. 8/14.

15: Take 10 book recommendations and read them
Not even close.
Honestly I really do like reading. This challenge wasn’t to encourage me to enjoy reading, but to find a time for it. I basically only read when I’m on holiday. Spending a day on the beach with a book is an ideal day for me, but in my day-to-day? I just don’t, much to my discredit. Anyway, I read the Post Office, a recommendation from my brother-in-law and enjoyed it, but the other missing recommendations will have to be for the future. That’s a trilogy of nos for the reading goals. Disappointing. 8/15.

16: Watch the top 50 movies of all time.
Also no.
I chose the list from Ranker and it was just the type of list I wanted. The good classics. You know, the ones that you should be able to refer to so you don’t derail a conversation by not asking for spoilers of or not having anything to say. I had seen 31 already, so this was pretty doable, but have I seen the Green Mile? No I haven’t. Terminator? Apocalypse Now? No. Have I seen all the Lord of the Rings movies? No, I haven’t. I feel your judgement. 8/16.

17: Listen to the top 50 albums of all time
Yes, and this was really enjoyable.
I’d recommend this goal to anyone given how universal it is. I chose the Rolling Stone top 50 albums and by and large it’s a good list. The aim here was to appreciate the classics more and maybe find a new overall favourite. I’m not sure if it’s my favourite, but Rubber Soul really did it for me. Being Rolling Stone, this became a Beatles listenalong at some points, but it’s hard to avoid just how influential they were. I wasn’t particularly a fan of theirs before but I am now. Also, the Rolling Stones are quite disappointing when it comes to albums aren’t they?

In general, I had listened to very few of these albums as albums before, although from time to time I’d be reminded of a classic single that I’d never known the name or artist of in the past. I’m going to rerank this top 50 at some point in the future and blog about it. As I’m writing this, number 51 on their list (Bridge over Troubled Water – Simon and Garfunkel) is playing. I feel an obvious stretch goal coming on. 9/17.

18: Complete “Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild”
Yes.
I should say that from the outset, this meant “Get the master sword and beat Ganon” as the only pre-requisites, because this game is huge. The game is so beautiful I felt like I was in a painting happily exploring from place to place. It’s magnificent, as anyone will tell you. I’d gone through the game how you are supposed to with the divine beasts etc, then making it up past those goddam lynels took a while and Ganon took a few attempts, but it was very satisfying to parry that final blow right back into his face. Of course then just as I’m congratulating myself for ticking off a goal, the extra Ganon battle starts. That one was a bit easier though and Hyrule can rest easy.
Well it can’t because the game doesn’t allow you to save after you beat Ganon, but whatever. 10/18.

19: Find a new hobby
Boxing.
Boxing fell into fashion with my group of friends late last year, and it was a lot of fun to try out. I’m not particularly agressive or strong, but thankfully I’m reasonably coordinated which is, as I would learn, probably more important.

The boxing gym near our house is big enough to have one ring in the middle, a row of 5 bags on the side and a small floor area. The guys who run it are, casual, to say the least. They come from the school of baptism by fire which has its pros and cons. It meant that pretty quickly I was thrown in the ring with someone with experience who “needed to practice his dodging”. Now, that was useful advice because I worked out pretty quickly what his dodge was. Clever me, I thought, so I faked and hit where he was dodging to. Clocked him right in the face. I’m a champion, I thought. Actually not clever, I realised, because the more you tag your sparring partner, the more they up their game. It was an oddly cool experience though having one of those rocky moments as you get hit and time slows as you see that he’s smacked sweat off your face. And this was the advanced guy who was going easy on me.

The second time I got in the ring was with someone with much less experience, but a lot more weight. Roughly the same height as me, but about 2.5 times wider. I don’t know much about boxing, but aren’t there weight divisions for a reason? Anyway, I was encouraged to “go for it!” by the trainers. I proceeded to “go for it” and very quickly learnt that his punch was much stronger than mine and we hadn’t worked on dodging or blocking yet. I had my ass handed to me. Later I was told “well, you went looking for it and you got it”…apparently you’re not supposed to give it everything or something. It was interesting but this whole “yeah do it you’ll be fine- wait you went for it so that’s your fault” attitude left a sour taste in my mouth.

Anyway, the guys there are nice and friendly, the monthly cost is really low and if you go when it’s empty you can put your own music on, but on top of the whole being punched in the face for general amusement, I would constantly pick up small injuries here and there to my wrists, ankles and ribs because I wasn’t learning any technique. I gave it a couple of months, and sometimes just used it to build up fitness (I can certainly skip much better than I used to be able to) but then when dancing entered my life, boxing quickly got put on the backburner. Fun experience though, and it counts as a completion. 11/19.

20: Achieve something in a hobby 
Yes.
Deliberately left vague when I set this goal because I had to find/rediscover hobbies first and then do something cool with them. I picked up ballroom dancing again at the start of this year after I met my partner, Macarena (yes, I know it’s the best name you could ask for from a dance partner) late last year.

She’s a pro and is setting up an arts school here with her husband. I had danced for a few years at university where I discovered that because of a shortage of guys in ballroom generally, you’re always dancing with someone better than you and learning quickly as a result. This happened again here, where I expressed interest in joining her classes, and she tested me out a little bit and thought we should try and compete together. Now, we have a couple of classes a week and work towards competitions because for her it’s good publicity and for me it’s good fun.

We had a month to put together a dance for an international competition in Santa Cruz where even though I’m British and she’s Chilean, we represented Bolivia. Freestyle event, so we chose the music and there were no restrictions. Her and he husband Tomas put this together:

And we won! Yes, the Bolivian ballroom dancing scene is in its infancy and we were only competing against 2 other couples, but man was this a lot of fun to learn and do. Technically we’re the reigning champions right now, so I’m counting that as a completion and then some. 12/20

21. Learn to independently cook 3 new things 
Not independently, no.

Cooking is simply not interesting for me. I think it’s great that so many people can have a passion for it, but I’ve never fully got into it and know that leaves me lacking somewhat as a person. Yes, I can throw pasta, an omelette or a basic stir-fry or whatever together if I need to, but I don’t want to. I’ll stretch to “we can cook this together if you don’t mind how slow I am”. I start making up reasons why I shouldn’t cook like “surely it’s better for the environment if we eat in restaurants rather than individually firing up our kitchens”.

I conscripted my girlfriend’s help for this one and started work on 1) sushi, 2) brownie and 3) lasagna. The brownie recipe that she passed me is a really good one and I can and have done that independently. For the other two, we made them together and they tasted good but gun-to-head do I back myself to put these together well? No. More practice needed. 12/21.

22: Go vegan for a month
Oddly this was the first one I ticked off.
I went in depth into the reasons why I did this and how it was here, so take a look if you like. 13/22

23: Own land
Yes. Come visit.

I was in the process of buying land when I set this goal, but if you want to know anything about Bolivian legal procedures; know that they always take longer than everyone says they will, there will be hidden costs all over the place and the rules will change depending on who you talk to. So yes, all of these things happened but I now own 500m2 of land just outside of Santa Cruz. I started writing blogs about its progress here if you want to learn more. 14/23

24: Plant half a dozen trees 
And then some.

Planting trees is incredibly satisfying, especially when they are as cheap as they are here. I’ve picked up a habit out of going to the market, asking for a tree recommendation and then going to my land to plant it. I blogged about it here and since writing that blog I’ve planted even more trees based on what has grown well.

My banana tree is already much bigger than I am and may start producing next year. Other plants have come and gone to pests and weeds, but the citrus stuff holds on nicely and my bamboo “forest” is on the way. Excluding the bamboo, there are about 20 young trees on the land now, and I’m really interested to see how it evolves and grows. 15/24

25: Decorate my room
My girlfriend says this is cheating and she’s probably right, but to hell with it this is my list. Yes.
This time last year I was living in part of our school. It was a school that we lived in rather than a house that we taught out of. My bedroom was great but it was just not healthy to be that close to my work all the time. I couldn’t switch off properly or escape work. I needed to move out and I’m so glad I did. Happy coincidence came up though, because I was flat-hunting at the same time as my girlfriend was looking to rent out a room in her house. Well, now she’s my girlfriend and my landlord.

My room in her house could still do with a little decoration really. A couple more plants and I should hang a couple of pictures, but given just how much better my living situation is for my mental health than it used to be, that’s a profound enough win for me. 16/25.

26: Do an ancestory test
The easiest one of them all, probably.
My sister saw this and, quite wisely, thought it made a good christmas present for a sibling. I privately hoped for a sliver of South American in me but no. I’m 6.8% Swedish ancestory so that’s pretty cool, but my genetics are pure European. Take a look.

I already knew that my surname is native to my hometown, so this wasn’t a surprise. 17/26.

27: Do an escape room
This was so much fun.

Santa Cruz doesn’t have escape rooms as far as I’m aware, so this was a London job. I gathered together a group a game theatrey friends and we set about cracking a murder mystery. It was even better than I thought it would be to be honest as we worked together bit by bit. Given that it was the first time for all of us, we got remarkably close to escaping and everyone had their individual eureka moment as we pieced things together, whether it was my friend Dan magnetising some keys through a maze or Ed, Sarah and Chi’s pattern completions.

My own moment came when we were at a bit of an impasse. We’d opened this wardrobe and there was a piece to a puzzle in a blazer pocket, but it didn’t seem that we’d got everything out of this part of the room. I step inside as I can see a few receipt tickets and that might crack a code down the line…wait a minute I can see a light….THIS WALL IS FALSE! The back of the wardrobe opened into the murderer’s secret jail cell with lots more puzzles. So so cool.

It was great fun, and once the hour was up we were just 2 steps away from getting out. It would have been nice to have completed it of course, but it was such great fun to just do. 18/27.

28. Get a tattoo
Got it, with 3 days to go.

I’ve liked Leonard Cohen since my old friend Marianne (named for the song) introduced me to him on a nightime drive back in the Uk. For a while I had considered my Chinese name for a tattoo or something videogame related, but once I had the idea for a tattoo representing Cohen’s “Bird on a Wire” it was decision made.

If you haven’t heard the song, it’s about trying, in your way, to be free. Cohen, like everyone, struggled with the concept of what freedom actually is or looks like in so many of his lyrics, but a bird on a wire asks just enough questions. For me, it’s a tattoo that celebrates flying around the world in my 20s and trying, in my way, to be free. It’s also in rememberance of my dad (the bigger bird that I, the smaller bird, am looking up to) who flew on many years ago.

A couple of days later I found out that it happens to be one of my aunt’s favourite lyrics too, which makes it even more special. I knew she was a big fan, but to be this specific makes me very happy. 19/28.

29: Write and publish material for Language Connection
Yes.
Language Connection is the institute that I part own and part run here in Santa Cruz. Now, I could have made a 30 before 30 all for the things I do in this company but I limited myself to one goal and that was to put together 1st versions of these excercise books that I’ve made for the kids who study with us.

There’s a ton of material (over 300 pages) in here that’s taken months of work, but it all came together at the start of June. Revisions will come of course, and there are 1 or 2 books to potentially add to the series, but I’m really proud of these.

I want to shout out to my friend Sion Clarke for his help on these. He’s the illustrator for all of the images that we’ve got going on here and they really give the books their own feel. He’s done such a great job. Thank you Sion, and to all the teachers of Language Connection who helped revise some of the activities in these books. 20/29.

30: Tie a balloon, riffle cards
Technically yes. More yes than no.
Choosing to be lenient again here because I hardly mastered either of these two skills that I’d just like to be able to do without thinking about. I hate tying balloons and just tying things in general because I suck at it, but I’m not a total embarassment anymore so that’s something. And that riffle sound when I first did it successfully? Yeah, that was cool. The goal should have been better from the outset really, but perhaps that’s something I can work on for the next batch.

 

Final tally: 21/30

 

Reaction to the result?
Pleased! I’m happy with that as a year of my life, and I would recommend this system to anyone interested. As a list, it was a constant “something there” and when half an opportunity arose to do something I sometimes felt like, “wait, this is something I do want to do. So why not do it now?”.

Another big pro to this list was some of the conversations I got out of friends about it. About what they would put on their lists. Some friends did make lists of their own and I’m keen to hear how they’re doing.

I’ve really enjoyed this though, and will probably make a “30 now I’m 30” list to go on from here. Some of these accomplishments have obvious stretch goals. Others are things I still want to do. Like reading, for example.

In case you’re doing something similar. Here’s what I would recommend to anyone making one of their own lists:

– Have a time limit
Turning 30 works but I guess it could work at any age, but the whole thing would fall apart without a deadline. I completed about half of my challenges a month before my birthday, despite having a year to do them.

– Be lenient
I’ve found it to be much better to be lenient and adapt impossible goals once I found they were too lofty, than to hold myself to these to the letter. Take the list seriously, but at the end of the day, it’s just a list. For example, if I had stuck with a 45 minute 10k, I would have given up before I got to a 40m 8k.

– Make your goals possible as an individual
Even if I wanted to have had a kid before 30 then you wouldn’t find it on this list because it’s kind of not just my choice.

– Include something you were planning on doing anyway
Meeting my niece was something that I didn’t have to have a 30 before 30 list to motivate me to complete, but it was probably one of the biggest moments of my year so it is worth celebrating.

– Have a range of difficulties
Being able to tick off something easy can be a real motivator to come back to the list as a whole. Be aware though that what you think is easy might not actually get done. It’s odd to see some “easy” ones I didn’t complete, so perhaps they weren’t so easy after all. I thought being vegan for a month would be the most difficult one for me, and it was really hard, but I did it. Did I finish “The Idiot”- a book that I actively enjoy? No, I didn’t.

– Make the goals specific
Have something concrete if possible which means you know when you’ve completed the goal. “Take my country total to 20” is obviously a yes or no situation. “Decorate my room” wasn’t great as a goal.

Most importantly, these goals are just additional to the real life day to day things that go on like staying physically and mentally healthy, working hard in my job, taking time for my friends, that kind of stuff.

I don’t believe in only living for today but I think it’s important to remember that our time is finite. Everyone knows someone who was taken from the world too soon. When all is said and done, my gravestone will not say “he succeeded” because what does that mean? But I’d be satisfied if it said “Well, he tried”.