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Do you suffer from ‘Complex Syndrome’?
It’s another beautiful day in paradise. You fulfilled your dream of leaving your old life behind and pursued the dream. You’re several weeks or months into your new utopia in Punta Cana and you start to wonder ‘now what?’. You’re surrounded by an abundance of apartments, with a constant churn of AirBnB visitors coming and going on a daily basis. You’ve had the ‘where are you from?’ conversation more times than you can remember and at the moment you think I’ve made a friend, t
Callum Bates
Apr 202 min read


What happens when a bunch of strangers go on a boat together
On any given day walking on the beach in Punta Cana, you’re going to see a host of boats skirting along the coast carrying tourists. Some, are fishing, but the majority are party boats blasting music so loud it feels like you’re right alongside them, not 500m from shore! This got me thinking, surely there are a lot of people here who see these boats, but never feel inclined to go on them. Either, because they’re obviously not going to like the music or getting onto a boat bar
Callum Bates
Apr 203 min read


The hidden loneliness of living in paradise
I moved to paradise but I wasn’t living the dream. With social media influencing decision making, even subconsciously, you’re being encouraged to live the perfect life. Jetting across the world, experiencing all that life and meeting a tonne of new people, that’s what it’s all about, right? What the world fails to tell you is that if you’re on your own or in a couple, the monotony of loneliness soon catches up, giving you a huge dose of raw reality. Being amongst a transient
Callum Bates
Apr 204 min read


It took 6 months to make my first friend
When I first moved to Punta Cana, it took me a good 6 months before I could say I had a real friend. Moving abroad on your own has to be up there with one of the most daunting prospects you could challenge yourself with. You can compare it with early-age explorers setting sail to discover the new world, leaving behind the comfort of home to forge a new life thousands of miles away on a Caribbean island. In those first few weeks, it’s menial routines you miss, such as sittin
Callum Bates
Apr 205 min read


I accidentally started a social movement!
Obviously, everything in places such as Punta Cana is geared towards tourism and rightly so, somewhat. After the novelty of moving here wears off a little, you start to think what else is there? You’ve walked the beach a hundred times, sat through hours of karaoke and ate and multiple restaurants week after week. Where’s the stimulation in a place like Punta Cana beyond the beach and restaurants? Before I started Punta Cana Project, I had likened life here to that of the film
Callum Bates
Apr 203 min read
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