I spent $3,836 on flights this year

Trading dollars for deeper relationships

The empty orange suitcase rudely laid open on the floor, demanding for me to fill it with clothes, snacks, and other Christmas gifts for my parents. I had the whole evening to pack, but my usual pre-travel enchantment had been replaced by an eerie exhaustion.

Do I really want to get on another flight?

It sounded like a champagne problem, but this was the ninth trip I would get on this year and I was tired. Travel was exciting and all when I first packed my down jacket for Osaka in January, but by now I was quite run down by commuting to the airport, squeezing my life into a rolling box, spending a week away from my fiancée.

I had to pay for it too? Ugh. Living in Hong Kong was expensive. Every month, my well-budgeted salary goes to the different pockets that I obsessively monitor: investments, savings, and a bit of shopping. I started off the year with a sizeable cushion of cash in my bank account. I would end the year with that cushion being alarmingly low. Traveling, as the world would have it, is expensive. Beyond flight tickets, I would also have to pay for visa fees (the joys of holding an Indonesian passport), tourism activities (like seeing penguins in Australia’s Phillip Island), and spending more money on eating out since I wasn’t cooking when overseas.

On my ninth trip, I had mastered the rudimentaries of showing up to the gate, picking a seat, and waiting for my luggage on the carousel that I could do all of it on autopilot (pun intended). But then I got out of the arrivals area and was instantly embraced by my mom, dad, and brother. This was the first time the four of us were together since 2022. I spent the next ten days drinking my dad’s coffee, getting my hair done with my mom, and talking to my brother about how to deal with our parents. We even hired a photographer to get nice photos of the four of us since it was such a rare occasion.

As much of a hassle travelling was, they were worth it.

I went into this year knowing that I can earn back money, but I can’t earn back time. The trips that I planned for were all to either see friends and family or spend time with friends and family. I was no longer enticed by witnessing turquoise oceans and Mount Fuji solo. I wanted to instead spend time sharing dreams and failures on my childhood best friend’s couch in Melbourne, getting lost with my colleague-turned-friend in Kyoto winter, reminiscing childhood photos with my parents in the Indonesian house I have come to outgrow.

I did occasionally think that in a few years, I would have more money if I didn’t spend all this cash on these trips. But would my obligations only grow then? Would I still have the relationships with the people I wanted to see? I wouldn’t be in my twenties, and a lower back that can withstand long haul flights and crashing at friends’ couches for much longer.

If I didn’t suck up the hassle of traveling this year, I wouldn’t see them this year. That’s the simple trade off that I wasn’t willing to make.

As karma would have it, my friends have been stopping by Hong Kong a lot more, too. I recognize that Hong Kong is an expensive city, and I don’t have the living room space to provide them with a spare couch to crash on. I try to lighten the monetary load in different ways, such as paying for their hotel or treating them to nice meals.

Being so flazéda with my money was not in my 2024 bingo card. I grew up being extremely calculative with this scarce resource, having been taught to jot down all of my spendings since I was ten. My parents cut corners in their spending to afford my education. I never planned to be promiscuous with my savings.

The wish to deepen my relationships with friends, family, and my fiancée changed my perception about money. There is so much grey area in between the seemingly binary options of being frugal versus spending carelessly in the present. Money is not a high score. It’s a resource that can be spent. I can save and invest it to grow, but it shouldn’t be to the point of hoarding. I’m supposed to trade money for what I want out of life. It’s a tool that can enrich my life right now, especially when invested in relationships and experiences that compound over time, much like financial investments do.

Sure, I could have saved that US$3,836 and watched it grow with compound interest. But relationships have their own kind of compound interest — every intentional encounter, every road trip, every wow-us-two-years-ago-wouldn’t-have-said-this conversation builds upon the last, creating a wealth and depth of connection that no financial calculator can measure.

It so happens that 2024 was the year I had enough money to nurture my relationships. This involves flying to see friends who live in other continents. It involves buying Catan because my friends wouldn’t buy it for themselves. It also involves paying for dinner at a nice Top-50-listed restaurant that won’t shoo us away after an hour because Hong Kong restaurants lack space and want to prioritize guest turnover.

Sometimes my investments in my relationships are in the form of money, too. Within my immediate family, I happen to be the only person with a regular income. This year, I’ve sent money to both my dad and brother when they requested it. I did contemplate it for a while, knowing that I could use that money to 1) invest in my own financial security and 2) travel to see them more. But they are my family and needed the cash, and I was in a position to help lighten their load.

Rik

called “connection” as my guilt-free spending category, to borrow Ramit Sethi’s vernacular. It’s money that’s free to spend as long as all other needs are met, and it’s what extracts joy out of the money we worked so hard to earn. Even if it costs $3,836.

My goodness was it worth it.

Thank you to friends who spent their time on this essay:

Karena

,

Rik

,

Tahsin Khan

, and

Kevin Hsu

.

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Update log:

• 🪐 Jin got me hooked to another Thai sapphic TV series, Pluto. I’ve got such a crush on one of the main actresses, Namtan, now.

• 💃🏻 I went clubbing with some close friends on Saturday night. I haven’t gone out in such a long time. But when allotted a schedule for it - no plans the day after, napping the day of - it’s so fun.

• 🫂 I’m embracing hugging my friends more (pun intended). When I’m seeing friends I feel affection for, I’m leaning into just hugging them, holding onto their arms, resting my head. We don’t spend time a lot of time together anymore because we’re now working adults. I enjoy hanging out with them when I can.

• 👠 Led my last Interbank meeting of the year. I have one term (one year) left.

• 💼 It’s my work wife’s last week of work and I’m lowkey kinda bummed.

• 🏃‍♀️ Ran 5km and it felt easy. I guess cardio does build up after all. I’m looking forward to more easy 5Ks.

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