An English couple have taken their two boys out of school to travel the world as a family after feeling deprived of quality time in the hustle and bustle of their old lives.
Emma Niblett, 36, said she and her husband Dan, 40, rented out their home in West Yorkshire, England, and jetted off to Bali in August with their two sons, Noah, 8, and Issac, 5.
“We recovered from the COVID pandemic and felt [like] We were repeating the same cycle,” Emma Niblett told the U.K.-based outlet leedslive,
Niblett said she and her husband decided to overhaul their lives when they realized they were spending most of their time cooped up at home, focusing on small things like chores.
They soon realize that this is taking away quality time from them to connect as a family.
“We weren’t getting time together as a family,” she said.
The mother of two also noticed that her sons were slowly becoming enmeshed in technology and she wanted them to see that life is more than what is on their screens.
“We wanted to see the boys in different cultures. They were spending more time on screens,” he told LeedsLive.
Emma and Dan started talking about the trip last Christmas, but they wanted their boys to finish the school year before going.
Niblett, who works remotely as a technology lead, took advantage of the flexibility of her job and did “something completely different.”
“We decided to get out there and go as far as we could,” he said.
The family then uprooted themselves and moved 7,700 miles from home to live in Bali.
She explained that the Indonesian province is “safe, cost-effective and sunny” and feels like it is an excellent place for her family to reconnect.
“It’s 20% of what we were paying in the UK,” Niblett shared.
He said a family can eat three meals a day in Bali for about $40 to $50.
However, a very affordable cost of living was not the only essential requirement for the couple as parents.
He still valued his sons and wanted them to receive a formal education, so Niblett sought out a school his boys could attend that followed the same program as his old school in Britain.
The boys attend the pop-up school from 9am to 3pm Monday to Friday, but they noticed some differences in the way they are taught compared to England.
“The ethos is different. They are able to choose their own projects, [and] They’re learning about the local area and the language,” Niblett said. leedslive,
“It’s less about academics and more about functioning in the world. When they started the boys said, ‘Where are the desks? Why are we not sitting in rows?
She said that since her sons have been going to school, she has noticed that they have become “much more creative” and are “surrounded by kids from Singapore, Australia and America.”
However, the mother feels that what her sons are experiencing is much more than what they are being taught in the classroom.
“Just being around people from different backgrounds, it [can] Open your eyes to so much more,” she said.
Overall, Niblett said living in Bali has given his family a chance to reconnect and create lasting memories that his old life couldn’t give him.
“Living in Bali is really encouraging us to slow down and live in the moment,” he said.
Niblett also said that the culture of the local people has opened his eyes to what is important in life.
“We get used to rushing around and ignoring what’s in front of us, but the Balinese culture is a culture of gratitude and we’re really feeling the benefits for our family,” he shared.
Niblett said her family was only planning on taking the trip for a year, but considering their experience so far has been eye-opening, the trip could last even longer.
According to LeedsLive, the family have traveled around Sydney, Australia and Bell and plan to spend Christmas in New Zealand and Japan.
They then plan to visit Vietnam and Borneo after the holidays.
