Pontus & Ulrika Lindblom: Vote With Your Feet

“That’s the ideal. That’s what I think would work best… if you could only vote with your feet instead of voting in a political democratic system.”

Automatically Generated  Transcript

Timothy Allen 00:03:04
I’ll introduce you as far as as much as I know, which isn’t a lot, to be honest. So I know that you’re Pontus and Ulrika, and that you’re Swedish. But we are meeting here in Prague. And this is part of… the Free Cities Foundation have come to Prague for a few days, and we are interviewing relevant people in Prague and your names came up, because I think you’ve got a fascinating story. So why don’t you Pontus begin? Why don’t you introduce yourself? And then Ulrika, if you say something, just, I’d like to know, in the beginning how it is that you ended up in Prague firstly.

Pontus Lindblom 00:03:44
Yeah, so my name is Pontius from Sweden. So I grew up in a small village in Sweden. And I have studied natural science. And then eventually, I came to Linköping, which is a uni versity town and I studied, like biotech engineering as my masters. And then after that, I did a PhD in the medical faculty, and that’s where I met Ulrika. She was also a PhD student there. So we met there in Linköping . And after we both finished our PhDs, in 2014, we have been thinking a few years about travelling after our PhDs living as nomads or backpacking around the world. Not with any particular plan, but just to see the world, see what opportunities there are. So we had saved some money, some fiat money in our bank accounts, to travel on. And my idea was always that we should be very frugal in our travels, not spend a lot of money. So my goal was that we were going to live on $40 or $50 per day. The goal was $40. But after one and a half years of travel in Southeast Asia, and in Central America, I calculated that we had spent just over $50 per day for the two of us for all the travel, all the lodging, all the fun things we did, we did a lot of diving, for instance. So even though we didn’t spend a lot of money, we had a lot of fun. And we met a lot of interesting people. And one of the goals with our travels were also to meet like minded people, which we’re libertarians and Bitcoiners. So wherever we went, we tried to meet up with with locals or other expats there in those locations who were into Bitcoin or libertarianism. So we usually looked at meetup.com or Facebook to see if we could find some group of libertarians or Bitcoiners. So

Timothy Allen 00:06:13
so before I hear from you Ulrika, it was mainly Southeast Asia, is that right?

Pontus Lindblom 00:06:19
The first nine months were Southeast Asia, and Sri Lanka and India.

Timothy Allen 00:06:27
A place close to my heart as well. I spent over four, I think it was been almost four years in that part of the world. Himalayas, and especially in Thailand, you know, Indonesia, everywhere. I love it. I love that part of the world. So you were planning on going back to Sweden after those trip? No, no,

Ulrika Lindblom 00:06:45
no. Our goal wasn’t was not just travelling, it was more. We wanted to explore the different different locations for where we could start a family and and find somewhere in the world that we fit in.

Timothy Allen 00:07:03
So how did you end up here then are in Southeas t Asia here is not a simple

Ulrika Lindblom 00:07:09
trip. No. And we have been more in more places. So that was just the first year and then we went to Central America, Mexico, Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala, and M before we went back to Southeast Asia, and then we have mostly travelled to Europe.

Pontus Lindblom 00:07:29
We have returned to Prague over the years, but but the original reason we came to Prague was when we were in Singapore, we met up with libertarians in Singapore. And then we were told about parallel and the police here in Prague. And in 2015, summer 2015, we met the King family, Carolyn and Paul who lives here in our community here in Prague. And we told them about bye It’s parallel and the police, and they wanted to check it. Check that out.

Ulrika Lindblom 00:08:09
Yeah. And it also that was in 2015. And then we went to an Arca poco in Mexico for the 2016 conference. And the meta met Pavel loopback. That is that was the main organiser for hackers. Congress. That is a conference that is been going on since I think 2015. Here in Czech Republic, so we were aiming for going to Prague to go to attend that conference in 2016.

Timothy Allen 00:08:40
Okay, I’ve got a question for you then. Because traditionally, I think a lot of people think of Sweden has been a pretty open minded, easygoing kind of country, how do you end up leaving wanting to leave Sweden going and looking elsewhere?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:08:59
It’s a lot of things. We met in 2010. And we, we grew to, we grew up together we in the fields of economics and political in politics. And we came into the potluck came to the pathway that we felt like Sweden is going to on the wrong direction is not going towards the more frightened for your society, it’s going to more and more authoritarian society. And with a lot of problems so in I think it was in 2012, we decided that we we have to leave Sweden and find somewhere else.

Timothy Allen 00:09:38
Can you tell me what what what what sorry, the button What is something that you see happening in Sweden, there’s a red flag to you because like, like I say, the outside world when I look at Sweden, I this Swedish girlfriend for a year, and I thought it was really chilled out place really cool. There’s there’s quite a lot of open minded that people seem to be very open minded, and very easygoing, and very live and let live there. So what are the red flags then?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:10:06
The first thing is that a lot of Swedish people are conformist, they, it’s long as you’re fit inside this society, mole, everything is equate. But if you fell, fall out of that mould than then you will really feel them. The difference between you and the rest. And a lot of things happen in the in Sweden that I reacted to before we met before I met Pontus, but one of them was the fraud law that came in 2016, that we’re highly going to move towards a more surveillance society.

Timothy Allen 00:10:48
Can you explain what that law was? The third, they are

Ulrika Lindblom 00:10:51
tracking citizens more on the internet that they want, they want to be able to plant backdoors and go into and read your mails and so on that they didn’t say that they say they wanted to find the child pornography arrests and terrorists by this law, but it’s like a slippery slope. And then it will be more like a minor felonies that will be intractable to go into those doctors, they

Pontus Lindblom 00:11:22
wanted to let the Secret Service in Sweden, like lawfully. Listen to everything that happens on the internet. And as

Timothy Allen 00:11:32
that happened, yeah, yeah. So right now in Sweden, you don’t need an especial injunction to tap someone’s phone or to listen to their

Ulrika Lindblom 00:11:42
they still need a court order. But those like it, when you have that law in place, they will like loosen it step by step. So that’s one of the things that is a red flag for me. And the other thing is that in homeschooling was hard before 2010, but it became almost completely legal in 2010. And then looking at how the structure of the Swedish school is, how it looks. I didn’t feel like I didn’t I wanted to put my future children in that kind of place. It’s more like it’s more like a storage place for so that both parents can work. So long days, but not so much. It’s like it’s also it’s in Sweden, and it’s only the state curriculum is the only legal like, document that all schools need to follow. So you don’t have like the variety that for instance, you have here in Czech Republic that you can have different kinds of school, everybody, everybody has to follow them. The Swedish state curriculum, and they put more and more things into this curriculum and that I feel like that shouldn’t even be in like taught in school, they they lose focus on what’s important. And it’s just like a storage place for, for the children. And you have like a yellow fever at night. Like if you’re in the in the middle of, of like activity range and intelligence ranges on you perhaps could go is quite good school for you but if you fall if you’re over skilled or like have some kind of like a disability in some field that you’re you have a hard time learning to read or then it’s the school is not for you. So if you’d like fall out of this middle category, then.

Timothy Allen 00:13:46
So you said that something happened in 2010, which makes homeschooling illegal. What was that?

Pontus Lindblom 00:13:53
I don’t know exactly what it was, it was 2010 or 2011, that they may have made it

Ulrika Lindblom 00:13:59
more or less bold to homeschool before that you could, you could do it. But it took a lot of effort and documentations. And you had to get approved and everything and but now it’s all it’s completely mandatory to send your kids to school. And if you’re not doing that you will get in trouble with the social services quite immediately.

Timothy Allen 00:14:26
Once again, something I learned very recently was that homeschooling was all but illegal in Sweden, which is once again a rather strange thing to hear from, from a British person that always thought of Sweden as being very open minded. Do you know what’s the general feeling from people Swedes in Sweden at the notion that homeschooling is illegal? Or do they not even know that this is something that most people don’t really care?

Pontus Lindblom 00:14:54
Most people don’t know about it, and most people don’t care about it. They are so indoctrinated from young age that you go to school and you don’t question but

Timothy Allen 00:15:05
if you if you said to if you weren’t an average Swede on the street, and you said, Look, do you think homeschooling should be legal or illegal? Do you think they’d say it should be mandatory to go to school?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:15:19
Yeah, I think they should they say probably it will say that. It should be illegal. Because in their mind, if you want to homeschool you either you’re either like a religious fanatic, or, or some kind of like me, you’re you treat your children really badly and want to keep them out of society.

Timothy Allen 00:15:39
That’s interesting. I this is all new, new news to me. Okay, so. So you You’re originally left on your travels, to look for a place to live? And what can you tell me about some of the places that you discovered that you thought, yeah, this could be, this could be good.

Ulrika Lindblom 00:15:59
It depends before children, they were different, like other places. But then when we decided to have children, then it just narrowed down to two at that time, that Prague is the only place that we felt like have everything that we that we want for really young, young children. So it was quite quite an issue, because we had been travelling for five years. And we were in we were in Southeast Asia. And it was just before the corona. Mania. So we were so it was not the corona mania that made us decide to have a home base. But where we had our plans for school was to go to Singapore, off to Thailand, and then Bali, and then perhaps in the spring go back to them to Europe. But we had in one and a half our daughter was one and a half at the time. And we had the gotten ill and travelled fatigued. So we felt like we need to put this on, like our feet down somewhere in there also. So we were in Thailand and discussed and we both said that let’s try to make a home in here in Czech Republic in private especially is specifically here in Prague.

Timothy Allen 00:17:20
So where did you spend the large part of the lockdown period? Were you here or were you

Ulrika Lindblom 00:17:27
in the we were quite oblivious? Because we were so we were so focused on finding a home here so we took the trip like the flight back to Europe and then drove to Czech Republic and it was just when the like the thing is in Austria and Italy was starting to happen so but we didn’t read about it. We were so focused on finding a home. So it’s it’s quite, quite easy to find a place here in in Prague to to live so I think it took two weeks and then we I got to this place that we’re sitting today. And the landlord really liked us we got it, got to write the contract and the week after and got the keys and they and then when we got in the Keys it we were in the beginning of March. So we had it because we had been nomads for five years. But we didn’t have anything. We had to buy every everything to make this a home.

Timothy Allen 00:18:31
Sure what, what so what did happen here in Prague during that lockdown period, like I’m your I’m getting the one I’m getting is that you thought Prague might be the best place to experience free kind of lifestyle. So how did how did it go here? Because I know I mean, I’ve spoken to a few people about it. And I know that it was there were lock downs, just like everywhere there was this. But I also know about someone told me this morning at lunch, breakfast that some of the cafes, restaurants, were putting green dots on the door in and things like that, which that kind of stuff definitely didn’t happen in the UK, for example. So what was the experience like in in during that lockdown period?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:19:14
Yeah, it depends. Because the first lockdown, it has been several. So the first lockdown when we came here. We didn’t know so much. And it was quite hysterical. And we were out buying furniture. And our friend called us and said like it’s a room that is going to be locked down. Do you have any food? We said, No, we don’t have any food. So we had to like in panic, go and buy some food. Because we have a small dollar we have to have something.

Timothy Allen 00:19:41
But I mean, like, I gotta ask you Pontus. What was it different? Did you Did did the lockdown period here happened? Better or worse than in other places? I mean, this was your bet your bet was?

Pontus Lindblom 00:19:55
I mean, Sweden would have been much more free if we were in Sweden at that time. But that’s what because they didn’t have a lock down in Sweden.

Timothy Allen 00:20:02
Yeah. So well, this is important. Because when we think about that period, and I always think Sweden did it best. And so I’ll come like, I’m still trying, I’m trying to find out why why you wanted to leave Sweden, like when they’re sick. It seems like a kind of libertarian society. Now.

Ulrika Lindblom 00:20:23
If we had the gun back to Sweden, then we have we would have had problems with social services, just because we don’t want to put our children in school. Right, and the taxes are so high. So we would we would have been needing to find work in Sweden and, and I think also like, it’s so it’s never good to, to live in the country that you that you were born in. With, because you’re you’re getting away much, much with much more things. When you’re living in a country where you don’t speak the language natively, or, or, or have the passport and the right. You may need to vote and you’re left

Timothy Allen 00:21:08
alone more when you’re in a country. That’s not your own. Yeah, I know. I know what you mean. That is if you’re the kind of person who wants to be left alone, it’s a pretty good tactic to be in a place. That’s not your home country for sure. But, so I was asking you punters about their lock downs here.

Pontus Lindblom 00:21:25
Yeah, they were pretty harsh. So they, they locked down all the stores that were not grocery stores or petrol stations or pharmacies, but then again, the local population, they are very sceptical against the government. I think that’s from the communist times. So they don’t follow all the government edicts. And like, even even the police, they don’t crack down on people not wearing masks and so on.

Timothy Allen 00:21:53
Was that your experience? Yes, yes. Yes. And it so that story about green dots on the restaurants? That’s a true story. Yeah.

Ulrika Lindblom 00:22:01
Yeah. I even had a map map online where where storage owners could like put up that they are open for everyone. So you could just go to that map and find restaurants and

Timothy Allen 00:22:14
and they weren’t getting shut down. You know, like what because of that.

Pontus Lindblom 00:22:18
Some of them were getting prosecuted, I think, but then the law made it so that they couldn’t find them in them. So the the lockdown rules that were implemented here was illegal according to the Constitutional Court. It was found out a bit later

Timothy Allen 00:22:39
so So according to you guys, Prague’s got a reputation for being slightly subversive, would you say like when you were travelling the world deciding where to settle down? Was Was Prague, something people talked about as being a pretty free?

Pontus Lindblom 00:22:55
I don’t know. But But for us, it was. Yeah, one reason we like progress because it’s a bit Could unfriendly and you have Pearland police here. And you also have also which is a huge market store where you can buy basically everything except fresh food and clothes. And you can buy it for Bitcoin, which is very convenient. I have other some restaurants and cafes and even some petrol station that accept Bitcoin.

Timothy Allen 00:23:28
So eliminate that, like that’s new to me what store Did you say? What’s it called

Pontus Lindblom 00:23:32
alpha dot c said al s said A.

Timothy Allen 00:23:36
A and where what is it a physical, a physical store?

Pontus Lindblom 00:23:40
They have a lot of showrooms. It’s a it’s a really big, like electronics markets to start with where you can buy cosmetics. Yeah, they’re expanding in all different areas. And it’s really big in Czech Republic and Slovakia. But his soul also in some places in Hungary and in Austria, I think as well. And they accept Bitcoin. Yeah, they have been accepting bitcoin since 2017. And they have accepted Bitcoin lightning payments for I don’t know, a couple of years,

Timothy Allen 00:24:17
but it Do you Do you mostly order online with him? Or? Yes, it gets

Pontus Lindblom 00:24:22
delivered? Yeah, exactly. All the orders are online. So either collect them in a post box, you have post boxes, alza boxes all over over town, or you go to one of their showrooms and collect your order.

Timothy Allen 00:24:37
That’s I didn’t I that was a new one to me. Right. Okay. So, so you don’t do you guys don’t live on a Bitcoin standard? Yes, you do. Right? Well, we do. Well, I’d like to talk about Yeah, I mean, maybe you should describe what you mean by Bitcoin standard for me. We’re living on a Bitcoin standard means you’re getting paid in Bitcoin as well. And that’s very difficult, because hardly anyone pays in Bitcoin. So Right.

Pontus Lindblom 00:24:59
Yeah, our story is a little bit different. I got into bitcoin very early, in 2017. So I’ll give that 2011 2011. Yeah. Sorry. Wow. Very early. And the reason was that I was involved in the Pirate Party, which is a political party in Sweden. That was started by Rick Falcon. He was the party leader. And I was involved in on a local level in Lean shopping. At that time, 2011.

Timothy Allen 00:25:35
Just quickly, before we go on, then what was the Pirate Party? I’ve got vague recollections of it. What was the main? Was it a libertarian thing? Or was it a fun thing was it was

Pontus Lindblom 00:25:45
basically started after the F ra debate in Sweden 2004. So they are very much against surveillance and freedom of information and freedom to copy information. So against intellectual property rights and things like that.

Timothy Allen 00:26:03
But it was started in a serious manner. It wasn’t like news. Sometimes you get political parties that are just trying to show how ridiculous politics is. This is a real party.

Pontus Lindblom 00:26:14
Yes, yes, they are. Dave are very serious. And the main questions was, yeah, free freedom to share information freely. So pirate copying, or what you call it in English pirates pirating. Yeah,

Timothy Allen 00:26:29
yeah. So but they didn’t believe in copyright. Or they did?

Pontus Lindblom 00:26:34
No, no, no, nobody wanted everything to be able to be shared freely, and also very much against surveillance and for, for privacy for individuals and for transparency for governments. And it became a pirate party movement that at its height was in over 50 countries. And also here in Czech Republic, the Pirate Party is still quite large. But the unfortunate thing that happened in Sweden will start in 2014. There was a shift in leadership. So Rick, Falco stepped down. And I’m not true, but it became the party leader. And it was a shift in the politics more towards like gender questions and HBT Q things.

Timothy Allen 00:27:28
What was it a shift from the middle to the left? Or was it a shift from the right to the left or

Ulrika Lindblom 00:27:34
from like, middle right to left, right.

Pontus Lindblom 00:27:40
I mean, Parker was never a party that wanted to like us to answer all the political questions. It only had a few questions that they would want it to, like put all the effort on, which was freedom on the internet, basically, freedom to share information and freedom for from mass surveillance.

Timothy Allen 00:28:01
Did that dampen your belief? In politics by any chance? Well, I mean, it does well have a party that shifts along the political spectrum.

Pontus Lindblom 00:28:12
I can say that it’s 2014 was the last time I voted in a political election, and that was for the EU election. I voted for the Pirate Party in the EU election. And they they had two mandates, I think at the time and they lost one of their mandates, or if they lost both, I don’t remember. But it was basically a complete failure for the Pirate Party in that election. That’s the last time I voted in a political election.

Timothy Allen 00:28:39
It just interesting what both of you what is your particular version of governance that you think, you know, works? What works for you? Obviously, that was a form of democracy that failed, according to you, would you say? Well, I mean, it was a democratic process. But it ended up disenfranchising.

Pontus Lindblom 00:29:02
I mean, I could go back a little bit. Like I’ve been interested in natural sciences, and science for for most of my life. But I’ve been quite oblivious and interested in politics, and even economics, up until 2010. But in 2010, I just buy shells when I was in, in Bangkok, in Thailand, I found a book in like used to books bizarre. And I just read on the back cover of the book. And, wow, this is interesting. So I bought it and read it. And that book just blew my mind. It’s by far the most important book that I have read, and it’s it, like began my political awakening and a huge interests for also the social sciences, politics and economics. And the book was the third wave by Alvin Toffler.

Timothy Allen 00:30:11
The third wave, right? I haven’t read it. It kind of Alvin Toffler rings a bell, but

Pontus Lindblom 00:30:18
he’s an American futurist. So he, he released his first book in 1970. And that is called Future Shock. And then after that, he released one more book, like every 10 years, and he makes huge amounts of research for each book, and he travels all around the world. And it tries to, like really see the big picture of like, human society, how it evolves over time from a really, really zoomed out position. So

Timothy Allen 00:30:54
so that particular book, then what was the overarching theme, or that you took? What did you draw from that book that changed? Changing Lives?

Pontus Lindblom 00:31:03
Yeah, it’s, yeah, it’s a look on human society and how its has evolved over time. So the third wave, the three waves, the first wave is agricultural society, and how the people live in that society with people they interact with most later, family over several generations, in a small village, perhaps, and they farmed the land, they don’t travel for, they don’t have much to exchange with others. And what that makes, to worldview, how you look at things and what the relationships are in the families and so on. And then the second wave is industrialization, as he described it. And that changes everything people move into cities. So you have a lot of people from the countryside are moving into the cities and you have factories that mass produce things and you have like split up of the family, you have like small nuclear families that move to wherever, wherever the work is available. So you can have families moving far in order to get work in the cities. Yeah, and the culture that evolves in the industrial age and in the cities, like everything is mass produced and standardised and mass consumed and so on. But already in the 1980s, when the Alvin Toffler book, the third wave was published, he could see that we’re moving in another direction towards towards more decentralisation and that is the third wave. So with

electronics, the internet I mean, he could see already where we were headed. Think.

So he made a lot of predictions about how that will change society in so many ways that people will become more independent will be able to take care of themselves. And

Timothy Allen 00:33:15
is it fair to say that what I’m taking from that is that the Agricultural Age was a was more of a decentralised age. Anyway, there’s the age of moving to the city’s centralised everything. And then it’s a movement back to teach them. Yeah, I can look at that that way. Yes, yes. Because I’ve often thought of that process as a constant thing like that probably will go on ad infinitum. That’s the ebb and flow of centralization, decentralisation Central, because they’re both forces that that it makes sense that when one strong the other one, you know it, there’s a counter force, and it goes up and down. So presumably, there’s a fourth wave. So it’s the most centralised version? What I don’t know.

Pontus Lindblom 00:34:01
Yeah, that’s very possible. Yeah. Perhaps for some AI or something that is centrally controlled.

Timothy Allen 00:34:08
Did already did you read that book? By any chance? No. Did you hear about it?

Pontus Lindblom 00:34:13
Yeah. A lot.

Timothy Allen 00:34:17
What do you think? What do you think? Like? I mean, all right, then let me ask you this. You obviously, do you take it, you believe that we’re in a third wave? Yes. And what’s your plan for the third wave?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:34:30
No, if, for me, it’s all about family. That’s how to navigate the our family boat in this changeable world. And that’s why we want to homeschool because we do see that things are getting more decentralised. And like, we can’t bring up children for a certain work type, you have to relearn during your age to because the development of the of the technology and everything in society will go so fast now. So there were their work that you perhaps want to have as a child, perhaps will not be there when you’re an adult. So you have to be able to, to learn your your whole life.

Timothy Allen 00:35:19
What about if so, according to what you said, the the initial family structure was very much with large groups of people living together. It’s like shared family like sharing, you know, you

Pontus Lindblom 00:35:36
the you had several generations under the same roof, basically.

Timothy Allen 00:35:39
Yeah. And then the industrialised age, compartmentalised all the families. So what’s the family look like in the Third Age, then?

Pontus Lindblom 00:35:48
All kinds of constellations, right?

Timothy Allen 00:35:51
So it can be anything you mean. So it is yeah, they’re not You’re not saying that the fam, the family unit that we see now is inherently wrong, when I’ve often thought you see, like, put it this way, right? I have elderly parents now. And it’s very easy for me to look at their situation and see how the nuclear family has failed them. Because where I try, I travelled a lot in Southeast Asia. And there you see many generations living together all the time. And you realise why it makes total sense. Because as you get older, you do need the support of your family, and you kind of earn it. And you especially when you have children, the elderly women especially take on that mothering role, that we don’t really it’s much harder for the nuclear family to sort of experience that. So I would say that the nuclear family has massively failed in that respect. And I I am not planning on trying to recreate that from my generation onwards, actually.

Pontus Lindblom 00:36:52
Yeah, yeah, I totally agree. I think the the way we treat our children and our elders in a lot of Western countries today is very wrong. Because we we will let the government take care of them. Both the children and young children and and our elders. And I think that is very wrong, and very harmful.

Timothy Allen 00:37:17
So are you so what are you doing to try and mitigate that then?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:37:21
And nothing? Right now we’re just we’re trying to to build our family. We have young children, so we have to focus on them. Ideally, we’ll be nice to have several generations under one roof but sweet Sweden is not an alternative alternative for us right now. So for us, the second best is to find a community for our children to grow up in and we have we have a community here in Prague. That is that is really important to us.

Timothy Allen 00:37:57
And that from my get a gather, the homeschooling aspect of that is pretty strong. Is that one of the The unifying factors of the community

Ulrika Lindblom 00:38:07
we have a very different bubbles you can say we have a Swedish homeschooling libertarian Bitcoin family bubble with children that we’re bringing up. And then we have a second bubble with the the first bubble and our friends that don’t speak Swedish, because it’s quite important for us to have our children learn proper Swedish and English, of course, but they’re having their native tongue to be taught really well is important to us. And then a second language, English. And even a third or fourth language is also less important. But so our second bubble is with the all day experts, homeschooling homeschoolers and check homeschoolers that fall into the libertarian and Bitcoin catalogue catalogue

Timothy Allen 00:39:07
categories. So, okay, I’m still interested in this third wave thing, right? Because it, you know, I’ve never heard it described like that, right? It’s very obvious that we’ve that, you know, as a traveller, myself, it’s very obvious that we’re living through the age of people moving into cities, like, everywhere you go, and I spent in particular, one place I can think of, I spend a lot of time in Mongolia. And then the 40% of the country is still no, actually nomadic people, the other 60% live in cities, there’s nowhere else to live, you know, like, and so,

Pontus Lindblom 00:39:46
and that’s the thing with the waves as well lists that you see the same pattern all over the world, but in, like, shifted in time. So United States is usually ahead, because they have had a more free society. So they are usually first in these developments. But all over the world, you see, basically the exactly the same pattern. Okay, I’ve got a couple of quest to go from agriculture to industrialization to, again, decentralisation.

Timothy Allen 00:40:20
What though, like there’s two things here. One is I’ve heard a lot of people say quite convincingly, that living in cities is important, environmentally, far more an efficient way to live. Right. Okay. I’m not saying it’s right or wrong, I just know, there’s a pretty compelling argument, for example, resources can be utilised better. I mean, I know this for myself, for example, I live right in the middle of nowhere in the countryside, and we drive around a lot. And if I lived in a city, that’s something I wouldn’t be doing. I’d be getting public transport, right. There’s the first thing the other thing is, what do you think, is driving people into the cities as well as in what was causing them to, to move to what causes that? What’s the underlying reason that that exodus of people from the countryside to the, to the city happens?

Pontus Lindblom 00:41:12
I mean, there are a lot more opportunities in cities, a lot more work available, a lot more interactions happening between people that can be fruitful in different ways.

Timothy Allen 00:41:24
And okay, then what’s driving them out? Then like yourself? I take it that you’re, is that something? You just, I mean, actually, you probably not because you are living in a city now. You know,

Ulrika Lindblom 00:41:37
if you’re asking other ProGear citizens, if we’re live in Prague, they will probably say no, because you live in Prague, according to them,

Timothy Allen 00:41:48
right? Okay. So what’s your, what’s your preferred scenario, your preferred situation, if you could just click your fingers and be in the perfect scenario for you? What would it be?

Pontus Lindblom 00:42:01
For me it would be in the countryside in a in a village with a international community of like minded families, libertarians, Bitcoiners, that all came together and decided to, like settle in the same village. Somewhere in the countryside. I grew up in the countryside, and I like nature a lot. And we both do.

Timothy Allen 00:42:25
How does so what if you, you know, I want to see how that works out. For example, What work are you doing there? How are you making a living who’s providing a you know, like, Who’s Who’s, where are you getting your food? Are you talking about living off the land? Are you talking about? You have run a business but you know, you buy your food?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:42:47
For me, it’s like, I don’t want to be living in middle of nowhere. I do like the convenience of having a city I just want don’t want to live in the city. I just don’t want to be in the outskirts or not even in in suburbia. Like perhaps A step outside of that. So it’s close to all the convenience that you can choose. So you can choose them if you want, but also be able to be left alone in a small village

Timothy Allen 00:43:15
is interestingly because this is a major part of why I even came to talk to you, because I tell me about your story with Próspera. Because this is very relevant. Now. I take it. I mean, we were just talking about where would you like to live? And what would you like to do? So tell me about your your journey, let’s say, involving Próspera?

Pontus Lindblom 00:43:43
Yeah. So I guess it started in October, when we both went to the Liberty in Our Lifetime conference, are you

Ulrika Lindblom 00:43:49
Yeah, it started a little bit earlier, because we decided that we have to look for a place to, to have us a second base outside of the EU because we feel like we don’t want to be standing with our feets to too far down in this in this land, if everything falls here. So we started, I think it was in last summer, then the idea came that we need to find somewhere somewhere to have an escape plan if the shit hits hits the fan here. Okay, so that. So it started there in the summer. So we were discussing where I’d been to Dubai, for instance, to have a look there. And we were planning to go to the El Salvador the adopting Bitcoin Conference in El Salvador. So so that was, for us an opportunity to see if El Salvador is a place for us to have us. Escape.

Timothy Allen 00:44:53
When you say an escape, are you talking about getting property? And what just having it there or what?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:44:59
Yeah, it’s do have a place to that you can go to if somebody if you need to move fast.

Timothy Allen 00:45:06
So you’re talking about needing some kind of local ID or having a having a another passport or another? They call it flag theory. Yeah. Another flag. Yeah.

Ulrika Lindblom 00:45:18
Just putting up more flags. But they don’t have to be like you have a second or third passport just to have, like a harbour see?

Timothy Allen 00:45:28
All over the world. So even just to know about these places, yes. Enough.

Ulrika Lindblom 00:45:32
Yeah. So. So we’re

Pontus Lindblom 00:45:33
just to explore the different opportunities that there are.

Ulrika Lindblom 00:45:38
So for us, so then October came in the Liberty in Our Lifetime conference was organised here in in Prague. So we both attended, we got a special deal from Peter Young. So we we could share one ticket because we were not able to go both at the same time. So we could split up today’s

Timothy Allen 00:46:01
why was that childcare by any chance?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:46:02
Yeah. So one has to be home with the kids. Yeah.

Timothy Allen 00:46:07
That’s a good idea. Was that an official ticket? Or did you just call Peter up and say, Can I?

Pontus Lindblom 00:46:12
Yeah, I emailed Peter Young and and he responded, like two minutes later and said, Yeah, that’s fine.

Timothy Allen 00:46:18
No, of course, but it’s just made me think maybe that’s a that’s an it should be an official ticket, shareable ticket, we give it we give a discount if you’re a student or whatever. So why not? If you’re

Pontus Lindblom 00:46:29
not, I can also recommend bringing the children to the conference. We have done that a lot. We did that in adopting Bitcoin Conference in El Salvador that we went to.

Timothy Allen 00:46:39
There were a lot of kids at Liberty in Our Lifetime as well. As surprised at that was quite a surprising thing for me. And

Ulrika Lindblom 00:46:47
they were a little bit older. I think you did when you were a little bit too small and too, too much growing up for our kids that are very quite young. There were people with babies, babies, it’s a different thing. They just tag along, but when did they start running? And

Timothy Allen 00:47:04
right, so you think maybe there should be some kind of play play area for kids? Right? We’ve just been looking at venues today, actually. And there wasn’t a play area there. But maybe that’s a thought. Anyway, I’ll pass that on to Peter when I see him. So going back to back to the Central America.

Pontus Lindblom 00:47:21
Yeah. So so we had decided, I think, like the spring that we wanted, or spring last year, I mean, that we wanted to go to the adopting Bitcoin Conference in El Salvador. So we went like one week before the conference, I think and

Ulrika Lindblom 00:47:42
in the end at the Liberty in Our Lifetime, we actually met Dusan Matuska and, and who else? It was one more that talked about Próspera. So I was actually at the VIP dinner and on that conference, and I sat just opposite of Dusan Matuska. And we started talking and you’d never met him up until that no, it was just by chance and we started talking about El Salvador adopting Bitcoin Conference in his mid age, Bitcoin Centre in Próspera and then like it just grew their conversation. So, after the dinner, we had planned where we had said that we will probably come to, to to attend and Próspera after the Bitcoin Conference in El Salvador.

Pontus Lindblom 00:48:36
And then at The Adopting Bitcoin Conference, we met other people that were involved with Próspera. So Ricardo Gonzalez, for instance, and Lukas Dushku, who is a friend of us through Swedish libertarian circus as well. He’s also involved in Próspera.

Ulrika Lindblom 00:48:57
He’s not involved, like involved, but he, he knew about it, and they had been there, yeah, in there. So

Pontus Lindblom 00:49:02
there he had been in contact with people there and so on. So he, he, he talked about it and recommended us to go there. And I also met a couple of other people who were also involved in Próspera in different ways. So we decided to go to Próspera in Roatan right after the conference also to be a part of the inauguration of the Bitcoin education centre there the Armitage Education Centre run by Dusan Matuska. And other people there.

Timothy Allen 00:49:39
So I’m gonna plug my last podcast because I did a I did a podcast with Dusan. And we talked all about that. So if you I don’t know what episode it is, but if you look back, you’ll be able to hear in fact, Ricardo, so we spoke to Ricardo, we interviewed a lot of people around prosper, but yes, yeah.

Pontus Lindblom 00:49:56
Yeah. So so like, everything just clicked. And yeah, also about we’re in the process of buying an apartment in Próspera as well. And that was first time was Dusan showed us. I mean, we have we had heard about the building projects, the Duna residences, but polygroup already here in Prague, at the Liberty in Our Lifetime conference. But when we were at the adopting Bitcoin Conference, do Sean showed us email he had he had been in contact with them because he was also interested in buying an apartment. Possibly,

Timothy Allen 00:50:40
this is in the tower. That’s right. Yes. Just for people that don’t know, because you’ve been there, right? Yeah, I’ve been there too. The the, in its current form, Próspera is a former resort. That’s kind of been revamped. Yes. But then, on the other side of a bay is the new Próspera, which is being built, which is currently what they call the betta building, which is where all the businesses are now originally, it had a place to stay in it. But then so many businesses wanted to move into Próspera They they basically ended up saying, right, no one can stay here. We’ll have to rent these out. And they began work on building a tower set back into the rainforest a little bit, which is currently probably nearly finished, I suppose. What’s

Pontus Lindblom 00:51:33
the time plan is started? The first tower should be finished in the end of May. Or sort of June

Timothy Allen 00:51:41
this year for moving in or Yeah. For

Pontus Lindblom 00:51:44
handing over the apartments to those who have bought apartments there. Yeah.

Timothy Allen 00:51:48
Wow. Yeah. And so and you are going in you’re buying an apartment, right? Is that right? Yeah. So talk me through that then. And I mean, I heard you’re buying it with Bitcoin. Is that right? Yes. That’s incredible. So that’s probably one of the most 21st century things I’ve ever heard. So you’re you’re a family. You’re a Swedish family living in Prague, buying an apartment in Central America in a free city with Bitcoin as pretty good as it goes, you take most of the boxes.

Pontus Lindblom 00:52:19
And I think you were heard that we were the first that were actually buying an apartment there with Bitcoin, is that but yeah, so so they have no legal tender laws, they’re in Prosper, so you can pay with different currencies? Sure. All accepted basically.

Timothy Allen 00:52:38
Yeah, the way I had it described is it’s as good as legal tender, Bitcoin in Próspera right. It’s not something that’s mandated but they’ll accept anything so

Pontus Lindblom 00:52:49
yeah, yeah. And to go back we are a family that lives on a Bitcoin standard. And for us, it means that Bitcoin is our primary currency and we’re whenever we’re not in Bitcoin land we need to exchange from Bitcoin to some other currency. So It’s much more convenient for us if we could directly pay with Bitcoin.

Timothy Allen 00:53:08
So what do you do you buy off plan? Or what? Like, how do I haven’t looked through any of the brochures of Próspera? Do you look through a brochure and say, I’d like this apartment and this layout? And

Pontus Lindblom 00:53:19
yeah, we will we were emailing with the developer. So like the last day of the doctor Bitcoin Conference, we got the contact details through Dusan. And then we are maybe we even use the formula on the on the website. Number oh, what’s up? All right, right. That’s, that’s correct. And

Timothy Allen 00:53:45
so, so you’re really and when you buy this apartment, you’re then a, you’re kind of signing a contract, right? Yeah, this is this is the how that this the free, this is how it works.

Pontus Lindblom 00:53:58
You first need to be an E residents in in Próspera. So so that’s what you need to do first before you can buy anything and Próspera. So tell

Timothy Allen 00:54:07
me how this works with flag theory, then? Because you presumably you don’t have any Honduran? Right. So or anything like that? Do you know so? So how does it work? Say Say, say the you suddenly announced that Swedish people are illegal? And you’ve got to get out? Right? So what happens you can just stay in Próspera as long as you want?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:54:33
No, we can’t. But it’s going to be we can have it as a base for for a shorter while while we continue our search. And it’s quite convenient to have. Because another thing for us to choose to Próspera over for instance, El Salvador it was the the budget that we had, so we it was much cheaper for us to buy the the the kind of apartment that we wanted in Próspera than in El Salvador. So it could have easily been that we have done this in El Salvador. For us is we can use the process like the apartment in Próspera as our base in

Timothy Allen 00:55:24
your personal question, then you don’t have to answer this. But how much apartments in Próspera? Like you can you can you don’t have to tell me how much

Pontus Lindblom 00:55:31
in the tower I think studio apartments start at $60,000. And then you have like the two bedroom apartments are up to $200,000.

Timothy Allen 00:55:40
And what happens to them when you’re not there then like,

Pontus Lindblom 00:55:43
well, they they will rent them out for us. I mean, you can be a part of like rental out agreement. So kind of a Airbnb, but they’re running it so

Timothy Allen 00:55:54
and what’s your plan, then? Are you planning on going there much?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:55:58
No. As long as it’s good here in Europe, we will use it for for the winter month.

Timothy Allen 00:56:06
Which is pretty good. Yeah. I mean, it’s lovely there, isn’t it? Yeah.

Pontus Lindblom 00:56:09
It’s Yeah, exactly. We do. Did you dive only with it? We haven’t? No, no,

Ulrika Lindblom 00:56:16
we have to set up some some kind of childcare if we want to go diving and we didn’t have time to do some dives a lot there, doesn’t he?

Pontus Lindblom 00:56:24
Yeah. And I mean, we definitely want to dive next time we go there. But we were only there for one week. So we focused on other things and we wanted to get like apartment to deal done and so on. So you

Timothy Allen 00:56:40
did you signed a deal in, in the b2b building Did you

Ulrika Lindblom 00:56:44
know we signed it? Online, they have, everything is online, they have the E governance system that you can sign contracts and where businesses

Pontus Lindblom 00:56:56
were told, like the governance platform that prosper uses is built by the same people the same team that built the E Estonia platform. And we are actually EU residents in Estonia as well since like 2017. And we’re able to

Timothy Allen 00:57:14
Okay, so what does that mean then? Was that another flag theory thing?

Pontus Lindblom 00:57:17
Well, it was while we were living as nomads and between 2015 and 2020 just to be able to work and to send bills for our work. We started a company in Estonia through a residency and that means that you can handle everything online very, very easily and conveniently.

Timothy Allen 00:57:38
Gosh, and so you really are like, you know, not proper nomadic. Kind of you do.

Pontus Lindblom 00:57:48
I mean, we try to be and we are there many

Timothy Allen 00:57:51
of you people like you out there. Probably.

Ulrika Lindblom 00:57:56
I don’t know how many but there are some people do you know what

Timothy Allen 00:57:59
I mean? Like you’re actually living the living it out, you know? There’s a lot of people that think about these things and dream about these things. But you’re on a Bitcoin standard you live in, you’ve got jurisdictions around the world that you can lean on if you need to, you know, like this is the modern nomadic is this, is this a third wave thing as well? Do you think this is one of the ways that third wave people live?

Pontus Lindblom 00:58:24
I don’t think he discussed it in such detail. But but definitely you can become much more independent on a certain state or government. As long as there are no like Corona lockdown rules that well, that’s

Timothy Allen 00:58:41
this isn’t always the thing. This is what I’m talking even about Free Cities, Free Cities are a wonderful idea. It makes total sense when you think that what’s important about a free city is that is the opt in aspect of it. Right? And we know that. But if you can’t travel somewhere, you can’t even opt in to that thing. So how, what are your thoughts on that?

Ulrika Lindblom 00:59:07
Yeah, we’ll just have to see. It’s especially for travelling internationally, if you want to leave the EU and go to North or Central America and vice versa, we It depends on how much of this vaccination passports they will roll out. So that’s why we don’t want to lean on just one flag, we want to keep it open as long as we don’t see where where the countries in the world, what direction they will take because I don’t think that all the countries in the world will go in the same direction that will be some that will go and then different

Pontus Lindblom 00:59:54
traffic in general, when it comes to different strategies you can use. As things turn more authoritarian, and so on is either you can easily move between different jurisdictions or you like settled down, maybe in the countryside and do a lot of prepping. I think we are more moving around. Kind.

Timothy Allen 01:00:21
Yeah, I know what you mean. So another personal question then, because I’m sure people are thinking about this as a digital nomad. How do you make a living? Are you living off old school Bitcoin or? Uh,

Pontus Lindblom 01:00:33
yeah, I mean, mostly, we have done some some projects in like the fields that we have studied as PhDs like medical science. And I have done some educational things around Bitcoin. In 2016, I wrote, like 100 page research report for the Swedish entrepreneurship forum. And that report turned like, came to the attention of the Head of Research at the Swedish competition agency in 2019. So I was asked to write another report about competition aspects of blockchain technology. So I did that this six months project. So So those are kind of the longer projects we have done, but Rick, she has worked for personal genomics company in Sweden. For for,

Timothy Allen 01:01:35
yeah, but these are things are these. I mean, obviously, part of being a digital No, or being a nomad these days is the ability to work from anywhere. And in fact, even when you when you bring the whole notion of lockdowns into the context. This really important because, like, for example, me, my business went to zero the moment they said, you can’t go anywhere. Yeah. Ironically, now, with something like a podcast, you can actually, you know, carry on doing it but large swathes of the population had to stop working and or go out of business during that period. So yeah,

Pontus Lindblom 01:02:15
that’s that’s why I think it’s so important also with like, Free Cities, and you start up your restrictions, where where we can kind of start over without all the this authoritarian, central planning and so on.

Timothy Allen 01:02:30
So yeah, okay, let’s carry on talking about digital nomadism. It’s just, is that what it’s called? Or is it nomadism? You’re just modern, modern day nomads. Because I, I travelled for many years when I was younger, for probably the best part of 10 years really, when you look at it on another note, it’s been years away from home, loved it, pre internet as well. So there was no we earned our money. Home and then we went away and spent it. There was no I think The most I ever did was a period of time where I was teaching English in Jakarta for for a few months, you know, to earn a bit of cash, but but there was no way to make a living. I know. Now, and this was news to me recently that there are a lot of countries around the world that give preferential treatment to digital nomads is Do you know much about I don’t know much about it. But it’s obviously a thing. But now I’ve got a family. Again, I know how difficult it is to be a nomad. It’s it’s something that strikes me as being very easy for younger people. And very complicated as soon as you get children. Yeah,

Pontus Lindblom 01:03:44
I agree with that. And that’s the reason we’re settled down in in Prague for for last almost three years as well. So

Timothy Allen 01:03:52
so your, is it fair to say that your your days of digital Your days of nomadism are over? Unless you’re forced to? And that was something you did when you were younger?

Pontus Lindblom 01:04:03
I mean, we still like to travel. And we still like I mean, the ideal situation for us would be to live, like three or four months in one jurisdiction in one country. And then, yeah, like free for different places over a year. Yeah, that will be the ideal not to stay too many months in one place.

Timothy Allen 01:04:25
And is it something you’re thinking of implementing?

Ulrika Lindblom 01:04:28
Yeah, and not right now. But that’s something that we want to work towards. But then I don’t want to write anything in stone, because you never know what will happen, just that, that is something that we will, that we’re working towards.

Pontus Lindblom 01:04:43
That’s the might go against a little bit what we were talking about before that, perhaps another ideal situation would be to be able to have, like many generations under the same roof and have your family and extended family close to you.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:04:59
But that is also if if Sweden would have would turn around, they become much more freer, then that’s the main goal, I think, is to go back and have our older elders will be living with us. And

Pontus Lindblom 01:05:17
I think also for for our community, like here in Prague, we are a community of seven or eight Swedish families with children, approximately the same age as ours. So you can say it’s a intentional community that has formed here in Prague. I mean, one reason we want to, like give the culture to our children that was dominant in Sweden, like before 1970s, perhaps that has been destroyed in the last decades. So so we are, you can also see us as kind of a diaspora from Sweden, trying to preserve like the good culture that we used to have.

Timothy Allen 01:06:01
But was that culture divided up in homes like this? Or is it more is it more of a community of people living physically close to each other? Like he’s because that’s the only the thing I’m noticing about my even my own thesis on this, which is, I consider that the best way to live is a scenario in which you are part of a small community who share the burden of many of the tasks, right. And we all know that back in history, historical humans did live like that. And there’s a reason and when you look at the modern world, you realise you can take parts of the modern world and you can kind of insert them into this way of living. But it does require physical closeness. Literally, I need to live either next door to you or in a large house with you or something. Is that something you think about?

Ulrika Lindblom 01:06:57
Yeah. And here in improv, improv, we do have most of our families that we’re talking about they live in, in a circle of is it 15 minutes drive or wood club public transportation, and a few of them will live in the same neighbourhood?

Timothy Allen 01:07:16
But what about something like Próspera? Do you ever? Do you ever think it is part of your eye is part of your dream? Not not as in? It’s part of your thesis that maybe one day you’ll be living somewhere like a free city jurisdiction?

Ulrika Lindblom 01:07:32
Yeah, may have more families that are coming with the children that our children can grow up with that shares the same values with us, then it will be much more tractable to stay there longer.

Timothy Allen 01:07:46
What are your friends here? Think about your Próspera idea.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:07:51
We haven’t a I think they’ve said like, Oh, congratulations.

Timothy Allen 01:07:56
They’re not tempted to fly over to Central America and get an apartment as well and go diving every day.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:08:05
No, I don’t. I haven’t asked them.

Timothy Allen 01:08:09
Also for them, but I mean, it’s presumably it’s something it’s something people talk about. Because if you’re if you care about liberty and freedom, and which you obviously do is to have come here, and all those families are the same, then the prospect that someone in the community has found this nice little idea, it must, it must, they must be talking about it.

Pontus Lindblom 01:08:32
Yeah, but we, we haven’t talked so much about it. With our friends here. It’s quite new. So

Ulrika Lindblom 01:08:38
we came back from Central America week before Christmas, we were here for a week doing the laundry and then went to Sweden for Christmas and New Year’s and we came back last week. So we haven’t been able to speak with so many here.

Timothy Allen 01:08:54
So it’s all going to be ready in May. And at that point, you can just go and visit any. Yeah. And shall live in your apartment. Yeah, yeah. As a as a resident as an E resident. It’s called your residence didn’t need to

Ulrika Lindblom 01:09:12
adhere to the Honduran immigration laws. So we can’t we have to. They have like the C four visa system with a few other countries. And you’re, you’re able to stay three months. So that we need to adhere to,

Timothy Allen 01:09:29
and then can you then leave and come back? Yeah. Yeah, Visa ran. But then I’ve noticed because I was in Mexico recently. And there were there’s been people doing visa runs there for years that I heard it’s getting harder. Some people arrive at the border and get two weeks instead of six months or whatever. Yeah. So what do you know about Honduras? And visa runs?

Ulrika Lindblom 01:09:51
Yeah, I think it’s, it depends on how many stamps you have, I think, and how we travel, I think us as a family, we get treated differently than if you’re a single guy coming.

Timothy Allen 01:10:02
Sure. Yeah. So what exactly then does having Próspera, E visa? What are you sorry, e residency? What exactly does it mean for you? Like, is it to do with the contract with

Pontus Lindblom 01:10:18
us? Yeah, for us, it was a requirement in order to buy the apartment, so and in order to come in to prosper, as well.

Timothy Allen 01:10:26
And that’s it. Yeah, right. Okay. So I’m driving and I’m trying to understand what the main advantages for you say, for example, why buy an apartment in prosper? Why not buy an apartment? Just down the road? On right. And in another neighbourhood? What so

Ulrika Lindblom 01:10:42
what’s the what’s the attraction? You can’t pay with Bitcoin?

Timothy Allen 01:10:45
Okay, right. There’s

Pontus Lindblom 01:10:46
one thing that’s one thing but but also the potential in Próspera with a new newly started jurisdiction with a very low taxation and governance model that makes it very easy to start businesses and do all kinds of things

Timothy Allen 01:11:03
is how much do you have to look into the governance model when you buy an apartment there? I mean, did you or do you care about that? Is it more like, for example, I heard when I when I was interviewing people there, there were there were talks about quite interesting ways of governing even property rights, such as the idea that you could buy the three dimensional space in front of your apartment rental, right? Is that something anyone told you about? Yeah, it does that exist now?

Pontus Lindblom 01:11:35
It’s supposed to exist.

Timothy Allen 01:11:37
But you don’t need to buy it. Are you going to buy a bit of space in front of your view? Or probably don’t need to do that? Right? Well, I think the building’s quite high up, they’d have to build a really big building. To spoil the view.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:11:52
It’s not so much more land in front of the sea. Yes. Okay. But to do stuff, so but,

Timothy Allen 01:11:58
but we’ll see. But that is something that you talked about, and that, you know, those kind of ideas.

Pontus Lindblom 01:12:03
I mean, for us, it’s really important that it’s located in very free jurisdiction. So the other place we looked at, before we decided to burn a partner Próspera was Dubai. So

Timothy Allen 01:12:17
um, what was your feeling? Dubai, Dubai, Dubai. Does that count as a Special Economic Zone or the what’s the attraction with divided tax incentives?

Pontus Lindblom 01:12:28
Yeah. I mean, the less regulation you have and the lower taxes you have, the more prosperous that you’re stiction that society will be. That is,

Timothy Allen 01:12:37
but what about the fact that that doesn’t necessarily a prosperous society isn’t necessarily a free society, though, is it? I mean, if you look at the Middle East, there’s there’s a lot of rules and regulations. I worked there during COVID Right. And we had a doctor that came with us because we were being tested three times a day, you know, so yes, they it’s not like they they just said come and do whatever you want.

Pontus Lindblom 01:13:00
Yeah, you have a lot of economic freedom but you In Dubai, you have less social freedom.

Timothy Allen 01:13:06
And what’s your feeling with Honduras? Then in that respect,

Ulrika Lindblom 01:13:09
let’s say that when the Próspera alternative, we got to know about it. And the Dubai alternative was less attractive for us. Yeah. But it’s still because I see it as a Roatan and Próspera again to Central and South America first. And Dubai, perhaps the port for Southeast Asia. And

Timothy Allen 01:13:35
yeah, you’re right. I agree with that. So it’s a hub. And having spent quite a few months in Central America last year, I wrote you realise that there’s something kind of going on in Central America, don’t you? Is that something I certainly picked up, especially with regards to modern ways of living, almost a lot of people flocked there during these times, mainly because obviously Mexico wasn’t, wasn’t didn’t had fewer restrictions. And then God’s gone El Salvador and the Bitcoins, the Bitcoin law and this kind of stuff, but it seems that there are a lot of people experimenting with things in Central America. Is that would you agree with that?

Ulrika Lindblom 01:14:20
Yeah. And we were, as we said, In the beginning, we were actually in in El Salvador in 2016. And it struck us when we were there, that Bitcoin would be a good way, like, like a good, solid web store would be a good place for Bitcoin to Why Why was enough? Because we were, we were just a few days. But the trouble to getting cash was, yeah, it was, it was quite hard for us to be able to even get the cash to be able to pay the locals that we were that we were interacting with, due to food and such things. But they the internet was, was good. So we never had like an internet. interruption in interruption, but but we had to go to the ATM several times per day to see if it will would be online.

Timothy Allen 01:15:19
All right. Did in 2016? Did you? Were you there long enough to get a sense of whether the country has changed a lot? Actually having been back to the Bitcoin Conference last year? Yeah.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:15:31
It has changed a lot.

Pontus Lindblom 01:15:32
I mean, we were in in 2016. And we’re only dirt roads and Chuck’s along the road.

Timothy Allen 01:15:41
What about the notion that El Salvador was one of the most dangerous places in Central America? Did you sense that when you were

Ulrika Lindblom 01:15:48
there? It sounds a little bit but we were because it was so dangerous. We just stuck to the, to the, like, hubs for for tourists, right. And now, when we came to LA last year for the conference, we rented a car and just went around the country with no light and just stopped where we wanted. The we asked one of our El Salvadorian local friends, if we were if it’s if it were one, if it were places in El Salvador that we should not going to with carb, and oh by car and she don’t this place she mentioned was this soya Pango. I don’t even know where that you know, it’s like a suburb to San Salvador. Okay, and where are they? I think we were there. And we were in in Salvador when they went in with the military like 10,000 military and police officer to arrest

Pontus Lindblom 01:16:45
gang members.

Timothy Allen 01:16:47
When was that? This this recently? Yeah,

Pontus Lindblom 01:16:49
it was in November,

Ulrika Lindblom 01:16:50
November, beginning of December.

Timothy Allen 01:16:52
So what’s your opinion on what’s going on in El Salvador? Then? Obviously, there’s two sides to the story. I

Pontus Lindblom 01:16:59
mean, the President and I Bucha is, I mean, it’s very authoritarian when it comes to dealing with the gangs, but I think that’s necessary. I mean,

Timothy Allen 01:17:12
I know it’s an it’s a tricky, it’s a tricky thing to think about. How do you how do you how do you level that out in your own minds, then? What makes you think, Okay, this is good.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:17:26
For me, it’s if you want to have a libertarian society, you need to everybody in that society needs to be on board with it. And most of the people in the world are not able to, to board that kind of society right now. And a lot of them perhaps in the central market would like to board like a communist society, not a libertarian. So, looking at El Salvador, I think that they need to do what they need to do because they have been going that pathway you In the criminality and no trust society and, and violence for so long, they need to do something.

Timothy Allen 01:18:12
Well, I mean, that’s how I’ve sort of made my peace with the situation is I have yet to meet a local person there who didn’t think it was a good thing. And in it and who else am I supposed to talk to about this? You know, like, and I’ve been spend a lot I’ve spent almost three to two months there, you know, and met a lot of people and I’ve not yet heard. And that may be because people are scared to even say they don’t like what’s going on. But but, you know, that’s a good enough barometer for me. That doesn’t mean I trust the Kelly any more than I trust anyone in a position of power. Like that. But But I do trust the opinions of the real people on the street to whose lives are now imagine immeasurably better. Sure, I didn’t meet anyone who was wrongfully arrested, or, you know, so but, but I suppose you have to, you have to think of it as a net gain or a net positive. That’s but but yeah, I think it’s not something that is an easy thing to think about. But I’ll tell you why. Because in the Philippines had a similar situation, you know, details matter. And he was also in the news, he was portrayed, much in a much worse way, I suppose, even then vocally. And the violence was much more obvious and out in the open, but still, on the whole. I know a lot of Filipino people. And I’ve worked with various Filipino people. And once again, it was a case of the average person on the street, generally thought what was happening was a good thing. But I know, but he’s still, you know, is a tricky one. Because because I don’t know what the correct answer is. I mean, if I look at it, in my own essay, I was in the place where I have domain, which is in my family, you know, if someone was being rowdy and destroying the family unit, I would have no problem in using physical force to stop them doing. If you scale that up to a, a nation state, the same thing is true necessarily. So I I’m, I’m I’m tentatively watching it thinking. And at the moment, the barometer says it’s okay. It’s good. People are people are benefiting from this, the vast majority of people seem to be benefiting from this.

Pontus Lindblom 01:20:48
Yeah, that’s, that’s what I what I think as well, from what I’ve heard, from just from the local population, and how it is visiting, they’re, like, everyone were super nice and friendly. And everything seemed calm,

Timothy Allen 01:21:04
where you can imagine yourself at home in the same situation. You can imagine living here and having a problem with the gangs. You wouldn’t mind if a heavy handed government came in and sorted the problem out, would you? It does seem to go against some some core ideas, though, that a lot of libertarians hold. So I don’t know. I’m I’m still looking further. Like I say that my barometer is, Are people happy with what’s going on? And how many of them are? And my experience of El Salvador has been most people have? Well, everyone, but then obviously, my, my, I mean, where to set is not

Pontus Lindblom 01:21:41
we don’t know how it’s how it’s going to turn out. So we

Timothy Allen 01:21:45
just oh, you would imagine that if, if, and if you can, if you can, if you if you roll with an iron fist, it doesn’t really matter who you’re rolling against. In this particular incident. Yeah, the bad guys are getting the iron fist. But you would assume that in the in the future, the good guys get the Iron Fist as well. I don’t know.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:22:03
It can it can turn and you see that with the Honduran government, like the last President made the those changes in the laws that they see the economical free, sounds good, they start to exist, and now they’ve changed the government, and they are not so fond of prosper and the other CD so.

Timothy Allen 01:22:25
So that Well, that brings us on to the interesting point of democracy. Because the problem there is the democratic process. The UN, I think this is what was one of my takeaways from visiting Próspera was that with Próspera, you sign a contract, and that’s, there’s your contract. There’s your agreement. You don’t vote in and out, you vote once you vote, and then the next time you vote will be when you leave because you no longer want to stay there.

Pontus Lindblom 01:22:54

Timothy Allen 01:23:06
That presumably though, if that idea gets too much traction, the powers that be are going to stop people moving. Because and I mean, we’re seeing that now. We’ve actually just all of us lived through a period of about two years where people couldn’t vote with their feet, unless they Well, they could actually, that’s not true, because I did. A lot of people I know did, but we were we were being very strongly disincentivized to. So how do you see the future? They’re like, Have you got any ideas about? Where whether that’s something that’s going to get worse or better? Or where are we moving in that sense?

Pontus Lindblom 01:23:46
Yeah, it’s probably getting worse.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:23:48
I think it’s getting worse, but I don’t think it’s going to get worse in at the same time in the whole world. So for me, it’s more like sit common in the boat, and waiting to wait to see what the what will happen. And don’t take like a panic move right now. Just see, what will different jurisdictions do and, and B be easily under move. At a time when we feel like it’s necessary to move?

Timothy Allen 01:24:24
You’re very much a contemporary prepper. You know, that word? prepper? Yeah, you know, the prepper is there normally guys that build bunkers in America and store food? This is a very much a modern version of that.

Pontus Lindblom 01:24:38
I mean, the the system in the world is super unstable, because it’s built on fiat money. And, yeah, Central Bank’s controlling, yeah, money, printing a lot of money. And, yeah, most of the money is credit, it’s a debt that needs to constantly expand in order to keep the system functioning. And private persons and businesses and governments are over their heads in debt. So,

Timothy Allen 01:25:12
so obviously, your Bitcoin, so this is close to your heart. But why does that make the world unstable? As you say?

Pontus Lindblom 01:25:20
Because it can’t continue like this? It’s, it’s, I mean, it’s just, what do you think happens in I mean, what we are already seeing as we have high inflation prices increasing because they have printed so much money. And as you expand the monetary supply, that causes the prices to increase? Okay, if nothing else changes,

Timothy Allen 01:25:43
okay. Do you have? Do you have a crystal ball, your own version of the future? Do you do? What do you see? I know you’re preparing for something? What is it you’re exactly preparing for?

Pontus Lindblom 01:25:56
I mean, the way I look at it is that it’s only a question of time before Bitcoin will out compete all the other currencies, just because it’s a better form of money.

Timothy Allen 01:26:09
And how does that future look then? So that when, when

Pontus Lindblom 01:26:12
it will probably take a long time, several decades, at least,

Timothy Allen 01:26:18
what it described the Bitcoin world describe the world sorry, under, under what you would call hyper Bitcoin isolation.

Pontus Lindblom 01:26:27
If if we are in a world of hyperbitcoinization, where everybody uses Bitcoin as their money, we have a stable, like money supply that nobody can increase, nobody can inflate. And that means that prices of everything should go down as we get more efficient in producing different things more efficient in division of labour. And, yeah, that’s the way you think things should work that everything’s becomes cheaper over time, because you have something a stable money supply to measure it against.

Timothy Allen 01:27:07
I think what my devil’s advocate would say, Yeah, but that’s a deflationary economy. Yes. And that’s bad. Because people hoard money, and everything grinds to a halt.

Pontus Lindblom 01:27:17
I mean, we wouldn’t have the, like, mass consumerism that we have today. We would have people that think for the long term and like sound investment of their money. If they’re going to use money, I mean, they will also always consume what’s necessary. But they will not over consume on things that they don’t really need, just in order to get something for their money because before the value of it depreciates.

Timothy Allen 01:27:51
I want to talk a little bit more about what other ways you’re preparing. Is there anything that we haven’t talked about that you think is an important way to prepare for Say you’re somebody who cares about liberty, you’re someone that kind of wants to be left alone. What is it, they should that you should be thinking about?

Pontus Lindblom 01:28:16
I mean, you should probably think about privacy protects your communications. And a lot of people in our community and day in, they’re very privacy focused, all of the communication that we do online, all the photos, we put online, all the social interactions, we have three different social networks, it’s all being registered, and like kept in big databases in different parts of the world. And only if you sometime in the future became a problem for the government, they can just check in those databases and dig up whatever dirt they need on you, in order to control you if you become some kind of political opposition in the future. And also, the problem is that all databases leak. So

Ulrika Lindblom 01:29:08
it’s also this can happen quite fast, because you have this four years, or five year cycles where in democracy. So in one term, you have like the, what you consider the good guys, but the the next term is going to be the ones that you consider the bad guys in doesn’t matter if you’re left wing or right wing, or whatever your political view is, you will always have harder under the rule where that is the bad guys, for you. So if they have all the databases, with all the informations of you, then you will not be so eager to go against them if they the bad guys can crush you.

Timothy Allen 01:29:53
Right? So don’t become an enemy of the state, is what you’re saying. I’ve watched it even in the last five years, so many people I know have become enemies of the state, and they were just normal people living their lives. And, you know, one can only presume that it does get worse from here, before it gets better. Are you hopeful about the future? I mean, go let’s go back to this first, second and third waves. What did Alvin say about the third wave? Did he was he positive?

Pontus Lindblom 01:30:29
I don’t think he said much about that. He only like explained the possibilities, new ways of living. He didn’t talk so much about the political conflicts, that will be the result, I think, and

Timothy Allen 01:30:43
so I go on, then are you Are you positive? Do you do you have Are you enthusiastic about the future?

Pontus Lindblom 01:30:52
I am. I’m I’m very positive, but it’s probably my nature to be optimistic. We have a lot of friends that are very pessimistic about the future

Timothy Allen 01:31:08
is easy to you know, you just have to look at the situation. And it’s very, I mean, I’m not I’m not I’m a pragmatic person, I don’t I look at what’s going on and say and see what’s happening to the best of my abilities. And it does appear like, for example, the social credit system, and Central Bank, digital currencies will happen. And it’s very easy to predict what the world will be like under that system. Z because you can, if you know enough about technology, which we probably all do, and you know enough about how you can implement that on such a large scale. It doesn’t look good for everyone. Yeah, you know, and totally, yeah, so come on, make make me positive. I’m, I am the same. I have an innate optimism about the human spirit, mainly because I you see it everywhere when the darkest moment there’s always more incentive to sort of shine a light, isn’t it? And you could argue we’re somewhere near pretty dark moments. I mean, not not anywhere near how dark it could get for sure. Because, you know, but but that as things centralise the decentralising force, and, you know, obviously, bitcoins of phenomenal decentralising force, that there was a result that came as a result of, you know, what’s happening in the world. So, so there are many other things growing out of this situation that I can only assume will balance out the equation, let’s say, yeah,

Pontus Lindblom 01:32:48
hopefully, we need a lot of people to opt out of the current system of the of the current government systems.

Timothy Allen 01:32:58
So what if, what if people just don’t have it in them? What if people aren’t bothered about opting out? though, let me let me ask you this, right? Because I had to think about this during the all these things that have happened to us over the last two years. So the choices we had to make, there was a lot of pressure to conform wasn’t their masks, vaccination, this, you know, COVID passes. You know, all those things it was there was very much a, and there were, if you were someone who didn’t believe in it, any one of those things, you had to try really hard to resist it because the path of least resistance was conformed to the conforming, wasn’t it? Very, very easy. And unfortunately, most people did conform. Everyone, in the case of many things, like masks was one of them. I knew a lot of people that thought masks were a silly idea, but just wore them anyway, because it was it was just just to keep are the same. But vaccinate, yeah, the vaccination to travel people didn’t didn’t believe in the vaccine, but it took the vaccine and a way to just to facilitate things. Yes. And then when

Pontus Lindblom 01:34:09
even now the lot of science show that the vaccine may cause a lot of harm. Just because they took the vaccine just because they obeyed already, they are not ready to to, like criticise their own actions.

Timothy Allen 01:34:26
Okay. But the point is they did what made their life the most easiest. So And where’s the, where’s the optimism there then, because I didn’t see many people choose the uncomfortable path of doing what they actually believed in.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:34:45
Here in our neighbourhood. It was a different situation, I think when the Czech government put out the military to keep people from going through between districts and the mosque was enforced, like as soon as you stepped out of the door, the first day, I was quite afraid when that law came into place. So I went out with the stroller with my, with our daughter just to see what our neighbourhood would react. And I was gladly surprised that most of them didn’t wear most, even though it was the mandatory mandatory this day. And then we were out in the playground with other families, just next to a police station in the police came out and throw through some trash. And he saw that we were several families playing without mosques in the playground, and he didn’t care. So

Timothy Allen 01:35:39
is that something to do with a recent history of authoritarianism do you think, because obviously, we don’t have that in the UK. And people conformed, just like that.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:35:50
And it’s also different in different areas of Prague. So if I went to another district here in Prague, the the people, the number of people that were, like, complying, were incredibly high. But in other areas, especially outside of Prague, and didn’t, so we could actually go to a skiing resort here in the, in the Czech Republic, when the the law said that we had to, that they think it was not like seem possible, but you had to be showing a PCR test or something I do believe but then the low the village here in the northern, northern Czech Republic, the whole community was against it. So the police were on the community side. So this, the hotels were open, and we could go, we could go and and

Pontus Lindblom 01:36:49
also, if you’re larger, larger gathering of people, you could say that it was for a political meeting. So you had to sign the list that you’re on this list for the political meeting, then they couldn’t stop you from gathering.

Timothy Allen 01:37:03
Which is like as our we say, that’s out the frying pan into the fire. That’s like you still have to report what you’re doing. No,

Pontus Lindblom 01:37:10
not really, not really report, just if the police showed up, you could show this protocol.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:37:15
You still have to loophole like the real name, you just do a signature?

Timothy Allen 01:37:22
Sure. I’ve noticed there we wouldn’t almost been talking for two hours. And that’s that’s very long time. So and you keep them to pop off to I can hear them again in the background, the kids. Let’s I’ve got one more question. Do you want to go into all that? I’ve got I’ve got one more question before we end so because we probably should, but I’d quite like Rica to to answer as well. This is something we ask everyone at the end of the at the end of the podcast. Everyone has a different answer. But I’d be interested to hear yours as with everyone else. This is a hypothetical situation in which If you have something like a sabbatical, which is, during this year of a sabbatical, you don’t have to worry about money, you have access to money. So you don’t you can do whatever you want. During that time. What would you decide to do during that year? If if money was no object, and you could take off a year?

Ulrika Lindblom 01:38:33
I would, I wouldn’t change anything, frankly. Because I would like to have that kind of, of living situation permanently. So during that sabbatical year would still work, to learn to work to do this temporary sabbatical year into a permanent life.

Timothy Allen 01:38:59
But what but that might be that you would, you know, build a community somewhere.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:39:05
Yeah, it would be like we’re doing now like, connecting, try to find people and connect with people all around the world and travel to meet with them. I’m still working on our, our base here in the in Czech Republic.

Pontus Lindblom 01:39:25
Yeah, I agree. It’s, it’s pretty much what we are doing. I mean, we should be doing that. Otherwise, we’re doing something wrong. Because I’ve always got sorry. No, because we don’t really, we don’t really have something else that requires our attention. Besides what we really do want to focus on.

Timothy Allen 01:39:48
I’ve always thought that this age we live in now was the age when virtual communities started to manifest in real life, which is kind of what you’re describing. And it’s really happening for me personally, because prior to the lockdowns, I didn’t even really have any online friends. It’s weird. It wasn’t that long ago. And now, most of my friends I know, are from online. So you know, and I suppose this speaks to what we were talking about earlier about, you know, the reaction to certain pressure is the is the birth of something else. And I have noticed so many people who are connecting now with their, their contemporaries online in real life, which is it sounds like you’re doing something similar here. But maybe you’re you’re moving it forward into a rather more global version of that. I don’t know. Yeah. Would you say that’s true? Yeah,

Pontus Lindblom 01:40:52
that’s what we’re exploring.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:40:54
Right now. Our children, they are so young. So we have to do work in a slower pace because of our family situation.

Timothy Allen 01:41:05
But do you? Do you have any advice then for people who may find themselves thinking the same kind of thoughts? They are a family living in a country and they’re not happy about the future, necessarily, or they see red flags, let’s say what would your advice be?

Ulrika Lindblom 01:41:29
It depends on what kind of person you are. But we have friends that are working towards making a circular economy in another country work some people want to be nomads, so they are just always on the run and just what what kind of thing is best for you. So either being be a prepper or vote with your feet.

Timothy Allen 01:41:55
So when you say a circular economy, you’re talking about a Bitcoin circular economy, okay,

Ulrika Lindblom 01:41:59
Bitcoin circular economies, we have friends that are setting up in different countries. And it’s not for the on a large scale for the whole country. It’s just like in their community.

Timothy Allen 01:42:11
So you either create a nomadic future or a sedentary future but you choose which one and yeah, and what do you think yours is then?

Ulrika Lindblom 01:42:22
I think we’re in the in the middle. Just because we’re Yeah, really young children and we’ve been in the Bitcoin community for so long. So we just want to see what kind of for the, the older ones so we want to see what what the young people have Bitcoin than the new comers what they will be doing in different countries

Timothy Allen 01:42:48
will also I think you have stages in your life. And I think it’s much easier to be nomadic when you’re younger, and then it would make sense to settle down when you’re older. I found myself doing exactly the same thing. And you know, there yeah, there They both have different strategies. They’re both different strategies, but they’re both important.

Ulrika Lindblom 01:43:07
And we were actually nomads with our first child up until she was one and a half. And it worked really well. So we had an international pregnancy insurance so we could choose which country I wanted to give birth in. And so I was in week 26, when we decided that we should give birth here in Prague. But we had other options, and we went to different locations to see if this would be a place. Good enough to welcome our first child. And then when she was born, we continued but in to move. So in a much slower pace. So she actually started, she learned how to walk in Netherlands. And she’s started to crawl here in Czech Republic. So have you like different?

Timothy Allen 01:43:56
Have you just quickly, have you got an opinion on the idea that if your children don’t grow up with a I can hear them growing up in the background? Is that yours?

Ulrika Lindblom 01:44:11
Is that outside? It’s our neighbours. Okay.

Timothy Allen 01:44:14
I’ve often wondered whether children that don’t grow up in the same place have have feel slightly more insecure. Do you think there’s any truth in that? Because they don’t have the my answer to it has always been well, as long as your family unit is secure. You kind of take that with you wherever you go.

Pontus Lindblom 01:44:33
I think later on that you said that, yeah, you have a really secure within your own family than you will be secure anywhere basically.

Timothy Allen 01:44:43
Okay. Well, I feel sorry to answer my own question there. But I think I’m I’m noticing that the children are probably going to put an end to this but there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s been it’s been two hours. I wasn’t imagining we’d be talking for two hours but Thanks for Thanks for coming on. It’s it’s been really interesting and good luck on Elric has not even here. She’s She’s with the children.

Pontus Lindblom 01:45:11
She’s coming back.

Timothy Allen 01:45:12
She’s coming back. Okay. Yeah, we were going to knock it on the head, I think is a good time. But yeah, thanks for talking and good luck with everything. I, I’m going to talk much more privately about all this stuff, because I think it’s phenomenal and really interesting. And it’s it’s a it’s a contemporary culture of people that probably you’re at the sharp end of the wedge with the way you’re doing it. But probably in the future in the not too distant future. There’ll be a lot more people. Yeah, yeah. I think so. Good luck. Thank you. Thank

Pontus Lindblom 01:45:46
you very much.

Timothy Allen 01:45:47
Thanks for coming on.

Pontus Lindblom 01:45:48
Yeah. Thank you.