Snapchat: Give Me 10 Seconds, I’ll Show You the World
When I first heard about Snapchat, I figured it was just a stupid app for tweens, something along the lines of kik but with more sexting. I ignored it and had no intention of using it until my friend, Ellen, convinced me to give it a shot. Ellen doesn’t have a Twitter or an Instagram, so it was pretty strange to me that she was pushing Snapchat, but she explained that she used it to keep in touch with her family. At the time, I was in Mexico with Ellen and our other college bestie, Rachel, and Ellen insisted that Rachel and I download the app so we could at least send snaps between the three of us.
Snapchat keeps me connected
I was skeptical, but I live far away from Ellen and Rachel, and I missed seeing their faces, so I caved. It wasn’t long before I started interacting with them both on a daily basis. All of a sudden I had access to random happenings throughout their day, small updates about their work life, quick jokes, and funny faces. Ellen and Rachel are amazing friends, but they both admit to kind of sucking at keeping in touch, so I went from hounding them for email life updates every couple of months to getting a series of snaps at least a few times a week. Even if I only used this app to talk to my best friends from college, it would be a total win. Of course, as time went on, I started adding more long-distance friends, and even my brother, which was pretty incredible. I swear without Snapchat I would see my brother’s face once a year at best, so way to keep families together, Snapchat!
Example: I recently bought a scooter. Instead of texting my friends and family, I sent them shit like this:
Everybody come look at how funny I am!
In the beginning, I only snapped friends directly and ignored the Story function, but while on the road I discovered that Snapchat was the perfect outlet for a quirky traveler like me because I am always looking to bring humor into my travel stories. This is how I talk to/about my friends:
How I snapchat The Museum of Modern Art in NYC.
I love writing about my experiences, but not every hilarious moment is worth a blog post, but it just might be worth a 10 second snap! My humor comes through pretty well in my writing, but sometimes you just need a video. While I do use my YouTube channel to do longer pieces such as my State of Puerto Rico According to Rease Vlogs, I don’t always have the time to make quality videos. I get hung up on the filming, then the editing, and half the time my stories don’t even make it onto the channel. Snapchat simplifies all that and lets me be silly while I show people around the world.
Just look at all these things I tried and hilariously hated! Thanks Snapchat, for letting me share these moments:
Snapchat is like a mini travel channel
Once I started paying attention to Snapchat Stories, I became addicted. You know how old ladies will refer to watching soap operas as “watching their stories”? That’s how I am with travel bloggers on Snapchat. Every night, I get cozy, watch my travel stories and catch up on the adventures of friends and strangers around the world. Sometimes I snap them with tips or comments, and sometimes we end up snapping each other regularly, which leads me to my next point.
Snapchat is the best social media platform for making friends
Listen guys, making friends as an adult is hard. Making friends in foreign countries is harder. Making friends in foreign countries when you work from home is really, really, hard. I made friends fairly easily when I lived in Argentina, so I naively assumed I would be able to make friends super easily in Puerto Rico. I was all “I speak Spanish, I like beaches, I’ve used the internet to make friends before. What more is there?” I mean, not exactly like that, but for real, I was overly confident in my friendship making skills. I joined Couchsurfing and Meetup.com groups and hunted down people on Twitter and Instagram. I stalked potential friends like an absolute creepster and even went on some very awkward “friendship dates” that usually resulted in me trying to fill every single gap in conversation by blurting out stuff like “SO YOU LIKE BOOKS? ME TOO AWESOME WHAT BOOKS DO YOU LIKE? SO COOL RIGHT?!”
Again, I’m exaggerating, but the point is, I could not seem to get past “hey, we seem to have stuff in common, let’s build a friendship” stage.
Enter Snapchat
I met some people online that probably had great friendship potential, but without a solid reason to text them, whatever spark of friendship we might have had quickly fizzled out. Snapchat eliminated the need for solid motives. All of a sudden, I could add new friends on Snapchat and just send them funny snaps, show off the books I’m reading, and demonstrate my personality in a less forced, high-pressure environment. You know what happened? They snapped me back! I started getting to know these new friends though 10-second stories and weird things they found funny. I no longer had to wait until I had an event to invite them to or try to strike up a conversation like an awkward girl on a dating site. Snapchat made it possible to get to know each other in 10 second increments instead of a hour-long coffee date.
Now I can share moments like this with my new friends.
Snapchat is my favorite
Snapchat may have started out as some tween nonsense, but now it’s for real. Snapchat is a valuable business tool for me as a travel blogger and a unique way for me to keep in touch with people. It lets me enter the video world without spending hours filming and editing and it lets me interact with my friends in a much more personal way.
So if you’ve been avoiding Snapchat, I recommend giving it a try. And while you’re at it, add me. You can also find me on Ghost Codes, a Snapchat user discovery app that lets you search for users by name or by category/interests. So add me on Snapchat & give me a heart on Ghost Codes and let me show you the world, 10 seconds at a time.
