Meeting Plebs Around the World
Lima, Peru
There’s a few things I look out for when I travel. Delicious local eats, stunning nature, a good cup of coffee and some nice waves.
Recently, another item has been added to my travel objectives…meeting Bitcoiners.
Depending on where you are in the world, meeting another Bitcoiner could be tough. At times, it feels like there's only 5k-10K of us. Going to Austin, Nashville, or El Zonte makes it easy to meet others that enjoy saving in hard money. However, I started my South America trip in Peru and it was quite the challenge finding another Bitcoiner.
After a few inquiries on Twitter, a random connection was made by someone who met a Peruvian pleb at Bit Block Boom in Austin last year. We exchanged a couple DMs and decided to meet up for coffee in Barranco, a cool neighborhood in Lima.
There’s always that instant bond when meeting another Bitcoiner. Someone as crazy as me who agrees on basic yet “controversial” ideas of using money that doesn’t get debased and can be sent freely.
Story Time
While in Peru, I had issues buying a LATAM Airline flight. I was getting errors at checkout (with no explanation). Through further investigation, I found out LATAM doesn't let foreigners buy tickets off their Peru based website.
If I used a booking agency or VPN, the price doubled. Wasn't willing to do that. I'm a Bitcoiner, I don't waste sats.
Here's the Fun Part!
I made the Peruvian pleb aware of my issues with LATAM and asked him for a favor. I asked if he could buy my flight using his Peruvian credit card in exchange for sats.
Bitcoin for credit? Hell ya. He gladly accepted.
Flight Booked!
We whipped out our Muun Wallets, I scanned his LN invoice and zing! My sats were now his.
No sending money to each other through banks, Venmo or anything like that. We are from different countries. It would've been close to impossible to settle digitally.
Meeting another Bitcoiner is great for so many reasons. I love not having to explain to each other the fundamentals or what the Lightning Network is. We just simply exchanged value in the most badass way possible.
Bitcoin solved an immediate problem for me. LFG. ⚡
Stack Hard Plebs.