On Tuesday, Brit backpacker Jacob Stroner created a GoFundMe campaign asking readers to cough up cash to fund his travels through Southeast Asia.
The long entry, titled “Travelling disaster,” tells of Stroner’s numerous passport, visa, and flight mishaps due to a damaged passport that led to him being held in detention cells in both Suvarnabhumi Airport and a Vietnamese airport and blowing through his savings on flight tickets he could not use since his passport was not valid for travel.
He’s now back at home in Overton, England, but hopes to get back to Asia with a new passport in hand as soon as possible. And he’d like you to pay for it.
As of this afternoon, the campaign is officially trending with 181 shares — including one in popular Facebook group Everything Bangkok. But netizens don’t feel bad for Stroner and his travel troubles nor are they sending cash his way. Only 16 people have donated a total of GBP372 (THB16,348) to the campaign. The page, instead, is being shared by people making fun of Stroner for his poor spelling, punctuation, and grammar as well as their unhappiness at the idea that others should pay for the man’s travels.
Much like the recent viral story about the foreign backpackers begging in Southeast Asia, many are questioning why this man feels that others should fund his fun.
Many of the commenters on Everything Bangkok allege that it said in the original GoFundMe campaign that Stroner had torn a page out of his passport himself and that’s where his troubles began.
Whether or not that scenario is the case, it calls to mind the story of this British woman, who tore a page from her passport to use as toilet paper when she was drunk.
