The Traveler's Curse

TJ has a super power.

He is one of the only American teens with the ability to speak over a dozen languages. After he graduates high school in winter, TJ embarks on a journey with a British friend to learn new languages and explore the most exotic corners of the world. While in Russia on the eve of conflict, the boys undergo a series of life-threatening adventures and passionate side-quests in the tundra of Murmansk and the snowy metropolis of Saint Petersburg alike. However, as tensions rise in Eastern Europe, things get complicated and borders close. In this shocking memoir, TJ must learn the true cost of adventure as the world goes into chaos and he desperately tries to return to Russia again.

TJ Huizar is a 20-year-old adventurer and filmmaker from Arizona, USA. Over the course of many years, he has taught himself over a dozen languages to a high level including French, Spanish, Russian, Mandarin, Persian, and German. With these languages, he travels to unique corners of the world to search for and document endangered languages and the stories behind them. So far, his search for endangered languages has led him as far as the highlands of Armenia and the arid deserts of Egypt to the isolated reservations of the Southwest and the dense jungles of Guatemala. He documents many of his adventures on his YouTube channel, The Planet Project.