- Slow-travel - how do you expect to get to know the locals? Only move to places you already know someone, or just hope to make friends once you get there? This is actually why I'm interested in a job like teaching or volunteering - gives you more options to meet people, but with FI the low pay doesn't matter.
Meet people.
We're not naturally very outgoing, extroverted people. It's something we're working on. But also, we don't necessarily need to meet a ton of people and know everybody. Think about how an introverted local might live. ;)
From the many travel blogs we read, most of them have no problems whatsoever meeting friendly locals when they live in a place for awhile (heck, a lot of times even when just passing through).
But yes, it is something we're actively working on improving.
- Teaching English as a back-up job career - how do you expect to get/be qualified for a local job? Of course, I just realized that because you're currently a credentialed teacher (with I'm sure a nice resume), that's probably different than someone like me who has no teaching experience.
Yes, it's a pretty solid fallback plan for us, as we'll have been credentialed teachers (though it will have expired by then) with nearly a decade of experience, and Master's Degrees in teaching. My wife specifically teaches English at the high school and community college level. So when recruiters are choosing people for those type of jobs, we're pretty much ahead of all other candidates (especially ones who might just have a bachelor's in an unrelated field). Those type of people can get teaching jobs too, but we'll likely have more choice and better benefits (signing bonuses, etc.).
It's an okay backup plan for most people, but we have some advantages there that make it really advantageous for us if we ever do need to earn more money.
Plus we might just do it for fun; we both like teaching quite a bit.