What is this all about?
I have always loved New York. In the six years that I have been here, I have seen enough to love it, and I love it even more for what it has to offer that I haven’t yet seen. I enjoy living in the village, I love the cafes, the nightlife, the 24hr pharmacies, subways, diners. I love running along Park Avenue on a quiet sunday morning headed towards Central Park, whose asphalt loops contain an oasis of greenery. Or spending an afternoon in SoHo. I love the art galleries, the comedy clubs, the broadway shows, the muliplexes. And as cliched as it may sound, I love the noise, the hustle and bustle. I love the randomness of everything, the chance to find a hidden gem amidst the chaos; whether it is the chance to be a part of a TV show taping, or having a half hour conversation with the guy selling pictures he took using a pin-hole camera, or getting your hair cut by a Croatian hair-dresser before you meet your Cameroonian and Chinese friend at a Japanese sushi restaurant and then head to a middle-eastern bar and smoke a hookah!
Surprisingly, I also quite enjoy my job, selling derivatives on Wall Street, and thrive on the pace and chaos and energy of the trading floor. And yes, I do like the money I earn to enjoy the lifestyle I lead!
If you’ve survived reading through all of this so far, you may ask why- why am I taking time away from all of this to go around the world on a random trip? And that too for six months? The answer probably is that it is because of all of this that I want to take this trip. At 27, single, and limited liabilities, I know that there is a life that I enjoy and want to live, and would be comfortable coming back to. I can therefore afford, financially and mentally to pick up a back-pack and head out and wander, not because I am lost, but because I want to find more (inspiration for the above goes to a T-shirt gifted my my friends Marie and Shivin); both what’s out there in the world, and also what’s there in me. Its an opportunity to learn, to understand that there is more to life to experience, and finally, to just go out there and have a blast!!
Most of my posts won’t be as heavy as this one. Occassionaly you will find me breaking into such a reverie, but for the most part it’ll be posting about my travels, my pictures, and random not-so-occcasional adventures such as losing my address book in copenhagen and my cell phone battery dying on my way to London around midnight and not knowing the contact info of people I was to stay with and having to call a friend in New York to get the number of his cousin in London and head over to her place (via a bar) to charge my phone and then extract the number (this, by the way, really happened!)
Coming next – what can you fit in a backpack?
