Like many of us, my journeys began in childhood, traveling with my parents. But it was not until a decade ago, in 2014, that I truly began exploring the world on my own. Starting with the easier, popular options, I eventually took the plunge to travel off the beaten track.
Off-beat—the phrase itself is too beaten now, as travel and experience-seeking have become the way of life for Indian millennials. Many try to earn brownie points over others by showing off how their experience is more unique than others.
At the threshold of the digital transformation in the travel space, I took to the outdoors, aiming more to learn than to enjoy or to share. The idea was objective: Would I believe the world to be the place as anybody else had seen and experienced it, or would I trust myself?
Yet, it’s funny that I expect you to read this collection of journals of my conversations and encounters across India. It’s not the India that I would desire you to stick by, but I would like to present my version that may intrigue you.
Most of these stories are excerpts, pages of a story half-written, left hanging in the air for you to wander. I may be guilty of irritating you at times, leaving you on a cliffhanger, or I might be expecting too much of you to be involved as deeply in the narrative while it doesn’t strike a chord with you.
But the aim of penning down this book was to share what it means to travel through the heart and mind of a person who always romanticized traveling and later found a way of life in it. I can’t say which one was better, but while the grass is always greener on the other side, it’s the one at your side that keeps you running.
You may peep into my side of the story here. I do try to facilitate you at most places—with visuals. All the photographs belong to me, and barring a few stories, most of the narratives are supported by visuals from those journeys.
So, here are my journals from different parts of India, travelled by public transport, to all places where I have stayed for less than Rs. 1500 a night, and on an average Rs. 700 per night. Here are the conversations that I had with the commoners as a commoner myself.
You might call it ethnographic research if you please, but it’s just the stories I haven’t told anyone and now I share them openly.
-Kanj Saurav
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