Back to good

There’s a song by Matchbox Twenty that talks about the sadness you feel when you are in a room with the person you love but you know deep down they are thinking about somebody else. Facebook has a weird way of reminding us of good and bad memories by bringing up old picture posts from years ago, and this is exactly what happened to me today. A picture of myself and someone I was very close to popped up on my feed, a day that was full of mixed emotions.

They say the best way to know if your relationship and friendship would last is to travel together. In those times of uncertainty when you are faced with challenges, you get to see a person for who they really are and how they react in such situations. So a few years ago, I invited my best friend to join me on a trip to Disney World, a place of imagination and fun, where you get to leave all your worries behind and just be a kid again. It was a trip I was excited about. We had been best friends for years so this trip was not a test but an adventure I had wanted to do since I was 15 yrs old and I couldn’t think of anyone else I wanted to experience it with than my best friend.

Looking back now, I realise that it was the beginning of the end of our friendship. We had some really fun memorable moments, but there were times when I felt all alone even when he was by my side. I could sense he was there physically but his mind was miles away. There were times when I felt very sad and angry at myself for believing that he was my best friend and that he wanted to be there with me.

These days when I see couples or friends sitting at a table not talking to each other, where one or both are busy on their phone texting someone else or their minds are miles away, it makes me sad that they don’t realise the moment they are missing by being present and be with the person sitting right across from them.

But I am now back to good. The universe has a strange way of giving us signs, often we are too involved and emotional to acknowledge even if they are right in front of us. It’s the fear of being right, the fear that the gut feeling you have is not just a feeling but it’s the reality of things. Do I regret this trip? no, Disney World is amazing, it’s a world where you get to immerse yourself in a place that’s designed to make people happy, where for those few hours you get to forget all your worries and everyday struggles.

At the end of the night, the Magic Kingdom puts on a spectacular fireworks. That night as I looked up the sky, all I could think was “when you wish upon a star…”, in that moment I looked at him as he was smiling at the sky and I made myself believe that he was in the moment with me, even if it was just that one moment. It was beautiful and it was magical. What I took away from this experience is that sometimes it is best to be alone and happy, than together and feel lonely.

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A sense of wonder

When you are a kid, everything feels so big and full of wonder. This is what I remember when my dad took me to London for the first time around 6yrs old. My father always tells the story about how I had horrible air sickness on the flight over and threw up all over the seats, but I don’t remember any of it. I suppose the good memories over shadowed the bad experiences I had. I remember walking the streets of London and feeling like I was in a different world; the crowd, the tall buildings, the unknown.

I remember my dad taking me to McDonalds for the first time and this became our special place – a big mac and a strawberry milkshake was my idea of heaven at the time. It’s amazing how certain memories stick with us and triggers a passion that I have yearned for my whole life. My dad instilled in me a sense of wonder, he made me want to know what was out there, he showed me that the world was a big place just waiting to be discovered. He also made me see that even 15000 miles across the ocean, there was another living world unbeknownst to me and the beauty of diversity. My father gave me a taste of this magical experience called traveling that has never left me to this day.

When I step into a new city, a new country, I hear a different language being spoken, the air smells and feels different, the history surrounding me; I get a feeling of excitement that I cannot explain. A curiosity for the unknown, the gift of adventure and learning. I close my eyes in a strange place I have never been to before, and I feel happy, safe and it feels like home.

And so the journey begins…

Hello there, thank you for joining me.

I am not sure yet what I want this page to become, but as a solo traveler, I often have a lot of time to myself to think. I always have a million thoughts, stories and experiences that I wish I could share but I never took the time to write them down. I want this page to be not just a travel diary but a place I can share my daily thoughts and musings about life as me.

I am here to learn from my own experiences, mistakes I have made, people I have met and moments that sometimes are too beautiful not to share. My hope is that maybe one day, someone just like me in search of some answers will stumble upon this page and see that they are not alone.  I hope this page achieves all that but also maybe help others who can identify themselves in my posts on their own journeys of discovery.

“Not all those who wander are lost.” … J.R.R Tolkien

Picture taken at Hobbiton movie set at Matamata, New Zealand.