Rock climbing in Thailand, playing in a band in Brazil, surfing in Chile, trekking through 600 kilometres of mountain regions in Peru. Sigh! Maybe your dream, and mine. But it’s only Sachin Bhandary who’s setting out on this journey of learning. He calls himself the odd traveller, and his travel plans The 12 Project. The 32-year-old Mumbaikar who’s originally from Karnataka’s Udupi, has also got people to partially crowd fund his travel. What more can one ask for?
For starters, Sachin sets off from Mumbai on an all-India train journey on February 5, traversing Kanyakumari, Dibrugarh, Kashmir and rolling along the hill station train network too. “I am getting off the train only on six days on this 24-day journey. Geographically, I cover most corners of the country and trains are where all classes of people come together. As young Indians we need to know more about those around us,” says Sachin.
It was last year that this PR professional decided he needed to take up this challenge. But why did he want to do such a journey? “‘Why?’ was a question I had asked myself every day for a long time. I wanted to travel every day. I have travelled quit a bit already — in 2010, I backpacked across Argentina, Brazil and Bolivia for 45 days. Last year, I suggested to my mother that we backpack through Europe and she agreed, so we did — couch-surfing, living with locals, doing Airbnb (a worldwide travel hosts network). So finally, in October 2013, I decided what I wanted to do.”
Sachin then mapped out 12 things he wanted to do, one thing a month, for a year — things that would help him overcome his fears and apprehensions. “The idea is not to take a sabbatical. The idea is to put yourself beyond your comfort zone. And this is what I wish fellow-Indians would do. Our travel is usually linked to peer pressure. You travel to Paris because your friend put up great pictures of himself in Paris. But travel is far more real in what it can teach than a classroom. I hope to build a community of travellers who will help one another. Most people have similar ideas but no reference point to do it,” says Sachin.
An amateur blogger, he’s also going to record stories of his travel and share impressions of the people he meets. After India, he’ll head to Sri Lanka looking for stories of Tamil-Sinhala friendship. “I’m sure they exist, but we only get to hear of the negative stereotypes.” Learning the Batucada drums in Bahia, Brazil, which Sachin says is very similar to what you hear during the Ganapati visarjan in Mumbai is another of his dreams.
Among the things on his list, is a visit to Colombia where he wants to understand the drug trade industry. “I’d seen a video online of this drug called scopolomina or The Devil’s Breath; it’s not a recreational drug but something used for crime. Everyone’s advising me against this stretch of my travel, but I’m not an investigative journalist; I will seek information on the streets, by meeting up people in the region.”
His morbid fear of water takes him on surfing lessons in Chile and scuba diving in Costa Rica. Then he goes to a Mexican village to learn cooking so that he can broaden the narrative that’s stuck at nachos and tacos. He’ll be in Puerto Rico to learn to Salsa, and then do a cycling tour from New York to New Orleans — a 2,000 kilometre stretch — to get a different view of the country we love to hate and have strong stereotypes of. “I’m also challenging myself to do stand-up comedy in New York using my travel stories. While I have done stand-up comedy in Mumbai, the idea is to see how far I can get with open mics in New York. I will go back every single night, for 30 nights, even if people don’t laugh. And I’ve never cycled long-distance before. So I cycled form Mumbai to Goa recently in preparation.”
Sachin is part of the Toastmasters network so he’s tapping in on that to find help along the way. He was recently in Bengaluru to meet cycling groups in the city and seek help from their networks. While he raised one lakh rupees from his crowdfunding effort on IndieGogo, he says he’ll surely fund the rest of the trip himself even if no one else funds him.
Soon, he also hopes to add to his site, stories from other travellers who are doing the odd travel from the world over.
You can follow his travels and stories, and offer funds, tips and links on >http://theoddtraveller.in
