Notes on traveling.

After many hours spent in transit, at airports, on the road, in a hotel, on the ghats of Benares, eating street food, walking through narrow gallis, being up before 7am every morning (miracle!) and a good solid week away from my computer, I am back.It’s going to take a couple of blog posts to describe the experience and I hope to be diligent in doing that because I really want to write it all down, lest I forget!Traveling makes my heart sing… It expands my world and my perspective in a way that no other thing on earth can do, I think. I think if you are open to it, it can do the same for you too.Here are some of my thoughts on traveling:

• Stay in a clean but non-fancy hotel. You shouldn’t be spending more than a few hours there anyway. Go explore!
• Eat local food. Try new things.
• Wake up super early (sleeping on holidays is a waste of time!).
• Walk as much as you can.
• Be silent sometimes. Be still.
• Ask questions to the locals about what they think about the city/town/village.
• Don’t go to the malls.
• Don’t eat at KFC, MacDonalds etc. (I could ramble on for a long time about how sad it makes me to see these places everywhere I go nowadays!!)
• Don’t litter.
• Use local transport.
• Don’t be constantly taking pictures if you are there for just two or three days. I know. That is maybe odd for a photographer to say, but that’s how I increasingly feel. I think if you’re constantly taking photographs, you miss out on the real experience. So I would say take pictures in moderation. Unless of course you’re on assignment or something!
• Have an open heart and an open mind, expect the unexpected and be adventurous.