North Carolina Travel Photojournalism {Gujarat India}
To know me is to know my strong desire to travel. I am an adventurous soul, seeking out foreign lands, unknown cultures and any opportunity to explore. Simply traveling with only what I can get into my backpack and my two feet.
There is something about an adventure in a new place that awakens parts of me that otherwise I would never know. I grow each and every time and with that comes more wisdom and peace within and with this world that surrounds me.
I have traveled quite a bit in my life. As a young child my family and I would drive across country countless times. I grew up here in North Carolina, but with a father from California we couldn’t stay away for the west coast for too long at a time. I came to know the open road and all the States quickly as we traveled back and forth between our two “homes”. In addition to road trips, I would hike the Appalachian Trail weeks at a time in the summers as a teenager. It wasn’t a big deal to backpack 12-15 miles a day as we crossed the ridges of the mountaintops through Virginia. Once I was an adult, I took any opportunity to travel. I have made my way through Europe, Cuba and several of the islands (Jamaica + Bahamas).
So how did this opportunity to India arise? Let me introduce you to someone phenominal…
This is an image of a woman holding a shoe, which needs to be repaired. This shoe has walked her literally around the world. She (with serendipity on her side) has made it to every continent with these shoes on her feet. She saved India for last. She invited me, her great niece, to join her. Her name is Jackie and she is without doubt one of the most amazing people I have ever known. Jackie is my match when it comes to adventure. In her lifetime, so far, she has lived with the hobo’s jumping trains, and was named the HOBO QUEEN, Gypsy Moon. She started a hospital in Belize. To this day, she lives in a place she calls “Freedom Forest” where she built herself a little home, with an outhouse and she lives so contently. This woman tells a stories like you wouldn’t believe. I find myself sitting at her feet like a little child hanging on to her every word. To spend this time with her was not only an honor, but a gift. Although we knew one another as family, we have never spent time together as adults. Neither of us knew exactly what to expect. We knew one thing-we were both adventures and off the beaten path kinda folks. We ended up having the time of our lives. We took India by the reigns and absorbed every drop it had to offer. We talked about everything under the sun and every night we’d laugh ourselves to sleep like schoolgirls. This trip was so rich with insight to one another and our surroundings. It could not have been written in the stars any better.
I’ve had several people ask me about the trip expecting grand excitement + stories. The truth is, this was a hard one. I am still processing the things that I saw and experienced. I am going to be honest in saying that I was naïve to what was ahead for me and even ignorant to think that I was going on a “vacation”. I was so gung ho to get on the airplane, seeing aunt Jackie, visiting a new country, I hadn’t really given anything else much thought. I had NO IDEA I was going to be on that plane for as long as I was. I stayed awake the whole time (watching four movies) thinking when I arrive (around midnight their time) I could just go to sleep and wake anew. Not the case at all. As I arrived on the native land and my car drove up to the beautiful Bungalow, there waiting for me, danced Jackie in the car lights with excitement of my long awaited arrival. It was the most amazing thing to come out of that car and into familiar arms after such a long, underestimated trip. Then the excitement came. After already being awake for some 20 hours, my adrenaline coursed strong and I could not wait to start exploring. It was hard to go to sleep and once I did, the new sounds of the unfamiliar place made for a restless nap.
My images help me tell the stories. Without them, I am still processing the experience in which I do not know I will ever fully embrace but it is strongly intertwined into my heart.
Incase your interested in the exact locations of travel, here is a map of our trek.
