Happy New Year to all the travel fanatic readers! This blog post is coming to you later than usual as I celebrated New Year’s Eve in the worst best possible way by staying awake for 23 hours straight. However, lets save that story for another day, another blog post. First of all you may be thinking why is Jenny not talking about the 5 women in her life rather than 6. Most lists come as numbers like, top 3, top 5 or top 10. What can I say other than those numbers are too mainstream for me? Just kidding, a random fact about me is that the number 6 tends to follow me around so here they are in no particular order the 6 travel-inspiring women in my life! I had great conversations with each of them as I asked them what travel means to them.

Claire

I met Claire in my previous laboratory job, she instantly became that work bestie/work mum for Ellie and I (More on Ellie later). Now, I know Claire may not understand to what extent she quite literally saved my life but she well and truly did. I had found myself dealing with some unexpected trauma at the time and a lot of which revolved around my career choices, my lifestyle choices and especially how much money I was putting towards travelling. Everyday on shift in between our samples, every talking moment was spent on past and future trips with her. Claire and her storytelling was my escape and my inspiration. My favourite country in the whole wide world is Jordan and it’s all because Claire encouraged me to go. She ignited something in me that reinforced to me that I wasn’t crazy for living life the way I was. This was Claire’s gift to me without her realising she was giving it, a gift that I will carry with me till the end of my days.

Claire has travelled to an impressive 57 countries so far. Claire embarked on a backpacking adventure in her youth by visiting 16 countries in the span of 11.5 months! It would have been a full year of travel had she not come back in time for Christmas to surprise her family! To Claire ‘travel is a way to relax'. Now that she’s a mum of two, its more so relaxing once she’s at her destination rather than the buildup of planning beforehand for the whole family. She explained how travel is an escape from the monotonous routine of daily life and in her younger years she also used it as an escape to run away from issues in the past. I’m sure I can speak for a lot of us and say that we can relate to the escapism when it comes to seeing the world and taking a step out of our realities. Claire told me that she didn’t really face hardships from anyone when she chose to prioritise travel, but it’s always something that’s going to be important to her. More important than having a bigger house, nicer car or spending money on materialistic things! As passionate as Claire is about travelling, she says that with age she now prefers to have a base that she can come back to after her holidays. Being a mother of two also means that Claire wants her children to see the beauty of the world, not only the different landscapes and architecture but also to have them experience the diversity of people and their cultures.

Ankita

Ankita is my cousin from India, who always had a vision to work in the aviation industry. She now lives in Doha, Qatar because she chased her dreams and is now working as a flight attendant. With no surprise, she has been to over 60 countries since kickstarting her career. Ankita says that ‘Travel is therapy to my life’ and she thoroughly enjoys waking up in different countries each morning. Ankita inspires me to travel because as an Indian woman she also experiences somewhat of the same troubles I do. In her own words ‘People tend to judge my job profile at times due to their sick mentalities without even knowing about the A in aviation’, but she doesn’t let anyone stop her from being herself and living out her dreams. This resilience has come from having no other choice than to set boundaries with unsupportive family members and even as far as cutting out some narrow minded individuals completely. I take so many leaves from Ankita’s tree because she reminds me that women like us don’t have to justify anything. We don’t have to justify our dreams, growth or career path, especially when you are faced with people who even with justification will never understand or be convinced. I’m learning from her how to stay unbothered by unsolicited opinions and judgment. Ankita has fortunately found her circle of people who she calls her own and is grateful to be surrounded by people who understand her.

Gita

Gita is my aunty and she is someone I look up to as she is a woman who has and always will give travel a priority in her life. She has visited 22 countries so far and she has revisited many of these countries more than once. To my aunty, travel means literally ‘the world to me’. She talks about how living a life of travel has meant that she has had many different cultures and traditions exposed to her. This taught her to appreciate, understand and respect different ways of life and other people’s perspectives around the world. She used to work at a travel agency for many years and this is where she gained knowledge about all the countries. This job sparked the motivation to actually go and visit some of these countries she once only saw behind a computer screen. Fortunately for my aunty she had immense support from family on her side and also friends who encouraged her to expand on her travelling. A pivotal moment my aunty went through was losing her mother, who was aged 59, and in her words she portrays how that loss ‘really made me open my eyes and realise that life was too short’. So, after going through periods of mourning, she hoped onto a flight and restarted and embraced her love for travel. I have always enjoyed sitting in my aunty’s living room and looking through her travel albums with her and she is an amazing story teller too. I’ve noticed with people who have been bitten by the travel bug, that when they recall memories in storytelling, there is a sparkle in their eyes and their demeanour. My aunty Gita now has a 12 year old daughter who has already visited 9 countries, a few of them more than once, and she hopes to pass down the love of adventure to her. Gita explained to me the importance of her daughter being able to not only experience different cultures, but to also learn gratitude in knowing how fortune she is already to have the privilege of travelling.

Ellie

Ellie is my work bestie from the same laboratory job where I met Claire. Ellie and I got on like a house on fire from the initial meeting. We were the only two women in our lab who were in their 20s and so we related on many things, especially the sending of work-related memes to each other about our not so great workplace. Not only did we bond due to our job escapism from our shared humour, but also our love for travelling. Sometimes what’s worse than a relationship heartbreak is when that one work best friend who gets you through all your days and is the reason why you didn’t quit your job, decides to leave!!! Ellie finished university and was doing this job for a year to save up for her long term travelling before she returned back to the UK and looked for a more degree-related role. A year took no time to fly by and she left the lab role and went onto her 8.5 month backpacking trip across the globe with her partner. Ellie has been to 26 incredible countries of which 15 countries she visited whilst on her big backpacking trip. In her own words she told me that ‘traveling is my way of feeling free and escaping the pressures of everyday life. It’s a way of experiencing other cultures, and viewing beautiful places you would otherwise only see on TV’.

When asked about what hardships she encountered by picking a travel-heavy lifestyle, fortunately she said she was fairly supported by friends and family. However, the hardship she faced was budgeting for the entire trip and having to cut her trip short by 2 weeks. I appreciate women like Ellie who talk about the raw and harsh realities that come with travelling because it’s not always going to be rainbows and butterflies. The other thing she spoke so honestly about was not having your own space when travelling with another person as you find yourself 24/7 in their company. Although, now that she’s on the other side of it all she believes that her and her partner are now stronger than ever for it having faced these new challenges. After all, you know what they say, that you don’t truly know someone until you start living with them. When I left the UK, Ellie, Claire and I had a final meet up in which Ellie said to me “this isn’t goodbye because I’ll be seeing you in Australia soon”. I patiently wait for the day Ellie and her partner move to Australia so that the four of us (I moved here with my boyfriend) can all live together and split the cost of rent haha!

Indu

Not many of you know this, but I used to work as a nanny and that’s when I met the sweetest woman called Indu and her even sweeter 3 children whom I looked after. Prior to starting working at her house, I had not even the slightest clue that the couple I was going to work for were big travellers! I vividly remember the first day I went to Indu’s house and whilst she was giving me a house tour, we entered the kid’s play room. My eyes lit up in complete awe as this room had one entire wall wallpapered with the world map and the consecutive wall filled with photographs all perfectly labelled by where in the world they were taken. In that very moment I knew I just belonged here and this was going to be a home away from home.

Indu has been to 25 countries and in her words said ‘for me travel is adventure. Travel is excitement. Having studied architecture, travel means much more to me as I get to see all the historical monuments I only ever saw in my books’. Indu inspires me a great deal because she too has faced typical brown women issues in her life because she chose a life of travel. As I spent more and more days with her, I established that she isn’t your standard Indian woman. Thank heavens to modern women like her who carve the path to follow for us younger women who also undergo these typical brown girl tribulations. We had many heart to heart conversations where she shared with me that because of her background, she was expected to grow her family soon after she got married. It’s societal and familial pressures as such that are the root to why so many women feel obliged to put their own dreams on the back burner or even worse…the trash can! Luckily for Indu and her husband, once they had the honest conversations that they wanted to explore the world first for a few years, it enabled their families to accept their decision. A brave move like that bought Indu and her husband 7 whole years of travel before their first born. Now that she too is a mum just like Claire and Gita, Indu wants her children to be inspired to travel when they grow up. She wants them to be exposed to many cultures so they learn to appreciate it. Indu wants them to ‘live the history of the world rather than just reading about it’ and she strongly believes it would help them grow more as humans.

Summer

Now this person is one of my newest friends since moving to Sydney. I guess by now you have established that I just keep attracting travel minded people wherever I go! I guess it’s also a sign that I’m exactly where I need to be and I’m on the right path that looks right just for me. Summer is turning the big 50 in 2024! She has already been to 10 countries and of the ones she’s visited she’s been to some more than once, some even 4 times! When asked what travelling means to her she told me that ‘it means complete freedom. I feel like I’m a better version of myself, I’m less self conscious too’. She also added that ‘the freedom I feel when I travel is priceless and it’s better I must say as a solo traveller even though it can get lonely, but being able to travel still outweighs it’. Summer shared with me that in her younger years she faced hardships but it wasn’t due to her travelling, in fact, she wishes it was that reason. Summer inspires me the absolute most in these present days as she’s about to embark on a fascinating journey. After 27 years of working in the same place, and not being able to travel when she was younger, she has finally handed in her notice and is leaving Australia to start a life in Turkey!

Now, I ABSOLUTELY adore people who quit jobs to travel. The people who are brave to stray from the norm or from expectations set onto them. With Summer, the inspiration I get from her is unique because she doesn’t fit your typical mould. She isn’t married or has children so she is completely now doing this thing called life for herself. So many women get caught up in a life where they are always someone’s somebody. Women are labelled as someone’s daughter, someone’s sister, someone’s wife or someone’s mother. The list goes on where women are having to fulfil many roles and duties to everyone else around them and actions like these are more often than not admired upon by many cultures. So when I met the woman that summer is, I immediately became her biggest fan whether she knows it or not. In Summer’s own words she explains ‘I will be turning 50 this year so I wanted to gift myself something I’ve always wanted to do in my teens but never had the opportunity’. Starting over as big as she is by picking up her life from the only place she has known to be home and moving it across the globe is bravery at it’s finest! Summer also inspires me because she is a reminder that there is more to life and it doesn’t just come to an end even when society makes it look that way! Unfortunately, a lot of us women in this lifetime are made to feel that if we don’t achieve everything in our 20s and 30s that we are well and truly doomed. Women like Summer are a reminder that as long as there’s breath in the lungs, its never too late to chase any dream!

I hope your heart was moved in some ways after reading this lengthy but wholesome blog post. To the people who want to live a life of travel and also have the privilege to do so, please do not stop. Do not stop until you are satisfied and until you reach a stage where you feel you’ve achieved your version of success. It doesn’t matter if your definition of success looks different than others. What matters is that you stay true to yourself because you only get to be your self in this lifetime. Go fourth and travel until your heart’s content and be wary when taking advice in life from someone who’s not trying to travel in the direction that you are travelling in.

In a world where so many people tried to control and define me by saying I should be doing this or I should be doing that, I only have one thing to say… this Jenny travels.