Solo traveling the world to escape the world

In April 2019, my life was falling apart. College was stressing me out. I was embarrassed by some of the decisions I made. I was tired of giving. Tired of being kind. I felt worthless. I was not motivated or interested in anything I was doing. And all I wanted was for someone to show up for me. It felt like a dark period of my life, and one week before my Easter break, I made the abrupt decision of escaping to a place where no one knew me. Taking the tough decision of breaking into my savings, I bought plane tickets and flew across the country to San Diego, California for a week.

I had never been to the west coast before, but I needed some good weather and a change of environment. When I landed at the airport, it felt like a breath of fresh air. For one week, I could freely be myself. No one knew who I was, and it felt like a new start. But little did I know that this was going to be my most epic trip ever.

One of my favorite Bollywood movies is called ‘Queen,’ a film about a woman who gets dumped days before her wedding and decides to go on her previously-planned honeymoon alone to Europe. The movie is relevant because, throughout my solo trip, I felt like I was living this movie again, but the only difference was that it was about my experiences.

On my first day there, I was put in a gender-neutral shared dorm at a hostel with three other men. I tried to be calm about it, but since I was a woman travelling alone, I was surely panicking. I obviously tried to ask for another room, but that night, there was no option other than staying in that dorm. Needless to say, I could not sleep that night. That was an epic fail at the start of my trip, but I tried to be optimistic and visit some of the coolest places in San Diego. This city does have a lot of lovely places, and I was glad to visit them. One of the most interesting ones was an island that can be accessed by a ferry. This island was truly magnificent, and I was so happy to be close to the beach and the sand, which I have genuinely missed during my time living through the northeast coast winter. One of my memories of that island is also when I almost got misled by my ride share driver. It was such a weird experience, and I did not know what to think about it. I am thankful for the observational skills that allowed me to realize that the driver was taking me in the wrong direction, and I was able to ask him to drop me off at that very moment. That experience scared me off, but now I am more vigilant whenever I use those ride share services. One other memorable experience I have of being there was kayaking in the pacific ocean. I kayaked before but in a river, where the huge waves were not trying to throw me off the whole time. It was a terrifying experience, and I totally thought I was going to die at that point in the trip. But my instructors were super helpful and were kind enough to help me.

At that moment, those experiences were scary, but reflecting on them a year later, I realized that they were necessary for my personal development. When I had left for San Diego, I was this depressed person who wanted nothing but the earth to swallow me. During the trip, there were moments when I thought I was going to die, but having survived those demanding situations, I realized that nothing could stop me from doing what I want. The trip surely did not cure my depression, but I discovered a way to help deal with it - traveling. For women, traveling alone is full of risks but not impossible. We definitely have to be a thousand times more careful, but we can make our solo trips more memorable and safe. I am truly grateful for this opportunity. I felt so refreshed afterward. It was kind of a different outlook on life, where I realized that sometimes taking risks can bring about the most positive outcomes.