Travel Blog - Journey, Stories and Experiences

An adult, grey, and beautiful pigeon sits on a balcony visible from my room. The balcony is one floor higher than mine, whose shorter side faces my balcony. I sit and work close to my balcony, inside my room, where my desk and chair are greeted with solid sunshine each morning. While I pay rent to stay in my room, pigeons live rent-free here. I see them all day, from my chair, flying in all directions, drinking water from the swimming pool, and diving from the terrace straight towards the ground. Now that so many days have passed, I inadvertently ignore them as they have become a part of my daily life. For more than a year, the balcony on the upper floor, which I mentioned above, has not been lonely. I say lonely because I have never seen any human on that balcony. Just some ropes and a pipe stay there, lonely and forgotten by their masters. The balcony doesn't speak to me, else I would have given her company every day. We are too close to hear each other, even if we talk in a norm...

 On my trip to Vietnam , I visited Ho Chi Minh City and then flew to Da Nang, which lies in the center of Vietnam. Da Nang had been in the news for the last ten days. It faced one of the most severe typhoons in Vietnam, 1 week before Sudhanshu and I were about to arrive. As soon as we walked out of the Da Nang airport, signs of the damage were clearly visible. For a change, the only joyous thing we see is the hundreds of children dressed in their school uniform, white shirt and red checked shorts, not more than 5 years old, walking in a straight line outside. Their teachers are with them, and just like any other school teacher, they, too, are shouting, and these children are responding. We do not understand their language, but it sucks to be in line on the road and walk towards one of the most beautiful beaches in the country. A long pole with the Vietnam flag is facing me, which has survived the typhoon somehow. But there is a bitter silence in the city that both of us can feel. I...

The division of our society is explicitly visible in the products people living within it make. A train comes with coaches divided into upper-class air-conditioned private coaches to lower-class messy and sweaty ones where people rely on air from the door and windows. This means if the train is not moving, its "AC" is not working. Buses follow a similar pattern where there are air-conditioned, high-tech Volvo buses which are often looked upon by people sitting in a lower-grade bus with hopes and desires, and often followed by abuses such as "rich brats". These lower-class buses are termed "ordinary" in the government booking portal, glorifying the fact that you cannot expect something lavish here, or to just portray that the other bus is "extraordinary". Maybe "ordinary" is an alias used for a bus but signifying the current societal status of the people sitting in it. I become "ordinary" when I sit in an "ordinary" b...

 Vietnam is a beautiful country, and my experience in Vietnam and Ho Chi Minh City was wonderful. However, a lot of people intend to visit Vietnam on vacation and are concerned about how to apply Vietnam visa from India, as Vietnam, unlike Nepal, requires a visa to travel. To help in this regard, this post has listed all the options one can take before visiting Vietnam. How to apply Vietnam E-Visa from India? The most common choice a traveller makes before visiting Vietnam is to take an e-Visa as it is the easiest and sought out process. To do so, perform the following steps: 1. Visit the Vietnam e-Visa website . 2. Select Apply Now. 3. Fill the form with details and upload a portrait photograph and passport image. 4. Review the application form. 5. Pay a fee of 25 USD for a single entry or 50 USD for multiple entries to obtain an e-Visa for Vietnam. That's it! After 3 business days, the Vietnam e-Visa will be sent to your email address as filled in the applica...

Skydiving has been a long-standing desire for almost everyone around the globe. It is nerve-wrecking but exciting at the same time to wonder about the views one would get while falling freely from the skies. Surrounding views in the context of skydiving are so important that while skydiving can be done at a lot of places, only a few of them are popular. One such popular spot to jump is Interlaken in Switzerland, and while I am here at this beautiful spot, I also wanted to experience the natural wonders that one may never get to experience while walking on Earth. Arrival in Switzerland I booked a helicopter to jump from 14000 ft above. In Switzerland, only helicopters are allowed to carry people, as there are too many mountains and planes can't maneuver as fast as a helicopter. However, I did not know how much 14000 ft means practically. Yes, I know aircraft fly at 36000ft, and this is less than half of it, but sitting inside an aircraft, none of us would feel the height as we would...

I can't open my eyes. My friend rolls his scooter on a downward slope and the high wind is hitting my face. It is a battle between me and the wind where I struggle to keep my head up, straight, pretending that there is nothing around me. "What are you saying?", is the common sentence occurring out of my mouth as I can't hear my friend. I don't even remember what story or what opinion of his is he telling me. Sometimes I say "Yes" just for the sake of it but sometimes I can't take the risk of a cross-question from him. It is nice of him to be talking with his head turned towards me. But sadly, that is not enough. With the slope still continuing on in a lush green area with tall trees on both ends, a motorcycle comes right beside us. The shiny afternoon is making this red bike glow making it impossible to ignore. The head turns towards us and the guy on the bike raises his visor and shouts, "Oye!". My friend stops the scooty and so doe...