Another Year, Another Adventure..

It was exactly one year ago on March 4th, 2012 when our friend Doug dropped us to the Newark Airport early in the morning. It is one of those moments I will never forget.  We had been busy wrapping work, packing our apartment, renting the place and stuffing everything we would own for 5 months in our backpacks. For weeks, it hadn’t hit us that we were leaving our jobs, our home, our friends, and our lives behind.  We had been talking for almost one year about travelling  around the world. The idea seemed silly. We joked and laughed about it. It was something that would never ever happen. Who would leave their good jobs, their home, to live out of a backpack for months? We weren’t ready to do the planning that went into something monumental like this.  

The Day

Dan’s ‘stuff’ for 5 months

My stuff for 5 months

But the idea stuck in our heads. We talked about it every weekend. And, then we talked about it every day at work, and after work.  Soon we started to read stories of people who had done something similar and we felt that we could do it too.  We started feeling that we could break away from the traditional and do what we really want to do and be free even if it meant letting go of material comforts and secure pay checks.  We created a long list of things that needed to happen in order for us to achieve this….from big things like cutting spending and re-aligning our finances to small things like buying stuff sacks and a clothes line.  The finish line started to get closer as we started to cross things off in our Round the World To Do list.  The idea no longer seemed silly or overwhelming to achieve. We were getting closer to it, one item at a time.  

                                                                                               a small part of our longggg todo list

What was left…

March 4, 2012: Day 1 of our trip

When March 4, 2012 finally came, it all hit us at the airport as our friend hugged us and bid us goodbye. We were leaving the US for a while and we didn’t know what would happen during our travel and what would happen after we got back and relocated to Colorado.  We had a couple of airline tickets, our backpacks and our excitement to see and experience the world, uninterrupted for a few months. 

The last year has been intense, crazy and exciting.  We traveled around the world, came back to US and then, drove across the country in my 12 year old Hyundai!   We found a perfect location to live in between Denver and Boulder…close enough to the mountains where we can see them every morning and witness amazing sunsets.  I would be lying if I said it hasn’t been hard. Although we had been dying to move to Colorado forever, we miss our friends back on the East coast and we miss the constant adrenaline rush of travelling.  There are days when I still look over the pictures from our travels and I wish I was still on the road.  I miss the freedom from routine and the excitement of the unknown.  Although, I do like that I get to sleep in my own comfortable bed everyday 🙂

First Stop – Milford Trek, New Zealand

Tongariro Crossing, New Zealand

Stalking Kangaroos, Port Campbell, Australia

Overcoming fear in Great Barrier Reef, Australia

Nuwara Eliya, Sri Lanka

Fighting the heat in Delhi, India

Pigging out in Munich, Germany

Can’t get enough – Somewhere between Lauterbrunnen and Grindelwald, Switzerland

Lost in Cinque Terre, Italy

Torla, Spain

Torla, Spain

Aljezur, Portugal

Mountains in Tennessee

Driving through New Mexico

Entering Colorado after a 3000 mile road trip in my 12 year old Hyundai

So, even though, our daily travel adventures have come to a temporary halt, we still get to hike and explore the mountains and trails in our area on the weekends. I love the fact that I can get up at 9am on the weekend and still get a serious hike in on challenging, remote trails.  This was never possible living in Hoboken. The most hiking we ever did was to the nearest brunch place on a Saturday.  

Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado

Silver Dollar Lake, Colorado

First time showshoeing – Evergreen, CO

View of Continental Divide 15 miles from our home

With these travels behind us, I’m embarking on a new adventure in 2013 —  culinary school.  From as far back as I can remember, I always loved cooking and eating :). I used to stand in the kitchen as a kid and watched my mother cook yummy dishes one after another. When I moved to the US for college, I had no choice but to cook my own food since there were limited healthy options for vegetarians.  I realized I was most happy when I was cooking and feeding other people.  Cooking as a profession was something I’d never considered because it was so unconventional in my upbringing.  After undergrad and a few years of work experience, I think I always felt like I’d end up going the conventional route – MBA school.  Even during the first few months of our travels, I was mulling over what grad programs I’d apply to in the Denver area.  I thought once I got into an MBA program, things were bound to fall into place and I’d know what to do with my future.  

But the experiences over the last year have brought me a little closer to clarity.  I realized it is ok not knowing what you want to do for the rest of your life, even at the age of 30.  It is ok if you haven’t figured it all out. I knew what I didn’t want to do at the moment – I didn’t want to go to MBA school. I didn’t want another desk job at a big corporation.  I knew I wanted to be outside in nature.  I knew I wanted to learn new skills. I knew I wanted to cook more and be healthy.

I guess I did figure out a few things. 

Once I moved to Colorado, it wasn’t hard to make the decision to go to a culinary school. I had always wanted to learn the right way to cook food, and the science behind it.  Once I got over the fear of doing the unconventional, I leaped right into it.   

Am I scared? Yes, I am scared. I am scared of failing. I am scared of looking back and thinking what a complete disaster of a decision this was. But, I felt the same way about leaving India to attend college in the US, about leaving my job in NYC, about traveling the world with nothing but a backpack, and about picking up and moving across the country to Colorado.  And everything turned out fine and so hopefully this will too!

Yesterday, March 4, 2013,  was my first day in the culinary school kitchen brandishing my fancy knives and donning my ill-fitting chef jacket, making it another moment in my life that I will never forget.  

Let’s see how long it takes me to cut myself with that 10 inch Chef knife!  (Update:  10 minutes into my first day!)

Watch out Bourdain! 😉