Words and Images Lester Babiera
I still can’t believe that I managed to backpack around India. My friends were convinced that I won’t enjoy it and I will end up booking my way out after a few days. Their conclusions aren’t unfounded; in fact, several factors drew them to it. First off the list is my dislike of Indian cuisine. I skipped meals in conferences when they served Indian dishes, and I hated the smell of curry. I also had an aversion to crowded, dirty, and noisy places, something that mainstream media often associate with India. But I still decided to give my travel plans a push. It was time to level up my travel game, and I decided to venture into a place that was unexpected and where I could be at my most uncomfortable.
After nearly three months of traveling the subcontinent, I eventually found myself enamored with India. Armed with a Canon G3X lent to me by Canon Philippines, India showed me why it is a haven for photographers. The country’s colors and hues are so vivid, it’s as if you’ve stepped into a perpetual festival. Landscapes and scenes of everyday life took on certain magic with astonishing bursts of color and activity. From the busy streets of Delhi to the calmness of the Himalayas, India was truly a feast for the senses.
But as the travel guides warned and the cautionary tales by previous travelers have proven, India is definitely not for the faint of heart. One must be prepared to leave comfort and be ready for anything that the country has on offer, be it good or bad. I had quite a share of travel mishaps in India, something that I had never experienced in my almost year-long backpacking trip throughout Southeast Asia. I was near tears from stress and anxiety at the sensorial assault brought about by the suffocating, dust-covered streets and never-ending honking of auto-rickshaws in Varanasi; I was harassed in New Delhi, and forced to spend the night on a filthy bed in Darjeeling.
“India’s colors and hues are so vivid, it’s as if you’ve stepped into a perpetual festival. Landscapes and scenes of everyday life took on a certain magic with astonishing bursts of color and activity.”
Nevertheless, India was definitely memorable—from the Golden Triangle, Varanasi, Himachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Amritsar, West Bengal to Hampi and Goa. Every corner of the subcontinent I visited was a treasure trove of stories. But traveling around India for three months is not enough to experience everything the country has to offer—not even a year is sufficient.
Due to its vast size and diverse cultures, India leaves a lot more for me to explore and a return visit is a certainty. There’s just something about the uncertainty and discomfort of it all that made the trip not just memorable but character-building; it inspired in me a craving for the unexpected and a hunger for new discoveries. That, and I can’t wait to snack again on paneer butter masala with naan, and a side order of masala dosa. •
Lester’s adventures in cycling on Instagram @bujibabiera and firstbikeride.com
