A Little More of Myself
1600kms through Himachal, five days, and a village called Soyal that I wasn't even planning to fall for. This is what stayed with me.
There's a version of me that exists only on the road, and i met him again this year!!
I drove 1600kms in 5 days through Himachal, ended up in a village called Soyal that i wasn't even planning to fall for, and somewhere between the mountain passes and the people i met, i came back a little more myself.
Soyal did something else to me too. i spent most of my childhood in a village in Jharkhand, and Soyal felt exactly like that. it felt like home. it taught me to be cool about things again, but grounded too — which is a strange but definitely good combination.
I didn't know i loved driving this much. like actually loved it. hours alone with the road and the landscape changing every hour, and somewhere in there i stopped existing… started living.
And then there's the other thing nobody tells you about travel like this. you sense the fear of survival. and it rewires everything. once you've felt that fear, even briefly, all your other small fears just look… small. i think everyone should feel that at least once, it puts life in perspective in a way nothing else does.
And at the end of it all, what stays isn't the landscape. it's the people. the strangers who became something more in five days. everyone i met taught me something about how to live. that's the part i miss the most.
putting this out here because i want to go back, more often. this is me telling the universe that.
a little more myself… my journey through my photos
I think green does something to you. not sure if everyone can relate, but this place was something else entirely. the feeling i remember most was "safe" — like someone is there, looking after me.
i'm not someone who strongly believes in god, but i think what i felt here might be the closest i've come to what others describe as faith. a safe space. a shadow to sit beneath. something that saves you from the duality of being human. (suddenly got too serious)
well, this is just a small representation of a bigger thought. a dream to have a place in the wilderness, staying connected to where we all come from — the soil. and it happens to be in Soyal village, so yeah, the metaphors got a little crazy on their own.
Will definitely be back 🙌🏻❤️
