Random Rants

Well, each one of us have read in one or the other blogs ...'Why I quit my five/six-figure salary to travel'? Really! Quit five/six figure salary at this juncture when world-over big corporates are cutting jobs at the time of recession? Well, that too for travel?  Is this a sole reason? Or you've been handed pink slip for day dreaming exotic locations sans meeting work deadline (pun intended)? And then, you come across a new breed of travel junkies who want to experience some adventure in their otherwise monotonous life. My question to you (the so called) travel enthusiasts, why did you even choose such a career that has erratic work schedule? A more deserving one would have got that admission /job.

So, you think you've been bitten by a travel bug? Yeah! We can see your pics of motorcycle trip to Leh/ Ladakh, shaking leg with the kaalbaleiyaans at the sand dunes of Jaisalmer, on a spiritual sojourn to Dharamsala & Gaya, scuba diving at the Andamans, exploring the ruins of Hampi, getting acquainted to French culture & cuisine at Pondicherry and even attempted to row in the Backwaters of Alleppey. Phew! Long list... see even a novice like me is familiar with the names of off-beat places and activities to look out for. 

Every second person wants to dabble in to writing. The travel junkie is so popular that he/she manages to get 10k likes for their recent trip to Timbuktu on Facebook! One image on Instagram or a set of hashtags keeps their post trolling on Twitter. Now that's enough for their blog site to get good ranking in search engine.Is that enough for a good travel writer? Well, am not here to judge anybody's skill. Barring few, am certain few contents may give editors' a tough time or even nightmares. The travel bug is also gung-ho about sharing information about the place. However, the authenticity of the materials/shared informations should be left to the publication for further research. There's stiff competition in the market, and am sure the trend would surely give the actual travel writer a run for his /her money.

So the prodigal wanderlust has graduated from holding a phone camera to a DSLR. And hence, you see pics of same location/place shot for more than dozen times. The convenient reason we often hear is..."we have managed to capture nature at its best". Thus, you see why professional photographers are finding hard to survive these days?

To all those...travel junkie /bug/ wanderlust/ wanderer...an earnest request to you. Just because you have started to blog or write travelogues doesn't make you a travel writer. We understand well that you've recently won a trip to an exotic spa/hotel stay or have been invited on a FAM (jargon for familiarization) trip by a tourism board. Stop advising or giving suggestions to people on how to plan their holidays. We are happy to see images of your trip and also the article that got published in National Geographic magazine and alike... There is a search engine with information galore, we will surely stop by your blog to say 'hi'...  Stop giving us update on stereotype information about your trip.