Let the adventure begin!

OK. Deep breath and here it goes, the first stage of my trip. Tel Aviv to Mumbai and then directly on to Kathmandu.

After the tragedies that have occurred over the last few weeks over in Nepal, I must admit I’m a bit apprehensive, especially seeing this is the first stop on my travels, and the news isn’t so amazing out of there at the moment. The sympathetic looks I’ve received from so many people who hear I’m traveling to Nepal this week, and phrases such as "oh I’m so sorry”, and “look after yourself” and “be careful” and “stay away from buses” that I’ve been hearing all around me over the last few days aren’t the most reassuring to a newbie traveller such as myself.

But somehow, irrespective of the negative build up, I’m actually excited. Well, excited in a calm, “what the hell is happening” kind of way. As I sit here at the airport eating my greasy chips and waiting for them to call my flight, I’m just thinking back over the craziness of the past couple of months and am amazed that this day has finally arrived.

I know that nowadays, traveling isn’t such a big deal. I mean, people do it all the time, and for even longer periods of time than I will be, but for me, this is something I never thought I would do. I’ve spent my life trying to be responsible, and, when that wasn’t always successful, dealing with the consequences of that lack of responsibility. Back problems and a dodgy immune system (or psychosomatic health issues, if I really want to be honest) have always made me believe that backpacking would never be an option for me, and my grown-up mortgage and the financial responsibilities that come along with it, have always pushed me onto the category of “responsible adult who can’t afford to take time off”, at least in my own mind.

Yet here I am, with my brand new backpack weighing in at an impressive 14.5kg, my daypack, and my grocery bag full of gluten-free goodies (hey I can pamper myself in the first few days, right?), heading off on my big 6 ½ month adventure. The last few days have been hard, saying goodbye to friends and family, running around doing last minute preparations, but the last few days have also been amazingly liberating.

After running around for almost two month taking care of the behind-the-scenes aspects of the trip, including the surprisingly astronomical job of preparing my apartment for new tenants (painting, cleaning, repairing, packing, playing the real estate agent to prospective tenants), it was only last week when I actually moved out of my apartment and into my parents place, that I actually started to feel like this whole thing was actually happening. All of a sudden my list of tasks fit into one small paper, and was comprised mainly of items such as “print plane ticket”, “photocopy passport” and “buy camera battery” (the one item that unfortunately didn’t get ticked off the list).

As someone who has spent a huge majority of her life working, and not being able to imagine life outside of the workforce, there’s something really strange about all of a sudden being totally free. I don’t have a job, my tenants are (thank god!) paying my mortgage and I have no responsibilities to anyone other than myself. It’s definitely something I’ll have to get used to but as I think about it, I guess that that may be the point of this whole adventure, that for the first time in a long, long time, it’s all about me and about doing things for myself, making my own decisions based on what I want to do and not what is expected of me.

While I’m not entirely sure how I feel about the idea, I do know that this trip is going to be something incredibly challenging for myself. I’m going to define and redefine my boundaries, pushing at them again and again, and I may just figure out, for the first time in my life, exactly what I’m capable of. Cliché as it may sound, I really do feel that this trip is something so necessary for me, and with all the apprehension and fears of heading out on my own, I'm hopeful that I’ll come out of this a stronger and more assured person. And if not, at least I'll have a great time trying.

So yalla, let’s get this party started. Nepal, here I come!