Happier people make a happier world I dream of that world
Transcriber: Rhea Ta
Reviewer: David DeRuwe
When I tell people that I’m a nomad
and traveling in India
for more than four years now
in various capacities,
including without money for the most part,
and on top of that,
when I tell them that I live
in my own self-converted van-home,
the most common question people ask me is,
“Vimal, don’t you have fear?”
I do have fear.
We’ve been conditioned to believe
fear is bad, that we shouldn’t get afraid.
Somehow fear will not
let you grow, etc. etc.
but that isn’t right.
Fear isn’t bad in itself.
It’s the most basic emotion;
it’s the basis of survival.
When you’re standing before the lion,
you should get afraid -
you can’t go and take a selfie you know.
As I said, fear isn’t bad.
The way you channelize it
will become the deciding factor.
So I do have fear.
I still remember the day I left home,
July 1st, 2016, more than four years back.
I didn’t have a single rupee in my hand,
not even any kind of perishable food.
I don’t know how I’m going to survive,
I don’t know whether I’m going
to travel even a hundred kilometres.
I don’t know whether
I’m going to get a place to stay.
I don’t know where I’m
going to get food to eat.
On top of that, I was carrying
a lot of things:
my phone, my laptop, my camera, etc. etc.
So my friends told me,
you’ll definitely get robbed
and you’ll be back in 10 days.
We’ll be waiting for you.
But I didn’t stop;
I channelized it.
Now, no matter how much I say
that I didn’t have fear,
at that point of time I was very positive.
I was positive,
but subconsciously, I did have fear,
because obviously
I’m taking lifts from strangers,
staying at various places,
but that fear helped me,
helped me make certain decisions.
I chose to stay
at places where there’s always
some kind of crowd
or where there’s no one for kilometers.
No in-between.
I chose to not travel at night.
This helped me stay at various places:
I stayed in bus stands,
railway stations, petrol bunks,
even at the police station.
I stayed in places, starting from a hut
to a five-star hotel,
I stayed at places starting
from a flat in a big apartment,
to a villa whose balcony
opens into a river.
Even with my van now,
I park at various random places.
I park with a view of sea sometimes,
sometimes it could be huge
agricultural fields,
and sometimes it will be petrol bunks
or at people’s homes.
So the fear
helped me talk to people,
talk to strangers
helped me find places,
thus make conversations with people,
thus helped me become a better person.
I remember I was going to Munnar,
someone put me in a bus,
and there was a boy sitting beside me.
He asked me, “Do you know Tamil?”
I said, “Yes.”
Probably he saw my bag and probably
assumed that I’m a traveller and all.
So he asked me, “Do you
know Tamil?” I said, “Yes.”
We started talking,
and in the middle, I asked him,
“Can I pitch my tent somewhere in Munnar,
because I don’t have a place to go.”
He told me, “No, you cannot because
it’s raining cats and dogs in Munnar.
You cannot pitch a tent anywhere.
Then I asked him,
“You know, can I stay
in the bus stand in Munnar?”
Then he told me, “You can’t
because the police will come
and will do a lot of moral policing
and ask you a lot of questions.
You can’t do that.”
Then I thought to myself,
“OK, I’ll figure out a way somehow.”
Then what happened was we resumed talking,
and after some time he told me,
“Please come to my home in the morning.
I’ll show you some places around.”
Then I immediately asked him,
“Can I come tonight
because I don’t have a place.”
At that point of time,
though I didn’t realize,
though it was an immediate question,
it was coming from the place of fear
because I really
didn’t have a place to go.
It was raining crazily,
and as soon as I land in Munnar,
I don’t know what to do -
this definitely coming
from the place of fear.
That is why I asked him.
So it was all happening subconsciously.
Then he told me, “See, I’m a dependent.
I have to ask my father.”
He was a teenage kid
and he was going to college.
So I said, “Yes, OK, fine.”
Then he called his father.
His father didn’t agree.
Obviously, I’m a complete stranger.
Then I said, “OK, it’s fine.
We’ll figure out something.”
Then we reached Munnar.
He has to go some
30 kilometers from Munnar.
He has to catch the last
bus which was moving,
has to literally run, you know.
But,
at that point of time, he told me,
“Pick up your bags and follow me.”
I said … I was confused. I said, “What?
You said your father
didn’t agree, then how?”
He told me,
“I’ll somehow manage my father,
but I can’t leave you here.”
That moment, I had tears in my eyes.
Then we ran, we caught the bus,
we reached his place.
His mother gave me fish curry,
the best fish curry I ever had.
You know, his whole home is not even
as big as most rooms in most homes.
They all slept on the floor,
and they gave me
the only bed in their home,
despite of my refusal a lot of times.
And the place is also beautiful -
it’s a small tribal village
and surrounded by hills,
and it was full moon that day,
and the next morning when I wake up,
I saw a lot of, lot of waterfalls.
It’s very rare I see
there was a waterfall.
In the morning when I was leaving,
his father gave me a 100-rupee note.
That boy took me around,
showed me a lot of places,
and put me in a bus.
If that day I didn’t have fear
and I didn’t choose to conquer that fear,
I wouldn’t have asked him that question,
I wouldn’t have met them.
This wouldn’t have been possible.
I remember I was in Coorg,
a place in Karnataka.
I was staying in a bus stand.
it was raining crazily,
and I searched for places to pitch my tent
but I couldn’t find.
I went to the shopkeeper there,
and I asked him,
“Can I sleep just beside your shop
because I don’t know where to go and all?”
He said, “OK, you can sleep.”
Then that day I slept.
I went into my sleeping bag;
I hugged my bag and slept.
I wouldn’t have done that
if I didn’t have fear
because I was definitely afraid.
I’m staying at a bus stand,
definitely, but I enjoyed it.
But I was definitely afraid.
Fear lets you take decisions,
lets you be safe.
It’s beautiful.
But most of us stop there instantly.
Fear, for most of us, is bad.
For most of us, we don’t conquer it.
Fear lets us stop doing things we love.
Fear will not let us take risks.
That’s bad.
Fear is beautiful.
Understand it,
respect it,
embrace it,
and conquer it.
Because people who do things
they love to do are happier people.
Happier people make a happier world.
I dream of that world.
Thank you.