Travelling overseas has always been a family adventure – visiting relatives, trying out new food, and the occasional, last-minute sightseeing tour. However, travelling solo can be quite a different journey altogether, especially when traveling to a new country for work, or so it seems.
I spent the last year working in Hyderabad, also known as ‘The City of Pearls’, in Southern India. About six months into working with a nonprofit, I was given the opportunity to speak at a conference in Holland. Having never been to Europe before, I jumped at the opportunity, not knowing what I was getting myself into. After arriving in Amsterdam, I realised I had no local contact number of the organising committee who had arranged to pick me up, no map or method of transportation, and no idea of how to even attempt speaking the language. All I had was a photograph of the meeting point and an approximate time of when to meet ‘the contact’. Somehow, after circling around the airport arrivals hall a dozen times, I approached a group of friendly tourists and found out they were, of course, the welcoming party. It seemed that my overexertion was overhyped.
Having made subsequent work trips overseas, I have found the art of mixing business and pleasure – whether squeezing in a trip into the city marketplace during seventeen-hour-layovers, or coercing taxi drivers to drive across town to capture the local scenery, or having a breakfast meeting with a business partner and ending up gaining entry to a conference session with serial entrepreneurs, it makes no difference. Ensuring that you live and you learn makes all the difference in the world.
Returning to Australia this past December, I have had the opportunity to reminisce on the last few months, especially my recent travel forays, and have been blessed by God to know that He has helped me through my travels to see the ways where I have been able to be a blessing to others. I have been blessed in more ways than one, but continue to change and be changed by my experiences, including the journeys that I contemplate taking in the not-too-distant future.
My fourteen months in India taught me a lot, but combining my interest in making change in the local community, as well as using technology as a platform to impact others, has got me thinking about how to take business and pleasure a step further.
Using my interest in technology, I was able to redesign an online platform to encourage users to think about ways they could initiate change within their community. Taking this message of change with me enabled me to effect change in others, whether speaking in conferences on my travels, or talking one-on-one with community leaders in the villages, I was able to identify with their story, and help them to see the connection between my story and theirs.
Can travel and tech be combined into an unprecedented journey of adventure? I think it can be.
