Bringing dream to reality in small steps

Where it all began:

I have no idea how to start writing here, may be, I would just write whatever comes to me at this very moment. I am currently in a break from work. No, not a paid break, neither a leave without pay, basically, I decided to quit my job last September and planned to do some traveling around the world. I always wanted to do that but hey, it is not that easy, who is gonna pay my bills, how am I going to finance these trips, what about the career etc. etc. so many parameters on the way to push back to where you are and there is always the family who thinks you are completely out of your mind to leave a stable job in this bad economy. But then if you have a passion to do something, how do you go about it. If I do not act on my passion, it is no good, right! I cannot tell you my feeling about the decision of leaving the job and taking a break from work for a year and spending my savings to do this journey of my life that I always wanted to do. I was nervous, worried, scared, unsure but then I was so happy, so free in my mind, so liberated to finally decide to do that I always wanted to do. So, after almost a year long thoughts, leaving all the negative thoughts of not getting any stable earning or quitting a good job in this terrible economy, not knowing what waits for me after the one year, here I am finally, took the big step of leaving my long-term job that was giving me a decent earning and a comfortable lifestyle. I have been officially jobless since September 2008. My research on best travel deals and hours of browsing on internet for months and months all came to some reality. I started planning for some of the trips of my interest several months before that but I still could not believe my guts that I actually left my job to follow some of my dreams!

Who I am:

I was born and brought up in Dhaka, Bangladesh and finished high school there. I am the youngest of four and I have two sisters and one brother. I have three nieces and two nephews who are my gems. My immediate family is only my mom who lives in Dhaka although she is visiting my sister in Sydney while I am writing for this blog. I just met her before coming back from Sydney last week. My extended family is spread out in Dhaka (Bangladesh), New York, Toronto (Canada) and Sydney (Australia).

India - My first step outside home

I studied for my undergraduate degree in New Delhi, India. So, I had a fair chance to visit Kolkata, Mumbai, Agra, Jaipur, Nainital, Dehradoon, Missouri, Shimla, Manali, some villages in the north. I have seen some parts from the north and east and a bit of the west of India. I had a chance to work in Bangalore, India for few months following the year of my graduation from India. That is how I could see a bit of South India. But there is so much more to see as India has such variety of landscape. I have seen the Himalayas and the Taj Mahal, they are just wonderful, no comparison I could find so far with either of those! I was a student then, barely had any money for traveling. I would love to go back there and see some more places in more detail and with a bit different perspective.

UK- My first real job took me there - My first Western Exposure

I lived few years in the UK right after I finished my degree from India while I was working at my very first real job. I used to love visiting new places all over the UK. So much great memories I have from the UK and I always wanted to go back there! Other than London, I liked Nottingham shire, Manchester, Harrogate, Edinburgh, Newcastle and one of my favorites was the Isle of Wight. London, oh, I love that city no matter how dirty it is becoming with more and more population, it brings nostalgia in me, it was the first city of my western exposure. How can I forget that city! I have spent so many afternoons and weekends walking through the streets, taking the trains, seeing the nature in London, Cambridge, Oxford and Northern England! Oh, I can't handle my emotion any more, it was the city that brought me to a different kind of taste for myself and my life. I am so grateful in a very special way, I can't explain that to you all, it is very personal..........and too delicate for me....

My Journey to Further West:

I left my job in London although it was a great job, good exposure and great learning. But for some personal reasons I decided to go to the US, the land of opportunity for further studies where I did my Masters degree. I got myself a decent job after my graduation in New Jersey and started working in Midtown Manhattan , a city I am so biased of for obvious reason. Since I moved to the US, I took a few trips back and forth to Bangladesh and India and also visited some of the states with some family and relatives but my traveling has been limited to the North East and some part of the west of the US. But since July of 2005, my passion for traveling went back live and almost every month I have tried to visit a new state or place or went back to a place I liked to go back several times. Sometimes, I just bought tickets to go to a completely unknown and interesting place and had one of the best times of my life. I have visited majority of the beautiful states in the US but then kept some special ones intentionally for later.

Most of the times, I travel on my own while going to these places. I would have loved to have company always but it is not always feasible and therefore, you gotta do what you wanna do. But I do have friends or family in majority of the times where I traveled to. Either I meet them there or stay with them during my visit and that way I can visit the place and my loved ones at the same time. I have been quite fortunate to have some good set of friends who are very good ones and precious and then I also have another good number of people who are also friends, may be not so close but we both have empathy and interests in common and somehow contributed to each others' life in a positive way. I would also call them friends. I have done a few road trips with some of my close buddies from even childhood and I cherish these friends and the time with them always. I have taken some trips with my mom, siblings or other family members as well. I love nature in general, whether it is green or blue, grey or black, sunshine or rains- I love it all. I love anything with tranquility and anything in motion, anything with softness and anything bright. But I also like mountains, volcanoes, forests, wild life, birds, running falls, glaciers, fountains, rivers, lakes, oceans, deserts, trees, plants, vegetation, gentle breeze, sunrise, sunset, rains, forests with dark and shades, placid lake, lights and shadows by clouds and sun, reflection on water and oasis in the deserts, sandy beaches, pebbles and rocks, natural formation of rocks carrying ancient history of civilization, flora fauna, walking clouds, snow and ice, changing seasons and fall colors. It is simply beautiful! The more I see the more I fall in love with it. Don't you!

Highlighted States/Cities/towns/ places from my visit to the US states are: NYC (my favorite, even if you say I am biased), Miami, Key West and Fort Lauder dale, Chicago, San Diego, San Francisco, Portland, Seattle, Yellowstone National Park, Grand Canyon, Niagara Falls, New Orleans, Lake Michigan, Lake Superior, Boston, Cape May, Austin, Nashville, Delaware Gap, Bear Mountain, New Hampshire and Jersey Shores. Please note that I have not been to Hawaii and Alaska but they are highly recommended for the variety of natural landscape and gorgeous beauty. they are in my list a little later after I finish my wish list.

Mexico:

I have had a chance to visit some parts of Mexico and Canada and the US Virgin islands/the Eastern and Western Caribbean islands. The water color at Gulf in Cozumel, Mexico was such a beautiful blue, I can't explain that beauty with my shallow knowledge of painting words. The other color of water that surprised me the same way much later was in the South Island of New Zealand, gorgeous green water in lake Wakatipu and Tekapo, what a beauty! Sometimes, I think if I could be a painter I would have painted all those colors in my canvass but then I think I probably could not in my ability. They are too pretty to be on canvass than where they are!

Canada:

I have only been to Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal in Canada and still want to go to British Columbia and Calgary, have plans to take the trains to the Rockies at some point. Montreal was a lovely city, reminded me of Paris. My niece studies in Toronto and we both visited Montreal together. It was a wonderful time in Montreal in terms of food, entertainment, clubbing, art and great memory for both of us to cherish.

Niagara falls is some place I can visit again and again whether it is the summer or the winter. The view is superb from Canada but most activities are in the US side, I enjoyed both. You cannot miss that if you are in Canada or in the North East of the US. Must go!

Caribbean Islands:

I would love to get back to the Caribbeans as I only went there for few days and was on two different cruises to the Eastern and Western Caribbean Islands. St. Martins and St. Thomas islands reminded me of Chittagong, a port city of Bangladesh and I enjoyed some good tender coconut there after so many years! I am crazy about tender coconuts, my record of having them is 48 in 15 days. No, you wouldn't understand it, you can call it an obsession but still I cannot make you understand! You have to grow with it to develop such a weird obsession.

Coming back to my passion for traveling:
I always had the passion for traveling but for various reasons, it never came true or there was lack of my initiative to make it happen. I have seen movies, tv shows, documentaries, videos of others' going to many places that I always wanted to go, digital pictures/ still photos, world maps, read about traveling around the world, places to visit, attractions of the world not to miss before you die, but seeing and experiencing something in your own eyes is something different. Just the way I cannot date online or have a virtual relationship with anyone, I also cannot see the world without seeing it with my own eyes, feeling and experiencing it with my own life. It got to be a first hand experience. Am I right! well, that is how I feel and it is only my perspective and that is why I am traveling!

I longed to travel all the continents and many countries in those continents. I started with a list and it crossed 50+ countries in five continents. My plan was to travel for a year but one year and fifty countries, probably not so feasible! Besides, the cost of traveling is also something I had to consider. So, I narrowed down the list and finally made a much shorter list not by the number of countries but by regions of my interest among the five main continents. The two continents I had to leave out for now are Arctic and Antarctica. They are not just two extremes but also quite cold to adjust and expensive to travel. I have not seen much of the main five continents yet, so I thought I would rather start with something more popular, may be historical but I love nature and I wanted to see man made civilization as well as different kinds of natural landscapes existing in this world. I have average fitness so I decided not to do any extreme adventure that ends in a serious accident nor go for a high-risk expedition that may be life-threatening, after all I still have my mom and close family and friends who would be sad if I am gone (think and hope!).

Bored enough by now! I guess, that is enough about the background of my traveling and how it all started. So, finally, my journey began on September 12, 2008.

Europe - I longed to visit for so long!

To start my year long traveling, I booked a trip with a group of unknown people all over the world to go to eleven countries in Western Europe including UK. I added Ireland in my trip plan as well. Cities and Countries I visited in this trip are:
London, Birmingham, Belfast in the United Kingdom, Dublin in Ireland, Brussels in Belgium, Amsterdam in Netherlands, St. Goar and Munich in Germany, Lucerne in Switzerland, Vaduz in Liechtenstein, Innsbruck in Austria, Venice, Florence and Pisa in Italy, Monaco, Nice, Bordeaux, Arles, Cascassone and Paris in France and Barcelona in Spain. I loved most of these countries although I have only been some of the cities/towns in each of these countries. I would love to get back to most of these countries to see more once I finish my preliminary wish list. I loved this trip and made a good number of new travel friends from Australia, Japan, Singapore, South Africa, Mexico, Canada and the US. We all had lots of fun and still keep in touch on facebook, email or phone. I even met a few people in my next trip to the UK again in November 2008. I will write about some of the exciting and funny experiences in my later posts. For now, I just wanted to highlight the places I have been and I liked the most. Monaco and Nice were my personal favorites, although I loved when we were driving through the Tuscan regions, I must go back to the Tuscan region again. Barcelona had the best street performance I have seen so far and Paris, oh, do I have to add anything new, probably not, it was my second time to Paris and I can go there many more times. Innsbruck, a magical small city I thought, not sure what others thought about it , I tried some real good shots in some of the liquor tasting stores. Amsterdam, we had some real wild fun there, no, I cannot talk about all of those here, after all, it is a public access site. But if you are interested I can share more later:) I went to Dublin on my own not as part of the group tour, but still loved it, there was something very attractive about the city, can't figure out what was it!

Australia and New Zealand: Reasons to be there is family and love for Nature

I have my sister and two aunts living in Sydney, Australia and I have been there only once two years ago. So, I decided to go to Australia spend some quality time with my family and also visit more of Australia and New Zealand. I stayed almost last four months in Australia and New Zealand. I loved my trip to New Zealand, it is one of the most beautiful countries I have seen so far. The landscape is very different from north to south of the country. North Island is warmer and has mountains with volcanoes, hot springs, lakes, rainforests, caves, beaches and islands. South Island is a bit cooler and has glaciers, mountains, falls, rivers, lakes, very delicate rainforests and just picture perfect look of nature everywhere. It was hard for me to not take pictures every time I was looking at her beauty. I got some amazing pictures although those do not even represent 25% of what I saw in my own eyes. I am a big fan of "Lord of the Ring" and so I did my due diligence of touring all the sites in Wellington, Dart River safari sites and few other places. It was an experience of my life time. My favorite town in New Zealand was Queenstown, so please do not forget to visit that when you are there! But then how can you miss Milford Sound, Fox Glacier, lake Wakatipu, lake Wanaka, lake Taupo, Rotorua and Wellington?

Australia is beautiful with thousands of beaches. I did not go to see Ayers Rock or Great Barrier Reef this time but will definitely plan to do those next time. Afterall, I have family living there so I thought to leave something unseen that way I can find a good reason to go back there. I stayed in Sydney few months and almost know most of the city pretty well, the harbor area and the parks make the city gorgeous. But my best highlights were Neutral Bay, Balmoral Beach and Cremorne in North Sydney. In New South Wales there are so many different places to go and few highlights are Blue Mountains, the Entrance, Kiama and Jervis Bay. I often took the train with the longest route and not having any destination in mind, just went from one end of the city to the other end, got down and had some food, walked around in the last stop, and then got back taking another train. It was a beautiful time I had there. I loved Melbourne in Victoria, one of the main cities in Australia. I would say it is a city with style, rich culture, great food and active and tasteful neighbourhoods. The transportation system within the city and around was impressive to me, reminded me of New York a lot. It reminded me of few of my favorite places in New York and San Francisco. South Yarra, St. Kilda, Docklands are few of the highlights of Melbourne. I went with my family to see the remaining 8 apostles out of the ancient 12 (one of the natural wonders of the world). It was one of the most beautiful roads that I have ever been to for a long drive, called Great Ocean Road! It is right by the Pacific for miles after miles and on the way to the Apostles through great ocean road we stopped at Geelong, Torquay, Angle Sea, Bells Beach, Lorne, Apollo Bay, Otway National Park, Port Campbell National Park, Twelve Apostles Marine Park. It is a must do if you are ever in that part of the world!

Upcoming Tours: Three months in South America

Well, so far these are the places I have been but there is a lot more coming up in few weeks as I am going to be on a road-trip in South America for three months traveling through Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador. I will have a lot more to share with you when I get back from that trip. Also, When I get time I will post some interesting stories from my trips above and some of the not mentioned small trips within and outside the US over the last 15 years.

I got to sleep, it is almost 1:23 am EST, wow, I thought I did not know where to start and now my challenge is how to finish my starting!