When she received her acceptance letter and moved to Delhi for her studies, Afeedha took every opportunity to travel. She visited Uttarakhand, Haryana, Rajasthan, and Punjab multiple times with her friends. But despite the joy of exploring new places, something didn’t feel quite right. She realized that her way of experiencing the world was different from her friends’. “I don’t want to see places as a tourist; I want to experience them as a traveler,” she says. “I want to explore every corner, connect with the locals, and see the real soul of a place.”
It was this desire that led her to plan her first solo trip to Himachal. The urge to go had been gnawing at her for years, but something always came up. Sometimes it was landslides; other times, family emergencies. Even after completing her second year of college, when she finally had a long vacation, her phone broke, preventing her from travelling. But when her sister gifted her a new phone, hope reignited, and Afeedha knew the time had come.
Booking a train ticket from Malappuram to Delhi was easy. But as the departure day neared, Afeedha was gripped by a sense of fear. “I thought maybe the universe was warning me,” she admits. The fear of the unknown loomed large. But with her family’s support, she mustered the courage to board the train. As she sat on the train, gripping her bag tightly, she was overwhelmed by emotions. Tears streamed down her face, but she refused to let fear hold her back. “I battled that fear and continued my journey,” she says.
Once in Delhi, she had no concrete plan, just a vague idea that she wanted to reach Spiti Valley, a place that wasn’t overrun with tourists. As she sat in her room in Delhi, still battling doubts, she met a group of boys who suggested she travel with them to a village near Kasol. But Afeedha was determined to go solo. “If I went with them, I would fall back into my comfort zone,” she explains. Instead, they helped her book a bus to Recong Peo in Himachal Pradesh, and with that, she was on her way.
Her journey to Himachal was not without challenges. The fear she had initially felt didn’t entirely leave her. “People think I’m fearless,” she says. “But I’m not. Even now, after two solo trips, I’m still scared to walk from college to my hostel in Delhi.” Her friends often teased her, wondering how someone so fearful could travel solo. But Afeedha never let her fears stop her. She was determined to reach her dreams, no matter what.