Venturing Solo: The Do's and Don't's

[00:00:00] Hello everyone, this is Shunali Shroff and this is Kiran Mandral and we are Not Your Auntys.

[00:00:10] Hello everyone, this is Kiran Mandral and we are back for yet another episode of Not Your Aunty.

[00:00:15] This week Shunali and I went to Chennai for and tune out so desperately that if they even call to say that some guy has come with a courier, he wants the OTP, I bark at them.

[00:01:42] How dare you disturb me?

[00:01:43] Yeah, because even though I'm not doing You went to Kashmir in the dead of winter. I've done that more than a few times.

[00:03:01] Kiranit, first the idea of traveling alone was extremely dull, daunting, boring all at once.

[00:04:02] I did my laptop, it was just a three-night trip. But I had the best time ever,

[00:04:05] because firstly, with your phone by your side,

[00:04:07] when you're truly alone anyway.

[00:04:09] Absolutely, yeah.

[00:04:10] Right?

[00:04:11] It's like a companion.

[00:04:12] It's a companion.

[00:04:13] I like taking photographs.

[00:04:14] So for me, instead of chatting with people,

[00:04:16] I was walking around, taking pictures,

[00:04:18] talking to tour guides, talking to the taxi while I,

[00:04:20] you truly get a sense of the place

[00:04:21] when you interact with the locals.

[00:04:24] But then I realized've sort of perfected resting bitch face. You can't. You have the resting sweetheart face. Everyone I noticed this time, my God, you're so popular. Everyone will walk up to you,

[00:05:41] hug you,

[00:05:42] kiss you,

[00:05:43] snog you.

[00:05:45] Nobody snogged me.

[00:05:46] Nobody snogged me.

[00:05:47] I'm just saying to ask you. I travel alone all the time. So I've really lost count.

[00:07:00] See, firstly, if you travel alone,

[00:07:02] supposing you go to Europe,

[00:07:03] which you should do so that your husband keeps going to Goa

[00:07:05] and you keep wanting pictures to each other. So you do miss the ability to share your joys or what is going on in the moment. But I think that carry a book, which you do, I bet. And do your homework. Do not go out alone at night, even the safest of the cities.

[00:08:20] Okay. Don't be alone on a road at night walking.

[00:08:22] Okay. That's a good tip.

[00:08:24] And carry a journal, ghoste.

[00:09:40] That's perfect for me.

[00:09:41] Yeah, but at night you will be afraid of your own creatures.

[00:09:44] You think so?

[00:09:45] The creatures that live inside your head.

[00:09:47] It's true. For what? For his watch and his camera. Oh Lord. God knows but he's done a whole book on it. Checking us out. Definitely out. Okay. Although you know Sudha Murti, I was reading that book about the Murti. Very interesting. Narayan and Sudha Murti went together to the US. She had already declined a seat at MIT in favor of a job she had taken at Telco.

[00:11:03] Because she had like argued the case for female representation at work with GRD Tata. The people are so warm and lovely are never really alone then i went to you just have to go with true cold i did kashmir with the kids and then i wanted to go to calcutta because it was december and i want to explore calcutta. So it had been my desire since i attended the literature festival there a few years ago and so i look myself at two different hotels one historic and luxurious and i had a great to a guide.

[00:13:24] that's a better word. Because what is that, what is the worst thing that can happen that you'll be eating by yourself? Yeah. For me, it's generally, you know, I'll click an ankle and fall and die and, you know,

[00:13:30] stray dogs will eat me up before they realize I'm dead because I'm traveling alone.

[00:13:34] In India, unlikely.

[00:13:35] Yeah. First of all, you'll never be alone.

[00:13:37] I forget to even call my mom. She knows that if Shinali's going somewhere, she wouldn't hear from me, even if I'm really absolutely idle. We were at Glenburne and another beautiful tea estate before that and they kept cribbing that there's no Wi-Fi and then I said this is the character building trip we went on a trek and then Uzara said my character's already built no thank you okay like what the hell so too much cribbing yeah. And then the husbands generally at least my husband is the creature of comfort so it's

[00:15:00] to get him to go to a new restaurant in any place is so difficult forget a new place.

[00:15:06] I know that there is no internet and there's no online shopping. And I love, I mean, that is my most favorite thing to go to bazaars and buy local pickles and poppers and things and then come back and then I made,

[00:16:21] we'll say,

[00:16:21] but he thought,

[00:16:22] I'm a bit cool,

[00:16:23] like, okay, so this time as well,

[00:16:26] I thought I'm carrying... Which you want to eat. Which I ate on the plane, by the way. You ate on the plane with Murukhu with butter. It was the best thing ever and I think I'm going to go online in autumn. So, anyway, now I'm carrying all this just dry powder. Okay, so he says, by the way, my Punjabi is limping Punjabi. Okay, I used to speak to my grandparents after they passed away, it's gone. So, you had exhausted the limits of your Punjabi. Yeah, so anyway, but it's enough to stay back when you go together because invariably I'll forget something. Like my shawl in the taxi. Shawl masalas? Yeah, but you tell me that you should tell our listeners about how much excess baggage you were travelling with.

[00:20:20] For every occasion you had five options.

[00:20:22] Should I wear this or should I wear this?

[00:20:25] I'm indecisive. What do I do?

[00:20:27] Did you carry like 20 kgs? I think there's going to be a party and I made a mistake. And you said it doesn't matter, you're looking fine. But this is going to be a topic for another podcast. But it really mattered to me and we'll explore why later. But you were calming me down and saying, it's just chill, it doesn't matter. And I was like, it's a lit fest. Why do I care so much that I am not wearing

[00:21:43] the right clothes for a dinner?

[00:21:44] Because writers dress in all sorts of- Not wearing that, just form a leering. I see. Not wearing that heavy choker sets and all. Just nice kundan drops. Okay, good. You know, I was hoping I'd carried another extra bag. I was hoping I'd buy lots of sarees. What was going on with those combinations at Nali? They were meant for if you walk down the road, traffic will see you at a distance and not hit you.

[00:23:02] That is what those sarees were about.

[00:23:04] What are those combinations?

[00:23:05] In my life, I've not seen such combinations. correctness to the point of being hypervigilant with people's speech. And in response to that, we were talking about that people have lost a sense of humor. We have constantly walking on eggshells around people. So that was what our panel was about. Yeah. And in response to what we had to say, there was this very nice person who stood

[00:24:20] up and she said that she's LGBTQ and she was a little overweight.

[00:24:24] And she's asked that a VOC question. But it was really nice to hear a man say that he wants to listen to our podcast and he found our way of thinking something resonated with him. So that was really nice. That was fun. That was interesting. And a lot of young girls who walked up to us and said they enjoyed the panel.

[00:25:41] I know so many. And one who said she'll help us to find sponsors. Yeah.

[00:25:45] Yeah, she said that she'll get in touch with a couple of beauty brands