THE YEAR FOR LOST TIME (PART 1)

Written by Misha Paul, marketing professional, founder of sustainable fashion label Love Again and sustainability advocate. She loves stories- the more vintage or rooted, the better- and always looks for them in her mother's old saris, while reading or even while travelling.

Not all who quit are lost. Sometimes quitters are the biggest dreamers.

For as long as I’ve known, I have harboured the dream of working with local communities on-ground and doing my bit towards sustainable community development. And this year, I finally mustered the courage and grabbed an opportunity to live that dream. In this three-part series, I’ll talk about my journey from breaking the glass cubicle in the busy city of Mumbai to running a cafe with the locals in the remote town of Kaza! Walk along.

I quit on March 31, 2023. 

I did not hate my corporate job. It definitely paid well and took care of my untethered indulgences. But I had a constant gnawing inside of me which kept me restless. Quitting, in no way, was an overnight decision. There was no “wake up and smell the dreams” moment, as I’d read in the innumerable ‘corporate girl, quits her high-paying job to become a traveller/ freelancer/ entrepreneur’ blogs and articles. In reality, my decision to quit came after years of despondency, of being torn between the hunger to live my dreams and letting go of the comfort blanket of a corporate paycheck, battling the fear of failure and years of saving- bit by bit. 

The tipping point (quite stereotypically) was an unplanned trip to Ladakh in June 2022, where without internet connectivity and with a lot of time in hand, my restlessness got the better of me. It was then that I decided it was time to dedicate at least one year- if not more- to my passion for working with and building sustainable brands. After years of dreaming and fighting my fear of treading unknown waters, it was then and there that I had the climacteric Fuck-It moment and I told myself- if not now, when? 

I took this picture in June 2022. It’s called Sangam or the confluence of Indus and Zanskar Rivers in Ladakh. It is located 35km from Leh in Nimmu, on the Leh Srinagar highway.

Now only one question lingered on my mind- now that I had given myself one year, how could I make the most of it and go on-ground to do some real work with local communities? 

HELLO VOLUNTEER TOURISM!

While a tourist spends only a few days in a destination, a volunteer traveller travels for a longer period dedicating their time to learning about diverse cultures and people and contributing in some manner to the local economy. Volunteer tourism rejects the traditional notions of ticking off check-boxes or the more recent trend of travelling for the ‘gram’. Unlike mass travel, it’s a more sustainable form of travelling where you travel with cultural, social and environmental consciousness, participate in environmentally-conscious experiences and find ways of giving back to the community or the place. 

I had always loved the idea of my work taking me places. This time, with slow travel in mind, I wanted places to take me to work. They say that where there is a dream, there is a way! That is how I came across the exciting volunteering opportunity to Run A Cafe in Spiti.  

SOL CAFE, KAZA (SPITI)

I’ve never been an avid mountain traveller. I’m quite a city girl used to comfort travelling. Taking up the opportunity to run a cafe in Spiti would mean I would have to fight my fears and spend a month at 4270m altitude above sea level. But I truly believe that one must be ready to move mountains for their dreams. So when I came to know about this volunteer-run cafe in Spiti called Sol Cafe, where volunteers came from across the world with their ideas, expertise, intent and time to work with the locals and run it, I knew it was time for fuck-it part 2. I learned that volunteers ran the cafe as their own, and made sure the proceeds went towards benefitting the locals and developing Spiti. The more I read about the cafe, the more intrigued I got. 

I knew I had no experience in hospitality. If I signed up for running the community cafe, I would have to take full charge of it- from waitressing to taking stock of the food inventory to being the cashier for the cafe and its shop to handling its marketing. I knew I’d landed on an insanely cool and unique opportunity, and if I let my fear get the better of me, then I would be making a mistake. So I signed up for it.

But very soon my excitement was replaced by fear. 

THE SPITI RESEARCH

Replete with serpentine roads, falling boulders and deadly turns, no wonder the Spiti Valley Road is considered one of the toughest adventure roads on this planet. I remember I was already getting motion sick while watching the innumerable Spiti videos at 4 am- the hour of the wolf from the comfort of my bed in Mumbai- at a height of 14m above sea level! 

Probably Relevant Side Note: The Hour Of the Wolf is the hour when most people die, when sleep is the deepest, and when nightmares are the most real. Well, I was literally experiencing The Hour! 

To say I started feeling delirious, with the question- how far was I ready to travel for my dreams - dangling above my head like a freshly sharpened butcher’s knife, would be like calling Spiti- a cold desert valley- ‘a little nippy during winters’. The warm, cosy world I’d carefully curated around me was constantly warning me that I wouldn’t last. The rabbit hole of Spiti videos freaked me out totally. But sometimes dreams have the power to propel one farther than one can even comprehend. I knew it was my year for lost time. If not now, when? So, at that hour of the wolf, I booked my tickets to Kaza.

But what is so scary about reaching Spiti and why was it so difficult to reach it? Well, wait for Part 2 of this adventure where I’ll talk about how I overcame the fear of mountains and ran a cafe at 3650m above sea level!

PART 2 COMING SOON!     

Photo credits: Misha Paul