Landscapes of memory along a contested corridor “Not all frontiers draw their lines with wire and warning. Some frontiers speak in orchards, water channels, and an older, slower grammar of staying.” A Summer Borrowed from Routine By June of 2015, my life had become a well-tempered checklist. The laptop opened to the same avalanche of tabs each morning;…
Riding toward the world’s highest pass and learning to turn back. “There is a difference between a wall and a door politely closed. The mountain, when it says ‘not today,’ is not ending your story. It is saving the next chapter.” Counting Returns, Counting Breaths By 2018, I had stopped counting trips to Ladakh. Numbers couldn’t hold what the…
A trek where each tea house becomes a heartbeat. “Some journeys don’t measure themselves in kilometers or passes. They count themselves in kettles boiled, doors opened, and rooms warmed by strangers.” The Valley After the Season Autumn 2015. Ladakh was exhaling. The last tour groups had long since returned to airports and dim apartments; the shop shutters along…
Off-grid miles where fuel, faith, and horizons run low “On the Changthang, distance is measured in breath, not kilometers and help arrives not on time, but exactly when you need it.” The Plateau That Became a Habit By 2014, Ladakh wasn’t a destination; it was muscle memory. My twentieth trip felt less like travel and more like returning to…
“Some roads are built. Some are borrowed. And some like the Chadar are permitted for a short season, under strict conditions: humility, patience, and the good sense to turn back.” The Vow After the Finish Line The finish line of the Ladakh Marathon in 2014 wasn’t tape or triumph. It was breath thin, bright, disbelieving and then the dull…
Fear, focus, and the art of breathing at 17,000+ feet. “You don’t conquer a pass. You arrive at it one breath at a time.” The Mountain That Stayed I didn’t come back to Ladakh in 2012 for photographs, bragging rights, or the myth of the “highest.” I came back because the first time I left, something of me stayed…
Where days turn into nights Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok is always open. It may doze off like an animal does when it’s hot, but it never gives in to quiet. At midnight, it sounds like a machine that has been left on too long, fluorescent lights buzz above, luggage wheels rattle on tiles, and announcements in three languages play in…
Walking Light in the Land of Mountains What Nepal’s Trails Taught Me About Waste, Wonder, and the Weight of What We Carry “When you carry only what you need, the world around you grows lighter and suddenly you notice what you and it could leave behind.” The Unwritten Road Mountains, Meaning, & Mistakes I didn’t travel to Nepal to…
The Mountain in Me A Place Remembered Before It Was Ever Seen “Some journeys don’t begin when the ticket is booked. They begin when a place starts whispering in your bones long before you know its name.” – The Unwritten Road It wasn’t the peak that pulled me in. Not the grandeur of Everest. Not the myth of Annapurna.…
When the Road Became the Mirror Not All Roads Lead Somewhere, Some Simply Return You to Yourself “You don’t always travel to find new places. Sometimes, you travel to meet old parts of yourself, the quiet, the cracked, the curious, waiting in the dust where the world forgets to look.” — The Unwritten Road It begins with a hum. Not…
