Euphoria

The word ‘Insurance’ brings shudders to many. The reason behind this is that there are a lot of policies and formalities that need to be done to get insurance for you or your loved ones. One of the less heard of, but highly valuable and important insurance cover is the travel insurance! Traveling is something that is done often by everyone. Even the small journey from yr home to the grocery store is a journey in its own means. I recently came across a study which suggested that nearly 16% of the deaths are caused by accidents (especially when people are on travel). It is of utmost importance to have a proper insurance for yourself so that your family is well secured and can be independent, in case something unforeseen happens. There are many firms which specialize in insurances for those frequent travelers who spend majority of their time outside their cozy homes (and sometimes outside their country as well). It is very logical that they insure themselves before venturing abroad for their business development. There are many companies which provide hassle free insurance schemes. Also, there are not any legal tangles when it comes to these. Not surprisingly, these policies are now finding many takers. After all, it is for our family that we toil this much!

Bikes!! The mention of this word naturally gives us the thought of a scientific term synonymous with bikes –“Speed”. Anything that is fast eventually gives us a thrill. Ever wondered how the world would have been without the greatest invention—The Wheels??!! Yes the same old circular things which we almost always see rotating!! Remember how we once loved to run along with that torn cycle tire as a kid?? People and things might have changed, but the desire to conquer time and distance has never changed in our hearts. Whatever one does in life, it finally comes down to the simple and basic human wish to conquer time!! But many of us seem oblivious of this nature of mankind.
Living close to nature is what makes life easier and happier. Getting used to the monotony of life only adds more pressure and a feeling of being caged. The places next to your own place may be different. The same place will be much different in another couple of years. So let those wings spread!! Open your mind and heart to a brand new world around you. The world is huge. Feel its magnificence!!

Traveling in public transport is a world in itself. Be it a bus or a train we use for commuting every day, it becomes an integral part of our daily life. Not all travels are bringing in change anyway!! But what makes this everyday travel interesting is the miscellany of people whom we see and listen to during our travel.
Sitting in a public transport bus, you can observe the whole world, if you are not listening to your music player and sleeping!! This is a totally different situation from that of a college bus. This is when you sit there for more than an hour and it’s not your friend who is next to you. Everyone as a kid would have hated this fact!! So it’s not slumber time, it’s time to be cautious and alert. It’s not always advisable to keep talking to the person in the next seat in a public bus!! Office goers and especially women who take the same public transport almost every day become so accustomed to it that you can even see them preparing stuff for dinner when they get home (I really mean this!!).Sooner or later, to many of us, it becomes a comfortable couch to sit and rest apparently.

As a student in school, have you ever imagined you traveling more than 60 miles daily??? The answer will be ‘no’ for many of us. But yes, it is happening and it has been happening to me for about four years now. Traveling by college bus, which was once tiresome, has become a part of life now. In fact there is no college without a least one-hour travel!!
College bus—it’s the place you make your first friends at college, it’s the place you study for your assessment tests, it’s the place where you turn on your radio and hear songs you never thought existed!! But of course, it’s the best place to make up for your baby-sleep!! Everyday, you get up from bed saying to yourself “oh yes.. i can sleep for an hour more in my bus!!” Today, it’s a special occasion at college or rather in the college bus – “Bus day”. It’s the same day which many of us get charged up about still many of us dread so much about!! The usual eating-sleeping-chatting cycle in the college bus is a little altered on this special day.

Travel, forgetting your worries, doesn’t mean travel without any safety and security. Safety takes the highest priority any day in a journey. Remember that when you travel, you are more exposed to dangers than you are in your daily life. Dangers can be anything from a normal wound, loss of our belongings to any potential risk to life.
A first-aid kit is something mandatory to be carried during a travel. A list of numbers and addresses to be contacted in times of emergency is also to be maintained. Before starting for a journey, all means by which the crew can be contacted have to be given to relatives and friends in the hometown. And yes, these are the times when our mobile phones will really come into the play. They serve as a very essential means of staying in touch with the people in the hometown. We should also make sure we don’t carry anything much valuable like cash or jewels. They might be lost or even end up being the reason for causing dangers to us. The whole morale of the tour might be lost in case of safety issues.

In Hindu culture, there is something called “Kshetrayanam”, which means, visiting distant places of worship. Such places were considered as the ultimate route to salvation!! Once all our duties in our family are over, we are expected to give up all that we have and travel to distant lands and ultimately find peace.
Now if you ask me the question “Is finding peace related to traveling?” I would say a big yes! Traveling alone gives us enormous time to think about ourselves and our life. That is what many of us lack. Watching what we do and how we react to situations. Traveling makes us think of nothing else other than food, water and shelter—the very basic needs to live. It relieves us from all troubles of life. This was the state the great sages of ancient times wished for at the very start of their journey towards self-realization. Getting back to the current times, traveling alone has become highly dangerous and nobody looks for self-realization now. Humans are in search of the least life-sustaining peace. That can very well be offered by a little travel!!

In foreign countries traveling across nations is something which has become very common. Nowadays we hear many foreigners wishing to know people in distant lands and get to know their country in their own perspective rather than from a tourist’s point of view. This gives them a real feel of being in a country culturally rather than geographically!! Knowing a place through books and Internet or even visiting a place just like that gives you only a glance into how life can be in this part of the world. But living as a part of it is an entirely different scenario.
Accompanying these foreigners in their journey across our country means traveling to our own Indian cities with a different outlook. Even the little things we fail to notice may look wondrous to them. The usual market place or shopping complex, the ever-existing traffic and bad roads, everything appears different from their point of view. The best part is, we realize the value of our own country, art, culture and customs. Things never appear valuable when they are got very easily. Only when people from distant places look at them and appreciate them, do we become conscious of the very existence of such priceless things and places in our country.