The long way home

Hinduism and Hindu mythology was something that fascinated me as soon as I arrived in India. Grand tales of gods and the divine seemed so far removed from the world they forged today – which is why I never expected to be pennyless, shoeless and nearly naked on an Indian beach, genuinely questioning whether one of these gods had muddied his divine hands in the life of lil’ ol’ me. It had really started in Goa. After having my only shoes mysteriously swallowed up by the sand (or the hands of a cunning opportunist) while swimming I’d resigned myself back to my bogan barefoot life – who needs shoes anyway? At least not in northern Goa, where rocking up to a beachside party bare foot and knotted hair fits you neatly into the foreign hippy boat. Even the knock-off Havianas I eventually bought kept wandering away from me: Left outside cafes and stores, quietly borrowed by friends and sometimes just disappearing and reappearing at the homes of other friends. So when I bid my final f...

There's lots of things that I love about hitchhiking - there's that feeling of not knowing where you'll end up at the end of the day, the sense of adventure, the undeniable convenience of free travel, but more than all that, the thing that astounds me every time, is the variety of interesting characters I meet. Because the people who pull over for the questionably-smelling but big-smiling backpacker are not your average Jenny from the block. In Australia and in Europe drivers regularly recount to me their past hitchhiking days; to and from school, to Darwin from Melbourne for footy, all the way across Germany every weekend for a girlfriend (ain't that love!). The little club of us who once stood thumbs-up now pulling over whenever they recognise the symbol, ready to help out a traveller and be a part of someone else's adventure for a while. Or, ready to unload their entire life story (marital problems and all), their opinions, political agenda and conspiracy theo...