On April 9, Shenaz Treasury posted a video of a time when she ate ice cream made of 23-carat gold when transiting Dubai. The former MTV video jockey, now one of the most sought-after travel vloggers, dropped her "Black Diamond" ice cream adventure on Instagram in the middle of the lockdown. Whipped up with Italian truffles, Iranian saffron and edible 23-karat gold flakes, the ice cream costs Rs60,000 a scoop. Apart from Black Diamond, Shenaz also tucked into some gold chicken nuggets and fries. Shenaz goes on to narrate that she later painted the airplane restroom gold, thanks to a rumbling tummy. Her post is indicative of a shift in how relentless travel addicts are adjusting to being grounded. At a time when the tourism industry has taken a brutal drubbing, how are travel influencers remaking their identity as eternal wanderers?
Shenaz, known for her peppy travel videos, has never been the kind to panic. Her flirtatious effervescence is now being channelled into dating advice for men, quirky travel stories, motivational talk on mental fortitude and performing comedy. The new videos are doing even better than her travel videos. The 38-year-old has never been busier with all the housework, writing her scripts and shooting them, doing yoga by her balcony and catching up with family and friends. "You know what, maybe we human beings are the virus and we are being kept in our homes because we have been destroying Mother Nature,” says Shenaz. “Nature does not need us. It is the other way around.” Her fifth-floor balcony is now her only escape into leaves, sunshine and birdsong. Shenaz says she only needs her mental health and creativity to remain sane and sparky.
This is the way of the traveller and steadfast explorer. They are used to working alone, even when they travel. In travel psychology, the real wanderers are independent, full of energy, have little fear, breathlessly crave novelty and are mostly self-driven. So, are travel junkies also more resilient? “This is probably the worst time to be a digital nomad,” says Shivya Nath, who quit her corporate job at 23, left home and sold all her belongings to travel the world indefinitely. “A traveller without a permanent home to go back to. That is how I have lived for over six years—out of two bags, working on the go, exploring a place for a month or three, then moving on. It took me a while to make peace with the fact that I suddenly have nowhere to go.”
Her transformation into a free bird, documented in her blog, The Shooting Star, landed her a book deal with Penguin and established her as a rising star of travel writing. She knows the future of travel blogging is highly uncertain unless people rethink and adapt. "I realised that all these years on the road have made me pretty adaptable,” says Shivya. “I quickly began to think of all the things I have been putting off and threw myself head-on into them. Despite the uncertainty and panic, I am enjoying uninterrupted hours of working on my blog, reading Murakami and experimenting with vegan recipes.” Shivya’s last trip was to the remote villages in Chhattisgarh just before the lockdown. She is optimistic about going back to Iran, Japan and Guatemala someday. “I hope my travel writing work, which focuses on offbeat and sustainable travel, will bounce back,” she says.
Now that the eternal vacationer is back home, a popular travel couple, Savi and Vid, has serious goals to offer on their Instagram account called Bruised Passports. “This is the time to slow down and recharge our batteries,” says the journalist-photographer duo. “We have always advocated living a slow life that is about self-development and nurturing relationships with our family, friends and fellow human beings. And this pandemic, while not ideal, has given everyone the perfect opportunity to do that.”
As one of our most-loved travel writers Pico Iyer says in The Art of Stillness: Adventures in Going Nowhere, it is only our inner landscape and how we process our memories of travels and the many encounters that can really uplift and illuminate us.