My dear readers, I would like to introduce to you my close friend Jackie. She is a polish-australian lady who left home three years ago for a road trip all over Europe for few weeks and finally decided to settle in England for a bit. We met one year ago in London and she was the kind of girl I admired for her experiences and for her strong, funny and generous character.
Before getting my tickets to South East Asia, I always fantasised about travelling on my own. I’ve met few girls during my life who decided to leave home with just a backpack. I realised that they were not that different from me, even if they were so much more courageous, mature and wise than me at this time…
A mantra of mine is: “Be your own hero”. So simple but so important at the same time. If I wanted to do this solo trip for so long and I admired the girls who did it, why couldn’t I do it too? Instead of admiring others, I had to work on, “being my own hero”… Jackie was one of the heros who influenced me to be a hero, myself.
“You have to be courageous and say YES to things when you travel. Push your limits and sometimes do things that you would be usually uncomfortable with.”
Whilst traveling, all the solo women travellers had a job, a house and sometimes a soul mate, friends and family who were waiting for them to come back (…or not!). They all told me that packing and leaving was a difficult decision but they all united that they never regretted this choice.
Jackie is definitely these type of girl. She had to leave her cocoon but the travel bug was inside her for a very long time. She explained that you can try to fight over it but it is not something that can be restrained. One of her biggest fears would actually not to be able to travel anymore!
“It wasn’t like I had an epiphany: “I want to travel alone”. It is something that I’ve always felt.”
It could be seen as quite strange to start the Wanderlust Queens Project by interviewing Jackie who travelled on her own a long time ago but I imagine, for somebody like me who is about to leave, there is nothing more reassuring than the words she said about her experience.
Why not start at the end? Having her sharing me the experience of a lady who had two years to think about how her solo travel changed in her life and character and understand the long term conclusion of it was a treasure. What is the deep conclusion of wandering around on your own, what does stay in your life and in our character after being living a “normal” life.
“My parents were happy when I told them.They knew it was something I wanted to do for ages and I’ve been talking about it for so long… I think, maybe, they were happy for me not talking about it anymore and actually doing it.”
Jackie admitted that she was thinking about traveling again. Soon. This moment in between in her life really reminded myself before taking the decision of leaving. The wanderlust bug can wake up few weeks or few years after your last trip and knowing that it’s still in her bring us to talk about the concept of the wanderlust. What is it really? Can you satisfy this urge in your life? What are the real motivations of the wanderers? Is it more scary to think that you will never satisfy it or would it be more frightening to loose it?
“Nobody warned me about moments of loneliness… When you’ve seen something absolutely magical and you have nobody to tell it to… In that moment it gets lonely. It’s character building.”
It was also an excuse to test some questions I planned to ask on the road for this project.
I wanted to bring the subjects of the concept of home, courage, loneliness, regrets, friendship, I wanted her to describe the term “wanderlust” and how traveling on your own can be build your character.
Thank you my 98p darling to share with me these memories, and add your good energy and your positivism to the Wanderlust Queen Project.
Thanks Stephanie for the corrections!
The Wanderlust Queens Project 
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