During the summer of 1963, a boy in his 20s chanced upon a number of black and white photographs while skimming through his father’s stash of travel pamphlets and postcards. When his father found out about this, he explained his travel dreams that he couldn’t achieve. That day, the little boy decided that he would find a way to travel the world as a tribute to his father.
Arun Narayan Sabnis, actor Shriya Pilgaonkar’s maternal grandfather, knew that his father could never afford travelling as he was the sole bread-earner in his family. Upon deciding to live his father’s unfulfilled dreams, Arun Narayan Sabnis initially made two unsuccessful attempts to travel. While he had an opportunity to study in an American college twice, he had to let go of them due to lack of funds and his visa being rejected on health grounds.
In 1973, a decade after he had taken his travelling resolution, he finally boarded a plane to England to study at the University College of London. From changing his attitude to broadening his outlook towards life, he learnt a lot from his friends abroad.
According to him, visiting Antarctica back in 2012 was one of his most unforgettable trips. In 2011, he booked himself a ticket for one of the riskiest oceanic cruises in the world and experienced a deadly silence as they crossed an 11 kilometre-long passage. While most of his co-passengers got seasick during this journey, he thought that he would nearly die. He even had several nightmares throughout that everyone is searching for his dead body in the ocean. However, that didn’t stop him from trying new destinations.
When you visit a new place, there is always a sense of adventure and anticipation. All of this together makes up the formula. Every place has its own.
Even though his wife doesn’t usually travel with him, they travelled together to England for celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary. After a short while, he went to Iceland with his granddaughter Shriya Pilgaonkar.
For his birthday, she had put out a clip captioned ‘Around The World With Ajoba’ that captures several moments from his travel days. You can watch the video here:
Note: All images are sourced from Shriya Pilgaonkar’s video.
Let’s pack our bags once this is all over!