My love for travelling from my parents because they’ve always loved travelling and growing up, we’d do spend all our holidays travelling to some offbeat places
1. Tell us about your upbringing & journey.
I’m a 28-year-old full-time YouTuber and content creator and have been in this field for the past 4 years, so I get to travel the world and work with amazing brands and I’m living my dream life now. But it wasn’t always this way.
I was born and brought up in a small city called Vellore in Tamil Nadu, graduated in Economics Honours from Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi and did my post-grad from Xavier Institute of Communications in Mumbai. I worked for 4 years post that in the corporate world in finance and then in advertising and marketing.
In 2017, I decided to take the plunge and give my YouTube channel a real shot, and today I have around 450,000 people following me online and have travelled to places like Czech Republic, Hong Kong, Dubai, the USA and Kazakhstan for work!
2. When did you start travelling and how did you decide to start your Instagram page?
I think I get my love for travelling from my parents because they’ve always loved travelling and growing up, we’d do spend all our holidays travelling to some offbeat places. However, when I started working in my job, I barely got any days off, and most of my vacation days would be spent visiting family back home.
So I only properly started travelling again once I quit my job and decided to do YouTube full-time. I started off doing budget trips and visited places in India like Varanasi, Goa, Kerala, and also managed to do a couple of trips abroad to Thailand and Vietnam.
I’d started my Instagram and YouTube back when I still had my job, however, I could only give it my all once I started doing this full-time.
3. What are the best road trips have you taken across the country?
I’ve done quite a few road trips around India but two of my favourite ones were a two-week road trip around Ladakh where we covered a lot of offbeat spots (like a village named Tingmosgang where we spent a couple of nights), and a road trip around Arunachal Pradesh and Assam, which came with a lot of challenges due to the weather but it turned out to be an incredible trip and a very memorable one.
4. What do you think made your content popular?
I think back to when I started creating travel vlogs in 2017, there weren’t as many women travellers posting travel content, so I think that may have been something that made me stand out at the time.
Also, I’ve always tried to be very authentic with my content and I like to make more raw vlogs that make the viewer feel like they’re travelling with me, and a lot of my audience comments and tells me they get that vibe from my video, so I must be doing something right.
5. Which is your favourite travel destination in India and the world?
This is the hardest question to answer because there are tons of places that come to mind, but if I had to pick, within India I’d say Rajasthan, the Andamans, Kerala and Sikkim are some of my favourite states to travel to. And internationally, Iceland and Vietnam have been such beautiful and unique countries to visit.
6. Are you someone who likes to take control of the wheel or stay back whilst enjoying the scenic vistas?
I’m the person sitting back and enjoying the views! I do know how to drive, and I’d like to maybe do a bit of driving next time on a road trip, but so far I’ve mostly been the one to sit and enjoy the scenic views.
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7. How can travellers in India boost local tourism and help uplift the hospitality industry?
Given the current situation with the pandemic, I think it’s so important to boost local tourism and uplift the travel and hospitality industry. Given that a lot of international countries still haven’t opened up to Indians, it’s a good opportunity to focus on and promote destinations within India, which there are plenty.
A few trends that I’ve noticed are people seem to be preferring road trips, offbeat travel, and weekend getaways. But one of the best trends that have come out of this situation is a focus on sustainability and promoting local businesses and travel companies while on these trips.
I think this type of sustainable tourism where the benefits of tourism are also enjoyed by the local community is one of the best ways to support the local community, and as a traveller, I also like how this will enable me to engage with locals and experience something new.
Kritika Goel is a full-time YouTuber, traveller and content creator, documenting her life and travels for her audience of 450,000 people.
- Interviewed By Pratibha Sahani
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