A Passage to India

For many Chinese, the idea of travelling still largely centers on experiencing as many cities or countries in the shortest time possible. 34-year-old Hong Mei wanted to do it differently: She quit her job to backpack and became the first female Chinese ever to travel across all of India.

With her debut travelogue, she wants to encourage Chinese backpackers to venture beyond their comfort zones and carve out time to look out for the real adventure. Together with her husband, American photographer Tom Carter, she traveled on a budget of US$ 15 to 20 dollars a day. Hong Mei, however, was not only limited by money but also visa restrictions as a Chinese citizen. She had to leave India several times to apply for new visas. Despite such difficulties, the couple traveled through the subcontinent for nearly a whole year and made their way into the remote region of Kutch at the Pakistan border.