"A fistful of Sunshine" Rupanworld's Profile

At the very introduction, I would like people to know as to why I am on Virtual Tourist. The site itself would offer you the Top 10 Reasons for being on VT but I have an 11th Reason and that is the main idea behind me being on VT. Virtual tourist gives me the scope of immortalising my trips. When a person makes a trip to a place, there are many plans, many thoughts, many dreams and wishes involved but hardly does he remember each and every one of them anymore with the passage of time. As the present travels to the past, some little events, some nice moments, some good feelings, that once, may be, even for a second, gave us some pleasure, some excitement, a little stir, seem to fade away. To remember every second of the dream trips I ever made, I need a medium that gives me the chance of reducing them to writing and storing them for ever and ever. From time to time I go through my own pages and re-live the moments that disappeared into the golden past. The fact that in addition I can also share all my travel moments with people all around the world, known and unknown, and perhaps in some way help them in their travel planning, is a BONUS.

Headless me in a toy museum at Arhus, Denmark

I have always been a great travel lover.
As a child, although I did not tavel much with parents, but we have definitely lived in some places across the beautiful North Eastern India.
I have lived in different kinds of houses, wooden houses, bamboo houses, asbestos houses, mud houses, house built on a tree, apart from the normal concrete houses.
Having lived in the North East India for the first 22 years of my life, I have also seen quite a number of natural calamities like an earthquake every month, floods once or twice a year, landslides during our travels every year, cyclones and lots and lots of rains. Perhaps snow was the only thing that I was far from. My earliest memory from the hills of the region that I lived in was that there used to be clouds hanging from the sides of the hilly roads we walked on. CLOUD UNDER MY FEET!!!!! AMAZING!!!!!

dressed as a Viking at Stockholm, Sweden

As for transportation, India has given me the scope of a variety of travels, starting from bullock carts to jet planes. Paddled rickshaws and autorickshaws still remain my favourite mode of transport. For details, check out my transportation tips in India page.

I have not travelled much in India (I have just been to some 120 cities and towns in India out of which only 40 are recognised tourist places, well that statistics might sound amazing to people from smaller countries but for an Indian, that means he/she has actually seen very less of the country) and one day I would like to complete visiting this whole wonderful country. I have been to 11 countries in Europe and while travelling across them I had the same feeling as I had travelling between different states of India and it made me more and more proud of my own country. It has such a diversity in geographical, cultural and social attributes that is unthinkable in any part of the world. Truly incredible!!

With a street side statue at Bratislava, Slovakia

In my home page, I share with Vters, my craziest travel photos, those that I have very good memories about.
When on trips with my family I have never felt bad about compromising with the tastes of my loved ones and if necessary, seeing less to leave space for them fulfilling their wishes too. But when they have not been around, I have always prefered to travel alone, except my trips to Berlin (Germany) and Marseille and Avignon (France), and I have very nice memories from them. Travelling alone has allowed me to see more in cities in less time, spend less time just sleeping and rather seeing more, spending less on eating expensive and rather using that extra money to buy nicer memories. My best trips have been those where I was the master of my own wishes and that also allowed me to meet strangers from all around the world on my trips.

In front of dancing house at Prague,Czech Republic

My favourite travel destinations abroad are:

Barcelona (Spain)
Paris (France)
Amsterdam (The Netherlands)
Stockholm (Sweden)
Arhus (Denmark)
Bratislava (Slovakia)
Luebeck (Germany)
Vienna (Austria)
Brugges (Belgium)
Dubai (UAE)

With a baby goat in a village in Bengal, India

My favourite travel destinations in India so far:

Varanasi (Uttar Pradesh)
Pondicherry (Pondicherry)
Jaipur (Rajasthan)
Kanyakumari (Tamil Nadu)
Kodaikanal (Tamil Nadu)
Shillong (Meghalaya)
Kovalam (Kerala)

... and the villages of Bengal

It will take me sometime until I complete building my India pages. Currently I am working on my Europe pages.

With horns of a Kudu, Rheda-Wiedenbruck, Germany

My Top 5 pages on VT:

New Delhi, India: The capital city of my country
Varanasi, India: Varanasi, the land of ghats and temples
Aarhus, Denmark: Århus: Denmark's second largest and youngest city
Bremen, Germany: Bremen, a world heritage site
Lübeck, Germany: Straight from the pages of a fairy tale book
India: India, through the eyes of an incorrigible patriot
Sarnath, India: The Holy land of Buddha
Kolkata, India: The City that taught me to love
Nyköping, Sweden: A Couple of hours in the rain
Bangladesh: My first foreign tour
Dhaka, Bangladesh: A city of contrasts
Bielefeld, Germany: *The city that gave me my first published photo
Bratislava, Slovakia: Bratislava - the smallest big city

My latest visits were to Goa, Chandigarh, Amritsar, Shimla, Wagah Border (India X Pakistan) but I am yet to build the pages for most. However, I have built my Goa page and I am sure everybody would love it.

For the other pages, please come back soon.

In front of a strange sculpture at Vienna, Austria

Places in India that I would like to visit soon: Darjeeling, Gangtok, Kashmir, Mysore, Lakhwadwep, Lucknow, Manali, Nainital, Itanagar, Tezpur, backwaters of Kerala, Mount Abu... and so on

Countries that I would like to visit soon: Nepal, Singapore, Seychelles and Mauritius.

Some countries that I wish to travel to some day: Italy (I had three unsuccessful attempts cancelling tickets twice), Greece (I had to cancel my tickets to Athens once), Monaco (I missed a chance by the fraction of a second), Norway (I had to cancel a ticket to Oslo), Finland, Switzerland, Russia, Greenland (Denmark), Antarctica ........... infact, the list will never end.

Dear Friends WISH ME LUCK