Colors And Culture: Experience India Through Personalized Travel With Mona Contractor

 

India is a big country with varied colors, culture and cuisine. The best way to experience India is through a personalized travel experience, and our guest knows the best way to travel. In this episode, Stephen Jaye chats with the founder of Merge Experiences, Mona Contractor. Mona talks about India as only she can, describing the colors and flavor of the country. She discusses her experiences helping western travelers in India and gives some travel tips, too. Tune in for more as we learn about the country, its people, and the unique experiences that it offers.

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Colors And Culture: Experience India Through Personalized Travel With Mona Contractor

One of the themes that some of you who have read some of my earlier episodes might see emerging is the theme of travel. Travel is something that’s always been quite important to me. One of my other pursuits is writing a travel blog called Jaye Travel Blog. I’ve always found that travel opens people up to different possibilities, options, and experiences.

One of the great benefits of travel that I’ve always observed is that you learn to get a little bit outside of the narrow view of just your specific place in your specific time. There are plenty of other places in the world where people do things differently. That means you get into the mindset of understanding that there are different ways to do things than the way your family, your neighbors, and the people in your immediate vicinity do in your current place in time and culture. My guest joins us from Mumbai, India, Mona Contractor, with her business Merge Experiences, which gets groups customized travel experiences. Mona, welcome to the show.

Thank you for inviting me. It’d be a pleasure to speak to you and your guests.

Thank you so much. My guests and I included will benefit from hearing about your business in planning people’s travels. Let’s start by telling us a little bit about what Merge Experiences is all about. Who is your clientele is and what do you do?

I used to work for somebody doing the same thing where you sell in the Indian subcontinent, but working for a bigger company gives you a lot of restrictions. I was literally living out of a suitcase, and I wanted to get out. I got a bit lucky when I started this particular business because my past clients kept on encouraging me to start on my own. That’s what I did. My whole focus was to give clients experiences and that’s what I used to do in my job as well. They remember that and said, “We want to work with you because we enjoy working with you.” That’s how we started.

What I wanted and I still want to, and I have been pretty successful in giving people, is an amalgamation of experiences as far as the Indian subcontinent is concerned. The neighboring countries are maybe more popular, but India is popular for some different reasons. My whole idea was to introduce the country the way it is, that real India, which is an amalgamation of so many things. For example, I do a lot of mic tours. If you’re a first-timer, I would amalgamate the entire experience and give it to you. India offers a lot of cultural experiences.

If you are a seeker, then India is the place for you. It can hit you sometimes and it can be an experience of a lifetime. Share on X

A lot of art, India is full of art and artists are everywhere in terms of paintings, clothes, and color. I would like to introduce India as an amalgamation of all the architecture, the history, the culture, the festivals, the noise, the smell, and the flavors. I call my country a glorious chaos because it is chaotic and crowded. It is overwhelming. We always tell our guests, “It’s going to be a bit overwhelming.” We also prepare them nicely when they come to visit the country. That’s what I offer.

The advantage of working for yourself is that you get to choose. You choose your suppliers also. When you work for a big organization, they stick to their officers. I have the advantage of that I can choose my people and my speakers. Some of them don’t even work for anybody, they just work with me. We’ve introduced this culture of introducing ladies who like to work from home. They quit their jobs because they were pregnant or they were looking after their family.

The team that I have, we all work from home. I do have an office for my meetings and everything, but we all prefer to work from home. It was not tough when this pandemic arrived, we’re used to it, but it’s just that our work stopped, which is a sad part. The whole idea is to introduce countries which offer similar experiences. Not similar but something which is different from the other countries, not the run of the mill where you do a tour, visit a particular place, and you’re done. What we offer is a complete takeaway for a person, sometimes a life-changing experience for a person. India is also a place where if you are a seeker, then India is the place for you. It can hit you sometimes and it can be an experience of a lifetime.

India is different. I would urge people to flock to us and we will be happy to answer all sorts of questions. That’s how I would present my country. That’s what I do. It’s not the typical travel where you do half-day to a full-day tour, it’s an experience of meeting people. Eating their food. Having to know what goes into certain illogical rituals that we have and things like that. That’s been our whole focus as far as India is concerned.

People then like to do the neighboring countries as well, which we offer with Nepal and Bhutan. Nepal is also an interesting place. It’s a place where Tantric Hinduism is practiced. They’ve included democracy in their constitution, but earlier, it was a Hindu nation. They used to practice Tantric Hinduism. One of the cities in Nepal, Bhaktapur, it’s like a microcosm. There are so many temples, and it’s pretty interesting.

 

Nepal is interesting, and so is Bhutan. A lot of people like to go there to have a different culture. Peaceful. I remember going to Bhutan years ago, it was so raw, there were no fancy hotels, and now they have everything. Before it becomes commercial, which I doubt, hit that place. It’s amazing.

I personally like Myanmar because it offers good experiences for the traveler. Sri Lanka is also a small island, and you have the most fabulous properties or hotels. Amazing food. It’s an interesting sightseeing and simple people. That’s what is the Sri Lankan experience is all about. There are countries that we send people to Southeast Asia, our main is Cambodia, Vietnam, and Laos. We also do Bali, which is also for people who would like to relax for a while. My personal favorite is Japan. The food is to die for. I love Japanese food. Japan needs no introduction. That’s one of my personal favorites.

First of all, it’s amazing that not only have you created this ideal job and lifestyle match for yourself running this business, but it seems like you’ve created this for a few other people, these mothers who work from home and able to do that based on your own choices. That, I love and I love the idea of opening up more people to the options of working the way they see fit as opposed to everyone trying to be the same person.

One of the things I’m wondering about the India part of the experience is, I know that India is a diverse place with lots of different subcultures within that. For the orientation, you can correct me if I’m wrong. I’ve been told to think of India before as what it would be like if the entire continent of Europe was all forced to be one country? You have Britain, Hungary, France, Malta, all under the same banner. Is that correct?

Yes. It’s like a bigger version of Europe where each and every state has a different language. We’ve got lots of languages here. If we divide the country, it’s divided geographically by mountains and valleys. In the Southern part, you’ll feel like you’re going to another country because the language is different and people look different. The Northern part is different, the language and everything. From Northwest until the Northeast, you will find some similarities between the language, the dialects, and everything. Each and every state in Southern India is diverse. It has its own culture own, even in food. They got their own flavor and own ingredients. It’s vast.

I also write for this online portal, and they asked me to make tourism for India’s Soft Power. They were about 60 to 70 questions because it is so vast. I said, “Choose how many questions you want to ask them,” because India is so vast, you can ask a number of questions to these students and train them. The whole idea was to stimulate them and introduce them to different destinations, which are there because, in India, there are so many destinations that lie dormant. We don’t know about them at all.

They are prolific places with lots of ancient cultures. In fact, the Golden Temple in Amritsar is popular because that’s the temple that serves three meals to people. I was speaking to a friend, we don’t know about this place. They have been serving free food to people. They stopped taking donations from people because they have all the money.

Each state in India is very diverse. It has its own culture. Even in food, they have their own flavor, their own ingredients. Share on X

No matter what religion, caste, creed, or whatever you are, you can go there and have your free meal. If you want, you can stay there for a few days and seek if you’re looking for a spiritual experience or something, you can stay there. India is full of such places. A lot of these places don’t even want any publicity. They just do their job quietly, and that’s about it. It’s a lot of experiences and a lot of stories. India is a land of stories. We have our epics, which is our history. They are full of stories.

One thing I was wondering is, from the standpoint of traveling to India, do you think that people should see the entire country? When you’re designing your tours, do you think it’s important that people visit all these different regions and see all the different cultures? Is it more about immersing yourself in the experience of this specific place that you’re going to?

It all depends on what time you have. It’s a large country, and traveling to the entire country is not easy. If you have a short time and you’ve decided that you want to do India, sometimes people plan and say, “This is what I’m going to do.” If you had fifteen days, we’ll amalgamate some prolific places around and give you a gist of everything. If you are somebody who feels that you want to come here again and again, which I guess you will decide once you’ve come here for the first time, then immerse in a few places and then enjoy it.

I must share this. I had a client who came in, because they were first-timers, I had made a tour that included everything. They said, “No, we don’t want to do this. Include important places. We want to spend at least 4 to 5 nights at each place, and maybe we’ll just do 4 to 5 places.” They did the capital city. They spent five days in Mumbai. They went to places that I told them not to go. They said, “No, we want to see and know how it is.” They did South India, but they only touched two places in South India. They enjoyed it and said, “We want to see more.” Hopefully, they should be back soon.

It all depends on how much time you have and how much you want. I’ve had people who stayed in India for three months. This was a retired couple from California. They said, “We want to explore all the aspects of the country, including your hotels, boutique hotels, food, and people.” I had an interesting time formulating the itinerary. They stayed from all the luxury hotels.

They started from Nepal, Bhutan, a lot of India, Sri Lanka, and then they did the Maldives. I’ve also had people who spend just about a week or ten days. They specifically tell me, “I want to be here for yoga,” and they do these yoga programs. I’ve had a client who keeps on coming back all the time. She said, “The first country that I’m going to visit is going to be India because I’m missing that yoga place that you recommended.” As diverse as my country is, my clients are diverse as well because they all are different. They all want to experience so it all depends on what you are looking at and will offer you accordingly.

Just so everyone’s oriented to the business, you put together the itinerary based on what your clients say they want to experience?

Yes.

Sometimes that involves different parts of India. Sometimes that involves all these other countries that you’re talking about, which is interesting that you brought up Bhutan. My readers can’t see this, but I’m in the process of reading a book called The Geography of Bliss by Eric Weiner. He goes to all these different countries to find out where the happiest people are. He went to Bhutan because they’re known for pioneering the idea of measuring a happiness index.

Most countries measure their gross domestic product, their economic output, and apparently, Bhutan was the first country to say, “We want to measure happiness, too. We want to judge our countries based on how happy people are,” which is an interesting experience. I don’t know if you’ve seen any of the results of that in your trips to Bhutan or what you hear from other people who went there.

I find Bhutan interesting. It’s a matriarchal culture. You will see women walking over there. I’ve seen men happy because they’re always playing these games. The bow and arrow are their sport. They keep on doing that. I was like, “This is interesting,” different than India. I don’t know about this measuring happiness part, but I usually see a lot of happy people over there. They enjoy the weather. Weather plays a major role in the context of happiness.

We even see that in sentiment here in the US because I’m blessed to live in Denver, which is one of the happier places probably because it is one of the sunnier places in the country and there are some places further East that tend to be cloudy or drearier, a lot of cold drizzles. What kind of clientele do you typically serve? Are you serving people from all over the world? Do you serve a lot of people who live in India, in the US, or elsewhere? Is there a certain segment of the population that you tend to work with the most?

Visiting India depends on how much time you have and how much you want to spend. Share on X

Ironically, most of my clients are Americans. They are from the East Coast and many are from California. I get to do a few non-resident Indians, extremely few, but I get a lot of references from my American clients because that’s the market I used to handle in my real job. They refer me to their friends who are in Australia or UK, but my clients are mainly from the US, Northern America, and a few from Canada.

Are there certain things that most Americans should know about visiting these countries? We all have different cultures and different things are perceived in different ways under different cultures. Is there anything generally that the average American needs to know before going to any of these places?

What we do is we give them the list of the do’s and don’ts when they visit our country. If they need to be vaccinated for malaria or things like that, we have a document which we share with them. To visit any country, it’s important to know the medical facilities. The second is to know the cultures because in certain places in India, like if you go to a temple or something, nobody’s going to tell you anything if you enter the temple in your shots, it’s always good to be fully clothed. As far as culture, your health, and your safety are concerned, we tell you everything, what to do when you travel.

India is safe, but there are certain pockets, which we will not take you there and we will not allow you there. I travel in my country alone and it’s safe. It is no problem. Any single woman coming over here is safe, we plan it accordingly. We make sure that you don’t get into any kind of trouble. There are things that happened in the country, but largely, the areas that you travel, we ensure that you have the best of safety measures to be taken and things like that.

We educate you before you come to the country. As far as your medication is concerned, we ask you to take it from the doctor, what are you’re taking and things like that because most of our clients are seniors as well. They would like to travel with their whatever medication and medical insurance. To take the insurance from your own country is crucial because we don’t provide insurances here. All these things, we educate our clients well before they travel to the country.

It’s a good thing to point out that there are a lot of people that have some misconceptions, especially when it comes to safety about traveling to certain specific countries or regions. It’s good to get the full story and also the general understanding that every country, every region has its own different culture and its own different ways certain things are perceived.

For example, in the US, it’s a big insult to stick up your middle finger at somebody. That’s not necessarily the case in other countries. People from another country will come here, and they’ll stick up the middle finger and not understand that’s going to be perceived a certain way here. The same thing works for any place you go. If you’re going to go there, there’s going to be certain things and it’s always good to have those specific travel guides. Is there any type of traveler that you work with that sometimes presents challenges on some of those fronts? People that don’t want to take any of these things into account and don’t want to adjust or do you generally always end up with travelers that want to be respectful and want to have the right attitude?

I’ve been fortunate in this aspect. All my travelers are well-traveled people. When you are well-traveled, only then do you choose a country like India to come to. Let’s face it, it’s a fact, not many people choose India as the first destination as far as Europeans or Americans are concerned. 100% of my guests are well-traveled people. It has been easy to educate them on this front. They understand what kind of behavior is expected in the country.

There are people who face challenges in handling a client. I’ve been fortunate, and also, I would not want to work with people who do not accept certain things because it reflects a lot on what we work towards. If you are going to come here and cannot accept or adapt to somebody else’s culture, then there is no experience. You’re coming here to stay in a hotel, see the place, touch base, and then you just go. That’s not what I look for in my clients.

 

I don’t want to sound like this, but I choose my clients. For me, referrals are important. I always ask them, “Who referred you to me?” It’s always better that we say we are not wholesalers. We are a boutique, and we are into customized and specialized programs. We work hard to get you that experience. If somebody doesn’t want to take that, then it’s their choice. They can just go to any other tour operator and take a regular tour. That’s the end of it.

That’s important because oftentimes, a good mindset to have is finding the right fit. There are people who travel for either tourism or partying, and maybe some of the Bali people could fall into that second category, but seems less likely for you. Whereas if you want to go to Cancun and get drunk for seven days or something, there’s a tour out there for that. In the same way, there’s a tour out there for people that are going to want to take Instagram pictures with the seven top destinations and go to those.

I follow Samantha Brown from the Travel Channel. She’s one of many people that often talk about the importance of engaging in the local culture as opposed to just viewing things and snapping pictures. It sounds like that’s the experience that you’re putting together. I want to make sure that we also cover your starting Merge Experiences. A lot of your clients that you were working with at your previous job were encouraging you. What pushed you to say, “I’m going to start my own thing now with these clients as opposed to continuing to work for someone else?” Was there a certain event or piece of feedback you got that made you say, “I’m going to do it?”

Yes. As far as Americans are concerned, because I only dealt with the American market in my previous job, I had to educate them in a lot of ways. They all enjoyed my explanation about the destination. I always made an effort to call my client and speak to them, “This country, you’re coming here for the first time. This is what to expect. This is what you don’t expect.” Over time, we learned from my experiences.

One lady, they were all from Manhattan, and it was a big group. She had carried a lot of packed food, tuna, and things like that. She was staying at the Taj Mahal Hotel, which is one of the finest hotels we have in Bombay. She had no idea about what the country was. She just thought that it’s a third-world country. “I don’t know what kind of food we’ll get.”

She was shocked. “Why am I carrying food?” When she saw and experienced the first destination and the hotel, because it’s a five-star luxury hotel, we put everything up. She apologized to us, saying, “Many apologies that I have not read about your country. I have not read about this place, and I’m carrying so much food.” She distributed the food to people around. They took it and she said, “I’m going to enjoy all your local stuff,” and things like that.

As far as Europeans or Americans are concerned, India is not the first destination, but a lifetime one. Share on X

From that time, we thought that it’s always good to educate people and tell them what to expect over here, what not to expect. This is what you will get. If you think you don’t like and enjoy Indian food, we’ll get you your tuna as well. We’ve got everything. We’ve got caviar. The gourmet meals are good over here. We’ve got amazing Japanese and French meals, lots of cuisines are there in Bombay, Delhi, everywhere. If you are not the type who would want to eat Indian food, we’ve got you sorted.

After that experience, we said, “Let’s educate them,” because let’s face it, it’s our fault that we have not marketed the country well. We are speaking to the government. Let’s see if now they’ll initiate the marketing part. I used to educate my clients in a big way as to what to expect and what not to expect. I started giving presentations. That’s what they missed when they were looking at other tours because the other places would give them brochures and they would write about a place, but that’s not enough when you come to a country like India.

India is extremely complex. It’s not an easy country to travel to. It’s not simple. It is difficult for a traveler to come here when they come here alone. If somebody is a typical traveler who just takes the backpack and they travel everywhere and then they write blogs, that’s a different ballgame. For a traveler, the clients that I have, it’s important to educate them as to what they will expect when going to a particular place or somebody’s home.

I also encourage a lot of home visits where they can see how people live. They don’t have to live with them because there are many luxury hotels that we have, which are fifteen bedrooms, but around 200 meters is where the owner has a bungalow where they live. You’re still in a hotel setup, but you’re still at somebody’s home. You give them these experiences. This is important when you come to a country like India, to educate your client. That’s how I got encouraged to start on my own because that’s where I made a difference. It was a huge kickstart for me. They all used to come back saying, “We wouldn’t have known. Thank you for letting us know.”

With your permission, I must share this incident. There’s a client of mine, who had a fine job in New York, and she said, “I’m tired. I want to quit,” and she quit the job. She said, “I want to come to India, and I want to do yoga.” She gave me the link to a site where they were offering 10, 20 places where they were offering yoga. I told her, “If you don’t mind, will you just do what I’m asking you to do? Because none of these places will give you the experience that you are looking at.” She said, “Okay, I’m going to do it.”

She went to this place in Coimbatore. She said, “Okay.” She did what I asked her to do. It was a three-day course over there. She said, “I enjoyed my trip,” and things like that. I said, “Okay, I’m sure you had a good experience.” After one year, she writes to me saying, “I did not tell you that time because I wanted to experience what I was taught.”

She was taught for 21 minutes a process where you’re supposed to do certain things. She said she did it extremely diligently. When you complete that particular course, you’re supposed to do it for 40 days, morning and evening, twice a day. She said, “I did it, and my knee problem got solved. Mona, I can’t thank you enough, but I wanted to absorb it, feel it.” She then said that she had a great time and things like that.

 

That was an experience that gave me goosebumps. I said, “Can I make a difference in somebody’s life like this also in a positive way?” Places like these, as far as ashrams and these yoga places are concerned, they all give you different experiences. Some people will love it. Some people just hate it and think, “We don’t like it.” It all depends on what your interest is.

When I was speaking to her, I felt that she needed a change in her life because she was so engrossed in her work. That’s how I thought this place will probably benefit her. That was a shock for me as well because when things happen without expectation, that’s how you realize your passion, you want to make a difference to people. My country and certain places in the country can teach you, give you that experience.

It sounds like this passion to almost produce a somewhat different travel experience has been what motivated you to start the business and what gets you through any of the tougher times because starting a business is always going to have a tougher time. There are always going to be times when there are higher amounts of stress when the workload is high and you have certain amounts of insecurity. What I’m wondering is people who travel the way you recommend traveling, the way you facilitate traveling, what kind of transformation do you typically see in people? Do the people come out with a different worldview, a better sense of purpose, or a better sense of self even?

This is one of the cases, my client who enjoyed the yoga. Other people take back a lot of India with them, a lot of learning with them. The first thing when they come to Bombay, they tell me, “You have a five-star luxury hotel facing the sea. When you step into it, it’s everything,” but the moment you get out of the hotel, there are beggars there, so you know the complexity of the country.

When you come to India, you will also see a beggar smiling. They ask me, “They are in the worst condition. Why are they so happy?” My answer to them is that if you come here, you will see the happiness quotient is high amongst people because that’s what their lifestyle is. That’s how they’ve lived, and they’ve accepted it. There is a lot of tolerance and acceptance. They will just have fun and say, “Hello,” or something they’ll do. It’s the level of tolerance. That’s the other aspect of the country, which I don’t want to get into.

India is a land of stories. Share on X

The people I generally target for this show are people who are looking for inspiration to do something different, looking for inspiration for the next steps in life. If anyone’s in that particular situation and they have three weeks or a month, of all the places that you serve or have traveled to, do you have a general recommendation of where to go or where to be thinking about?

Yes, I have. For people who are wanting to come here for a long time, then I would give them a detailed experience of the country. I would include the North and the South. I love the North, but my personal favorite is the South. It’s a different culture. That particular part of the country was less invaded than the North.

In the North, you will find a bunch of aggressive people. The South are cool. They’re mild. They’re just the way they are. When you go to the palaces in the North, the Rajasthan palaces, there’s a lot of grandeur or there’s a lot of opulence. South, you go to a palace, it is as good as your home, even the royalty over there is simple.

The main experience over here is of the food because the food is so diverse. Indian food is healthy. The original food that we have at home is not the naan, gravy, and things like that. It’s simple, nice food. Food does a lot of talking about your lifestyle. To experience a lifestyle, the way women cook over here, why do they include a particular ingredient, because the entire menu that we have for your regular eating, it’s scientific in nature.

Yes, if you’re coming for a long time, then I would love to give you the scientific aspect of the rituals that we do in the temples and how logical the religion is because of how logical certain things are. I would love to explain that to the travelers then tell them a bit about ancient history because everybody knows about the history of India from the past 200 or 300 years. Nobody knows the ancient history.

Ancient history is interesting. There are monuments and places which are so beautiful. Everybody knows the Taj Mahal because it’s a wonder of the world. There are places in India that are even older. They are like one rock monolithic and it makes you think that this cannot be done with just a hammer and a chisel. This needs planning. It cannot be done. I would love to introduce my travelers to all these hidden aspects.

Take and show them the saints and that we have are more of scientists when you go see them. The way they did things, the way they played with the energies, the way they consecrated things. We were not taught, this is all teaching when you work in the travel industry. It gives you a different aspect of life because you’re meeting a lot of people from different backgrounds, and then you want to do your own research as well. I would like to share that with my traveler.

Before we wrap up, I want to give my audience a chance to get a hold of you. If anyone reading about this is interested in your travel experiences. Is there a webpage or best way to contact you if there’s interest?

Yes. I’m doing up a website. They’re going to get a construction page. Get in touch with me. I’m on Instagram. The easiest way to get in touch with me is by email. I have an email, Mona@MergeExperiences.com. They could write to me and I will answer all the queries and questions. If they want to speak to me, we’ll be happy to schedule a call. Let me know that it’s from Stephen’s reference show. I would be happy to talk to you.

Thank you so much. Mona@MergeExperiences.com. Regardless of what anyone reading chooses to do, I want to encourage everyone out there to open your mind up to different types of experiences, which is what I believe is one of the biggest benefits of travel. You’ll learn different ways things are done. You’ll learn about different cultures and different frames of mind. Maybe you’ll like a certain frame of mind, maybe you won’t, but the main point is that you’re exploring.

You’re checking things out. You’re learning things and you’re coming with an open mind. Any other specific messages you’d have for anyone in my audience that’s either looking to travel or thinking about taking that leap themselves and following their passion the way you did when you went off on your own and founded Merge Experiences?

No matter what you do, even if you have a well-paying job and things like that, I would want people to take up a hobby that may land you up and making a career out of it. It’s important. In whatever you do, maybe you are into a corporate job, one aspect of one’s life has to be something where you would do something creative. Maybe learn music, art, photography, or do some painting.

That will encourage you to explore different things because if you like a painting from a particular place, I would want to know where this painting is made, how it is made, and who’s made it. Widen your horizon if you have something else to do. I was in a job. It was a travel agency, it taught me a lot, but it had to according to the book that they had written of following certain things, which I did not enjoy after the point.

You will learn, and then you’d say, “I’m stagnated. What next?” I’m sure this is experienced by each and every individual in this world. That’s when I feel that one should learn something different. You never know, you may find your passion there, even if you don’t want to leave your job. I understand people have financial needs, lifestyles, and things like that. Personally, I feel that aspect is important. Explore yourself and see the creative side of you.

Anyone that’s feeling a little bit lost, say, “I don’t necessarily love my job, but I’m not about to quit,” and doesn’t even necessarily have a specific idea, the easiest thing you can do to start getting on the right path is to be creative and be open. Start trying things, start learning about things. Try to do something. Do something on the side and form a hobby. Eventually, the right opportunity or the people will come even though you have to be a little bit patient about it, it seems like or sometimes?

Start writing or write a blog like your passion. Write what you feel like. That works.

Writing, art, creativity. Part of it is getting some of that noise out of your life, those distractions, and finding time to say, “No, I’m going to sit here and I’m going to be creative.” I hope that anyone out there who’s feeling in that kind of stuck situation will, just something little. If you have a busy life, and you don’t have tons of time to do something major, it doesn’t take that much time to start. Write a blog.

Mona, thank you so much for joining us on the show from Mumbai, India. Just so you all know, it is possible, as some of us have had work experience with this, too, to find times to coordinate with what is close to completely the opposite side of the world. It’s 10:00 something here in the morning, and it’s 10:00 something there in the evening. You’re getting ready for bedtime and I’m getting ready to go to my next task of the day, but it is possible to coordinate that. Mona, thank you so much for sharing your experiences and your knowledge about culture.

The pleasures entirely mine, Stephen.

Thank you to everyone else, also for reading. I encourage you to explore, be creative, and find a place, find a destination that’ll open your mind up, or find an activity. There are less expensive ways of just getting a coloring book and opening your mind up that way or starting to type a blog on the computer without leaving the home.

I’ll tell you what I’m doing these days. I wanted to learn a language so I’m trying to learn German. It’s free from this app called Duolingo. I’m enjoying my German lessons.

That’s another fantastic thing. I know German has a word, Schadenfreude, which is the word for when you’re secretly happy about someone else’s misfortune that a lot of other languages don’t have. It’s interesting to even think through that aspect of it.

 

I’m yet to reach that. It’s just basic, I’m trying to understand, but it seems to be pretty easy. I thought it’s going to be difficult, but it’s pretty okay.

Once you start learning other languages, I know in India, it’s almost impossible to get by knowing only one language. Once you’re in the mindset of learning languages, learning more becomes more natural.

In India, everybody speaks English. No problem.

Everyone knows the local language, Hindi, and English. Does everyone have to be trilingual?

Yes, North India is predominantly Hindi and English. South India is their language and English. They don’t know Hindi.

It’s a good thing to always be learning something, even if it’s as simple as picking up a book that interests you. Go to the bookstore, look around, something will interest you, you’ll pick it up, and expand your mind more than some of the other stuff. Thank you so much for your contribution. Thank you to everyone reading, and I hope you’ll join us next time.

Important Links:

• Jaye Travel Blog
• Merge Experiences
• The Geography of Bliss
• Instagram – Mona
• Instagram – Merge Experiences
• Mona@MergeExperiences.com
• Duolingo

About Mona Contractor

A daughter, a seasoned travel professional, executive coach and an entrepreneur – lead by passion, nature lover, yoga practitioner, food enthusiast.