Vivek Cheruku travels 15 states in 50 days

Twenty-two-year-old Hyderabadi Vivek Cheruku and six others went on a journey across 15 Indian states to explore the country’s heritage, culture and  food. It was part of an internship that four of them had bagged.

Vivek explains: “The whole idea was to inspire youngsters to travel. The group had four interns and three crew members, and I was part of the crew documenting the journey. We had to move from city to city, speak to locals  about their culture and traditions, and shoot the city in a different way.”

He continues, “It was part of an internship by Zostel (a hostel chain) and the trip was not only about documenting the heritage and culture, but to explore just about everything that we came across.”

The group started their journey from Jodhpur and travelled across the country including Hyderabad, the Wagah border and less-explored place like Triund (in Himachal Pradesh). “We also travelled to Osian, which is an oasis in the Thar Desert, where musicians played all night. That night was the most memorable of all, as I had never slept under an open sky.”

He adds, “At Triund, we walked up to the glaciers. In Varanasi, we walked into shehnai exponent Bismillah Khan’s house and the current generation that stays there played perfect hosts. In Kerala, a fisherman took us to the middle of the sea, showed us how he caught fish and even cooked it for us. There is so much love across India.”

And, the group also explored Hyderabad. He says, “In Hyderabad, we only explored the Old City. We also spoke to vendors at Chudi Bazar at Charminar.” So what did they learn from the trip?

“We saw how diverse our country is. You can’t sit at home, browse the Internet and understand the diversity of the country. You have to travel and experience it. We encountered so many things, had to travel in rains, in climate as low as 3ºC and as high as 48ºC. The trip  was definitely worth it.”