Stories of Daring Journeys by Women

By Shy Ventures

A collection of personal, short stories and photographs by women from all over the world. Topics range from adventures and travel to grief and difficult life choices. Each contributor shares their challenges, vulnerability, introspection, and the lessons they learned.

Contributors include:
Maxie Haufe, Rikki Ayers, Fran Gleisner, Lu Davidson, Cherilyn Davidson, Vivienne Askey, Natasha Lloyd, Elise, Sinja Martens, Daniela Ramos, Bruna Miguel, Carla Braun-Elwert, Anna Pendergrast, Ana Ornelas, Jessica Papini, Amanda Rogers, Elise, Heena @confusionofcultures.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Shy Ventures
• Release date: Dec 15, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201809591

Book preview

Dedicated to all who are preparing to step up to a challenge, daring enough to follow through and brave enough to share.

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No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher and the authors, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in the text and certain non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

CONTENTS

LOOK OUT FOR ONE ANOTHER

CYCLING ALONE, SURROUNDED BY MEN

A PLACE WHERE NO TRAVELLER EVER STOPS: THE IN-BETWEEN

OLD WOMAN HUT

THE WRONG DESERT

A FLIGHT BEST FORGOTTEN

TRIPLE STEP

TRAVELING WITH KINETOSIS

ME AND MY MONKEY MIND

LEARNING TO PUT MYSELF FIRST

SOLO-TRAVELLING TO FIND SELF-LOVE

ACCEPTING THE PAST SO I CAN MOVE INTO THE FUTURE

A FRIEND IN HIGH PLACES

VENTURING INTO THE UNKNOWN... TOGETHER

FINDING POWER IN SEX AND WORDS

MAKING LIFE CHOICES UNAPOLOGETICALLY

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Photograph by Jessica Papini.

Campervan conga line.

LOOK OUT FOR ONE ANOTHER

by Maxie Haufe

In August 2018, I went to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival – the biggest open-access theatre festival in the world - for the first time. My love affair with theatre was still quite fresh, or let’s say I never really went to any sort of theatre festivals. In Berlin, I had started going to plays by myself, as none of my friends shared my drive to see as much as possible. But going to a theatre festival in a new city and by myself was something new for me.

I heard that Edinburgh goes completely nuts during the month of August when the Fringe takes place, so I was excited to see lots of great and affordable theatre, but also quite scared. When I arrived, I realised I hadn’t had much alone-time in the past few months. Since I was planning to continue on to New Zealand for a year, I had crammed a lot of music festivals and little goodbye-trips with friends into my already-busy full-time-job life.

I often found myself having a lonely moment at the Fringe festival. It was worse when I didn’t have to change venues between shows and I’d just hang around in the beer garden. All around me were people sharing stories of plays they’d seen, or performers and crew would be chilling after their shows and I’d just sit there... feeling like an outsider. Alone. Out of place.

But funnily – and it happened to me twice – there was a woman who started to talk to me. Both times a different person, both times middle-aged, asking me how I was finding the Fringe. After finding out it was my first time, we’d have lovely conversations about the inclusiveness of Fringe, how daring both the performers and the audiences are. I vividly remember the last drag show I’d seen and so many white-haired audience members enjoying it immensely and then asking myself if I would ever see something quite like that in Berlin.

The first conversation was with a woman who lives in Edinburgh and goes to lots of Fringe shows every year – it was such a great way to learn more about the heart of the festival and helped me to feel more included as if it were my festival too. The second conversation I had was with a woman who had come to Edinburgh with her whole family and ended up introducing me to everyone, giving me valuable tips for other picks to go to.

These little encounters fitted so well with something a very wise traveller-friend once told me from her own experiences of travelling: that women look out for each other. Fellow women help to make sure we get where we need to go, regardless of cultural or language barriers. And this was my experience, where I might have looked a bit lost and a woman picked up on that, maybe not even consciously, and made me feel good about myself again.

And why not? I will do that now myself and be that woman. I am doing it right now, in New Zealand, with a younger woman who is just starting to travel here and unsure if she should have a full travel itinerary mapped out. Especially when you are so much more settled with yourself, why not talk to younger women who seem to be in the middle of that journey to themselves?

So I think I might have found a little survival strategy for times of loneliness while