Ashrith Shetty

Hello, I am Ashrith Shetty, the techie, co-founder of travel blog Vacaywork.

I am the curly, thick-haired man who loves his Royal Enfield bike as much as his wife!

A non vegetarian, travel lover who loves to bask on the beach and climb a mountain to watch sunset.

How do I Contribute to Vacaywork

I am the man behind the camera. Most of the images on our blog are captured by me (unless my lady went on a trip without me).

Well, Sahana and I don’t bother to click ourselves much.

But, as I hold the camera most of the time, you don’t see me on screen much.

My Education and Profession

Since childhood, my mom made me realize what doors can open for a well-educated person.

So, I studied and am planning to further my education a lot ( Done with PG in Software Systems, aiming to do Ph D).

Don’t assume I was a brainy kid; I struggled in math.

But being a journalist’s son, our house was the first to have a computer with the Internet in our Indian village in 2000!

Well, I admit, I used it to download games and open Playboy magazine as a teenager with friends.

But the way a computer works fascinated me. Thus, I knew I love computers.

There is a saying in India for those who take up Computer Science engineering course, “You first become a computer engineer, later think of what you should become.”

Not boasting here, but I knew I wanted to take CS, and I am a passionate computer engineer working for an MNC with 12 patents and 8 publications.

Although I wasn’t introduced to travelling at an early age, my journalist father let me use his camera in that small village of Dakshina Kannada District in Karnataka, India, at the age of 11! It was a Kodak reel camera.

So my dad continuously insisted and stopped me from clicking random images – what if the reels get rolled out!

So, even today, whether it’s my iPhone or my Nikon D3500, I read the frame for at least a minute, and I never click random photos. This really helps me in not creating a “Junk” of photos. It is like either good picture only or no picture at all.

Oh yeah, I play a lot of games on PS4 – FIFA and Cricket. I watch a lot of movies.

Sometimes I wonder if I can be a cinema critic because I analyze every aspect of a cinema.

Speaking of which, as a hobby, I have also directed a short film, Chakra view, which was recognized in Kolkata Film festival 2019.

When I watch it now, I feel I could have made it much better, LOL.

In May 2022, I was invited as a guest speaker at TEDxMITWPU to talk about “Untapped Frequencies.”

I discussed how various aspects of my life, such as making short films, travelling, working in tech, and biking, have helped me grow and become better.

What do I like like to write about?

You may have noticed that I’ve written a very few blog posts on Vacaywork.

I’m more of a proofreader than a writer – a ruthless reviewer, you can say.

I mainly write about trips with my boys, food, places related to video games, and locations where famous movie series were filmed.

Food , cinema and Video games are my favorites, next to traveling.

The rest, I leave it to my architect wife who loves history.

What is my favourite part of Travelling?

Among the very few common interests between Sahana and me, planning a trip is what we love!

While Sahana goes deeper into researching to find some offbeat places on beaten paths, I plan where to stay and how to budget – this teamwork is what I enjoy most.

Why Do I like to Travel?

I love to travel so that I get to eat food that I never knew existed!

Devouring food that I have watched in a movie gives me some kind of satisfaction.

Living in the multicultural city of Bangalore, I have access to Sushi, Biryani, and Kebabs.

But eating Biryani in its birthplace Iran, tasting Sushi in Japan, and grabbing a shawarma roll in Turkey – my soul attains Nirvana with every bite of local delicious food when I travel.

And this food gala doesn’t need to be international – as much as I am a fan of Heath Ledger’s Joker character, I love George David played by Nivin Pauly in the Malayalam movie Premam.

I drooled watching him munch on those Banana frittatas in Premam.  When I did the same in Kochi – I had a sense of satisfaction.

I don’t have many holistic opinions on traveling like my wife Sahana has – I know I find true bliss in traveling! It makes you feel ethereal when you see something new in an unknown land.

And my screen time reduces a lot while traveling (apart from taking pictures).

Who do I travel with?

I travel with the love of my life, Sahana. We got married in 2018 after dating each other for about 9 years.

But on every trip, I feel I am getting to know her better.

When you travel to an unknown place, you are surrounded by only strangers.

Your travel companion is the only person whom you know. So, traveling with Sahana makes our marriage more intimate, and it grows stronger.

Then my boys – my group of friends. Taking short trips on a bike was like a yearly ritual when I was an undergrad student.

But once we all started working, traveling with the boys to celebrate a Bachelor’s party began.

I was even sad when the last man in our group got married – thinking no more Bachelor Party trips.

But guess what, we now go on an “Uncles Party Trip” – carefree, most of the time partying by the beach! Rarely do we pick places to explore; instead, it’s a laid-back time, unlike our trips to Lakshadweep.

Would I Quit my Job to Travel the World?

As much as I love traveling, I love my job too – both give me equal happiness. Solving riddles in the workplace generates equal dopamine that travelling does.

I know people who travel the world might have quit 9-5, but they still need to do a job – the job becomes traveling.

So, I am going to keep traveling and photography as a passion and continue my romance with my computer forever.