took a decision to change my life I have
been a smoker for 10 years and I decided
to quit and this wasn’t the type of
quitting that Mark Twain had quipped
about you know when he said quitting
smoking is the easiest thing in the
world I know because I’ve done it
thousands of times now I didn’t want to
be so proficient at quitting like Mark
Twain I wanted to get done with it so I
was on my fourth attempt I quit cold
turkey and ten years of smoking you know
it catches up with you I couldn’t climb
a flight of stairs without losing my
breath but today January the 29th 2017
has been for years one month and six
why did it work on the fourth attempt
why from the very beginning when I
decided to quit
I got myself a bicycle now it was in
such poor shape back then I couldn’t
ride it till the end of the road but I
never gave up you know I stuck with it I
was patient with it and has my breathing
improved so did my distances and I
started commuting to work two kilometers
each way four times a week no four four
times a day six times a week
and that adds up right it adds up over
time I got stronger I grew more
confident and soon I was taking day long
not day long and hour long trips outside
money pal the joy and the joy of feeling
your life bounce back come back you know
it just comes back it’s fantastic I grew
in confidence and when you grow in
confidence you begin to dream and dreams
give you hope for a better tomorrow but
my mother didn’t think so no I love her
to death but she didn’t think so and
then I told her I’m going to take my
bicycle and I’m going to cycle to algum
day and for those of you don’t know
algún Bay is like a hill it’s 40
kilometres from here and I told her I’m
gonna go cycle there she said son you’ve
gone mad absolutely mad you know why do
you want to go through my so much
trouble you can get on a bike and get on
a bus pay this guy 60 rupees and he’ll
take you on top in two hours right why
struggle so much your cycle may break
down you may break down you know and it
was a possibility it was the possibility
and I was stumped I didn’t have an
answer to that but you know what I went
and did it anyways because this wasn’t
for my mother this wasn’t for my father
I was doing this for me I made it
personal I went and climbed a Gombe not
just one several
time’s a clap again and to go from plow
struggling to climb up a flight of
stairs to going up and cycling forty
kilometres and then climb uphill ten
kilometres and to stand on top of Argan
Bay and suddenly at that point
everything becomes possible everything
becomes possible and adding fuel to that
fire was the fact that I was reading
variously about oh I’ll show you a
slides I lose track just get into the
that was i okay I climbed a Goomba and I
was reading voraciously about expedition
bicyclists people who got on the bicycle
and went around the world climb
mountains went into the desert road on
frozen lakes and these guys were
ordinary people like you and me normal
people with normal jobs you know doctors
engineers chefs lawyers musicians and
the fact is that they were leading
ordinary lives but they were doing
extraordinary things on a bicycle and I
was inspired I was inspired on August in
August 2014 18 months into my quit after
I quit smoking that is I took a very
bold step I quit my job I packed my
bicycle in a box most people thought it
was a TV what is my bicycle and I put it
on a flight and I took off to Srinagar
with the dream of riding the Indian
Himalayas now when you’re in Srinagar
pictured the map you have seen ago you
have about you have much of Pradesh
Uttaranchal and then you have the whole
Nepali Himalayas spread right before you
you have ganesha mall you have the uh
Epona’s you have every stereo and after
that comes
junga and no this was not on a whim this
was not something that I decided to
Esther day and went tomorrow you know
it’s nothing like that just one year of
hard work so many sacrifices made I
saved every penny to make this dream
come true and here I was starting down
with the Indian Himalayas and now I know
man the adventures that I had this one
time sorry I keep losing track of my
slides yeah so this one time I was in
the Indus Valley I was cycling in the
Indus Valley really close to the
Pakistani border and it was late in the
evening and I was crossing over the
bridge over the Indus and I got stopped
by the army and the army guys were beta
kadjar oh it’s too dangerous for you to
be out at this time of the day it’s time
that you got in and they found me a
place to stay
they found me a place in this really
charming little village called dar
cheeks dark chicks yeah and I hid the
place at a very nice time it was the
annual apricot harvest time festivities
everywhere people who are merrymaking
and stuff like that wherever I went
people and I come sit have chai tell me
a story what are you doing where are you
going and they gave me so much apricots
to eat I couldn’t help myself
I just kept eating apricots and they
grew on trees
this tree is you can just pluck and eat
applicants and I went mental on them but
the thing is you eat too many applicants
it leads to indigestion yeah and they
don’t tell you these in the guidebook I
mean what the hell the other thing that
they don’t tell you in the guidebook is
the toilets here is very primitive the
villagers there have to make do with an
outhouse you know the business end of
which is like a small hole in the floor
you do your bit you stand up put on your
pants go to the side you have a shovel
yeah that’s what you do you get the
point and it stung by God
stunk so much the first time I use it
I’m like Gunny she had never taken a
in this village never but now that
had gone mental on the apricots I had to
go I had to go so I did this the one
thing you know one thing possible I ran
I ran I ran out of this guy’s house I
ran across the village I crossed the
opticore tortured I didn’t look at the
apricots I crossed the stream and I went
went to the army camp looking for better
facilities and I found better facilities
I found this fantastic toilet it had a
curtain I opened the curtain of the
toilet was there I was so clean it was
like wow liquid heat of it but I wasn’t
into eating I had done enough eating for
the day yeah so I sat I did my thing I
relaxed and the minute I relaxed I
started taking in the details
wow what a toilet was so well equipped
there was like a full-length mirror a
table fan you know there were books to
read their bottle drinking water and the
toiletries face wash hand wash shaving
cream
toothbrush toothpaste everything you
needed I wasn’t in there for that but I
finished my business anyways I got up I
flushed you always flush upon it I
flushed I got up I washed my hands you
know check my hair and then I used the
good towels there and I stepped out the
minute I stepped out I ran into this big
man he was standing right outside I know
what he was doing but he’s standing
right outside thought it’s like Hugh
just did guy like that he could crush me
in his finger big mush and really angry
really angry I’m like and he’s
angry at me you know and like what did I
do and he was too flabbergasted to talk
kept saying hey Cody Cody CO and
look back and I’d seen the sign of
toilet you know before I went in but now
there was a little more relaxed in big
bold letters right underneath it was
written officers only I’m not an officer
I’m gonna sh
he was an officer not good for me
Don tire no dr. Ghali daily put her and
not only that he made me go to the local
local store there which the army ran for
the handicrafts the villagers made and
he made me buy a cap yeah
a red cap look at that face officer no
so my advice to you is stay away from
apricots you know don’t do don’t have
this apricot business the other thing
you should do is don’t believe in
guidebooks take her guidebook and throw
it out of the window
that’s when adventure happens it’ll come
it’ll grab you by the collar and say our
job waiter come have an adventure and
that’s what happened I was in Ladakh
yeah and I was just leaving the back and
I met this very charming very
enterprising Haws man by the name of Sun
sing this chap and within ten minutes of
having a child with me he convinced me
to stop riding the highway and a 10-day
detour into the wast deserts of rupture
Valley and I was like yeah this is
adventure this is what I worked for for
a year and I grabbed that opportunity
and I went off with this guy
and it was magnificent my god look at
that
it was just pure mountain and space and
space and space and wide open skies
recyling right in between on this path
put all my luggage on this horse on his
horses and we went off into the desert
oh the kind of adventure that I had my
god and it was challenging the days were
challenging this one time I had to push
my bicycle up up a hill an eight
kilometer hill I pushed my bicycle to
reach a pass
five thousand six hundred meters that’s
five and a half kilometers about her
head right now I was there
pushed my bicycle there it was awesome
there were days when I walked and had to
Korea to wait a stall we had to wait a
swamp carrying my bicycle on my shoulder
that was another adventure this other
time I actually spotted a small leopard
it was amazing an amazing experience you
know another day and this is when things
got really challenging the weather
started changing and I think this was
day number eight the weather started
changing got really cold the clouds that
come and got really cold and we as usual
we got up really early in the morning
and the thing is water water right water
water is like so precious are out in the
desert you can’t carry water for ten
days so what you did was go from point
to point you know and you refilled on
water for that day so we used to get up
really early in the morning pack our
bags and start walking this day I don’t
turn out of the blue we got hit by a
sandstorm and all we did was like a
crouch and wait for it to pass we waited
two hours but finally it subsided the
storm subsided but we lost two precious
hours and two hours is a lot of time in
the desert because conditions just
change gets really hot in the afternoon
and around 3:00 the winds come the winds
the winds are a forester it’s impossible
to walk against it and it blows against
you you know every step is excruciating
and we walked and walked and walked and
the water never came that day at 3:00
p.m. we were supposed to reach the place
where we supposed to get it oh this is
this is when we were about to hit the
sandstorm I just took this picture by
then I’d given up cycling because it was
just too tough I put it on the horse I
was walking behind him at 3:00 p.m.
we’re supposed to reach we were supposed
to reach a place where there was water
and we reached there and guess what the
stream had actually run dry
the stream had run dry we had no water
we had walked eight hours we had
weathered a snow a sand storm the batter
of the heat we had no water to drink no
food went through the wind and we reach
a place where we thought we’d have some
water and there was no water there I had
I was I practically gave up i sat down
and I said I’m not going I’m staying
here and something was like that’s not
going to happen
the minute we sit down it’s game over
it’s going to get cold we’re not gonna
have water there’s no food we have to go
and now and then the winds came the
winds came and it made things impossible
it just pushed you in every direction
and you had to go right and we started
walking and it was one excruciating step
at a time I was just I I was I was
barely conscious I guess I just kept
following sones footsteps because he was
right ahead of me and suddenly he was
like they do they do I’m like this is it
he’s lost it the horses are gonna run by
and I’m dead but he kept pointing you
know bid to bid do and he was pointing
to these hills and I didn’t understand
what he was saying so I kept looking and
has I looked I suddenly saw the face of
the mountain change it was actually
changing there was some movement that I
couldn’t make out and then I realized
what bit do means doesn’t couldn’t can
someone guess it’s it’s sheep sheep and
there was the sea of sheep that was
coming down and where there’s the sea of
sheep there is a shepherd exactly this
guy came down that hill like a messiah
man he just came and saved us like
literally this was like he just came
like a sea of sheep and I was
mesmerizing to see that and he came he
rescued us he took us back into a valley
a side valley and he got us water that
oh sorry I think I’m missing one slide
that’s nice I don’t have to change and
anyway and you know what he got this
water and suddenly something so mundane
has like water to connor different
meanings the ordinary became
extraordinary you know and that’s what
adventure does adventure is supposed to
change things for you make the ordinary
into extraordinary things know like
water had new completely new meaning for
me now and by the way which is a very
important resource and I think in some
ways it’s the same adventure has done
the same thing for me it’s changed my
ordinary life into something
extraordinary I never imagined that I
would be able to cycle the mountains go
into a desert right but I’ve been able
to achieve that I never thought I’d give
a TEDx talk but look at me I’m standing
here and telling your story an adventure
has done that for me
but it comes at a price right like I’m
getting up for a new adventure right now
in six months I’m going to Alaska to
kayak for six weeks and I’ve been broke
once I’m getting ready to go broke again
yeah and you need to be physically fit
imagine getting stuck in a desert no
water no food lost and you are woefully
unfit is that a situation that you want
to be in no right that is a recipe for
disaster so I need to prepare for it
four hours of intense physical workout
everyday without a beat that comes at a
price of no movies no food outside
no friends no social life so what is it
all worth is it really worth it and I’m
supposed to actually quote Mark Twain
now so just give me a second so Mark
Twain said 20 years from now you will be
more disappointed by the things that you
didn’t do than by the things that you
did so throw off the bowlines sail away
from the safe harbor catch the trade
winds in your sails explore dream
my name is Ganesh we’ve been a wonderful audience thank you