This podcast is called the Three-Month Vacation, and yet we almost never cover vacation stories.
Well, that’s about to change. Here are some stories from India and also from Singapore and France. Allons-y!
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We have a podcast called The Three-Month Vacation, but most of it is about working in a way that allows you to take a holiday.
Still, from time to time, we need some actual holiday stories. I got this idea when a friend visited recently and asked me to tell him some stories.
One of the interesting things about travel is staying in different hotels.
One of the fun things about hotels is that sometimes you stay in rooms where famous people have stayed. The staff will say, “Hey, you stayed in Madonna’s room!” or “That was Paul McCartney’s room!”—which has happened to us. But as my friend pointed out, “Yeah, but you didn’t meet them.”
The problem is that we don't realise they're famous even when we encounter famous people.
That’s precisely what happened in Goa, India. We were staying at a colonial-era governor’s residence, and as usual, I spent my mornings painting in watercolour.
The staff, who had gotten friendly with us, mentioned that the residence's owner would be visiting and that he was an interesting person to speak to.
Later that morning, someone walked in, smiled, waved, and headed toward the owner’s bungalow. We assumed he was the owner.
The next day, we started a conversation when we saw him again.
“So, what do you do?” we asked.
He hesitated. “I make movies. I’m an actor.”
The logical next question: “Have you been in anything we might know?”
At this point, his wife looked slightly embarrassed. “Yes, he’s quite well known,” she said, then turned to him and added, “Maybe they live in New Zealand, so they don’t know about you.”
As it turned out, we had no idea who he was—and he didn’t seem thrilled about that. After he left, Renuka emailed his name to her sister, who replied, “Oh yeah, that guy is really famous! He’s in movies, TV series, even on Netflix.”
That was our first faux pas.
A few days later, I was painting at breakfast when another guest struck up a conversation. She mentioned she was an actress.
The conversation soon drifted to her father, who had been the editor of Science magazine, which excited me because I used to love reading it. We talked for a while before she left. Once again, Renuka emailed her sister. The reply? “Whoa, she’s really famous, too!”
Two famous people, and we had no clue.
That's not the end of the story. We left Goa and were in Mumbai when we spotted giant billboards—one or two stories high. Who was on the billboard?
Yes, the two people we'd met in the hotel in Goa and the movie were being promoted on those billboards. Maybe next time we’ll sit next to a famous person and still not know. And it won’t matter.
This takes us to our second story, which occurred in Singapore.
The first story was about meeting famous people, but sometimes you can become inadvertently famous.
Well, not exactly famous—but you might attract some unexpected attention. When I travel, I take thousands of photographs, many of them of people at work.
In Singapore, I walked past what looked like a salon and took a quick photo of someone inside. I tend to hold my camera lower rather than bringing it up to my eyes—it creates a more dynamic angle and makes for a better picture. Sometimes, I even bend down slightly to get the shot.
I took the photo and started walking away when I noticed someone behind me, filming us.
It was clear he was following us, which made me uncomfortable. I told Renuka to pick up the pace, but one of the two men kept filming. Not knowing his intentions, we ducked into a clothing store to avoid him.
We waited a few minutes, and I even deleted the photograph, just in case that was the issue. But when we stepped out, he was still following us. We slipped into another store because Renuka knew the store well.
She told me we could enter through one doorway and exit through another at the back. However, when we got to the “escape door”, it was bolted shut.
Through the corner of my eye, I saw the men approaching, and they looked ominous
Identifying themselves as the owners, they aggressively demanded to know why I was filming the salon. I explained that I wasn’t filming, just taking a photo, and even offered to show it to them.
But they weren’t interested. I was taken aback because people usually just want you to delete the photo. These guys were uninterested in the picture and had a different agenda.
They insisted it was illegal to take photos of stores in Singapore—something they had made up just to keep the pressure on. They grilled us for the next few minutes, convinced we were competitors trying to steal secrets.
Eventually, things calmed down when we asked them to check my website. As you probably know, I have a photography site at theotherseandesouza.com.
Once they saw my photos, they realised I was just a photographer. But to get to that point, we had to convince them we weren’t locals, show them our passports, and even let them look at our itinerary.
Finally, they believed us. We shook hands and even agreed to meet again for coffee.
Is there a moral to this story? I don’t know. But here’s the oddest part—when I walked past the same salon the following day, I noticed it had a huge glass window. Anyone, at any time of day or night, could take the same picture. And yet, for some reason, they had singled us out as spies.
That was our moment of being mildly famous. And here’s the kicker—the guy filmed me, but I also took a picture of him to show him how I take excellent photographs. So yes, I still have his photo, too.
Finally, I have a third story—not directly about our travels, but about people we know, including clients.
One of our clients, Ronak Pattani, traveled to Australia. Originally from India but raised in the UK, one of his childhood dreams was to attend the Boxing Day cricket match at the Melbourne Cricket Ground (MCG).
Ronak was travelling alone and found himself at a bar in Melbourne, where he struck up a conversation with the bartender.
When he mentioned his reason for visiting, the bartender was so impressed that he told Ronak he had a little gift for him. If Ronak returned the next day, he would receive the surprise.
Intrigued, Ronak showed up at the bar the following day, but the bartender wasn’t around. However, when Ronak spoke to the bartender on duty, he nodded and handed Ronak a package.
Inside the box was a pair of well-worn shoes.
The day before, the bartender had casually asked Ronak his shoe size. Now, here was a pair of shoes in that exact size. However, they weren't new shoes but rather well-worn and seemingly from a different age.
What was the connection?
As it turned out, these were the shoes of legendary fast bowler Dennis Lillee. If you’re not a cricket fan, this might not mean much—but Lillee was one of the greatest fast bowlers of his time and the second-fastest in the world.
It was an incredible piece of cricket history, given to Ronak purely because of a random conversation in a random bar in a random country.
You can imagine how thrilled Ronak was—and he’ll probably be telling this story and showing off those shoes for the rest of his life.
