Selling everything and travelling the world!
Since I was a little boy I’ve always imagined myself as a world traveller. I never ever saw myself married with two kids living in the suburbs as most of my classmates and friends did. I was the epitome of a daydreamer…so much so that one day when as a 14yr old I visited the local store to buy bread for the family, the wife of the store owner had what I now see as a defining interaction with me which changed my view of the world forever…
She was a startlingly beautiful women who now worked in a small corner supermarket, and I’d often wondered how she’d ended up in so unlikely a place. On this fateful day she was alone in the shop, and when I offered the 5c it cost for a loaf of bread in those days, she said: “Ah, Geronimo, the boy with the dreamer’s eyes…What do you want to be when you grow up?” I answered somewhat bashfully: “I want to travel the world”. She gazed at me a little sadly and said: “it’s great to have dreams, but the trick is to make your dreams a reality.” I didn’t know how to respond to this beautiful woman, so obviously trapped in a reality which was not her dream life. “I never managed to make my dreams come true, but if I look in your eyes I know you’ll do better than me,” she said before forcing a slight smile. I asked her why she called me Geronimo, as my name was Derek. She said that Geronimo was a great American Indian chief, and somehow my eyes reminded her of a photo she’s seen of him as a girl. He too was a renowned dreamer it seems.
This exchange haunted me for many, many years and I always vowed to myself that I would never end up living a life I was not happy with. As I entered my teen years I obsessed over philosophy and religion, devouring books on the subject from the local library at a rate of three books a week. I guess I was always considered a bit odd by my school mates – debates and arguments with teachers were not common in my school, but somehow I was always questioning of my place in the world. As a Roman Catholic I attended church on Sundays, and catechism classes once a week. The questioning extended into religion to the extent that our priest had a meeting with my parents to express his concern over my lack of faith and my constant demand for answers on the precise location of God (was he between planets or living on a planet?) I was held back for an extra year of confirmation lessons in an attempt to overcome this problem.
Since then I went on to graduate from University, teach high school kids and establish several businesses from scratch, including Central Castings, now the oldest casting agency in South Africa, Controversi Films, which produced some ground-breaking documentary films, my fashion photography business Derek Antonio Serra Photography, and Classic Camper Hire, the only car hire company in Africa renting out ’70’s classic VW campers. I have taught young and old the joys of photography and filmmaking, and when I look back I can say that for a boy from a working-class neighbourhood in Cape Town, South Africa I’ve not done too badly. But now the time has come to enter a new, exciting, scary phase of my life – travelling the world with my partner of 5 years, Akhona Kraai.
This blog will document in detail why I have decided at the age of 53 to sell my house, and sell my cars and other assets and set off on an epic life adventure of travelling around the world with my partner Akhona. We will use our many skills and accrued knowledge to in small ways contribute to our amazing world by volunteering and working with local communities and try and make the world a better place…
