The World We All Share

A road trip illustrates for me that the journey to get to your destination is an essential part of it. With my family, we used to pack the car so full that the sleeping bags and tent almost blocked the view of the rear window. That meant we were completely ready for an old-school road trip without GPS navigation or pre-made reservations. Just a road map and a camping guide led us to an adventurous journey for which we had a kind of destination but how we would get there was yet to be explored. We often impulsively decided by reading the guide on the way or by asking locals in a bar where we could discover the next treasure on our trip. And sometimes reality is more surreal and fantastic than dreams. This is what makes that life can be, if you decide to look at it that way, always an adventure.

Countless times, we arrived long past midnight at a campsite because we had spent all afternoon at an archaeological site or a national park and in our enthusiasm, we forgot all about time and distance. It’s quite charming to set up your tent in the complete dark with a blanket of infinite sky and stars above your head. And only in the morning you find out that your tent is next to a meadow with cows...

A road trip is the ultimate way to interact with local people, which often happens when you get lost once more, and to really feel part of the environment around you. Getting lost is finding yourself. Discovering the world beyond what you know is becoming an adventurer at heart.

Hiya World! With this blog & vlog project, I hope you get inspired too by the stories of the diverse wonderful people I meet.

If you want to connect or meet up, kindly contact me on instagram (theworld_weallshare), facebook (The World We All Share) or via theworldweallshare@outlook.com Enjoy reading & watching and let me know what you think! 🙂

Anouk Stella

Hi World! This is my first message to you 🙂 Through connecting with people, let’s make this world a better place for all of us!

Some of the globally acclaimed storytellers who inspire me are the people behind Humans of New York, The Atlas of Beauty and Nas Daily. Yet, most of all I am inspired by the people I meet who are overcome numerous challenges to do what they are passionate about.

One of those inspiring people is Zeina. She is a girl from Iraq whom I met in Istanbul when we were both on a study exchange there. Zeina dreamed of travelling all over the world. But for her it was not that easy to make that dream come true: she has an Iraqi passport, which does not give an easy access to a lot of countries. Also, she wears a hijab. By launching The Zeina Diary, she started a blog about her travels to inspire anyone who really wanted to travel but didn’t for one reason or another. In doing so, she proved that where there is a will, there is a way…

Recently I met Ishara at a hostel. He is from Sri Lanka and put all his savings together to come to a conference about the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals in Europe. At home, he is a social entrepreneur. He built a team of volunteers to provide job training to young people, especially girls who could not attend school, so that they would develop their skills to find a good job. Over the years, the organization he founded had trained 8000 young potentials successfully. He is working hard every day believing in the societal impact they created. Yet, he had still not been able to achieve his own dream: attending university.

Everywhere I kept meeting wonderful people started projects with the goal of creating positive change. For a long time I was thinking, “so what will be my project as a positive contribution to the world around me?” And then I came up with a project that would combine my interest in other people and what they are passionate about: to have people tell own their stories and to share these stories. I am convinced that sharing personal stories is the best way to create a connection with other people in a globalized world and towards a collective future. Through connecting with people and have them tell their stories, I hope to inspire you as well with The World We All Share!