- Achini Udayarathne on how to blog while enjoying the journey
When Achini Udayarathne, better known by her Instagram name @sl_runaway_girl, was a little girl, she had to hike up a mountain one day to attend an almsgiving. From that day on, she recalls counting down the days every year until the next almsgiving to be able to embark on that hike again. Eventually, one mountain became two, three, and more – as she entered adulthood, she began exploring the mountain ranges of Sri Lanka, and somewhere along the way, was able to turn her passion for hiking into a viable career as a travel content creator on social media.
Her journey began with a few friends who she would travel with and, as we all do on trips, take dozens of pictures along the way. In conversation with Brunch, she told us that it was never her intention to start a travel blog, but as most social media users, she too would upload the occasional picture, video, or story online.
“It was actually a friend – Danny – from Jaffna who pushed me to monetise my social media. He walked me through the intricacies of handling a blog and helped me start my journey as a travel content creator,” Achini told us, adding that she is eternally grateful to him for helping her find something else to be passionate about.
To her, blogging and the never-ending demands of social media were never tiring; in fact, it motivated her to travel more. She acknowledged her travel friends for the support she receives behind the scene. “Behind every perfect picture are my friends helping me find my angles and interesting hotspots to blog,” she added.
While to the untrained eye, content creation may seem easy and dismissed as just taking pictures, Achini pointed out that there’s a lot of hard work and a huge support system behind it. Achini found creating travel blogs continuously to be a huge challenge that she was attempting to overcome while pursuing her higher education.
“The first challenge I faced as a blogger was editing my photographs well. Somehow I studied many tutorials and learned to edit through a software called Lightroom for mobile,” she told us, although she mostly focused on writing blogs about certain locations that catch her eye. She found that narrowing down her audience and figuring who was best for her was also a challenge. “As content creators, we have to be cautious when targeting an audience, as many people don’t respect nature. Some might visit the places I recommend and leave a trail of pollution behind, which would come back to me; so we need to understand the section of social media users that are mindful of the environment and target them as our audience,” she explained.
While travelling, Achini also tends to take part in many volunteer programmes that support the environment; she also tries to help as many rural students along the way in whichever way possible. “Being able to share my resources, in whatever small way I can, is a great honour to me,” she expressed.
Sharing some tips for aspiring travellers, she debunked the common misconception among many that girls cannot travel alone. She explained that while a woman travelling alone may not be the best idea, a group of women travelling together is relatively safe. “All I have to say is that I have travelled a lot with my girl besties and we always had a totally safe environment.”
Speaking about financial issues, she noted that people can start travelling with a small budget. “The only thing you need for travelling is courage. Additionally, and most importantly, if you start travelling, do care about the environment. Do not pollute and destroy the beautiful places,” she said, advising anyone that travels to be friendly to nature.
