Adventures Of A2D2: Disha Chopra Is Changing Tourism For Kids In India

Disha Chopra embarked on a journey with a blog entailing her personal experience as a family out on an adventure. What started as informative writing culminated in a passion project that came to be Adventures of A2D2. Often referred to as the Tarzan and Jane of India, Happy Campers and George of the Jungle family of India, today the family of four (A2D2 decoded: Arush and Disha - the parents, and Amer and Dinaira - the kids) are not just creating awareness around conservation and sustainability but is also shifting perspectives for several city kids - who have for long been away from India’s biodiversity treasure. 

In conversation with SheThePeople, Disha Chopra looks back on the origin of Adventures of A2D2, why India’s biodiversity requires undivided attention, how the onus of sustainable tourism falls on every citizen, and how she successfully manages to take children amid India’s wildlife and give back to nature.

Excerpts From The Interview

The Origin Of A2D2 

Chopra, a former journalist, always wanted to do something in the field of conservation. While she did not have any domain knowledge, she navigated her way into it organically. “Interestingly, we once watched a movie called Captain Fantastic which talks about a family, which lives in the wild. From eating to sustaining and doing everything with the basic principles of nature, they lived a life that heavily inspired me. And immediately at midnight, I started my page Adventures of A2D2 in 2019. The idea was initially to document our journey into the wild, because my husband and I, along with our two kids who were then toddlers used to go for lots of glamping and Safari trips, and trekking into the wild. So, we thought that families like us, when they see us going into the wild, and they realise it's not so difficult, it’ll probably inspire them to also go into the wild and get a closer feel to nature. And that, to me, is the first step towards conservation,” recalls Chopra

Your humble beginning spiralled into something bigger and better that helped your family serve a purpose you're collectively passionate about. How did it go from being just an Instagram page to the company that it is today? 

We all have had a very rough time going through COVID-19. Right around the time when the situation simmered down, many people who would otherwise go for holidays outside the country started visiting our page and asking me for recommendations for options within India. From there, the conversation would go further, and they would ask me if I curated any wildlife holidays. I would say, 'No, our page is out there solely for information.' And one fine day, my husband and I just decided to take a plunge - take young children and families with us into the wild and see how it goes. It's from that thought that we started our first trip, it was a glamping trip. And there's been no looking back ever since.

Your primary focus is on - mindfulness, preservation and inclusivity. What are the major challenges you face in keeping all three factors aligned considering the vast Indian tapestry that you cover in Indian tourism, especially with children involved? 

I read a very interesting line somewhere - It's better to do conservation and sustainability imperfectly than to try and perfect conservation and sustainability. So, what we do counts as baby steps into conservation and sustainability. This is sort of our non-academic approach towards conservation. Why I call it non-academic is because when you take children, especially at such a young, impressionable age, whatever they do or see, they soak it in. So, imagine going into a forest, being able to see the tiger in the wild and being able to witness a langoor, fireflies or butterflies - the kids are amazed by it. Unfortunately, urban children today are not able to see these things so what we hope to do is that we take these children, we expose them to wildlife, flora and fauna, and we have conservationists and naturalists on board to assist.

Another significant practice is that ours is a plastic-free zone. We don't use anything with any sort of plastic in it, we believe in a lot of earthy usage of whatever's made locally. These are small steps, but the idea is that once children and their parents are exposed to this incredible biodiversity, they will never look back at and they will never see a butterfly the same way. They will never see an exotic bird the same way. And once you see something and love it, you'll always want to protect it for the future as well.

How child-friendly are Indian tourist places and what can be improved in this regard?

That's a loaded question. Every place is inherently child-friendly. I know this particular statement will not be understood by a lot of people. But let me just elaborate a little bit - children are the most non-fuss beings that exist, it's actually the parents who make something child-friendly or non-child-friendly because it has to be parent-friendly, or non-parent-friendly first. 

We have to ensure our children are not used to such luxuries and comforts, and keeping that as the basics, we must keep their expectations very real and grounded. Of course, we don't explore a place that would be potentially dangerous to a child. However, hotels, lodges, and camping spots are all fairly child-friendly. And if you make sure that your child is not used to a whole lot of luxury, I think, the entire country can be explored on foot.

As a family, how do you create a synergy of your personalities while planning and executing your tours?

When I started out, it was my husband and I who were the hosts, and our children were part of the holiday. But now, it's barely been 18 months and I feel both my children are the hosts and us adults are part of the holiday. This journey has been very interesting and I've seen my own children evolve into such mature individuals. To give you a big basic idea of how we divide the duties between the family. So, I take care of things like safety, logistics and getting the itinerary together, and my husband looks at the activities in the wild. My kids are now playing mini hosts to everybody who's coming on the trip with us.

Your children are involved with planning trips now while you’re also inculcating within them the habit of sustainability. Not a lot of other parents have the same ideology of taking kids to the wild to teach them aspects of conservation or have a holiday for that matter. How do your children find a balance with their peers? 

So, one of the reasons that A2D2 has been successful is that we take baby steps into the wild. We understand not everyone has been on a safari, not everyone has been to a forest, or on a trek, let alone a trail or a hardcore camping trip. Our idea is to introduce them to this world gently and we cannot do that if right at the onset we scare them off. That's part one. Part two, children are great survivors. We've always heard babies are great survivors; well, so are children. They spend just a day in the forest and they get so comfortable with the environment. So, it's more about managing the parents than the children.

Also, when children have other children, it brings a whole different dynamic to the holiday. When you take a whole lot of children together, they feed off each other's energy and enthusiasm. This I think has been one of the biggest success stories of Adventures of A2D2.

In what other ways have your travels impacted your children? How do they balance their education alongside travel and family time? 

I often tell parents to look at the opportunity cost of missing a day at school. Having said that, we try to make sure that our holidays are pegged around national holidays; festivals where children get a few holidays or a break from school so they don't miss too much of school. However, if there is a day or two that they do have to miss, I explain to every parent to look at the opportunity cost of it - what is the child learning in this trip vis à vis what they would be learning in school. That's one of the ways of getting more and more people on board.

Talking about education and what my children have learned, apart from becoming fantastic hosts, I've seen a certain sensibility in them, I see kindness and generosity in them when they look at plants, birds, and animals, or when it comes to avoiding plastic use. There has been a huge sensitization drive, which has not been sort of purposely put in, it's just very organic. So, whenever they see anybody who's using single-use plastic, they will be the first ones to go and try and explain to them why they should not do that. Every Diwali, in their sweet way, they make posters as to how people should not burst crackers or pollute the environment and they go and stick it on every tree, not only in our colony but in our area. These are small things, but I think, somewhere there is a huge impact and I hope to see this have a domino effect. 

I'm going to read out a line to you, that I read somewhere and it impacted me. It says, "A society grows great when people start planting trees, the shade of which they will never sit in. I think when it comes to A2D2, we've just started planting those seeds."

Just a small example, "Why bamboo toothbrushes?" it's something as simple as that, right? Imagine if 8 billion people start using bamboo instead of that one plastic brush. it's as simple as that - a small change will be a huge change because you will be the catalyst of that change. There is nothing called a small impact or a big impact. Impact is impact 

How are you changing the perception towards holistic, responsible tourism in India for travellers?

We don’t want to just take children into the wild, we also want to give them a very holistic experience. We’ve done everything - from Safaris in India’s stunning forests to trekking in the Himalayas, from glamping in Garhwal to taking kids to the salt lakes of Sambhar in Rajasthan. India has an incredible landscape. You’ll see sometimes pictures on the internet and you’ll imagine, ‘Oh, this is a place in Africa or Argentina or the Amazon forest." But it’s incredible India all the way - we have forests, we have deserts, we have mountains, we have beautiful rivers and deltas. India is the animal and bird bowl of the world. We just need to be aware and more appreciative of what we have. We need to be open to travelling within our country.

There has been a huge surge in India’s tourism particularly since COVID-19 and we seem to be finally appreciating our country’s beauty. So, I think mindsets are already changing, and things are already on an upward surge. So, to answer your question about how we can improve tourism. I think the most important aspect is to be responsible tourists by keeping our tourist destinations and our country clean. This one factor will change the tourism landscape of India completely.

How do you think Indians can become sustainable travellers?

We need to begin with small, easy steps that actually make a big difference if each person does their part. The three things that we can start with are:

1. Carry your water bottles. You will not be able to buy a single-use bottle that cannot be recycled. 

2. Figure out the most eco-friendly way to travel to a destination. Make sure you carpool instead of every person taking a personal car. 

3. Avoid wastage. Wastage of resources and their disposal is one of the most problematic issues we’re fighting today. Think responsibly. It’s not so difficult.