Creator · Filmmaker · Traveller
Open to all adventure. Come travel with me, one episode at a time.
ON CAMERA
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Fresh episodes from the road, shared as they happen.
ON THE MAP
Kerala
where the camera goes
Ferries, cathedrals, sunsets and strangers.
Camera on. Every day.
Come along.
Open to all adventure.
My Story
No filter. Real footage. From a black sheep in Kerala to the Arctic Circle.
I was never home. A different school every few weeks, late nights out, sleeping at my best friends' houses. Everyone else in my family was settled and disciplined. I was the black sheep, and my parents fought with me about it all the time. Growing up only made it stronger.
Here's the joke: the boy who couldn't stay home got sick on every bus and every train. I threw up on trip after trip. I kept getting back on until my body gave up fighting.
My own tent. A sunrise over Munnar I will never forget. Then my own bike, and long rides across India and up into the Himalayas.
In college my family refused to give me money for the Himalayas. So I went with nothing in my pocket and filmed my first YouTube videos on the way.
Up there something spiritual hit me. Why fame? Why money? Why things? I gave all my footage to a friend and he posted it instead of me. It blew up across Kerala: newspapers, radio interviews, YouTube. Then I deleted every social media account I had. I regretted it for years. Maybe it was fate.
▶ Watch the Red FM interviewI kept travelling, but with no camera, no followers and no plan to be famous. Just the road.
Malta looked perfect from the outside. Model. Film actor. A luxury life with a convertible, a lot of girlfriends and a lot of love. But on that small island I had no freedom.
I'm a rebel. I ask questions when I see injustice. My boss cheated me. He revoked my card and never paid my taxes, and overnight I was illegal and stuck in Malta. The people who were supposed to stand with me turned against me, because I was always different.
Twelve-hour taxi shifts by day, filming and editing by night, until that was gone too. Two days without food. Nights hiding at the airport. Depression hit hard and I fought back with workouts and swimming in the sea. That's when I understood: I want money and I want freedom, so I'll work at the thing I'd do for free. Travel and film.
I took my risk and crossed to Italy broke, making a few coins on the street for food and filming everything. Instagram grew to 10,000 followers and a million views.
Alone with a high fever and an infected leg. Then betrayal: the guy throwing bottles in the street, a man I trusted like a brother, wrecked months of my work. I filmed riot police and streets on fire in Turin. I made my first short films in Milan, one about schizophrenia and one about sleep paralysis.
Rome and the Colosseum. Christmas in Venice. Pisa, Napoli, Vesuvius and Pompeii. Sorrento with a world record holder. Camping and yoga in the Dolomites. A deep talk with a famous Italian actress. Then the hardest goodbye of my life when I was left behind.
My first days in Germany started in detention. I tried to get my papers and failed, badly. But Berlin felt like freedom: wild camping in the mountains, the Cologne Cathedral I couldn't reach when my heart was broken, beautiful people and real love stories.
I made my first intimate videos there and they did really well. Not porn. Films about love, intimacy and purity, not sex or pleasure. Dance and acrobatics.
Swiss lakes, Austria, France, then north through Finland and over the Arctic Circle, chasing volcanoes and the northern lights. I go where most people are afraid to go: empty, wild, mysterious places.
In Delhi I watched a mafia selling a little girl, maybe twelve or thirteen, to men. I couldn't help her in any way. I will never forget it. That is why I am building a safe home for people suffering around the world, starting with the kids nobody is there for. Every film, every view and every bit of money I make goes toward that home, and one day toward big films that fund it.
See the home I'm buildingThe map so far
Kerala · Munnar · The Himalayas · Delhi
Gozo · Comino · Marsaxlokk · Blue Hole
Milan · Turin · Rome · Venice · Pisa · Napoli · Vesuvius · Pompeii · Sorrento · Dolomites
Lakes · Forests · The border
Austria
Berlin · Cologne · The mountains
France
The Arctic Circle · Northern lights
Project 1
Ray is manifesting a home for orphans and for children from war zones, in the Himalayas of north India. Palestine. Iran. India. Sudan. A place where a child can finally put the day down and sleep.
Orphans and children who have lived through war.
North India, in the Himalayas.
Support goes through Ray’s own page. He accepts PayPal, GPay and Wise.
Adventure with a purpose.
Snapshots
Golden hour in Milan
Films & Videos
On air
The radio interview from my college days, after the Himalaya trip.
On Instagram
@malayali_raju on Instagram →Elsewhere
Collabs
Brands, festivals, travel boards and fellow creators: if your story has heart and a road in it, let’s make something together.
rayprade@gmail.com
