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Story
Counting the Minutes
Nothing symbolises Western society – particularly, its notion of time as a commodity for sale – better than the taxi driver’s meter. As a child, I watched them with a morbid fascination. Seeing the price rise before my eyes with each passing moment was anxiety-inducing, painful almost, but I couldn’t take my eyes away from…
August 10, 2020
India Story
The Halloween Puja
I’m going to be a boxer. I walk to town and ask my tailor to make me a baby blue bathrobe with a hood. This requires a fair amount of pantomiming and gesturing. Then I ask him to make me a pair of red boxing gloves. “Boxing gloves?” asks Rajesh. He sends a boy out…
July 27, 2020
Story
Summer Romance
Ten years ago, I lived on an island off the coast of Honduras. It was summer when I was there. It was summer almost all the year. The air was hot and buttery; day lasted long into the night. Through the afternoons, men played dominoes in the shade beneath the mango trees. In the evenings,…
July 21, 2020
Bali Story
Adios, Motherfucker
What’s the most quintessential injury an Aussie can get in Bali? A scooter accident. Okay, what’s the second most? Animal Bite. What’s the third—actually, forget it. Picture this, it’s 3 o’clock in the afternoon and you’ve just down a beverage called Adios Motherfucker. Sorry, Adios Motherfu*cker. Can’t forget the oddly placed asterisk; it’s honestly charming.…
July 3, 2020
Story
The Last Cigarette
Nothing ever changes where I’m from. It’s small-town forgotten suburbia where fuck all happens and everything stays the same. No one knows where they’re going – we just know we want out. We claw at the lip of the sewer lid, only to fall back in, left to sizzle out in a cesspit like a…
June 19, 2020
Bali Story
A Balinese Quest for Magic Mushrooms
When people say drugs are a gateway, their minds often jump straight to visions of calamity and misfortune. More often than not, drugs provide a gateway to the next adventure. An escapade you would never have possibly found yourself on, had it not been for the quest to alter your reality. In my case, on…
June 17, 2020
Japan Story
Rush Hour Sucks Everywhere
In Tokyo, rush hour extends to 8pm. Not because of systemic inefficiency, but simply because lots of people work later than 6 o'clock. And I am one of those unlucky folk. When I was back home in Perth -- behind my steering wheel in bumper-to-bumper traffic, dreaming of life in Tokyo and cursing…
June 16, 2020
Story
How to Travel and Tell No One What Happened
I’m on the streets of Paris. It’s July 14th, Bastille Day. It has been 230 years since the unsettled French populace murdered a bunch of bootlickers and displayed their blood-stained heads on metal spikes. Where the Bastille once stood is now a despondent construction site. Replacing the jeers of angry peasantry is the mechanical beeping…
June 11, 2020

Astray is a storytelling project centred on travel, community, identity and liberation.

We’re based out of Lenapehoking / New York City: the homeland of the Lenape. Specifically, we’re in Manhattan: a name that comes from Mannahatta, meaning “island of many hills”. As grateful guests in this city, we recognize the strength and resilience of the Lenape, and extend our reverence to all Indigenous peoples everywhere. This acknowledgement comes from our commitment to working against the ongoing legacies of settler colonialism.