Simply to Meet the Challenge

And of course, for the love of adventure. That powerful draw to experience opportunities that proves so irresistible is not ordained particularly toward the male of the species. There are women too, who are given to wonder at the world around them, compelled to explore and to advantage themselves in ways quite out of the ordinary. By exerting themselves in so many enterprises, of the spirit and will and physical challenges that most people see as beyond their capabilities or willingness to expend the charged energy or to submit to the allure of adventure.

There are women who will brave the elements, aspiring to become the first to climb a trio of formidable, weather-stricken mountain heights, alone but for their adventurous spirit. And others who will undertake solo flights in the frigid and lonely atmosphere, while other women, determined to meet the challenges they themselves place before themselves, indomitably paddle across vast ocean spaces. And of course there are those who will forge a way for themselves to traverse vast deserts of dry, wind-drifting sand; others who ski across huge tracts of frozen tundra.

Some succeed in their personal missions to test their physical mettle, their adventurous prowess and intellectual curiosity, some do not. Some are heard of and celebrated for their perseverance and spirit, and others are simply mourned by their distraught families and wistful friends, remembering them as they were, when last they saw them, laughed with them, shared personal childhood reminiscences together, and now miss their close presence.

There are other categories of adventurers, women who are given to the love of seeing exotic new places, geographies where history has left its mark, traditions and cultures excitingly different than those loved and familiar. These are people who open themselves to new experiences, exulting in achieving what few others aspire to, and not because they want to be different, but simply because they are spurred on by their inner urging to know more of the world they inhabit.

One such is a young woman by the name of Ani Ashekian, an adventurer of the spirit, a 30-year-old paralegal from Toronto, who never, it appears, tired of travelling the world. With friends, when that kind of serendipitous opportunity presented itself, but solo when adventure called, not to be denied. Ms. Ashekian submitted to a whim to join two of her friends who had planned a trip to Beijing. This was a last-minute decision, a spontaneous desire to continue her deepest pleasures in life.

She had returned only days earlier from a trip with her boyfriend, to Costa Rica. She remained with her friends for a while then decided she would go off on her own, to see Hong Kong, keeping in touch with her family from time to time through telephone contact or text messaging. The last contact with her family, assuring them that all was well, was on November 10. As an inveterate and dedicated traveller, she had previously been through Europe, South America and Canada on her peregrinations. Her family trusted to her past experience.

Her goal was to have visited 30 countries by the time she reached 30. Her China trip would have completed that initial inspiration. That they hadn't heard from her was cause for a niggling worry, but she was expected home by December 15, and her family was at the airport to greet her, right on schedule. She never did arrive home. Since then, authorities in Canada and Hong Kong have been alerted, and the search is on to pick up the elusive trail of this enthusiastic traveller.

In Hong Kong, authorities have activated their missing persons' department to avidly search for clues, including looking through hospital records, and that of morgues. Nothing has thus far come to the attention of those searching for her whereabouts, not even from a private security agent hired by the family, in Hong Kong. She is assuredly somewhere, no one can quite imagine where. This kind of mysterious occurrence is not entirely unknown; when a world traveller, often enough a single woman travelling on her own, seems to disappear.

Lone travel can be a dangerous thing for anyone. One could legitimately question whether it is more potentially dangerous to travel now, in the 21st Century, than it was, say during the 19th Century. When, in fact, many adventurous women from Europe or North American undertook long and sometimes physically arduous journeys abroad to far-flung places to satisfy their curiosity about other societies, traditions, climes and peoples. Travel and social-history literature has been enriched by their chronicling of their adventures, experiences and observations.

Ms. Ashekian may yet turn up to soothe the concerns of her worried family and friends. Perhaps simply delayed as a result of having been pulled by her curiosity in a direction she hadn't anticipated. The uncertainty of knowing where she is, whether she's in good health and not having been abducted, or something awry having befallen her, will ensure those who love her will spend many sleepless nights until the mystery of her absence is cleared.

Her family and friends now rise to meet their own challenge, anxiously awaiting the outcome of their loved one's absence.