OUR StORY
chaa·lo (verb)
pronounced: chah-loh
hindi/urdu/gugerati word for “let’s go”
CHAALO’S STORY
Zaneeta, our founder, is the first in her family to be born in the United States. Her father originally came to the U.S. for graduate school, and after securing a job, he immigrated to the U.S. with his wife from India. As they began their new life, he said “Chaalo,” and the journey began.
While Zaneeta doesn’t speak a second language (feel free to ask her why), one of her favorite words as a child was chaalo, which means “come on, let’s go” in her parents’ native language, Gujarati. She loved using it when visiting India—and later, when traveling with friends around the world.
Today, she believes there’s no better word to capture the spirit of an organization that encourages young adults, especially those who might not otherwise have the chance, to take their first steps into the world.
Chaalo is more than a phrase. It’s a part of our founder’s heritage, a reflection of her life philosophy, and now, the heartbeat of our mission.
Zaneeta was privileged to have traveled to a few other countries before starting college, which fueled her desire to study abroad. She had planned to spend a semester in Spain, but then she met a classmate who had participated in Semester at Sea, and nothing was the same after that. While on Semester at Sea, as a senior in college, not only did she get to visit 10 countries around the globe, she discovered how people are the same despite their cultures and what it means to be an American.
Fast forward to 2024, Zaneeta was laid off twice in two years and realized a few things after a lot of self-reflection.
The first was about how fortunate she was to have her parents send her on a high school trip to Spain and on Semester at Sea when she was in college.
ZANEETA’S STORY
Zaneeta is the first in her family to be born in the U.S. She is also the first in her family to hold a U.S. passport - her parents naturalized a few years after she was born. She used her passport for the first time before she turned one to visit India for the first time and continued to visit every few years - sometimes to visit family and other times to travel. She remembers being called “American baby” and locals being fascinated with her. She also remembers all of the misconceptions Indians had about what it was like to live in the U.S.
The second was about how exploring other countries had changed her perspectives. One of her biggest aha moments came in 1994 when she was in China and realized that people and their governments are not the same.
The third was that being a tourist and being a traveler are not the same, and that to keep learning and growing, you can’t just check countries off a list by visiting their main attractions. You have to interact with people and experience the culture.
And last, that no matter how many times you travel outside the U.S., you learn more about yourself and what it means to be an American. You also learn to recognize how privileged you are to live in a democracy.
So with those thoughts, and many, many more, she decided to combine her expertise in higher education and nonprofit management with her love of travel and establish her own nonprofit organization to help shape the next generation of global citizens at a time when it feels like learning to respect others different from ourselves is needed more than ever.
She hopes she can pay it forward and spark the love of learning through international travel, which in turn will have a world of impact.
