In 2014, Naina Rishiraj’s uncle died from a heart attack at 60. He had been working his entire life with the dream of traveling the world once he retired. But, despite being “fit as a fiddle,” Ms. Rishiraj said, he passed away suddenly and never got to live that dream.
It was an awakening for Ms. Rishiraj, who was then a 22-year-old freelance journalist. She had wanted to become a journalist since she was 9 and had put a lot of pressure on herself to do so.
“I was like, ‘Why am I not on BBC at 10 o’clock?,’” said Ms. Rishiraj, who grew up in London. Ultimately, she said she realized, “‘I’m 22 years old. I need to slow down. Life is so precious.’”
In 2016, she decided to take a break from her career and backpack across Southeast Asia and Australia for three months. That October, she settled in Sydney.
Ms. Rishiraj first met Ryan Anthony Hawkins at the Bounce Sydney Hostel in March 2017. They were assigned to the same bunk bed in Room 203: He was on the bottom bunk, and she was on the top.
Mr. Hawkins had also traveled throughout Southeast Asia in 2015. When he returned to his hometown, Regina, Canada, he felt that completing a bachelor’s degree in kinesiology at the University of Regina was not the path that would fulfill him.
