Rhinal Patel

Rhinal Patel grew up in the valleys town, Pontypridd. She is the daughter of an African refugee and Indian economic migrant.

She gave up a high profile career working with A-list celebrities like Angelina Jolie to travel the world and help people less fortunate than herself.

She also spent time learning a subsistence way of living from a hunter gatherer tribe. This led to her donating all of her travel budget to slum children in India and travelled home to wales with no money. Despite the dangers she hitch-hiked and accepted help from strangers to challenge a number of social issues which she has given interviews about since in welsh and international media.

She has now set up a charity called the “Pursuit of Happiness” through which she gives workshops on human rights in partnership with international organisations like amnesty international, looking after the environment and mindfulness.

Some of the positive things that she achieved was reducing plastic waste and meat consumption in the favelas and amazon communities and inspiring women to “say no to violence”. She now writes about her experiences and was also a key speaker for International women’s day at the welsh Millenium stadium, Tedx and recently a United Nations model conference on climate change.

Her next challenge which is to be the first woman to walk the length of the Ganges river. Her main focus will be giving workshops in empowering women, a topic close to her heart after being followed and attacked several times.

She hopes to inspire more people in wales to step out of their comfort zone and stereotypes to live their dreams and encourage support for vulnerable people internationally seeing through her story that true happiness does not come only from receiving but giving, wholeheartedly, and especially to those less fortunate.