That Time I Went To India

I went to India! It was very far. That's the short version.

The long version is that in March of 2020 I was supposed to go to India to visit my company's office, where we had just hired two new employees. The night before I was supposed to leave, bags packed and all, my trip was canceled. We all know why. Fast forward six years, through budget cuts and management changes, and FINALLY I was cleared to go visit the now six employees I had only ever met through Teams. A coworker and I spent a little over a week in Hyderabad, where my company has two offices. If you've not heard of this city, it's one of the largest in India with over 11 million people. It's a huge hub for IT and global businesses, with ongoing construction in every direction. 

Our timing was incredibly lucky. We flew through Abi Dhabi, UAE, three weeks before the Iran conflict started. The flights were so long, 14 hours from DC and then another 3 to Hyderabad. We were also incredibility privileged to be business travelers and got to fly business class! This was one of my favorite aspects of the trip, because I'm not fancy in real life and this was most likely the only time I will ever get to do this. I was able to get some sleep on the planes thanks to the flat seat and pharmaceuticals, but I'm terrible about sleeping when I'm not at home and was chronically tired the whole time (plus there was a 10.5 hour time difference). I was just surviving on fumes and pushed through, but when in India, you see India.

My second favorite aspect of this trip was that we were with local coworkers who devoted themselves to making sure we had a good time, and they did such a phenomenal job. I'm sure I wouldn't have had half the experience if I had gone on my own or even with a tour guide. Here's the whole group; I'm bummed I may never see them in person again. 

We arrived on Friday night, and on Saturday morning headed out to make the most of our weekend, sleep or no sleep. We started by shopping, as I we both had some things we were looking for. I bought some clothes, which was an unmatched experience because I am not short in India. At 4'10", I even have to alter petite-length clothes in the US. In India, I'm just a normal height and everything fit right off the rack! It was so refreshing being able to talk to people eye-to-eye, and in some cases, I was even the taller one. MIND BLOWN.

I bought fabric as well, which one day I will craft with, if I can bring myself to cut into it. My coworker bought pearls, since Hyderabad is famous for them, but I didn't as they would have been wasted on me. We ate lunch at a cafe and had chai, of course, and some local dishes. This is where my India coworkers came in clutch, they ordered for us and recommended all the best things. In general, the food was amazing. Despite several paranoid warnings before I left, I never got sick even though I ate raw fruit and vegetables. I also never ate any street food or anything outside of an established restaurant, so I'm sure that helped.

In the evening we drove to a massive temple called the Statue of Equality. Cell phones and cameras were not permitted inside, so the only photo we got was one we purchased. But take a look at the link to get a sense of scale. It was gorgeous and the weather was perfect, pollution aside (more on this later). 

The next day we visited a craft market called Shilparamam - everything for sale was handmade and there was such beautiful landscaping that we came back again later in the week. I saw dahlias in February! There was a little pond where you could rent pedal boats, but it was so tiny I'm not sure how you would do more than just go in tiny circles.

So, the traffic. You may have heard about it because India is notorious for chaotic traffic. No lines on the roads, everyone just nudging themselves into the smallest of gaps between vehicles. Horn blaring is not optional and continued 24 hours a day. If you have to cross the street, well, you just cross wherever. Luckily I only had to do this once, and that was enough for the rest of my life. We also visited Chowmahalla Palace, which is located in the old city. The buildings are closer together and it seemed like the markets and traffic all just ran into each other.

The palace was where the last Nizam of Hyderabad lived up until the 1940s. It was quite beautiful but also reinforced just how different their lives must have been from the crowded conditions right outside their gates. It was a long day and one of our coworkers started feeling carsick, so she called an Uber motorbike and went back home - I took this photo from the car, she was right next to us!

After two action-packed sightseeing days, we spent the rest of the week doing work stuff and having meetings. A highlight was the food - nearly every restaurant we went to was delicious and cheap. In fact, coming from the US where the dollar is much stronger than the rupee, everything was inexpensive to us, about 1/4 of what it would have cost at home. One of the downsides was definitely the poor air quality and pollution. This is an issue in most of India's cities. Public transportation is very limited and so everyone travels separately. 

As an introvert and highly sensitive person, India was A LOT. Noise, lights, smells, movement, everything unceasing. Even in my hotel room I couldn't achieve silence without noise-cancelling headphones. I'm so glad I got to experience the country, though. Would I go back? Maybe? I only saw a very small part of one city. I'd like to see more of the coast and mountains and be able to acclimatize for longer to get used to the time change. But, it will be a few years before I even consider it!

In the Dead of Winter

Happy New Year! In my last post, autumn was only just arriving while I was dreading the start of winter. Here were are, in the thick of it. Thanks for all of your suggestions on how to survive. Some of those included: 

• Get outside regularly, no matter the weather
• Make a ritual of visiting a local restaurant (rituals in general)
• Cozying up on the couch, watching TV and knitting
• Photo walks outside
• Binge read a book series
• Make plans (crafting or otherwise) for the coming warmer seasons
• Visit a sauna or take a warm bath

A thread through all of these survival mechanisms is to get out of the house into the world. I'm currently feeling very cooped up, but looking through my photos from the past few months, I reminded myself that I have gone out into the world, no matter how cold and gray.

In November I took a solo trip a few hours away. I was originally planning on going to New York City, but trying to find a hotel that wasn't insanely expensive proved impossible, and the whole trip started to feel very overwhelming. Instead, I went to a book-themed hotel! I stayed in the Daisy room, and you better believe I took every interesting book off the shelf, threw them on the bed, and spent a blissful few hours reading a few pages of each and adding to my TBR.

I was familiar with the area because I went to grad school there many years ago, but I hadn't been back for at least 15 years. I visited Winterthur (where I used to work) and enjoyed the misty, autumn weather. 

The next day was spent at Longwood Gardens, which has the best conservatories anywhere - believe me! It was late in the season and the next day they were planning to close to start setting up Christmas decorations, so the mum display was looking a little tired. It was definitely still beautiful, though.

I had a sophisticated (carb-based) afternoon tea with some friends from work:

And my mom booked us tickets to a lantern festival that exceeded my expectations:

January has been more challenging with the constant grayness and freezing temperatures. Soon I will be going somewhere warm and sunny though - somewhere VERY far away. Can you guess??

It's also goal-setting season, which I will be sitting out. Maybe I'm as self-improved as I'm going to get? At this point in my life it's mostly about maintenance and survival. I just try to show up for work everyday, get the kids to school and drive them places, clean the house, exercise so my bones don't turn to dust, and repeat. In terms of reading, I had similar thoughts to Diane, who pointed out that she will never read all the books on her TBR, so is focusing on savoring the experience of reading. I am vowing to ignore the new books with the biggest marketing budgets to instead focus on authors and types of books I know I will love. So many of my favorite authors have new books coming out this year: Daniel Mason, Maggie O'Farrell, and Claire Fuller, among others. 

Recently I was on a walk and needed a new audiobook immediately (do you ever do this?) so I downloaded a bestseller that a lot of people seem to like because it would be an easy listen. And I didn't like it and it was a waste of time. This year I will be focusing on my singular reading desires and not reading any listicles like "The 437 Books We're Excited For This May".

My favorite genre of book is "really long and follows a set of characters over generations". I'm happy to take recommendations! I have loved: North Woods by Daniel Mason, East of Eden by John Steinbeck, The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne, The Shell Seekers by Rosamunde Pilcher, Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead, and Flashlight by Susan Choi. I'm currently reading The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese, and I can already tell it's going to be an all-time favorite.

I leave you with photos I took on a photo walk (inspired by one of the comments on my last post!), which was of an abandoned house I often drive by. I think the colors in this photo embody winter in the Mid-Atlantic. SO GRAY. I have heard of "stick season" being a thing in New England before the snow comes. Well guess what, it is stick season all winter long here. UGH. 

Real Life vs. The Internet

I know I haven't posted that much this year, but that's because I've been livin' life in the real world! Going to work, doing chores, taking kids to playgrounds, cutting flowers, etc. etc. I thought I would pop in here today because yikes, have you seen the state of the Internet? I made the mistake of logging on to Facebook the other day and was immediately bombarded with fake photos, fake videos, and fake news stories. Pinterest is all AI generated these days which is only the tip of the iceberg. Substack and YouTube are OK, with a little too much of a lean toward "curation" and "aesthetic". If one more 20-something tells me to "romanticize my life" you'll know, because you'll hear my scream wherever you are.

I bought an Oru folding kayak for my birthday - it was a little pricey but 100% worth it. It fits in the trunk of my hatchback sedan and it's easy to store in the house, too. I was a little concerned about floating in what is basically a huge USPS mail bin, but so far so good! I'm looking forward to some colder weather kayaking in the hopes that the crowds are kept away. Fun fact: Maryland is the only US state without any natural lakes.

We went on a few trips, one to a lake in Virginia, and to the Outer Banks in North Carolina. This was Cora's first time seeing the ocean and she jumped right in, fully clothed. A hurricane was brewing off shore so there were yellow (caution) flags up on most days. It was pretty stressful trying to keep 8 children from drowning but luckily our rental house also had a pool which was easier to supervise.

I'm realllly scraping the bottom of the barrel now, flower-wise. My July planting fizzled out due to extreme heat and hardly any rain. I still have 120 dahlia plants but it's been so dry they are not producing like I hoped. I have 8 more flower subscription pickups before I'm done for the season, and boy will I be glad to take a break. I've already decided to scale back next year. So often turning a hobby into a job takes some of the joy out of it, which has happened over the last 4.5 years. Next year I'm hoping to reclaim some gardening fun.

I'm not here to rain on anyone's fall parade, but fall is already nice. I don't need special flavors and decorations, hot books and cozy blankets. Nature is already beautiful enough. So let me propose, let's make winter the special season. After the end of year holidays, it's just dark and cold; Valentine's day is not going to cut it. I'm trying to think of ways to make January-March feel bearable. Maybe a special box of treats that is only opened then? A mission to try new restaurants or visit museums? If anyone has winter traditions, I'd love to hear them. 

Until next time... If you have a blog and are a human with a regular life, I am grateful for what you do. I may not always comment, but there aren't many real people on the internet anymore and I appreciate you!

I'm a Notebook Person

Are you a notebook person? Do you obsessively research different types of Japanese paper and buy new journals even though you certainly don't need another one? Do you invent reasons to start a new themed journal? If you answered yes to these questions, you'll likely enjoy this post.

I recently read this post by Carolyn Yoo which spoke to my notebook-loving heart. I have never heard of a techo kaigi ("notebook meeting") before but it seems like an excellent idea, particularly for those us of who refuse to limit ourselves to one notebook. I currently have six notebooks in use (not counting sketchbooks and art journals; there are four of those.) This is too many for me, and I do have a long-term plan for reducing them, but I also cannot abandon a journal without it being completed. Are you also an eldest child?

Sorry for all the Amazon links: I know it's not cool to support Amazon these days, but when it comes down it it, it's the cheapest notebook source, and we get free shipping through a shared family Prime account. When I'm ready to re-buy notebooks, I'll probably use JetPens instead.

Planning & Exercise Tracker: Random planner from Amazon

Over the years I have realized that I prefer undated planners. If I am on vacation, I likely won't fill out a spread for that week, and (see above) I hate having blank pages! This means they also will last longer than a year. I throw away planners when I'm done with them, so I'm not picky about when I start them.  I started this current planner on April 28. It is always open on my desk with work and personal appointments and tasks mixed together. I like having a week on one page, and I chose this particular planner because it has a section for to-do lists and a habit tracker. I use that and the monthly spreads to track my steps, workouts (with active minutes from my Fitbit), yoga, and walks. If I don't write these down, I will definitely forget my activity for the week.

"5-Year" Journal: Levenger 5-Year Journal

I started this 5-Year Journal in 2010. If you can do basic math, you'll know that I have had it for 15 years. Without fail, I complete a streak of several months, and then forget it exists for years. Some pages have 5 years filled out, others have none. I assume a sane person would simply say "not for me" and move on with their lives, but I CANNOT HAVE BLANK SPACES. So, it persists.

Reading Log: Stalogy A6 Grid, 1/2 Year

This was a case of coveting a notebook without having a specific plan for it. The Stalogy notebook pages are fairly thin, I assume kind of like Hobonichi paper, but I have never seen a Hobonichi in person. I enjoy the sensory experience of crinkly pages with slight ghosting from the other side, so I am a fan of this brand. I am using this one as a reading journal, where I list the author, title, dates started and finished, and then take bullet point notes as I read. It's not anything profound, but I hope it will help me remember books more clearly. I also don't put every single book in here, just ones I want to remember.

Memory Keeping/Travel Journal/Everything Else: Moleskine Cahier Large Dot Grid

This is my longest-lived form of journaling. I have had a notebook like this for over 20 years, containing notes, quotes, journaling, travels, and lots of paper glued in. While other notebooks will come and go, I think this style is for life. I have used different notebooks over the years, but I am now on my second Moleskine Cahier, because I like that it's only one signature and sewed together. I put so much paper into it that it gets quite thick, and notebooks with more pages can get too bulky and heavy.

New cahier on the bottom; completed journal on the top

Long-form Writing: Midori Notebook A5 plus Paper Cover

My scrapbook-type journals are some of my most valuable possessions and one day I'll pass them down to my kids. Sometimes I just want to write some drivel, though. This journal is long-form writing, some of it interesting, most of it super boring to read back. I write in this notebook once or twice a week, and I'm not quite sure what to do with it when I'm finished. Ritual burning? Censorship? The Midori paper is on the thicker side which I don't prefer, but it is super smooth.

Lists and Notes: 3-Pack Notebook from Amazon

Finally, I always have a notebook on my desk for notes during meetings, scribbles when I'm researching something, or to-do lists. I prefer spiral-bound notebooks for this because they stay open easily. Sometimes I rip pages out, and I have no intention of keeping these when they're done. I got this cheap 3-pack because I liked the flowers.

So tell me, how many notebooks are you using right now? What are your favorites?