My wedding anniversary was on 28th April and per usual I am here to send out a letter days later. 🙂
This year, the letter is very important because few weeks back, I would have again thought that life has been the same, so what new to write. However, as I am writing this to you today, a lot has changed or about to change in our life this year. When I write this, it sounds scary and I don’t know how to tone it down, but I know in my heart that we will sail through new things happening in our life together. I also hope that its all for good, for better and brings immense happiness in our lives.
I would work on being less scared of changes and more reassuring like you. That, by the way, is truly God’s gift. I mean, I am sure you would have scary thoughts about changes too, but you know how to face them and also enable me to be better at facing them. You bring so much joy and calmness to anything that is happening and I hope this continues. I hope our love for each other continues to increase.
On another note, I believe my FOMO about traveling may peak this year, so we will figure that out together. I definitely look forward to many more fun trips and vacations in near future. ❤
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It has been such a topsy turvy month. There is so much that has ensued that I don’t have the energy left to do a proper low down of March.
But it deserves a post to go in the history of my life as an important month, so here you go.
The initial part of the month was all okay, and my regular programming. I made a note to share here that I tried a new Greek restaurant, ‘Ryba’, near my place which i liked decent enough. At the time of making that note, I didn’t know it would become a special date for me and my husband, but more on that later.
After this, I embarked on my work trip. If i hadn’t made it clear before, I hate work trips to the core and if you are a long time follower of the blog, you would know that I didn’t used to like them even when as a young, 20 something I got them as a foreign travel opportunity. This one I especially hated because it went on longer than I wanted and expected and without much of a motive. I am still there in Bombay now on my work trip, but since it’s closer to my in-laws family, I did visit them in between which was good.
apart from this, i am missing my place terribly and there are some pretty life-changing things that March brought but I’ll dedicate separate posts to them.
hope you all are doing good, would love to know more!
In the past few days, I created a goal for myself which was to post a Feb update before 28th. 😀 It has been a supremely busy month (spoiler alert: didn’t succeed in the most important task that showed itself this month). However, this month shall be remembered as a month of some good firsts.
I am taking cue from Lyssy’s post here to take stock of my month, she calls it “What’s Up Posts”, it was started by her blogger friend Shay 8 years ago it seems!! Let’s see if I manage to do it every month.
I am going to answer all the questions in the below card for the post then.
What We’re Eating?
This month presented a lot of opportunities of trying new take-outs in big groups. This also made me think about being a bit of a restaurant snob on food delivery apps. What I mean is I always look for food I want to eat when ordering in, but if I don’t have any fixed, well-loved restaurants to order from, it becomes a risky situation when a lot of people come over. It’s a hit and miss. While I used to make fun of people who had designated restaurants to order from on food delivery apps, I am now becoming one for at least big hangouts! I have discovered some gems already. If you are a person reading this from Gurgaon, you might want to order from ‘Punjabi Angithi’ for some good North Indian starters/finger food and ‘Being Chef’ for an all-encompassing good menu – they literally have everything from Thai Curry to Pizza and its all above average!
What I’m Reminiscing about?
I am in general someone who reminisces a lot, so its difficult to keep a track of this. 😀 But, exactly at this moment, nothing.
What I’m Loving?
I loved going to my first ever cricket match in a stadium. I am not into sports, so didn’t expect this. It was definitely fun and now going to watch one in Dharamshala where the stadium is surrounded by mountains is so on my list!
What we’ve been up to?
The best part of this month was the chance to reunite with some of our close friends who don’t live in the same city/country.
What I’m dreading?
Like I mentioned at the beginning, I didn’t succeed in an opportunity that presented itself. What I’m dreading is how it affecting my confidence, honestly dreading is a small word for how I am feeling about it right now.
What I’m working on?
I am going to repeat this from last month: I am trying to work on this. Trying being the keyword, haha!
What I’m Excited about?
Funnily, I am actually excited about March despite it being a loaded month at work, and I have work travel too. However, I am looking forward to the other things – my husband’s birthday (Sometimes we literally do nothing on these ‘special’ days, but I still look forward to these days), the chance of going on another small vacation. Oh, just realized I actually have one more tiny vacation coming up which I totally forgot about!
What I’m Watching/Reading?
For someone not big on watching a lot of new stuff, I did watch a couple this month!
First, I watched ‘The Romantics’ which is like a documentary on Yash Raj Films, one of the biggest movie producers in Bollywood. While it was not what I expected it to be (I thought it was about Bollywood in general and not Yash Raj specifically), it had a lot of nostalgia, which is why I suppose so many people loved it!
I am now watching ‘You’ on Netflix. Frankly, I am quite irritated with this show, because its quite a done and dusted concept of a sociopath trying to control life of his beloved (hint: as my husband says, Shahrukh from Darr :D). However, because of the cliffhangers we are going along for now.
As for reading, I think I am finally becoming that person who reads multiple books together (and takes time to complete even one of them). I am reading ‘The Accidental Prime Minister’ which is my 2nd for this year. I talked about it in my January update as well. It is just about okay. More on that later. Then, I also started ‘Kashi ka Assi’ from my trip to Banaras, a book I stumbled upon in a bookstore there. It is stories from Banaras so I just bought it but its not what I expected at all! I am also reading ‘The Book Thief’ from the beginning of 2022! Its a hard copy at my parents place so I read it when I visit.
What I’m Listening to?
I have nothing here, the podcast thing I mentioned in my January Update also hasn’t caught up yet.
What I’m Wearing?
First of all, I am glad I wore some of my office clothes when I went to office once! Shouldn’t be too happy, as I do have a lot of work from office days happening in March what with my work travel.
Secondly, I am glad for the opportunity of getting to wear Indian wedding stuff at the wedding that I attended.
didn’t have a picture, so took a screenshot from a video
Thirdly, its about time for a spring clean-up and my wardrobe really needs a clean-up because for someone who doesn’t impulse buy, its a huge red flag to think ‘I can’t find anything good to wear’.
What I’m doing this weekend?
I am looking forward to it, will share later. However, I did go to the World Book Fair happening in Delhi until 5th March, and it was so good to be back at it again!
What I’m looking forward to next month?
I already covered that above.
What else is new?
I bought some new makeup, so I look forward to sharing about them soon!
There’s this Pizza chain where I live called Fat Lulus. We went to their Khan Market outlet after the cricket match and I loved everything we tried, albeit it was expensive than what I expected.
Despite Google offices having family days where people can bring in their their near & dear ones, I had been to my husband’s office only once until February and it was a very stressful visit because I really cannot be okay going anywhere on my workday. However, this month I went one day when I was on leave and it was so good to try all the amazing food in peace. I really want to go again!
Grateful for the Google layoffs being over in India, I hope there’s no second wave of this, really.
I signed up for Bloganuary sometime ago, not knowing how the prompts are going to be so much about questioning your existence. Haha! This is why I avoided writing a post on Bloganuary prompts until now, but here’s one that’s quite tangible while also being subjective.
Who doesn’t love watching sunsets? I am no different, but I should also mention that I am no chaser of it. Hence, I won’t say that I have a list of best sunsets, but I would like to dedicate this post to all the sunsets that I have been blessed to witness. 🙂
I would mention a few that I can think of from the top of my mind.
Starting with the National Capital Region of Delhi, where I live (well, Gurgaon), albeit its a pollution laden one I cannot help but find romance in the Delhi evenings. There are a lot of greens around and in a city with so much busyness, it still is a relatively calm time if you are not stuck in traffic, of course. If you are part of the office traffic, then f*ck your life. Sorry, but no sunset can make that day better. 😀
Focusing on different sunsets that I have witnessed, I am reminiscing about sunsets from the beaches of Goa, nothing comes close to how beautiful beach sunsets are. Funnily, I am a mountain person and I can’t recall a mountain sunset as a standout. I am not sure why that is and I feel like a fraud (like I have ditched mountains or something). Just for the record, I have also been to the Andamans, but the beach sunsets standing out for me are still from Goa. Maybe, I wasn’t at a beach during sunset in the Andamans.
I also want to mention those “sunset points” in tourist places like from the forts in Rajasthan. They might not be serene like beach sunsets, but they are picture perfect beautiful.
Typing about this made me remember that Kutch Rann sunset, I mean, can you imagine a white desert all around you and a sun setting there? Linking my post here on my visit to the white desert of Kutch.
Found a mountain sunset while searching for images, I am not a fraud after all 🙂Found another gorgeous sunset among my images, the bridge next to my home in Berlin 🙂 oh man, why did I not think of this!
A special shoutout to another “sunset point” since its from a special trip. Rahul and I started our wedding prep with a mindset that we are not going to plan a honeymoon since a) we were too involved in our wedding prep so didn’t want to take up an additional planning activity (its quite common for people in India to leave wedding prep to their families), b) we had taken multiple trips together already, a whole lot of Europe covered together already :). However, as the wedding drew closer, we decided to plan a getaway to Seychelles and right before booking the tickets, our travel agent made us notice that Rahul’s passport was expiring. 🙂 Hence, we changed that plan to a small (really tiny actually) hill station in Gujarat, Saputara. It was a very regular chill place to be, nothing out of this world, but since it was technically our honeymoon, I think the “sunset point” we hiked to deserves a mention. 🙂
What are some of the gorgeous sunsets you have seen?
It has been a month of too much on my plate. Mainly because there were almost 3 trips that I took, thus, leaving no weekend for just being. I am sure all of you have seen those memes about ‘this is the fastest January ever’ and right now, I am feeling exactly that.
So, where did I travel to?
Before 2022 ended, Rahul and I took a quick trip to Rishikesh with two of our friends. It was quite impromptu as Rishikesh is only 6 hours drive away from where we all live and Rahul & I were anyway visiting my parents, who live even closer to Rishikesh. Our friends decided to pick us up on their way and it was a very smooth and chill trip. I’ll write about it in a blog post and link back here.
After that, my friend and I took a much awaited trip to Banaras, the ancient, holy city in India. I don’t remember properly but I am very likely to believe that she and I have been thinking about making this trip since 2016 and so glad that we finally made it. Again, a post is due.
Then, this weekend that just passed us by, Rahul and I went to Jim Corbett National Park with my parents. I would probably not dedicate an entire post to it as it has very limited things to do, so let me just get to it here. Basically, its a national park where you can be one with the nature – flora and fauna both. The place is famous for tigers and there are regular forest safaris arranged for tiger spotting. I have been here once more before with my engineering friends and there used to be only early morning safaris back then. This time, there were afternoon safaris as well, which is what we opted for to avoid the early morning cold. Literally no one I know has ever spotted a tiger in the Corbett Safaris and so was the case this time for us. 😀 There are very less tigers in the entire national park region anyway. We did, however, spot tiger paw marks. My trip highlight was the Kosi river that flows from this place. When I had been to Corbett the last time, I didn’t know about the river, neither was my resort situated near it. My husband researched and told me about the river and that there are resorts next to it. Hence, I spent time looking at the river from my room’s balcony and we also went to sit there. It was really peaceful and calming.
I am then taking cue from Lyssy’s post here to take stock of my month, she calls it “What’s Up Posts”, it was started by her blogger friend Shay 8 years ago it seems!! Let’s see if I manage to do it every month.
I am going to answer all the questions in the below card for the post then.
What We’re Eating?
I mentioned here how I am trying to eat healthy in my daily routine. The only thing is that this month didn’t have a lot of routine days, but that also means I loved so many things during my trips. Banaras trip was exceptionally good when it comes to food. I have written all about my Banaras food expeditions on my Instagram here, in case you would like to know.
What I’m Reminiscing about?
I am in general someone who reminisces a lot, so its difficult to keep a track of this. 😀
What I’m Loving?
Absolutely loving my rhythm and carving a routine for myself in all the chaos. I should also mention here even though I hadn’t considered it while writing out this post that I am thankful for the chaotic but fun travel opportunities.
What we’ve been up to?
Work, travel and finding moments for myself and even for me and my husband.
What I’m dreading?
I am going to meet a lot of a particular side of my extended family in the upcoming days, dreading is too strong a word, but I am cautious of it getting too overwhelming.
What I’m working on?
Snail’s pace but I am trying to work on this. Trying being the keyword, haha!
What I’m Excited about?
Even though I mentioned I am worried about getting overwhelmed about meeting the said side of my extended family, I am looking forward to enjoy in the wedding this is for. I love Indian weddings more than anything!
What I’m Watching/Reading?
I just completed my first read of the year – The Hindu Way by Shashi Tharoor. It was a roll over from 2022, now I am onto my second one – The Accidental Prime Minister by Sanjay Baru, I have never read a book on politics and, surprisingly I am quite enjoying it.
I am watching ‘The Crown’ every now and then, mostly with my meals. I am not able to binge watch it because a) I cannot play it as background music while working since it requires attention the first time, b) my husband does not enjoy it, and a couple of hours at night is the only time we have in common apart from breakfast so I don’t want to watch such a long series during that time.
I recently concluded ‘Emily in Paris’ and man do I love it! I never expected to enjoy it so much. I might do a post on it, you know.
I am also watching the Indian version of Shark Tank, not enjoying it as much as the Season 1.
I may have re-watched a lot of stuff, and I am also looking forward to watch SRK’s latest movie Pathaan after 4 years in a movie hall. Although I don’t have a lot of hope from the story, but just for the heck of watching SRK on big screen.
What I’m Listening to?
Oh, this is a good one for me. So, I may have mentioned that I am not into any specific music, mostly anything nostalgic Bollywood or any famous Punjabi songs float my boat. Every now and then I listen to random podcasts but I haven’t found one that I love and its very random and also very infrequent. However, very recently, I have kind of started building my podcast listening habit to avoid looking at my phone in mornings and right before bed. I am liking it not only to avoid screen time but also because I am leaning to informative stuff. I won’t share which ones I am listening to because I don’t have a strong opinion yet on this. 😀
What I’m Wearing?
I am sad that I didn’t use a lot of my winter stuff on my trips, but kind of repeated the same things. I just wanted to be super comfortable and not try at all. I am also sad that my two boots that I love have started to chip, because I definitely wanted to use them more. I’ll probably check with a shoemaker who sits outside my house if something can be done.
What I’m doing this weekend?
The coming weekend, i.e. Feb first week, would be the weekend I would want to chill completely. Let’s see how that goes, although knowing some upcoming things, I think it would be busy again.
What I’m looking forward to next month?
The said wedding fun.
Planning for more travels, especially a big one, fingers crossed.
Most importantly, improving some things about my work.
What else is new?
I had to think hard for this, so I am just sharing a silly thing that came up in my mind – I am soon going to try a fun takeout and planning to convert it to date night. Let’s see how that goes.
Still counting it as the right time to be posting this. I am scared to call these goals. Goals is a) very definitive, if I don’t achieve this, I feel there would be a scorecard at the end of 2023 and I don’t want to end up feeling bad, b) very tangible, while as you move along this post, the things that I am mentioning are not super tangible.
Here we go:
Less Phone Addiction: Its already 19th of January and I don’t think my progress is worth noting in this department. 😀
Health & Workout: Pretty consistent in this department. So, I would break it further into three areas:
Healthy Food: I think I improved a lot in eating salads along with my regular meals, ever since I asked my domestic worker for chopping vegetables. It has made hell of a difference instead of cooking everything from scratch. The only problem is that I am still not completely over my unhealthy snacking, however, I am on a good path.
Workout: I mentioned here that I have been quite consistent with my workouts, but not able to improve their durations. This area is still the same largely, but I am happy to continue my streak. This is going to be my year for consistency!
My Supplements: I have been prescribed some basic Vit D and B12 kind of tablets but I haven’t taken them since more than 4 months or so! Not even now in Jan, I am going to fix this right after writing this post.
Reading: I won’t say that I improved drastically in Jan, from my lull in the last 3 months of ’22, but I am off to a good start. Read more about my reading goals here.
Writing: Every year, I have this goal to dedicate more time to my blog and every year I fail. Let’s see how this goes.
Work: I mentioned here how 2022 was not the year of growth for me in multiple aspects, work being one of them. I also mentioned how that was intentional. I’ll tell you what I mean by that – I do my work sincerely and I like my line of work more or less but I am in a zone where I want to bring more balance to work and my life outside work. This is something difficult to achieve in the line that I am in, so I consciously try to do my work sincerely but not go overboard. As it happens in India (in consulting all over the world actually), work life balance and growth kind of stay at loggerheads. I do look forward to growth, but I am not sure how far I want to go to achieve that. Here’s to growing without losing oneself!
Save more: This should be hardly a goal for me, since I am not an impulsive spender and, by God’s grace, I make enough money to not worry about anything I want to spend on honestly. However, I have recently made a big investment with my husband, so we need to be conscious of saving. I think the main lifestyle impact due to this would be on our traveling, since we are not going to cut down on day to day expenses, we would need to plan travels consciously, while earlier, it was just deciding on the whim.
Personal Goal: This is something I am not comfortable sharing but I’ll work towards it with intent.
What does your 2023 vision board look like?
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