Hello!
Welcome to the last edition of the year!
Starting off with a question for y’all: Where did the year go?
I spent this year reclaiming my time from all the activities that I was supposed to do. I was supposed to be traveling, wearing the latest fashion, and making social media stories. I couldn’t care less about any of them anymore.
In the middle of all the holiday merrymaking, I hope you are taking some time to reflect on what a ride this entire year has been. I hope you fulfilled all the dreams that you set out to achieve. And while we are taking the time to understand how things have changed around us this year, I would like you to think if you have experienced any internal changes as well-have your personal goalposts shifted? Have you outgrown your lifestyle choices? Do you like a different artist / different genre of movies / different food preferences perhaps?
I encourage you to ponder over these changes if any.
Reading Corner
With the sun setting at 4 pm here in Boston, I have long hours in the evening when I catch up on reading. This month, I am resuming reading English, August by Upamanyu Chatterjee. This book is a slow read: there are no plots to uncover, no drama to unfold. However, page after page, we find ourselves imaging the life of an IAS officer who has been posted in a dusty, grimy district of Madna. The writing is vivid in describing the places, an accurate description of small-town mannerisms, of experiences. The protagonist is an urban, rich guy in his twenties who finds the district life amusingly mundane. It is his tribulations that we undertake together: of him, wanting to give up, of him going on some soul searching in this seemingly bleak place. I am yet to completely finish the book and it might be too soon to say if there is a conclusion.
Some of my favorite parts of the book are :
He realized obscurely that the sense of loneliness was too precious to be shared, and finally incommunicable, that men were, ultimately, islands; each had his own universe, immense only to himself, far beyond the grasp of others.
After a certain age, I don’t think anyone can make new friends. If you’re in a job like mine you just stay away from old friends for long, they live a life you think you want to live, and when you next meet, everything is the same only on the surface, because you don’t talk about the things that really matter. Communication is impossible and pointless because you have to part again.
I’ve been trying to write as few letters as possible because writing letters is the supreme indulgence for me nowadays. Communicating with people is difficult here and it’s such a temptation to make up for that through letters. Writing letters is a wonderful way of coping out—the lectures that go badly, all the people in this place whom I can’t talk to.
It’s hard getting to know people. Everyone seems friendly at first, everyone stops and asks, “Hi, how ya doin’?” But after a while you realize that that’s it, nothing ever follows up with that “Hi, how ya doin’?” And to answer that with anything less exuberant than, “Pretty good,” is a social outrage.
At times I hysterically wonder why people even leave their own countries and go abroad. Why don’t we ever learn that all changes of place are for the worse. It’s not love for a place, it’s the familiarity, like old winter clothes. What I really didn’t bargain for was the nostalgia—I have such a bad memory that the past usually becomes mere past for me with great ease. But here I take nostalgia to absurd extremes—watching Hindi movies, Guddi, Barood, etc.,
Have a recommendation that is similar to this one? Write to me!
Writing Corner
December
December gives me an excuse to brew and drink copious amounts of chai. On most days, it is a straight-up Tapri version, runny, watery, and acidic with the slightest hint of milk. But come December, I bring out all the masalas to make a more interesting version. I have a box of dry spices handy for my chai- half a stick of cinnamon, a few pods of cardamom, dry ginger, 2 pods of pepper, all roasted slightly and pounded gently in a mortar and pestle. After allowing the tea to boil with a generous amount of milk, I add this homemade masala mix as a final garnish before taking it off from the stove. I have my chai in my chair with the window slightly ajar. The tips of my fingers feel cold with the winter breeze, a hint of the sub-zero temperature outside, which only makes the chai feel a lot warmer and delightful.
On most evenings, I take a walk around the block: an exercise to befriend the frigid weather instead of being wary of it. The sidewalk is calmer, and I enjoy the last couple of minutes of sunlight before it goes down at 4 pm. I pass through brownstone apartments, retail shops, through Boba Tea outlets, and a Shawarma King restaurant that does not see patrons on most days. Its neighbor, Six Hot Pot, however, has a different story to tell: I find a whole lot of activity occurring here- with people coming in and out, with servers bringing in a hot pot of broth to tables and everyone on the table sharing. People are happy indulging in the food, in the conversations around them: it looks inviting, almost asking me to bring my tribe too. I imagine sitting with my friends here, enjoying a good meal, learning about Hot Pot, laughing.
On my way back, the night is upon us although it has only been a couple of minutes since I stepped out. The lights at most apartments are out, and I gaze at the brownstone apartments- large windows that try to compensate for the lack of patio-balcony setting. It allows me to peep into their living rooms, with workstations emitting blue light, an odd cat sitting along with the window, looking back at me, a larger-than-life Beatles poster, houseplants, Christmas trees.
An excuse to doll up in this season, there are Christmas trees with string lights, with a star on top, and are sometimes placed right by the window which gives them a nice view of the street outside.
There is no escaping the holiday season and American capitalism is in full swing during this time of the year. I would often think the Holidays in America to be excessive- holiday flavored drinks, all the gift-giving, an odd wreath hanging on the signposts, red ribbons on the doors of homes, and the over-the-top display of cheer. This year, I decided to give in a little bit- I have a faux Christmas tree for tabletop, and for the first time have brought the holidays into my own home.
Learning Corner
Some interesting things I came across on the internet
Lounge Corner
See you in the next edition,
Happy Holidays!
Pratiksha