Leavenworth: Is this Winter Wonderland worth the hype?

 Alright Alright Alright!!!

It's been a while since I returned back to my blog. Although it doesn't mean that I wasn't writing. I have poured my thoughts into pages upon pages of a ten-year old diary, with an extremely fluid fountain pen. The joy of a pen running smoothly over high GSM paper is something else. A computational fluid dynamics engineer would say that the flow of the ink from the cartridge to the paper was laminar. That's the kind of obsession that has kept me away from typing my thoughts in.

So what brought me here today? A memory from a time that had genuinely scared me. 

In my life, I have been through some really tense situations without getting flustered. Those tales are long and each one deserves a blog. This one happened in a remote Bavarian village in the state of Washington, US. The place is Leavenworth, a Christmas holiday destination, known as an idyllic town, nestled among snow-capped mountains. A beautiful winter wonderland. 

My wife and I had been checking out this Bavaria-themed village since quite some time. On Youtube, we would watch the live feed of a street view camera which overlooked a town square, decorated with trees draped in LED lights. The village resembled a Bavarian village surrounded by snow covered peaks. I wondered how such a place came into existence in such a remote corner. Luckily, we got a chance to explore this village on our own. In our recent visit to Seattle, we were meeting our cousins in Bellevue, Washington. We finally had an opportunity to visit this village.

We left for Leavenworth from Bellevue in the morning. It was a grey morning, with a drizzle, every now and then. As the weather report read, the mountain didn't come out that day, which is a colloquial way of describing the weather in Seattle. If Mount Rainier is visible, then you may expect a bright day ahead. It looks like this picture below, from my cousin's apartment, which is a pretty sick view to have.

So yeah, we didn't get the mountain's blessing the day we left for Leavenworth. Nevertheless, we moved on with our plan. My wife and I had a bus from Bellevue to Seattle, from which a bus would take us to Leavenworth. Before getting on with the journey, we helped ourselves to a nice coffee, a soft blueberry muffin, and a cupcake from a local confectionery. A quick bus ride from Bellevue to Seattle, and we reached our boarding point. The Seahawks were playing the Patriots, in the Superbowl, in a few days time, so Seattle was pretty decked up for the game. I had just returned from Boston a few days ago, so my allegiance lay with the Patriots. In all honesty, I have never watched nor do I follow American Football. 

The bus was delayed, so we passed our time going through pamphlets of other cities and townst o visit in Washington. Apart from Leavenworth, we loved Portland, Oregon's vibe. Although American marketing is on another level, so be careful of what you are getting sold on. The bus stop was having a really dull morning that day, but neither the weather, nor the ambience could dampen our spirits. There was a lady struggling to get the right tickets for her travel. We were busy planning the day at Leavenworth, while also trying to keep an eye out for our boarding call.  As soon as the bus came, we took our place by the windows. A quick attendance, and we were on our way. The bus took an hour to get out of Seattle. We were glued to the window screen, alert, not to miss anything extraordinary. Though the architecture in US rarely stands out. Despite us peering out to catch anything exciting, we could only appreciate the uniformity and standardization of American establishments. Having travelled to some of the corners of the US, we weren't surprised. It was a good time to catch some sleep.

As soon as we got out of the city, we were hit with the views we were waiting to catch. Washington and its beautiful natural beauty popped up. Leavenworth is nestled in the Cascades mountain range. So we came prepared to gaze at the beauty of its snow-covered peaks. The drizzle gave way to snow as the bus rumbled through the interstate. The snowflakes occasionally landed on our screens before melting into a drop. One turn after another, we snaked around hills and valleys for the next couple of hours. Finally, we climbed down a little valley where our destination lay. The last leg of the journey was us mostly thinking about food. We had finished our cakes and were getting sharp hunger pangs.

The bus reached a deserted parking lot. We got down, looked around. There was no snow anywhere. Where was the winter wonderland we came searching for? Surely, we will find some spots as we move into the village, we told ourselves. I swung my backpack and we started walking towards a huge concrete building. It must be a place to get some refreshments for the rest of the trip, we thought. As soon as we walked in, we were back in the US. The thing about American standardization is that you will find the same convenience inside a store, no matter which corner of the country you are in. We quickly grabbed a couple of bites and got out to explore the village. The village is entirely walkable, which is what we love to do when on a trip. With a physical map in hand, I lead the way into the town. About half a km later, we finally start noticing the cute village springing into life. There is some music playing from the other end of the road. The beautiful buildings built for tourists to experience a Bavarian villager's life are decorated with Christmas lights. The trees are draped in LED lights in various colours. The snow has been neatly shovelled off walk-ways and I could see very few tourists around. Suddenly, we realize that we are standing at the same spot in front of the camera, which gets streamed live on Youtube twenty-four by seven. So many people around the world would be watching us now. We looked into the public camera and wave at it. It goes without saying that no experience can be adequately captured in a camera every. This is what an AI will never get. The ability to be truly present in the moment, soaking everything in. The cascades with with snow covered peaks are looking down upon you, as though they are watching us in a little show of their own making. We wasted no time and got to explore the town.

There was the nutcracker museum, various bakeries, many cute souvenir shops, many pubs, cafes and eateries, and what not. We couldn't hold out on food any longer, so we went to have lunch in a beautiful restaurant on the main road, called Gustav's bar. Inside, the restaurant was done in thick oakwood, almost entirely.

I helped myself to a nice draught beer, because I was in faux Bavaria. We loaded up on a delicious burger, a sandwich and fries. After a sumtuous meal, we spent the afternoon exploring the village, completing our checklist of things to do, or food to eat. It was a lovely afternoon. Whenever we got tired, we found an empty bench to soak in everything the place had to offer. Leavenworth is notorious for being overcrowded with tourists, especially in the winter. Thankfully, our timing was impeccable. It was as if the entire village had put up a show only for us.                                                                                            

The display outside the nutcracker museum.

 I tried to take better pictures. Unfortunately, my skills as a photographer are limited. Rather, I felt guilty whenever I took my hands out for a picture. The place is so beautiful that you wouldn't want to waste even a second trying to capture it. Some things are meant to be experienced in-person. We were loving every moment. It was cold, yet cosy. We were strolling, hand in hand, feasting our eyes on anything that looked cute, and more importantly, overwhelmed with gratitude for this experience. It was like our honeymoon all over again. A couple of hours of enjoying a hot beverage, crepes, local snacks and some souvenir shopping, we heard a loud bell followed by some chimes. The music, which we had heard when we got to town at the start of the day, was playing out nearby. It was that of an Accordian (a wind instrument with keys), but instead of an actual player, it was an extremely elaborate cuckoo clock, with figurines dancing to the music. Some of the tourists gathered around this clock along with us. An extremely ornate clockwork performance featuring reindeers, dancers, dwarves, and several other miniatures lasted about 5 minutes. Before we could get enough of it, these little mechanical miniatures returned back to the cuckoo clock. 

Where is the scary part in all of this? 

The cuckoo clock reminded us that we should be preparing to leave. The lights had come on, and our ride back to Bellevue was from a location few kms away from where we were. We still had time though. We said our goodbyes to each of the little shops we went into. Once we made peace with saying goodbye, I opened Uber, tapped for a preferred cab, and waited. In the meantime we recounted our experience to each other. A few mins elapsed, but we didn't get any confirmations. I changed my preferences and tapped the book button. The mountains were getting cloaked by the clouds. A slight drizzle had started. I checked my phone again. No confirmation yet. I made my preference even more generic. This time, I stayed on the app screen. The loading bar was slowly progressing across the screen. In another min, it had completed the scan yet no Uber drivers seemed nearby. I start to worry.

About 30 mins have gone past, but not a single ride has been confirmed. Both of us are on multiple apps. My calm demeanor had turned into a frantic wait. I was starting to get worried, although, I tried hard not to show it on my face. My wife was still assured. But as more time elapsed, I was beginning to panic. Unlike any of my previous experience I didn't have a guaranteed plan B. We had to return to Bellevue that night, because our flight out of Seattle was the next morning. From Seattle, we had a flight back to San Jose, following which, we had a flight out of San Francisco to Bangalore via Heathrow. We were literally going to travel half-way around the world and each leg was planned back-to-back. I should have accounted for any unforeseen circumstance, I told myself. But right then, I couldn't miss my ride back to Bellevue, surely. 

While I was panicking, my wife remained cool as a cucumber. Somehow she was quite composed, to the extent that she was unbothered. I invoked my cousins' help to see if they could book a ride on our behalf, but even they couldn't. Almost an hour had passed. We barely had 30 mins left to reach the pickup spot. I calmed myself down and started a google search for any local cab providers in Leavenworth. Three or four options later, I finally connected with a person, a real human and not an automated voice. In no time, I explained the urgency of my request. He patiently heard me through and promised that he will be there to pick us up in 10 mins, in his pick-up truck. With almost no time left, we had no option but to pray dearly that this guy, in the middle of a small village, would show up in his pick-up truck and drop us. Every second passed slowly. Can we make it?

The lights had turned on everywhere now. We had our credit cards, so finding a decent place to stay was not an issue. But to make it in time for all subsequent travel, felt like threading a needle from a yard away. About twelve minutes had already passed. No sign of the cab driver yet. I called him for the seventh time. Click. 

"Hello, Partha. Where are you?"

"We are right next to the crosswalk, under the traffic lights. Look towards the Leavenworth town sign"

"Got you. Wait right there"

He turned his car right around, and in doing so, must have broken at least a couple of traffic laws. As soon as he pulled up, we jumped to the back seat and asked him to race away. I started to call the shuttle service to check their ETA. The customer service agent had answered but he couldn't be sure of the ETA of the shuttle that was meant to pick us up. We completed the payment before we even got down. Another ten minutes later, we were at our pick up spot but we were five minutes past our designated pick-up time. Did we miss the shuttle? The pick-up truck cab driver wished us luck and sped away.

When we looked around we were in the middle of nowhere. Not a single soul around. It was an empty parking lot with a couple of parked vans. The parking lot was next to a highway crossing. It was already dark now. Apart from a few lamp posts in the parking lot, we could only see a church at some distance. It was a beige building built like a Georgian cathedral, with conical mounts over cylindrical structures, giving medieval vibes. Yet, there was no sign of any shuttles or vehicles coming our way. In the US, people are on schedule, to the minute. What if we had missed our ride? At least Leavenworth had some decent options to stay. This no man's land has nothing around. Even the church looked quite spooky, to say the least. We were better off in Leavenworth in that case. I made sure I saved the pick-up truck cab driver's number, in case we had to call him back.

The night had truly settled in. I was glad to have my wife's company but at the same time I felt responsible for our safety. It was almost 20 minutes past our pick-up time. The operator of the shuttle service had not yet confirmed the exact location of the shuttle when we called her. We waited under a lamp post. From afar, a car pulled up into the parking lot. It surely wasn't a shuttle service. When it rolled in, a window rolled down and I could see a muzzle. It was a guy with his pet dog. I trust people with pets. After a moment of hesitation, I went up to their car.

"Hello. We are waiting for a shuttle back to Bellevue. You wouldn't be the service provider by any chance, right?"

"Hi, you are right. I am here to walk my dog. Are you guys waiting for a shuttle service"

"Yes, we are. I am not sure we are waiting at the right place though."

I read out the location to him, which he confirmed was correct.

"I guessed we missed our ride back home"

"Ohh that's bad. Where do you have to go back?"

"Bellevue"

"Okay. That's quite far from here. I hope the shuttle shows up still. Otherwise, you should probably head back to Leavenworth"

My heart sank. I picked up my phone to call the cab driver back. But instead, my phone rang.

"Hello, Partha?"

"Yes, yes, please tell me."

"I am so sorry to keep you waiting. But I have good news. The shuttle got delayed on the way. I spoke to the driver. He should be pulling in to pick you up any moment now"

"Oh thank you, thank you, thank you so much. I couldn't tell you how relieved I am." It felt like I was Sandra Bullock from Gravity, where she finally tunes in to an amateur radio station from the decommissioned Tiangong Space Shuttle. In the movie the amateur radio operator had a dog too.

"I am glad." the customer service person's voice cracked. "It is quite unusual that our services get delayed by even a couple of mins. Looks like you are in luck."

My face showed, that an immense weight had been lifted off me. I looked at the curch far away, and thanked God for keeping us on track with our schedule. In a few minutes, a headlight turned towards us. I had never been so happy to see someone come for us. The shuttle rolled in in style. The shuttle driver apologized for the wait, confirmed our names, and opened the huge sliding door. First, my wife got in, followed by me. We found individual seats one behind the other. All the other seats were taken already. The door closed, and we rolled out of the parking lot, almost immediately.

Even though I was relieved, I was not entirely at ease. The shuttle was warmer inside and it was pitch dark. Immediately after we left the parking lot, the snow came. Through the tinted screen we could see that the cascades had kicked up quite a storm. The trees were pitch black, with only the snow reflecting off the moon light. The cars racing down the interstate showed a glimpse of how bad the weather was. I was all alert. In a shuttle with five other strangers, for a journey that would take at least 3 hours, I was in no mood to let my guard down. My wife took a small nap, and I cajoled her into it. The shuttle raced through the darkness. I kept on checking the maps to track the progress. On the window, I could only see the snow swirling swiftly with the wind whenever a car crossed us from the opposite side. I didn't even blink once. After an hour and a half later the speed of the shuttle reduced. I could see a semblance of a town from the window, before it finally pulled up into the parking of a refuelling station. My wife's got up when the huge doors slid open.

"Alright folks, we have stopped for a break for 10 mins, not a minute more. Do not be late. There will be no waiting."

We got out, stretched our legs, and walked into the convenience store. Both of us were hungry now. After a quick bathroom break and a quick snack run at the store, we made it back to the shuttle. The last leg was not terrifying anymore.

A couple of hours later, we were in Bellevue. We made it. My cousin brother was at the bus stop to pick us up. The Leavenworth trip was finally over. Was it worth the drama? I guess so. My wife says that a little bit of drama does make a trip all the more memorable. I couldn't agree with her more. 

                 

Why is Sonam Wangchuk fasting?

Between my day job and nightly pursuit of my passions, who am I? I asked this question to myself insincerely, with no real intention of chasing an answer. I am a guy who has more or less made peace with life. Life's definition for me is to be alive, to experience and etch moments in time. It could be as crazy as a trip or an experience, or as simple as catching the sunset, or having a laugh with someone you love. Life doesn't have to be difficult if you know what you need to keep you happy.

Ask any materialists, my answer will be beyond their comprehension. Who can blame them, or rather anyone. As the saying goes 'whatever floats your boat'. Pursue whatever you choose to, but do it with the right intent. You may ask me, what if you have a passion to do harm, or to exploit others, where do you draw the line. It's quite simple. Your pursuit should not come at the cost of causing harm to others, or impeding their rights. You may counter, "What if I am preparing for an entrance exam, I am bound to fight for my seat, taking over someone else's seat. Won't that mean I cause someone hurt, or harm?" My answer to that is that it won't. The system gave everyone a fair chance, a platform to prove yourself. You did what is right by you. So the harm isn't perpetuated by you towards any individual. It isn't intentional. It's rather the difference in your circumstances. To bring people from different circumstances to a level playing field, a system of reservation was created. It's the job of government, the system, to uphold the spirit of fairness, and for its people to hold it (government) accountable for its failure to do so. The judiciary exists to impose these checks and balances. Has the government or the judiciary done its job well? You should have an opinion, but more on this in the future. 

Rights. Impeding the rights of others. What do we mean by rights?

You may go back to your Civics subject from your childhood curriculum. One of the most boring subjects. One which entailed questions like rights, constitution, definition of freedom etc. What seemed like the very definition of boredom, somehow, has the most important texts and passages of our life. It is by these words that we live our daily life. This system, laid down by the people, for the people, and to be upheld by the representatives of people, gives everyone the platform to thrive in life. The pursuit of happiness begins only on the firm foundations of our constitutional rights and freedom of life. If you don't have this fair system, the only rule of law would be of money, power, and survival.

Thrive vs Survive. Which one to choose?

Survival of the fittest is a rational given by materialists, who justify their endless pursuit of money, power, materials, as their one and true right. It made sense in a world where usable resources were scarce. Back in the day, when humans were hunters and gatherers, our instincts were the difference between survival and death. However, ten thousand years ago, we discovered agriculture. With agriculture, our temporal horizon increased from surviving the day, to surviving the year, to surviving the lifetime, and now to leave a legacy. This expansion of our time horizon led us to build all these systems. From tribes, to clans, to villages, to cities, to civilizations, the need for an order and merit-based system was always the ultimate goal. Sure, human beings fell along the way, made terrible mistakes, yet they still wanted to build a society that would move on from surviving to thriving.

What's the key difference between surviving and thriving, you may ask.

You survive when you live in a world of scarcity. You thrive when you are living in a world of abundance. The difference is knowing what you really want from your life. If you know you want to make music, you would derive all the joy from life making your kind of music. If you know you love designing games, you will want to spend all your time in creating something that you love truly. Nothing else will matter, or should matter. You can feed your passion with time and practice, everything else is background noise. With the improvement in medicine, with the development of technology, with the progress towards superintelligence, we hope to build a world of abundance. 

So why are we failing spectacularly to recognize something so simple?

Because we don't spend the time needed to ask who we are. Which is what brings me to the first question I asked of myself. Who am I between my day job and nightly pursuit of my passions. Just a normal human being, I guess.

So why is Sonam Wangchuk fasting?

Because the system built to protect the people has failed. Because the representatives chosen to uphold the spirit of fairness have made the system unfair.

Remembering Cleve Moler... the man behind MATLAB

It was past bedtime. My wife and I had barely finished our conversation when the rain finally came. It wasn't the first shower of the summer. More like the fifth shower, over the last two really hot months, in Bangalore. But for the first time this summer, the rain had finally turned benevolent. Not raging or tumultuous, not sparse or farcical, but just the right amount of rain, the city needed. We both sat up, drew the curtains open, and paused to look outside. The haze from the rain made a halo around the streetlights of our apartment, around the tower demarcation lights, and over the oddly hoisted, glowing from within the dial, clock, above the swimming pool. The mist from the rain was sprayed into our bedroom by the wind. The city, and certainly, all the people in it, would have thanked God for this blessing from the skies.

In a state of mindless polling, I opened my Outlook, anticipating an e-mail from a customer. Instead, I found an email from our CEO, Jack Little, with nothing but Cleve Moler's name in the subject line. The moment I saw the subject, I feared the worst news. I took a deep breath and opened it. To my dismay, it was an announcement of Cleve's passing away. May his soul rest in peace.

It's been eight years since I joined MathWorks, the company behind MATLAB. For those people who haven't had anything to do with STEM, this software would have still touched your life in ways you can't imagine. If you have ever driven a car, or taken a cab, if you have ever taken a flight, or used a PC or a smartphone, if you have used a home appliance, or undergone a medical scan, if you have ever traded in the financial market, or been among the very few who have travelled into space, you would have used a tool that was designed using MATLAB. 

Cleve Moler built the first version of this software.

And since the last 42+ years, the world has benefitted from his work in innumerable ways.

I am writing this small post for Cleve, as a tribute to this lovely, brilliant, kind and simple gentleman. I am not claiming to have known him in person. There would be thousands of people who would know Cleve much better than I do. My memory of him is from a very simple incident, but not very long ago.

We were at our Annual Sales Kick-Off event a couple of years ago. It was the first day of the event. As is standard, Jack was delivering the Quarterly update of MathWorks' performance. I had taken a front row seat. No, I wasn't getting an award, nor was I gonna be up on the stage to deliver a talk. It just happened that the front row seats were vacant. Besides, the event organizers are always happy if the front row seats are occupied. Somewhere in between Jack's talk, I noticed that Cleve had also settled in, right behind me. Since I was seated at the very end of one of the columns in the middle, Cleve, in his motorized wheelchair, was seated in the alleyway right behind me. I looked back and smiled at him. I felt nothing but immense gratitude for the man who built MATLAB. Thanks to him, we were all there. Right when Jack's talk got over, the audience got up to leave the hall for a break. I too was about to get up, when I felt a very light nudge on my chair. I turned around and saw it was Cleve's wheelchair. He had realized that his electric wheelchair had slightly gotten out of his control. He feared that he would have knocked me hard. It was barely anything at all. Despite assuring him right away that it was nothing, he got profusely apologetic. He looked at me, and he kept saying sorry. In my gratitude and admiration for him, I kept telling him that it was all right. He didn't have to apologize and  I barely felt a thing. Yet, Cleve seemed inconsolable. He seemed to have lost some confidence in operating his wheelchair because of that miscontrol. His hands trembled when he tried to steer his wheelchair away. That very moment, Cleve's caregiver took control and lovingly yet carefully steered Cleve away. Even on his way out of the hall, Cleve had that innocent, apologetic look, as if something grave and untoward had happened. I hope my assurances eventually had an effect.

I will always remember that short encounter with Cleve. He had a brilliant mind, without a doubt, but he was a simple, kind and sensitive person. I cannot imagine doing anything to even one-tenth of what he did, or having an impact like he had with his work. But I hope I will always remember to be kind and sensitive to others around me, like how Cleve was with me the other day. Today, Cleve is no more with us in person, but he will be remembered through all of us at the MathWorks, and indirectly, by more than hundred-thousand customers and by more than five million users of MATLAB who have accelerated the pace of Engineering and Science, over the last 42 years. 

As Jack put it in his email, Cleve has been a force of great goodness in the world, and we will miss him.

What's up!!!

This is not going to be blogpost reminiscing all that you missed, but rather a mere contemplation of how life in general has evolved from over seven years ago. By now, I have survived, a second re-election of the ruling party, a pandemic that cornered everyone to their homes, literally, a few foreign trips, an advancement in AI that is rendering people jobless, a third-but-cautious re-election of the ruling party, and finally, after much struggles and challenges, a lovely person to come home to. Life has been good to me in the last seven years, which my fellow readers (if any) have missed.

As I sit before my laptop, trying to wade and comb through any significant thoughts, I must also tell you that in the last 8 years, Liverpool FC have won the Champions League once and the Premier League twice. It is incredible to be a Liverpool fan at this point of time. As I write this blog, my thoughts are also drawn to the beautiful parade that LFC players undertook, and the terrible incident caused by a driver who rammed into 60+ supporters in his car. It was horrific that the parade, which was meant for a celebration ending in a horrible way.

I have a beautiful home now. From my balcony I can see deep into the Bangalore skyline. Here's a picture of it.

Those little lights near the horizon is the Bengaluru skyline, which has remained my home for over 13 years now. <May the fourth 2026> Resuming this blog post after a year, I have to add that Liverpool FC have lost a beloved player in Diogo Jota, to a brutal road accident, and the last year has been a tough year for us. Yeah, Mo Salah leaving Liverpool is truly the end of an Era at Liverpool, an era, every Liverpool fan is so proud of>

Such a long time in a single city, that I have not contemplated moving to any other. After all., all the major tech advancements in India happen in this hub. That and of course, the Bengaluru weather to thank God for this comfortable life. Funnily enough, I came across an Instagram post with a picture of Warren Buffet, and a quote, that surely didn't come from him, about how you should be grateful in life despite any uncertainties that tumble your way. I came across something similar from a character called Stratt in the book, Project Hail Mary, who before seeing off her favorite person, Dr. Ryland Grace, had cited the brutal nature of humanity and its struggle for food. 

What else is up?

I have been reading a lot of books. It's really me going back to the phase of my life where I am rekindled my love for good literature. After the phase in the early to mid 2010s, and of course while I was in school. Just over the last couple of weeks, I have finished reading two books; Project Hail Mary, and Days at the Morisaki Bookshop.

Days at the Morisaki Bookshop, is the story of a young girl in Japan, Takako, who started experiencing her adult life. The book starts with a scene of Takako, getting dumped by her boyfriend who she knew from work. Unable to move on she quits her job and just refuses to step out into the world. Concerned by her reluctance to move on from reclusion, her mom makes her decide between one of the two options: arranged marriage or moving on to help her Uncle Satoru's at their used bookstore. Her uncle, is delighted to have 'Takako' help him with managing their used book store focused on modern writers of Japan. While Takako, realizes that without a job, it will be difficult to continue at her current arrangement, she decides, albeit reluctantly, that she will accept her uncle's offer, in exchange for boarding and salary. Not many things change at first, but the human mind is also funny. Even if it has seen some serious trauma, it does get bored of. Boredom gets Takako up on her feet. Slowly and steadily, she develops a taste for literature, steps out to explore a new suburb, and makes new friends. The book reads as Takako's own narration of this period of her life.

If you want to know about Project Hail Mary, there is a nice movie that came out, which people have enjoyed at the Imax theatre. I haven't watched the movie because I wanted to read the book. I'll leave that story for you to discover.

Among the other books I finished, there was a re-read of 1984 by George Orwell, and a book titled Dove, based upon the life of a teenage sailor, who takes his boat, called Dove, around the world over a period of five years. He starts off from California, heading on to Hawaii, to New Zealand, Australia, Madagascar, South Africa, the Caribbean islands, and finally back to California. 

Is that all?

Nope. I have now journaled my thoughts continuously for more than a year and half now. The intention is to have a log of my undiluted thoughts, available to me and family, as a memoir. Why did I prefer a journal over a blog? It's my love for calligraphy with a fountain pen and a plain old blank pages of a diary, where my thoughts could descend without any justification or judgement.

As Miranda Priestly put it,"That's all". For now, at least.