Seeing your loved ones struggle + thoughts on evolution

Even if you have gone through the similar or even far more struggles in life, it is hard to see a loved ones struggle with something. My brother is in his post-graduation-job-hunting state, and is going through the typical frustration and depression that comes with it. I feel bad seeing him go through it, and I feel helpless. I know it will pass soon. I have been through that state twice or thrice in my life so far and know what it takes. I also know that it is these struggles that makes one a man.

And it is not like he is a kid... he is old enough to be able to deal with such struggles himself - so I am not too worried, even though I feel bad for him. But I cant imagine how stressful it must be for parents to deal with the struggles their kids go through!

This makes me think - doesnt life get progressively harder as we grow up (you just need to compare your school life to your current life to realize this)? Why is that? It is not the case for other animals. It wasnt even the case for stone age men. We just evolved to make lives harder for all of us - what are we progressing towards by making life only harder? Are we really evolving towards destruction as opposed to betterment or stability? Or is it that all this hardship is part of a process of evolving into a being greater than the human, who once evolved will live in peace?

(No, I am not depressed or worried, I am just thinking logically :) )

Recommendations from recent experiences

• Book: The Great American Bathroom Book (2 page summaries of all time famous books... best way to know which book to buy to read the full version)
• Movie: Inception (2010) (a brilliant concept, a complex but gripping storyline with numerous undercurrents, giving way to lots of interpretations)
• Place: Mendocino, CA (a wonderful showcase to the breathtaking pacific coast)
• Food: Sayur Lodeh (an Indonesian dish that is a lot like avial); tofu skin salad (looks something like this; is cold and kind of bland, but I love it!)
• TV show: Good Eats (loads of trivia about food - one ingredient per show)
• Online shopping: thisnext.com (has some really fun and cool designs; great for home decor and for gift shopping if you are looking to buy something that is really unique)

Keeping track of achievements

There was this project that I worked on, for which I worked a lot and the results turned out pretty good too. But I only worked the regular hours - did not burn the midnight lamp or go without lunches on days etc. Because it was relatively smooth that way, I did not feel like it was a big achievement or anything.

Soon after, I was asked to write a case study based on the project. Only when I got down to writing it - detailing the journey, listing out the achievements etc - did I realize that the accomplishment was pretty huge.

Lesson learnt - It really really makes a huge difference to take the time to write down your achievements to both reward yourself with a sense of accomplishment for what you did and to give you the confidence to talk in pride about all you've done.
And most importantly, you have something to look at and make you feel better when things arent going that great.

Other people's lives

- I just came to realize that this happens to almost everyone, not just me: There comes a time in life when you walk away from all the pointless drama and people who create it.

- You see so many people around you - colleagues, friends, friends of friends. You hear their stories from them, you read stuff about them on their blogs and facebook profiles. You monitor their activity on twitter. You analyze their careerpath on linkedin. And then you think you know what there is to know. The thing is - you dont. What you hear and see is only the mundane stuff. What is never told is the real story. Everyone's lives are more complicated than you think they are.

5 years of professional experience

I just realized - 3 months ago, I reached the "5 years of professional experience" mark. Not that it means much... it only means I have grown 5 years older from when I started out on my first job. But still, I remember when I first started looking for jobs and noticed the "5 years experience" requirement in many job profiles and sighed. Just gives me a cheap thrill that now I have that "qualification"!

Conversational English

I don't want to sound "peter-ish", but I do speak English far better than I speak Tamil, my native tongue. My vocabulary is very good and so is my diction.

But when I converse with native Americans, it makes me realize what not being a native English speaker means. They play with words in a manner that doesnt come naturally to me.

Here is an example. This is an email from some guy in my company to a graphic design intern: "I'm attaching the presentation I showed you. I’d love for you to take a stab at reformatting it, and cleaning up the graphics so it tells the story. I’d encourage others on the team to similarly send you any internal presentations that might need similar graphic love."

That 'graphic love' part....I would have never thought of putting it that way, but it is such a nice way to put it, albeit simple! And this was just one instance... I hear such bursts of word-plays very often from native speakers.

Point of all this being that it makes me feel there is no language that I can speak "really-really" well :).

Yet another start

I was pretty apprehensive about the whole move thing initially - just the regular inertia towards change. But once I actually moved, life has been busy enough to keep me from worrying. Like, I dont have the time to miss my Seattle friends, or reminisce about my life back there etc.

Things have been pretty smooth otherwise (oh apart from my handbag getting stolen in between!). Likey my new job. Moved to a new pretty 2-bedroom apartment. Don't have a new set of regular-hang-out friends as yet, and haven't started doing all the extra-curricular stuff I have been wanting to do. But I guess I'll get there...

Pacific Coastal Road trip - WA to CA

We drove all the way from Seattle to the bay area in my car this past weekend.... a 2.5 day long journey. Except for actually deciding we would do the trip that weekend, we didn't plan anything else about the trip. We didn't pre-decide any of our stops, we didn't pre-book any hotels we would be staying at during the night. And that made it really really fun. We drove for as long as we could each day; we stopped where ever we felt like stopping; at night when we were exhausted from the driving we just randomly found a hotel nearby to stay in. Being unplanned led us to accidental fun discoveries... nothing stupendous or breathtaking, but still fun all the same, just because it is unexpected.

Check out my flickr for a picture story of our road trip (click on the trip set so that you can browse the pictures in sequence of the story) :). And do have yourself logged-in into flickr... some pictures are only visible to friends and family.

Packing is tiring...

.. even if it is only stuff contained in a single bedroom apartment. Especially tiring when you planned to allocate only 3.5 days for it. Not just is it tiring physically, it is also a very analytical process. You need to run through all the inventory in your head to figure out what to pack along with what to maximize efficiency, firmness of packing, storage space and cost. Also, packing is not just packing - it is also numerous trips to (1) dispose off the trash, (2) sell unwanted stuff, (3) give away unwanted stuff to charity, (4) maybe buy more packing material and (5) get food to eat since you need to pack away the kitchen stuff and clean up the fridge.

I am making up for all the bending-and-stretching I did not do over the past year or more, in 4 days.

The pluses - Having a chance to dispose away all the unwanted stuff is a good feeling. Having an opportunity to donate your old clothes, handbags, shoes, household items to a shelter for battered women is a great-great feeling.

The hub of exciting epicurean experiences

SFO, it is! Some interesting eateries I found:-

1. A restaurant where you eat seated in pitch dark, served by blind men!: http://sf.darkdining.com/
2. Restaurant with cross-dressed waiters/waitresses: http://www.asiasf.com/index.php
3. Restaurant with foreign films shown during dinner: http://www.foreigncinema.com/home.html
4. Underground restaurant with a ghetto like feel: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/01/22/MNGOOGRA241.DTL
5. A cafe where the menu item names are like "I am beautiful", "I am committed" etc: http://www.cafegratitude.com/cafemenufeb08
6. Organic Indian bakery: http://spicevice.com/products/product-list.html