All posts tagged: random

My First Chinese Wedding

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A wedding is a must-attend to graduate in the understanding of a culture. A batch-mate at work took the plunge last night, giving me my first sneak peak into a Chinese-Singaporean wedding. Gate crashing The title’s a misnomer. It’s a Singaporean tradition in which the groom must earn the right to his bride. The groom, accompanied by his brothers (the western equivalent of the best man), shows up early in the morning at the bride’s house. They are greeted by the bridesmaids and tasked to pass tests on life’s essential skills (culinary, physical, endurance etc). Before the tasks started, all the brothers were made to sign indemnity forms! In this particular wedding, the tasks were considered rather mild, and included doing push-ups, decorating a cake, dancing & eating dumplings of 4 kinds – sweet, sour, spicy (stuffed with chilli) & bitter (boiled with panadol!) After completing all the tasks, the groom is given the key to his bride’s room where she waits in her bridal gown – rescuing the girl, Bollywood style 🙂 Tea ceremony …

Don’t read.

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I haven’t written anything I want to read. I want my words to become a language on their own, to dance before your eyes, to sing to you in the silence. I haven’t written anything I want to read. I want my words to sketch characters in your mind, to fill your nights with colorful dreams, to show you sparks on a bright day. I want my words to be yours when you lose your own, to say what’s true when you’re in doubt, to be with you when I can’t. I haven’t written anything I want you to read. Shivya NathWelcome to my blog, The Shooting Star. I’ve been called a storyteller, writer, photographer, digital nomad, “sustainability influencer,” social entrepreneur, solo traveller, vegan, sustainable tourism consultant and environmentalist. But in my heart, I’m just a girl who believes that travel – if done right – has the power to change us and the world we live in.

Carpe diem!

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This one is for all of us who have put our dreams on hold. Remember when we were 16 and the world was our playground and nothing, absolutely nothing, was hard to envision? Adulthood has undoubtedly put our dreams into perspective, magnifying the fine line between the good dreams and the bad, the big and the small, the realistic and the idealistic. It is trying to convince us that dreams are just that, and that life is meant to be filled with sacrifices. It’s a lie. Think of the last time you really, really wanted something and gave all you had to get it. Think of the thrill you felt, irrespective of whether you made it. If the thought was short of a smile, you need to think again. Cliched as it might sound, life comes with no warranty card. We spend so much of our time doing things we hate that we forget all about the things we love – future or no future. It’s not about being rich or famous or successful. It’s …

It’s a girl thing.

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Here’s the most powerful depiction of girlhood I’ve ever come across. Eve Ensler, the creator of The Vagina Monologues, is amazingly inspiring. All hail! This talk, entitled ‘Embrace your inner girl’, was delivered by Eve Ensler at TED India (Mysore) in 2009. Shivya NathWelcome to my blog, The Shooting Star. I’ve been called a storyteller, writer, photographer, digital nomad, “sustainability influencer,” social entrepreneur, solo traveller, vegan, sustainable tourism consultant and environmentalist. But in my heart, I’m just a girl who believes that travel – if done right – has the power to change us and the world we live in.

Guess who’s back!

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Let me say a fashionably late hello to the new decade. I have finally found my new link to the blogosphere. No prizes for guessing; I’m probably the last person to resort to mobile blogging! I’m already in love with my beautiful new white iPhone and all set to resume blogging! Happy 2010 to all 🙂 Shivya NathWelcome to my blog, The Shooting Star. I’ve been called a storyteller, writer, photographer, digital nomad, “sustainability influencer,” social entrepreneur, solo traveller, vegan, sustainable tourism consultant and environmentalist. But in my heart, I’m just a girl who believes that travel – if done right – has the power to change us and the world we live in.

’cause time flies

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It’s been exactly a year since I unofficially graduated from college and lost myself in the insanity of adulthood. I have loved the freedom since, the rush of responsibility, the financial independence, the stamp of a degree, the corporate chaos. And also hated it. Life has changed in many ways, and yet, in some fundamental sense, I am still the restless, fickle mind of a young student exploring the ways of the world, looking for adventure in the least likely of places, and forever moving by elimination. I have however, in this year, found a master key to survival – living a day at a time. Of all things that work, this one works wonders. It’s amazing what a day can be, with no future to look into and no past to brood over. I am not aspiring to be a life coach just yet, so I’ll leave you with these lines from Porcupine Tree, But after a while, You realize time flies, And the best thing that you can do Is take whatever comes …

The creeper

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It sprang from beneath the dark earth Upon the dark earth Disillusioned by the light at first That shone in the sky above Shivya NathWelcome to my blog, The Shooting Star. I’ve been called a storyteller, writer, photographer, digital nomad, “sustainability influencer,” social entrepreneur, solo traveller, vegan, sustainable tourism consultant and environmentalist. But in my heart, I’m just a girl who believes that travel – if done right – has the power to change us and the world we live in.

Pen, paper & poetry

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Poetry can truly transcend time and geography, and make you believe in the equivalent of a fairy tale for adults; a kind of serene, beautiful existence where words can smell, touch, smile and cry. The Street: Octavio Paz A long and silent street. I walk in blackness and I stumble and fall and rise, and I walk blind, my feet stepping on silent stones and dry leaves. Someone behind me also stepping on stones, leaves: if I slow down, he slows: if I run, he runs. I turn: nobody. Everything dark and doorless. Turning and turning among these corners which lead forever to the street where I pursue a man who stumbles and rises and says when he sees me: nobody [Original: La calle] Mad Girl’s Love Song: Sylvia Plath “I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead; I lift my lids and all is born again. (I think I made you up inside my head.) The stars go waltzing out in blue and red, And arbitrary blackness gallops in: I shut my …

Gen Y generations

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Forget generations X and Y. They definitely can’t be seasoned by decades, particularly not gen Y. It is evidently split into micro-generations; Gen Y-ers could at best be clustered by 3 or 4 years. Take the early 80s-born for instance. They loiter around social media, they’re mildly fascinated by facebook, they use skype as a ‘cheap’ means of communication, they google their recipes. But that doesn’t make them one of us. They’re not compulsively RSS-fed. They’re not facebook addicts, nor pro-multi-taskers. Their social lives aren’t dependent on google talk. They don’t get twitter. SMSing is not ingrained in their system. A blog is just another website. Forget functionality; their motivations, aspirations, values, opinions, all belong with gen X or are only incrementally different. Here’s a snapshot of us (not them) in the workplace. I surfaced in 88, incase you’re speculating. I wonder what the 90s-offsprings would say to my ‘micro-generation’. Given the pace at which our lives are evolving, we are probably not far from the point when a year will be sufficient to create …

What will be, will be

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We walk through life not knowing what would’ve been if we had taken the other path or made the other choice. And we find comfort in dismissing it as destiny. Through time, destiny has become inseparable from religion, spiritualism and in the bigger picture, life. Objectively though, it seems to be yet another measure to give order to all the chaos in the world. It helps, the way the it helps to have hope and faith, to believe in something bigger than ourselves and our circumstances, to even surrender in the name of a bigger plan for our life. Chances are that those are the very elements that make our ‘destiny’. Destiny is often intertwined with fate, and somewhere along the way, the two meet astrology. Astrologers claim to be able to predict our destiny, and sub-consciously, we are inclined to believe them. In fact, sunsigns, zodiacs and horoscopes have exerted more than their fair share of influence on people by becoming self-fulfilling prophecies. I can’t say if it’s a factor of age or experience, …