21

When I came to the new city I was 21. (I still am for exactly 24 more hours)

It's quite an age, I must say! It has been a turning point for me for everything in my life - an age of change and learning, adventures and education, people and culture. 

A potpourri of dreams and emotions! 

Highlights of 21: 

1) Dreams. I entered the year with a smile. I knew it was going to be a roller-coaster ride and I could feel the adrenaline rush. It started with my admission into my dream school and that was probably the high of the year!

2) Hourglass. The next few months were a whirlwind. A lot of planning and a lot of chaos. Applications and visa interviews. A complete Information overload. 

3)Soaking in. There were so many occasions that I was trying to soak in. Family and friends, birthdays and anniversaries. Everything was feeling like sand that was falling from my hand. While I was excited about starting a new life I knew that there was a lot that I am going to miss.

4)Goodbyes. Then came the time to say goodbye. Farewell parties and airports. Tears and hugs and smiles through tears. OVERWHELMING.

5) Chicago. New city, new home, new bed, new fairylights, new pajamas. It was all new. New people, lots and lots of new people. Lots and lots of new happy people.

6) Northwestern University. Integrated Marketing Communications. INTENSE FIRST QUARTER. Lots of new peeps. Asians, Americans, South Americans, Culture, Conversation, Food, WOB. Laughter and a whole new IMC family! 

7) Fears and Tears. Out of the comfort zone, fears of people judging you, tears because of homesick days. Stressed Midterms and finals week. 

8) Accomplishment. Lots of relief because the first quarter was over. Out of the comfort zone was turning into a comfort zone, the house started to feel like a home.

9) Travel.New York City. Sightseeing through rose tinted glasses and days that felt like a movie. Empire state of mind.

10) Dreams coming true. Sometimes rosier than the actual dream and sometimes - Meh! 


WELL ,

There were a lot of experiences that were life lessons,
But what's more important is what I take from this year : 

1) Strength - We're women honey, strength finds us! Well, not being sexist but when the emotions go up so does the strength! All the emotions in this year have made me a stronger person. Extreme happiness and extreme homesickness, tears and laughter and skype calls and letters. Cooking meals and groceries and navigating through a new city. 21 taught me to take care of myself :)

2) Family - I value my family so much more! The value of 3 hot home cooked meals a day, of the mother's hugs and the father's scoldings. My nani's unconditional love. Sometimes you need to go away from people to value them more. Sometimes on a Skype call, you suddenly realize the value of a touch! I always valued my family but today I realize the value much more.

3) Relationships - I realized how important a support system is. I derive my support system from deep relationships. People who you can call at any hour and people who are there for you through it all. I am miles away from home and miles away from all the important relationships in my life. I see them all surviving, rather flourishing and so I realized how lucky I am to have a support system! 

4) Goals - I'm just 21 and in grad school. Believe me, it's a risk I took. I didn't give myself a few years to gather some experience and then go back to academics. Maybe I'm in a hurry? I'm not too sure... But this year, I think is the year where I have really started working seriously towards my life goals. There's been clarity and motivation and the education has provided a direction for me to dream and achieve :)

5) Happiness -Finally, Happiness. 21 reminds me of the quote - 
"If you want to be happy, be! "
This does not mean I've been happy throughout the year... I have been a sulky weirdo on days and a tortoise in her shell on others but through all of this I have realized that happiness is something I have to find within myself (or within the fridge)

There have been nights where I've danced on the tables too, days when I didn't give a rat's ass about life, days when I have sketched and painted and written poetry, and days that I have spent in bed with a huge tub of ice cream. 

The year's been a long island ice tea. In a tall glass. Strong and definitely not smooth.but once I finished it through my curvy straw it's left a good high ;) 

Thank you 21, You've been quite a ride!

ps. You know what 21 still hasn't managed to teach me? To proof read! I hope 22 gets me to be a little more patient!

Some serious last minute 21 year old swaggggger,

Juie 

Material

A dried black rose lay on the bedside. 

There was a somber silence. 

Two glasses of wine were on the table with parched lipstick marks. 

Two photo frames, tissues from her favorite restaurants and a rose gold hourglass. 

Red chopsticks with golden moldings on which ‘Fulfillment’ was delicately carved in Chinese calligraphy. 

Perfume bottles with just about 3 milliliters of perfume that she left to store. 

She sprayed some to remind her of road trips and some were just remembrances of home. 

Fairy lights hung on the windowsill because the sun wen down too early. That’s what she said but secretly she was looking for magic in her normality. 

A sketch pad and a box of fine liners, because art took her away from the rut of her daily life.  

A vase with a purple daffodil - standing tall and statuesque. 

Books - half read, fully read and untouched.   

A box full of photographs, mostly sepia. 

Letters rolled and tied with red ribbons. 

Memorabilia, smiles, memories and other ephemera.

Thankful

Culture is a beautiful thing! Every culture has so many intricacies and this year has been my time with the American culture. First Halloween and now Thanksgiving! Being a vegetarian I cannot be a part of the Turkey ritual but Pumpkin Pie is the BOMB.

Anyhoo, Did you know that Thanksgiving day is a day of giving thanks for the blessing of harvest of the year? FOOD! Isn't food the best thing that has ever happened. Quite a gluttonous thing to say as I bite into my caramel filled Ghirardelli chocolate square.

However, apart form Food, there are so many things to be thankful for and so I think Thanksgiving is probably one of the most beautiful festivals I have ever come across. I try to be thankful every day but then sometimes I'm a serial cribber. So here's my chance :

I am Thankful for this opportunity that I am getting to see a whole new world, a new perspective through the same old eyes. A new set of friends and a new home, socks covering my toes to keep me warm and fairy lights in my room to keep me joyful.Tears that make me value my people back home and smiles from the happiness that the new ones give me. Struggle (READ : STATISTICS) because I'm realizing my strength and strength because that's something I really need. I'm thankful for the seasons I have never seen before; the colors of fall the whites of the flakes. A warm cup of Peppermint Mocha (Thanks Nandita) and a chocolate-chip cookie. 

I'm thankful because my people back home are safe, sound and happy and I'm thankful for the technology that  makes me see their happy faces. For a beautiful mother, a passionate father and the cutest grandmother in the world. For my dog who wags his tail for me on Facetime! For my best friends that I miss so much and for the telepathy that still prevails! You guys are still my support system and distance couldn't do much to that. For brothers and sisters, friends old and new, for love and for happiness and a few frowns too.

I am thankful for the eyes I can see from that sparkle and cry, eyebrows that I raise when I'm trying to ask why. Limbs that walk through snow and sunshine, people who I can really call mine. Ears that can hear christmas carols and a voice that can sing along, a mind and heart that tells me what is right and wrong. A nose that can smell something chocolatey and nice and a tongue that craves cinnamon and spice.

If you think for a second or two, you'll  suddenly realize there's so much to be thankful for!

That you're Happy, Healthy and Loved.


'tis the season to be jollllllaaaaaay,
Love and snowflakes,
Juie 

People

You know who you learn the most from? From people around you!
In this new city I meet new people every day! In fact, the people I have met in the last 3 months were unknown to me all my life. From the train ticket checker I met on my first train ride in Chicago to the shuttle driver who drives us to school everyday, from my room-mates to my extraordinary cohort of 120 IMC-frenzied class-mates, From Devraj, the Wok-guy who fixes an amazing bowl of asian wok for me to my professors in school, all these people in the new world that I am in have taught me so much more than what meets the eye. A smile, a tear, a comment and sometimes a joke gone wrong, an expression and an eye contact; things that can easily go unnoticed are sometimes life-lessons!

And so, I write about People...

They're made of skin and bones, freshly pumped crimson running through their fragile veins, thoughts and fears and technicolor dreams that emit light through the radiant sparkles in their eyes. Remarkable, sometimes helpless, sometimes misunderstood and sometimes magnanimous. Thinking, dreaming, loving grenades with skin sometimes sun-bronzed  and sometimes pale, some white and some in varying shades of brown. Some wish upon shooting stars and eyelashes.Some make machines, some are machines, while some are free in their own madness. 

Mostly fire with a crust of ice. They have the depths of the ocean inside them. They all err sometimes, in fact they're made to err. Personification of the most perfect form of imperfection. 

They all have their ways to feel free. To Blow away like dandelion seeds? 
Some sing and dance and write, some laze with a good smelling old book, some rave and some choose intoxication. But free? That's an anomaly! They're strangled by society, culture and religion. Sometimes they're strangled by the very thought of being free. 
Their minds are trampolines and they all have invisible wings, believe me they do! They all fly in the wee hours before twilight to places that they want to see. Places where they feel free. Little caverns full of love and light. 
They fly in wakefulness too, through parts of their mind that they are ignorant about. 

You know what affects them the most? The same living, walking, temporarily beating and pumping material that they're made of. They all hate to hurt but they hurt each other. Some forgive and some don't. Some dwell and some forget. 

They build empires sometimes, earn a lot of green crisp paper, some live simply in little homes full of belonging. Some have never heard of love. They all suffer in the same quantity. Some are homeless and some live in white marble palaces.Some wear rubber gloves and have grease in their hair and some have a diamond band tied tightly to their wrist. Some eat sugar cubes and bread, they drink some water and fill their stomachs. Others fine dine in style. But they're all starved.

Looking for something that they don't know of. They know there's something out there. They don't know the shape, the color, the texture or the feeling. But they know its there. 
They're made of hope, people. 

Huge wells of hope they are

and that's how they survive. 

Beginnings

Okay so I was this whole "Out of the Comfort Zone" believer. Telling people how they should go and challenge themselves and be brave and be strong and things like that. Quite a Visionary eh?

UNTIL,

I had to do it myself.

That's when I became chicken-shit.

 For starters I made masala chai with tons of salt in it, made a vegetable curry with lots of sugar (America makes both salt and sugar look the same *-*), Got terribly homesick for 2 weeks, lost my credit card, got stalked by a mad man, Dialed 911, Sobbed in front of a policeman, Almost got escorted home, Burnt an entire pot of rice, Met a stranger, Interviewed a stranger(One of the most enriching experiences of my life) Got to know cultures, Hated stats, Cleaned the bathroom pot, Loved consumer insight, spoke to new people, explored the city with the boy, Ate reallllly good food on days and really trashy food on others, Chilled with the roomies, Hung out with Ketan and Nibha..

Quite an eventful one month and 18 days. 

But in all of that.. I didn't find the time to do things that I really really love to do... To write and to sing and to sketch by the lake… and to be free! 

Free? Of course I'm free. I’m independent, living alone... living my dream ... That's what you're thinking!

By free I mean…Stress-free with no cares about the future, no cares about grades, Peace and joy, learning for knowledge and living the day to its fullest…CarpeDieming' it? That sort of went out of the window! I was bogged down with assignments and grades and stress and deadlines and long days and junk food… GRAD SCHOOL IS NOT EASY BROTHERS!

But today, a day before my midterms I'm suddenly at peace :)

As I look out of my window and I see the orange maple leaves fall… Im at ease… The sky is the perfect blue, I have my consumer insight book in my hand and I'm genuinely enjoying what I'm reading (Do you know why Santa Claus has a red and white costume? Because of Coca - Cola!) It’s fascinating, I'm suddenly learning for myself, for taking it with me for a lifetime to come and not for tomorrow. Finance is teaching us to focus on long-term goals and not on short-term goals… that's what I'm trying to do today. So this journey is going to be about gathering…Experiences, knowledge, memories and happiness for a long long time :)

Maybe I'm finally finding comfort outside my comfort zone :)

This is just the beginning...

A pocketful of sunshine and a bucketful of dreams,

Juie

Pasta Al Gusto

These were the wise words written on the wall of this quaint little Italian restaurant :

"Amicizie e Maccheroni, sono meglio caldi"

(Friendship and Macaroni are best when warm)

Chicago hasn't disappointed at all when it comes to food (Cooking at home is definitely an exception to this theory). 

Nibha 'B'rastogi took us to this cute little Italian Diner in Belmont and it's definitely in the top 5 of the best Italian restaurants I've ever been too (High Five Nibha!). It was sort of a quiet girls night and it was one good meal!

The decor is simplistic, cozy and relaxing. Wooden Chairs, Yellow lights, a potpourri jar filled with Pasta assortment, Silverware framed inside a little photo frame, white crockery et al. It's homely and welcoming and perfect for a quiet dinner after a long day or a cozy dinner for two. 

Like any other Italian meal this meal started with Garlic Bread. The bread was really good but what was actually melt-in-my-mouth was the Mozzarella. It was delicately toasted with little golden brown specks of crumbly cheese. It was definitely a great start!

Being a vegetarian I sometimes feel that options are too little.

But Boy! I'm okay even if I'm just given one option at Pasta Al Gusto : Penne Verdure.

Tube Pasta with mixed veggies, mushrooms, spinach, broccoli, onion, olive oil and garlic sauce.

This is what the menu reads. It sounds pretty basic right?`

But that's the thing! The best chefs whip up the most delicious food with the most basic ingredients. 

Here's what it was : 

I asked the chef to replace the penne with spaghetti(I live for noodles). The vegetables were noticeably fresh especially the spinach and mushroom.The spaghetti was tossed in parmesan and olive oil and the vegetables were lightly sautéed in olive oil with a hint of garlic sauce.  The only spices I could taste were chilli flakes(Which I asked him to add), pepper and salt. The taste of the garlic wasn't in the face. It was subdued yet very flavorful. That's the thing about garlic I guess, the uncanny ability to enhance any spice and bring it to its actual potential.There was a slice of bread that was served as a side to the Pasta. The presentation wasn't out of the world but it was fairly tempting in a homely way.The portion was huge but my appetite is of an elephant so ya, I finished it all!

As they say, the best things are worth waiting for. (Read: Dessert)

One Word. Tiramisu. 

(Did you know that 'Tiramisu' means 'Pick me up'. Quite literally, I'd definitely Pick you up!)

It was orgasmic. That's the only adjective I could think of. I'm pretty sure that I haven't had better Tiramisu.  It was the usual Tiramisu with Coffee, Mascarpone cheese , and a batter of flour, eggs and coffee BUT there were little caramel bubbles between the layers. There's no caramel in traditional Tiramisu but this one was special! After a spoonful of tiramisu had melted in your mouth the caramel stayed and melted slowly and deliciously and OH MY GOD that feeling! The presentation was beautiful too (Or maybe it sucked, but because it was so delicious it looked beautiful) There was cocoa sprinkled over the dessert and all over the plate. 

So Yes, It was a simplistic meal but it was uber-satiating!

If you ever end up going there (which you should) you can take a bottle of red wine with you! 

So basically,

All's well that ends well boys!

Bon appétit !

A big spoonful of Rich creamy Tiramisu,

Juie

Why Hello!

Welcome to my New blog :)

For the ones who don't know, I'm Juie and I'm from Mumbai, India.
I have just moved to Chicago, Illinois.
Actually, I haven't  'just' moved, its been 28 days + 12 hours to be precise.

For the ones who've followed my older blog ,

I hope you enjoy this one too :) 

The main purpose of this blog is to write about this new beautiful change happening in my life. Living in a new city changes almost everything.New roads and a new house, a different skyline and different colors that fill the sky, new people and new cultures, new struggles and challenges , sometimes the only thing that isn't new is you. That's a struggle too you know, keeping up with all the newness around while not changing yourself. 

I'm going to collect memorabila and memories, observations and art,products and brands and situations and emotions, awe and surprise and love and laughter!

I'd want to surprise you, excite you sometimes, make you think and make you wonder, I'd tear you up sometimes and sometimes you'd think I'm plain weird, 

But what I'd kinda like to do is - Make you smile.

Words take you traveling and I hope I do too.

Lots of fresh smelling lakeside wind,

Juie