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100 things that made my year in 2023

2023 was a fine year overall. It felt like a year of progress professionally, and generally life was good in India. I celebrated ten years of motherhood. But I also lost someone. And I got stuck in a moving escalator.


Here it is, the good, the bad, the ugly:


  1. Celebrating New Year in Goa

  2. Celebrating “New Year” several more times in the office because my workplace is culturally very diverse

  3. Having COVID for the third time

  4. Getting tenured

  5. And getting promoted (and my husband getting a huge promotion)

  6. Surviving, and mostly enjoying, 10 years of motherhood

  7. Wearing an Indian saree and lengha

  8. Running six 10k races and two half marathons

  9. Completing a total of 33 runs of 7.5k on average

  10. 1000 piece jigsaw puzzles

  11. Book club

  12. Reading 40 books

  13. Of which 10 were audiobooks

  14. And two books were about Sikh culture

  15. My grandma turning 98

  16. Practicing to think of myself as 40, just to get used to it

  17. Starting a wine club

  18. Lots of chasing and tickling the kids

  19. Giving up veganism—though I’m still about 90% vegan/vegetarian

  20. 100% giving up on mascara

  21. Not having to cook any meals because I have an amazing housekeeper-chef

  22. Implementing an “inbox zero” policy at work

  23. Giving up on paper agendas and using Google Calendar

  24. Interviewing approximately 6,000 people for a green card

  25. Traveling to the remote Andaman Islands

  26. Developing an obsession with diving

  27. Radhaganar beach—one of the most beautiful in the world, seriously, Google Images doesn’t do it justice

  28. Doing a comprehensive body health check up at the hospital

  29. Still being the only person in my family without eyeglasses (though apparently my eyesight is deteriorating, which I found out during my checkup…)

  30. The movie Palm Springs

  31. The Backstreet Boys in concert; a semi-serious childhood dream come true!

  32. Imagine Dragons in concert

  33. Shopping on Marshalls.com

  34. Discovering the joy of nice pajamas (Natori)

  35. Rice-dal

  36. Instead of eating Big Macs, which don’t exist in India

  37. Learning how to properly kick a soccer ball from my son

  38. Having a sore foot for three days as a result of that

  39. Publishing 24 blogposts

  40. Riding a horse

  41. Quitting Hindu lessons

  42. And re-starting Italian

  43. Serving on the Israel-Gaza conflict taskforce

  44. Starting a five step skincare routine, and ditching most of it

  45. My 98-year old grandmother dying peacefully in her sleep

  46. Spending only 3% of the year in the Netherlands

  47. Visiting a tea plantation in Kerala

  48. Learning that white, green and black tea are all from the same plant

  49. Nail art

  50. Driving a car only once all year

  51. Avoiding a fifth root canal treatment with antibiotics

  52. Eating popcorn for breakfast

  53. My son playing the keyboard

  54. My daughter becoming a gymnastics fanatic

  55. Not traveling to any new country (I’m still at 41 countries)

  56. Dressing for Halloween as Barbie and my husband as Ken (which was great, because he looks a bit like Ryan Gosling)

  57. Watching three musicals live: Westside Story, Mamma Mia, and The Sound of Music

  58. Dinner with the cast of The Sound of Music (the adults!)

  59. Performing a Bollywood dance in front of 200 colleagues

  60. Visiting Dharavi, India’s biggest slum (not a PC word anymore, I know)

  61. Breaking my vow never to sing karaoke again (with Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go)

  62. Covering the cost of this blog with ad revenue (though I earned way less this year than I did last year)

  63. Killing more insects than in any other year (mosquitoes and cockroaches)

  64. A colleague telling me my shirt is inside out

  65. Upgrading my kitchen’s spice rack. By the time all my kitchen appliances are RVS this style will probably be outdated.

  66. Adding to my Persian rug collection

  67. Playing poker

  68. Paddle boarding at Wallowa Lake, which is the closest thing to heaven on earth if you ask me

  69. Blowing up 100 balloons for each of my kids’ birthdays

  70. Long walks to basically nowhere

  71. Listening to podcasts like “Decoder Ring” and “Even the Rich”

  72. Learning that it’s a scientific fact, proven repeatedly, that ice cream is healthy. Just like wine

  73. Convincing both of my sisters to visit me in India

  74. Putting a record number of presents under the Christmas tree

  75. Wearing silver and gold shoes to work

  76. Wearing dress shorts to work and getting away with it

  77. Experimenting with the butterfly stroke

  78. Bidets

  79. Going to bed at 10 PM (instead of midnight)

  80. Watching Trevor Noah perform live

  81. Being a criminal investigator for a day

  82. Playing paintball

  83. Using Apple Notes to write down all my thoughts

  84. Swapping plates and drinks at restaurants with my husband when I like his thing better

  85. My shoe lace getting stuck in a moving escalator

  86. Being in Chennai during a massive cyclone

  87. Trying to control (limit) my kids’ screen time with Qustodio

  88. 50 Cent in concert

  89. Food poisoning

  90. The Bombay Hash House Harriers

  91. Traffic

  92. And honking cars

  93. Dressing in different colors for nine days in a row to celebrate Navarati

  94. Dog sitting

  95. Brew Dog brewery

  96. Walking my first stretch of the Pieterpad trail

  97. My stocks gaining value for the first time in two years

  98. Our 12-year wedding anniversary

  99. Organizing a clothing swap

  100. Ehm… oversharing?



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