The last time I wrote something for my blog was during the COVID-19 lockdown in the first half of 2020. It seems only appropriate that I update the blog again during my 20 day vacation from work that I’ve primarily spent within the four walls of my apartment. While Omicron has torn apart travel plans I was really looking forward to, there’s something about unexpectedly getting 3 empty weeks on my calendar that felt liberating — an unknown burden lifted off my shoulders. It brought me back to an eerily similar emotion I felt during my latest performance review at work. Let me explain.

I really enjoyed writing about my trip to Germany a couple days ago and since I find myself missing traveling again today, I thought I’d take some time to reflect upon another fun adventure from last year. In August 2019, my parents and I spent a week detached from the rest of the world (due to the remote nature of these islands) in the highly underrated tranquility of East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia. The trip was divided into two segments — three days on a boat exploring the Komodo National Park followed by a four-day road trip across the island of Flores.

As I write this, the world is facing an unprecedented global pandemic and I’ve personally been stuck at home for most of the past 90 days. I decided to clean out my notes earlier this week (don’t judge, I’m running out of things to do) and came across a note I was using to keep track of my trip to Germany late last year. It was meant to turn into a blog post at some point and since I really miss traveling, this is a good time as any to relive those precious memories.

A couple weeks ago, I traveled to Sikkim with my family. Sikkim is a state in northeast India, known for its glaciers, mountains, tea gardens and diverse flora! It is also home to India’s newest airport (Pakyong Airport) built at 4,500 ft above sea level, whose news sparked our interest to travel there.

The last few months have been a complete whirlwind — wrapping up my undergraduate thesis, final examinations, graduating from college, moving to a new home & starting my first real job at Google! More on all of this in future blog posts but in between all of the adult-ing, I also traveled to eastern Europe with a few friends from university for our grad trip!