19th June 2013
The sound, smell and sight of a storm are reassuring and comforting to me. I sit here thousands of miles away listening to Ghanana ghanana from Lagaan for a moment transported to Bangalore. The breeze outside is warm and whispers promises of a downpour. I feel peaceful and content.
I’ve been having smell hallucinations of various things which just take me back to moments and feelings of when I was a child, and dreams about family and boats. In some there are people who are in 4 different continents meeting up in my school which is very close to my current apartment, next to the city center of Sydney! I think the mind is very powerful and can do so many things if we open out to those experiences.
My first paper was rejected and we’re reworking it to resubmit. It looks better than the 1st version now. 2nd paper is also ready to go. I’m still hopeful about finishing by December but there is a small chance of having to extend into February.
I will be coming home between 26th July and 11th August. I booked only last week because I didn’t want to wait till December and I was really running low on ‘home maana’. Whenever I come home I feel at peace, recharged and happy, and having been away now for more than a year, I was really starting to feel the deprivation. This will be a short trip though in which I will be working half the time mainly so I don’t lose the pace and can sustain the last few hectic months of the PhD. I still hope to meet as many people as possible.
Apart from working, I’m still keeping some time for music; choir on Mondays (performance coming up in early July), Jazz vocal classes, singing with my colleague around once a few weeks. My blog passed 100,000 views recently 🙂 I’m watching The Guardian because I liked Simon Baker in The Mentalist so much. I finished Star Gate all three series and Quantum Leap earlier this year. I’ve been paying extra attention to my food and exercise of late to make sure I don’t burn out with my work. And of course there are still other social activities like parties, BBQs now that it’s summer and I even went for a cheese tasting thing last weekend (only the microbial/bio ones). These are considerably rarer than before, almost like I’m socially withdrawing, though I don’t want to. My flatmate got back from Finland only on Monday so I hope to spend more time with her.
I’m happy because it reaches 33 C today and doesn’t go below 20 even in the night. How great is that 🙂
Hope you’re all happy and healthy!