Geneva Journals- The Cold Lake Dip

My cold shower story goes back to Bangalore days in 2016. Like they say, temperature is relevant-in 2016, Bangalore winters seemed cold to me. After that, I went to Rajasthan and began to experience North Indian winters. I was getting adapted to Rajasthan weather and managed to have cold showers only when I didn't had option of heating my water. When I moved to Geneva, I always wanted to enjoy the lake swims and cold lake dips. In 2023, I couldn't go near the water. As the year began, Snigdha suggested for a cold lake dip and in February while the temperature was 8-10 degrees celsius, Snigdha, Grusha, Ani and I visited the lake and had a lake dip. I was keen to try out cold lake dips since then. 

When I returned to Geneva after a long break and autumn kicked in, I visited the lake and had my cold lake dip. I felt very refreshed and ever since, I was regular to the lake and enjoyed cold lake dips. Mostly on fridays, I visited the lake and had my swim. Another memorable cold lake dip was, just after the Berlin trip. 

I had an extensive trip at Berlin and Leipzig. I had my first exhibition in Germany and was overwhelmed by the reception and abundance I had in life. No sooner I landed in Geneva, than I headed to the lake at night and had a cold lake dip. It was a refreshing one.

                                            

I also began my birthday with a cold lake dip enjoying the cloudy weather. From now on, will be regular with my cold showers and cold lake dips. A great way to celebreat human endurance. 

Geneva Journals- Biryani times

If I put my heart into it, I'm sure I'll achieve it. On my birthday, I tried cooking biryani and failed terribly. Since then, I was determined to cook biryani by trial and error. I'm not inclined to watch videos and learn cooking. I know I can save a lot of time by following a recipe however, I tried to learn by my own process and managed to cook delicious biryani.

 

 

2024- A year in Music

Spotify has given me a wrap of 2024 in music. The way I listen to music has changed and I wish to change it for good and spent more time listening to different genres more consciously. 

My top songs of 2024 seemed to be

1. Vida Karo
2. Adigaa
3. Aangan
4. Love like that(feat. Ali Sethi)
5. Periyone

Apart from these, there are many new songs I listened to thanks to all suggestions by dear friends. This year, listened to a lot of live western classical music in August. Apart from it, had a great year listening to a lot of different kinds of music.

2024- A year in Movies

The movies I watched on big screen at Belgium, Austria and Geneva are more remembered than the movies I watched very passively. Napolean and Masters of Air, Manjummel Boys,All we Imagine as Light are couple of movies I enjoyed well. Will plan to watch more world cinema in 2025

1. Hit Man
2. Masters of the Air
3. Manjummel Boys
4. Matti Kusthi
5. 12th Fail
6. We are the World
7. Three of Us
8. Ticket to Paradise
9. Aadujeevitham
10. All we imagine as light
11. Laapata Ladies
12. Tillu Square
13. Dunki
14. Crew
15. Napolean

2024- A year in Books

In the beginning of the year, I planned to read 20 books and more but, managed to read 16 books. All of them left an impact. After a long time, began reading telugu books, thanks to Harish. Will put conscious efforts to buy and read more Telugu books. A lot of books on health and healing were picked. Also, a lot of books which I borrowed were read completely than the books I bought. I wish to prepare a list and catch up on books rather than reading at my own whims. 

1. Cured by Jeff Reddinger
2. The Power of Subconscious mind by Joseph Murphy
3. Nenu Brahmanandam by Brahmanandam
4. The Wolf who Loved Music by Christophe Gallaz
5. The Dark Side of Light Chasers by Debbie Ford
6. Why the Germans Do it Better by John Kampfner
7. Wisdom from the hidden life of trees by Peter Wohlleben
8. A book of days by Patti Smith
9. Mutant Message Down Under by Marlo Morgan
10. The Polaroid Book by Barbara Hitchcock
11. Whereabouts by Jhumpa Lahiri
12. When we cease to understand the world by Benjamin Labatut
13. The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks
14. A handbook for my Lover by Rosalyn D'Mello
15. Quantum Body by Deepak Chopra
16. Until August by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

2024- Year in Months

2024 has been a blooming year with a lot of growth, healing, learning and unlearning. It has also passed in intensely leaving me with a lot of experiences. Let me reflect 2024 in months. 

Jan- Sought consistent support and endured my first european winter with a lot of writing and music. Started the year with the book Cured and listened to a lot of music. 

Feb-I explored Geneva on foot, walking around and beating up the winter blues.Exploring a place by walk has become my favourite taking me to beautiful magical places. Shivam accompanied for a meal and walks for a long time. Grateful for his company. Also, having painted for a long time, I hosted open studio, welcoming people to pass over and check out my art. A lot of dear ones dropped by and also got a chance to meet many new people. 

March- Harish visited me in Geneva. Spent great time catching up on what we were upto in our lives. I travelled Belgium, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Germany. Caught up with Harish at Leuven, got a chance to catch up with his friends and also senior Sharayu in Netherlands. Spring break gave me a good holiday to get over the winter blues. Creatively, I was preparing for my installation, focused on forced migration and spaces. A beautiful start to the spring, I had my 2nd exhibition Empty Spaces- Flow was opened at Fab. 

April- A little bit of college, classes, exhibition, I had a great time catching up with many people. Also, Akhila was getting married and returned to home for a small holiday. Hosted a couple of creative workshops at the institute. Worked on an creative intervention project near UN premises. 

May- Spent good time at home, met Shyam, Sunny and returned to Geneva to finisht the semester, exhibition and classes.

June- An intense month as Dad was gettting retired, finish the semester and had to leave my student residence. 

July- Lived in france and caught up with Dan, Rob, David, Karen, Bart and many more people enjoyed the summer holiday. Tried learning saxophone a bit and had great time, walks with dog Lola.

August- Snigdha was leaving to India. Visited Geneva for a while, gave her send off and moved to Bern. Caught up with Tena, Alberto, Nancy, Liki, Rafael, Lucas, Ben and many others. Also, visited Germany to attend Vipassana course and met Chayan, Peer, Martin, Margaret, Nicolay and many other friends. 

Sep- Spent a week in Austria resting and winding down from 2months intense holiday and returned to Geneva to prepare for the semester. The last two months have revealed me the importance of trusting the process of life. 

Oct- Moved to new home with Atys, Elcin and began to work for my Germany exhibition.Began to celebrate 30 days of birth month. Also, I started to take cold dips regularly at the lake. It's cold but very refreshing. 

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Nov- Continued celebrating birthmonth and traveled to Germany to catch up with Sun, Sumin Ahn and many more friends. Celebrated birthday with all the loved ones. Also, the gratitude book, we worked on got released. 

Dec- Semester end has given me a chance to hustle again. Finalised my thesis idea, caught up with many friends before the holiday begins. Celebrated christmas with Grusha and managed to keep up with cold lake dips and had my last cold lake dip on 30.Dec.24. 

A very meaningful 2024. I turned 30, spent great time going inwards and learning to practice compassion and be okay with myself in all highs and lows. Summing up my 2024 in a word would be- Magical.

Merry Christmas

 Many of my friends wished- Happy birthday to Jesus. I realised that most of the festivals is the celebration of one's presence. Christmas marks Jesus birth and his presence. All of us celebrate each other in our own ways and Christmas is celebrated in many ways at many places. As a child, I remember gathering as a family, attending church, sharing gifts and spreading more love. As an adult, we've moved places and festival celebrations have changed in many fold. 

Here, in Geneva, attended Christmas eve mass at St.Pierre Cathedral where the choir sang carols while different people recited the 9 lessons of christmas walking us through the event of Jesus birth. Starting my day with an intention of celebrating christmas, I cleaned the house, cleared a lot of unused stuff and gathered at Grusha's place to celebrate christmas. Grusha cheered me up with a lot of  delicious food- baked chicken, veggies, cheese, pasta, cake, snacks and a lot more. Munching on snacks and recounting good old days, we listened to Grusha's soul music- Fado which she discovered in her last Portugal trip. 

While we regaled in happy times, we painted giving each others word to interpret asking- what my word means to you and your word means to me? I gave her words Bloom and Night. She prompted me with Green and Water. 

Adam joined us for the dinner and shared what it means to celebrate as a community and shared his passionate project of documenting the social history of his community. I got a chance to see a very old black and white pictures of his family in plain white albums. I felt elated to hold the pictures in my hands and see the time frozed in the photographs. 

Grusha got us christmas gifts and called it a day with hot chocolate. Thanks Grusha for having me in 2024 Christmas. 

Thoughts- The Personal Finance Rule

A friend shared a personal finance rule which seemed very handy. Of all the money we receive, we can divide it in the ratio of 50:30:20. 50% to savings, 30% in expenditure, 20% in experiences, leisure, splurge.

 

 

 

Holidays with Harry- Focus

When did you begin to trust the process of life? I asked Harry. 

"The more I began to observe my thoughts, the more I could understand that I need to neutral my negative thoughts. The more I let go of negative thoughts, I just had to do my work and detach from the outcome." he shared a tale on how he realised being detached to the outcome seems to be the key. 

As I began to contemplate on the processes, he suggested me to watch Steve Jobs commencement speech. Nicolay also suggested me the same. Along with it, we discussed how we need to bring all our focus on what we want to achieve and everything would fall in place. Until it fall in place, do not let the focus unwavered. 

Memories- This day that year

Looking at the date 19 December.2024, I felt special. I didn't think much about it until I was retiring to bed. Azim Premji's central office red walls got flashed in my mind and the whole journey flashed. On December 20.2018, I travelled from Hyderabad to Bangalore to attend interview at Azim Premji Foundation office.  The interview call, the supporting conversations,everything just flashed by.  Six years ago, I made last minute plans at office as I got to know about the interview, informed by then boss Aravind about leave, flew from Hyderabad on an early morning flight. Took Jet airways this time. Reached Kempegowda airport, got on the bus and headed to electronic city. By the time I reached, thanks to Bengaluru traffic, I could straightly walk into wipro campus. I spent morning around the campus looking around, had lunch at the cafetaria and attended the interview. The most vivid memory of the day was the five minutes before the interview where I sat at a cubicle, waiting for my chance to enter the cabin. I remember the blue board infront of me. I breathed hard calming myself and said, 'Abhinay, this is it. You've made it this far. Be yourself.' At first interview,  I met Anchal and Jagadeesh who asked me my interests and my presentation. I presented about conversations and need of in-person conversations for social connection. After the interview, I was welcomed by Giridhar for another round of interview. Giridhar made me feel like home as he began to talk about books, writing, I got excited and shared my journey. No sooner we began to talk, then others came to point out the time. We talked for almost half an hour or more. I cherish the conversation I had with him. Soon after that, I walked out appreciating the office architecture. As I was out of office, I talked to Shreya who was there throughout listening to me and supporting me in my adventures. 

That was my 2nd job interview after TCS. Currently, as I sit in Geneva and think of career, I'm surrounded by people who are constantly in fear of their career journeys and  are amused by my stoic belief of making it big here in Geneva. People are clueless of how I'm confident to make it in life, to make it in Geneva. As my favourite professor Brindusa suggested, I followed her advice- You don't need to explain yourself to others. I stopped explaining myself to others. I believe I deserve the best and I'll get what's best for me at the right place and right time. Time to act, do my best and surrender.