About Supermarket Cereal Boxes

I went into a supermarket yesterday after many months. That's when I realized I now use apps with my local groceries for most of my deliveries.

Anyhow, during my trip to China, I had an extremely delicious breakfast for 3 days in arow. I would go to this local grocery store and buy the same thing. It was yoghurt with cereal and dried strawberry. And yesterday, I craved for exactly that. So, I went to the supermarket here to recreate it.

I went to the cereal section. It was so big, with so many brands and options, I felt a little lost. That's when I noticed this extremely old man, he had with him a lovely walking stick. I say lovely because the walking stick was very beautiful, with an intricately carved top handle. He had hearing aids on, and to me, he seemed to be struggling. He kept raising his hands to the top shelf and his hands were shaking. He stood in one place, not moving.

As a 35-year-old I myself was struggling choosing a box of cereals, and presumed he was too. I went up to him and asked him if I could help him, maybe he needed some help in taking the box from the top shelf?

He looked at me and told me smilingly. "Thank you for asking. But I am guarding these 4 boxes. They are the last 4 boxes of Oreo cereal in Dubai. My grandson and I went to Lulu, Choithrams, Carrefour, Spinneys. Nothing. All sold out."

He pointed to the 4 boxes and said "I am going to buy all 4. But I ´m waiting for my daughter to come. I want to confirm this is the one. Children are very specific. My grandson loved this so much. Can you believe that all Oreo cereal boxes are sold out? This is the last supermarket that has these. And only 4 boxes left."

He looked at me through his glasses and once again thanked me. He stood there the whole time I was in the supermarket, ensuring no one else buys them.

That interaction was very wholesome for me. The old man must´ve easily been 80, he was a local Emirati and I loved what he was doing. 

Anyhow, I purchase colored fruit loop cereal and dried strawberries, and hope to recreate my Shanghai breakfast in Dubai.

Context is Everything.

There was a drama called The Newsroom that I really liked. I recall enjoying most of the earlier episodes. One of the things that still sits in my head is an episode where Jane Fonda´s character (or her son´s - I can´t quite remember) wanted to get rid of someone from the organization.

It´s nearly never easy to fire people from big companies - maybe unless in a mass lay off.

In this fictional organization too, they wanted to fire someone, and it was brought to their attention that firing isn´t so simple.

She (he?) went on to say that they understand how difficult it is to fire someone in a senior position, but all they need to do is create a context. 

As a 25-year-old watching this drama, I didn´t quite get it. 

But as someone in a mid-senior position in a company, having seen so much corporate drama and politics across companies, countries, and industries, this sentence resonates very well with me.

I now know context is everything. Context can very cleverly be developed gradually, over a period of few months, no one will suspect a thing. We humans love gossip, love to hear what anyone and everyone has to say about someone else - this way context spreads.

To the extent that we start to normalize the next bit of contextual news. It no longer surprises us that so and so is doing a bad job (he probably is doing the same job as he always was doing), but perhaps, someone said something about him - being late, smoking too much, errors in emails, never opening the doors for women, unpolished shoe etc. And this beef - scattered over a few months, targeted strategically, will question his actual output (even though his output is the same).

It´s subtle, quiet, effective and spreads quickly. And there you go, you have context. So, when you want to finally fire someone, no one is surprised because a strong context looms in the background.

Buildings of Beijing

This is the 2nd part of my China miniseries. Wherever I go, I ´m always interested to see how people actually live. How have the buildings been designed, especially the older buildings, built 30-40 years ago. When you´re thinking of a city that has 22m people, the urban planning becomes so important.

Most older buildings we saw had at least 10-12 floors, the newer ones were 20-25 floors high, made more of glass and steel than concrete. Most photos I took were while being in a taxi.

Beijing has several glass and steel skyscrapers, both for residences and offices - but I focused on the older buildings. They are what, in my eyes, have character.

There were many over passes with elevators for pedestrians, cutting across the city traffic.

The below was called the Galaxy Soho building, it was not a residential building, but a business park. Also, the dedicated 2-wheeler lane was very cool!

Some areas had so many residential buildings, it was like a sea of buildings. Imagining how many people live in this city, it´s not hard to understand why so many buildings sprang up all over the city.

I really liked the below building; the design spelled more class. In a city like Beijing, when you see a villa or a low-rise building, you can imagine how expensive the apartment would be.

This was a highly zoomed-in photo, a sea of buildings. Low-rise, medium-rise, high-rise, old, new - the below photo has it all.

There were some areas that were ear-marked to be preserved by the government, to avoid gentrification. I hope the next time I go; I can still walk the inner lanes and see my favorite hutongs. Built during the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, the Beijing Hutongs are filled with houses located around a square courtyard where the inhabitants lead a traditional life anchored in the past. That´s my next post!

China Miniseries

What can you write about your trip to China? I want to write so much that I foresee that my fingers are going to hurt.

For us, China was always an opaque notion. Yes, almost everything we use is Made in China, including our car and phone, yes - we've learnt about the Great Wall of China and the 1.4b people, yes, we have heard about the Chinese fried rice but beyond that, we've barely seen any photos or given a second thought to the 2nd largest economy in the world.

To be honest, traveling to China was never part of our plan in the near future, we had our entire trip booked to Japan but we never received our visa on time and were in a pickle, and on a whim, last moment, decided to go to Beijing and Shanghai. After traveling there, I'm cautious of not saying I traveled to China, it's like saying you traveled to India after seeing a part of Delhi. India does not equal a part of a city, it's too vast.

We did 4 days in Beijing and 3 in Shanghai. We did so much, saw so much, this was an extreme cultural immersion. I loved every moment of my trip. Like always, I thought it would be amazing to live and work there. This is a never-ending problem in my life, whether in Hanoi or Singapore, Amsterdam or Barcelona.

I enjoyed the marriage of old and new in Beijing, and liked the very-modern city that Shanghai is - it's one of the finest cities that I have visited in my life. And that it houses 25m people is very hard to believe unless you've been there and seen the housing, transit system and the infrastructure built.

I took a total of 563 photos and videos, and this is a miniseries in order for me to remember my trip. 

Here is part 1.

Part 2 is Buildings of Beijing.

China Part 1 - Beijing Things

There are so many things I want to remember and so I write. 

The city houses 22m people. It was formerly called Peking which is how the airport got it´s IATA code name PEK.

I was very surprised to find dedicated 2-wheeler lanes throughout the city. We saw so many people ride cycles as well as 2-wheelers and this was something I really appreciated.

We saw a MUJI hotel. I actually entered to ensure it was what I thought it was - it was true to the minimalist Japanese design we´re all familiar with.

This pretty street was in DongCheng, near the Dongsi Shitao metro station.

I didn´t know that I would see so many cherry blossom trees in full bloom in Beijing. I may have inadvertently taken a hundred photos of these beautiful flowers and foliage.

I really liked the packaging and design of so many products. This was a delicious and low-sugar tea sold in vending machines across the city.

Just a few men smoking near pretty pink trees.

It´s always nice to see cyclists in huge numbers in any city.

This was outside a mall. Mots big stores/malls/banks/big houses have 2 stone statues on either side - the money dragon - indicating good luck and wealth.

I came across a fruit called hawthorn berries, that was sweet and commonly available - as fruit, as candy and as juice. It was delicious. Imagine being as old as me and discovering new fruits!!

Other commonly used vegetables in local cuisine are bamboo shoots and lotus roots. Below was in a lovely hot pot restaurant where you choose what to include in the hot broth.

Buildings are great, but I appreciate how the government has preserved (for now) the inner alleys containing hutongs. I did some digging into what the traditional house as like and I´ll write about it later.

A typical house entrance.

I think I will go back.

Buildings of Paris 2

I just realized that every time I visit a place, I land up taking a zillion photos of the architecture, design and symmetry of the buildings and neighborhoods. If I visit a place again, I make it a point to revisit some of the neighborhoods I previously visited, to keep the memory alive. This time, the only neighborhood I could revisit was Chatillon, where my sister was previously living and which I had walked around a lot in last year. It was surreal. Seasons had changed, foliage had shrunk, everything felt damp from the incessant drizzling, but the magic remained.

I landed up walking an average of 15k steps every day for more than week. I was able to discover churches, parks, gardens, commercial centers/shopping malls, quiet residential areas, quiet lanes filled with quaint art galleries, busy tourist areas, small lanes that open to main roads along the river Seine - but I probably would have only seen 1/10th of the city of Paris.

Some of the areas that I got to walk by this time - Montparnasse, the Latin quarters, St Germain des Pres, Chatelet, Faubourg St Germain, Montrouge, and of course, in and around arrondissement 1 and 7.

I also sat by the river and read, every now and then a gust of wind would blow, and I would adjust my scarf around me.

I've heard so often that Paris is the romantic city, and I always thought of this as a love between couples. But I now wonder, I think it's more than romance. Love for one's city, to walk the same lanes every day, with your dog, cat, friend, lover. Love for the centuries old buildings, an architecture and a soul that you just can't ignore. 

While in Paris, a friend asked me if Dubai had a soul. I think yes, having lived here for so long the city grows on you. For a first timer, someone who spends only a couple of days and views only glass, steel and concrete, the soul will not be evident. But in Paris, even for someone who has only a long layover in Paris and decides to walk an hour along literally any route, the soul could be felt - buildings 200-300 years old standing poised in neighborhoods filled with similar buildings, churches dating back to the 17th century and some universities even older.

Even the newer buildings built in the last few decades blend right in, not changing a thing.

The iconic Louis Vuitton building, this was right by the Seine.

I bought some real cute souvenirs from here, not the usual magnets.

So many perfect bricks and chimneys.

The rain added a very interesting backdrop to the already beautiful architecture, it all looked like a scene out of a 60s movie, with little color. But then you see a Yamaha motorcycle whooshing by, and you're brought back to the present.

That pink building.

As you go walking, every time you think, ah this is good spot for a groceries store, you will find one - most likely a franprix. Every corner in every neighborhood.

As you go towards the periphery of Paris, the buildings with their lovely-to-walk in lanes give way to homes and charming narrow lanes with tiny almost indiscreet gardens. The view of these rooftops in the forefront with the backdrop of taller buildings captures the city well in my eyes.

Nature in Paris in February

To experience the same city in different seasons is a lovely experience. Even though I'm not a fan of winter, I spent a little over a week in Paris in February of 2024. It was overcast, drizzling, raining, windy and all of this while being between 5 and 10 degrees, a stark contrast from last year when I visited in July and then in September - both those times, the weather was very warm and welcoming.

But nature was still bountiful. Shades of green and brown and grey made the palette beautiful.

Sometimes, I could see early signs of spring, plants trying their best to push out a new flower.

Nature is truly amazing, earth's natural make-up. 

In some places, the foliage was so lovely, I had to make a mental note to come back to the exact same spot in spring.