Popagandhi

1. We celebrated Lunar New Year a few weeks ago, and as usual, I was 8000 miles away from home. What does home even mean now?

2. I have not left the U.S. for three years. That must be some kind of record for 'no international travel' for me.

3. This month feels like the start of a new season of life. Our 8 years of 'visa anxiety' has come to an end. The pets we started our lives here with are no longer here.

4. Sabrena is done with grad school soon; we can finally travel

5. In a bit of a 'life reset', the events of no 3 also mean that I now have a lot more control over my life

6. I seem to have promised a variety of friends, trips to see them once we were done with our paperwork

7. Right now, that list comprises: Mexico City, Guadarajala, La Paz, Mumbai, Surabaya, Kuala Lumpur, Kathmandu, Bangalore and Chennai

8. In short, I'm right back where I started!

In a world that feels like it is coming undone, I find a lot of solace in making things with my hands. The biggest breakthrough I developed was when I decided I don't need to be good at everything that I do. I can just.. do things.

That goes against my programming as a competitive over-achiever, but it was ultimately what gave me the mindset I needed to.. do the things I need to feel less shitty about the world.

Things I did:

• Attended an intro to pottery class
• Started a doodle notebook
• Picked up a water brush and a palette of colors
• Learned how to develop film (black and white, and color) at home
• Learned how to print film negatives of various sizes in a darkroom (black and white, as well as color)
• Fold origami
• Code this website entirely by hand

Some things stuck more than others. I'd like to learn bookbinding, as well as to go deeper into pottery. Like I love saying: my hobby is having hobbies. I don't want or need to ever hustle with my hobbies.

I think I am just done with hustle, full stop. I enjoy making and building things, whether it is software, or a thingamajig. That is enough for me.

In late April 2025, I had the opportunity to talk about my interesting career trajectory 'From Fintech to Fin Tech'.

If you told me a decade ago that I would be working at an aquarium, I don't think I would know what to think. I hadn't discovered my love for marine life, puns, or marine puns at the time. My life is so much richer now.

Here's the video.

In January this year, I wrote this about how I felt being away from 'home' for the Lunar New Year again:

This lunar new year eve, I am usually home in Singapore.

I am seven years old, and I wake up to the smell of roasted chilli, poached chicken, and cabbage soup.

There’s a bustle in the kitchen. My grandpa is stirring a pot, making his signature chilli paste that we all won’t eat our food without. My grandma is fussing over the roast duck, soy sauce chicken and whole fish and prawns.

I walk into the kitchen, in search of a snack. No matter how busy they are, they always have time to feed me.

Have some hae jor, beancurd rolls stuffed with pork, shrimp and chestnuts. Have a bit of everything.

My grandma calls me her ‘little baby mouse’, because I eat so slowly and carefully.

I watch TV until my cousins arrive. I put on my good clothes (but I have to be forced to do it). I greet everyone: first in Teochew, then Mandarin, then English.

Happy new year! Happy new year! Happy new year!

Eat, rub my tummy, smell everything, laugh and poke my grandpa’s tummy. I do that every day, but especially on lunar new year, he is especially jovial and happy. I tell him he looks like a fat Buddha, and he laughs.

If you hold your chopsticks that way, ah girl, you are going to move very far away from home. Very far away from me.

How right he was.

For an all hands meeting at work, I was asked if I wanted to share a story about my life and how I got here.

It has not been the easiest, holding all of these identities and selves, often in places that did not welcome me. I think sometimes of Merantau: of finding a home away from home. All of my parts and intersections make up the messy and glorious bits that I have lived and experienced.

I turn forty this year. I want so much to tell the four year old self: it's going to be fine, you're going to have fun, one day you are going to put up beautiful photos of your life and tell your story to everyone.