When I was growing up, I thought all families had the same weekend lunches as mine: a giant cauldron of yellow noodles, simmered. When my grandmother died, I thought about that simple dish often. How she conjured love out of a few basic ingredients.
In all of my 29 years, my grandparents had been such a big part of my life that I could have never conceived of a life without them. Losing them was a shock to the system.
Between 2012 and 2014 I spent significant amounts of time in Myanmar, which was just 'opening up' at the time. My ability to speak various Asian languages opened up an interesting world of street conversations for me, that helped me learn bits of the country I might have never known in just English.