I’d rather cook at home than eat out (mum)
My mum was never happy if we ate out — she’d complain that she could make way better food, quicker and for a fraction of the cost. I have to say, she was right!
Look, I love going out to eat things I can’t cook myself: delicious biriani or proper French food but come on… pastas, salads and burritos? That’s ridiculous, I can whip that stuff up in 20 mins, enter a sick flow state and have things as spicy as I want them!
As a lifelong foodie this was a shocking revelation I had. I now probably cook more than ever before and my food is absolutely perfect for my palate. I don’t even have to change out of my sweatpants.
I call my friends for long chats instead of just texting or DM’ing (dad)
I’d think my dad insane when he’d spend endless hours on the phone with old friends in Nairobi, New Jersey and Ahmedabad. Now I do the same thing.
Today alone, I spoke to an old colleague in Austin, an old boss in New York and an old chum in Amsterdam. As I grow older, my friends are splintering to all corners of the world. I want to make sure I stay in touch with the ones that matter to me so I take my valuable time and pick up the phone.
‘Ride it til the wheels fall off’ rather than buy new stuff (both)
My parents were refugees in the UK in the 1970s. They didn’t waste things and my mum was a genius at saving money by repurposing things. To this day I remember going into the freezer, getting excited at finding ice cream only to find garlic and ginger cubes. Equally, my sisters all wore the same clothes their older sister and brother had worn a few years earlier. Hand me downs. We were thrifty.
Call me a reformed classic consumer or new age minimalist but I hate junk. I cannot abide having something in my home that I don’t use frequently. If something has multiple uses, its a prized possession.
I am using a 4 year old phone and 7 year old Macbook… in my 20s this was unthinkable. People have to have the latest clobber, the facial recognition technology, the Spring fashions. More power to them.
I’m now old enough to have a few ‘trusty olds’. For instance my trusty old electric toothbrush, shaver and chef’s blade. All things that give me immense pleasure to use and I see no point in replacing them. I like things that are old, with character and stories behind them.
Watching Indian movies, shows and adding Indian spices to every dish (mum)
Maybe this is an immigrant thing but when you’re a young Indian kid in the UK you just want to fit in. That means English food, English pop culture and pubs. Now I am older, I embrace my cultural heritage, loving nothing more than sitting down to a Gujarati thali and putting on a cheesy Bollywood flick.
It’s a weird swing of the pendulum; perhaps it’s just my sad little way of connecting with my parents who have both passed away. Maybe it’s nostalgia or perhaps it’s an awakening from the years I spent foolishly stifling that side of myself for fear of looking uncool.
In any case, I love Indian shit now.
Telling stupid jokes/ stories to cashiers (dad)
I can’t help myself here.
Earlier today I was informing the cashier who rung up my coffee beans that I went to a coffee plantation in Guatemala. As if that wasn’t pointless enough, I decided to inform him that Starbucks actually buys the best quality beans from farmers in Guatemala.
The guy told me he doesn’t drink coffee. Undeterred, I told him Starbucks burns the beans in a bid for quality control, hence the garbage taste.
His colleague generously smiled and told me he’d heard that fact. That was apparently the validation I needed for my story because I wished them a good day and left.
Still not quite sure what came over me but it’s interesting to observe myself turning into a fucking cheeseball at only 32. I’ve also clearly not lived in New York for a couple of years or I’d have been eaten alive by the patrons in line behind me.
Wearing 10% of one’s wardrobe, all the time (both)
This one might be a function of the fact that I have been essentially homeless by design for the last 2 years. I just don’t want to settle anywhere so I’ve just been dragging a collection of t-shirts, jeans, and sweat-things from place to place every 6 months. I obviously pack fairly light.
I also just love the familiar feeling of my favorite jeans or t-shirt — it feels comfortable and I feel as though I project that comfort out into the world in my interactions.
The act of preservation is also appealing to me — looking after old clothes that serve you well. Your old pair of boots worn in just right. Showing it’s age and character, like humans do. Cracks in the leather. Reality.
Packing for trips at 2am but showing up to the airport 4 hours early, minimum (both)
My mum was a super last minute person. She would be sat on the floor, packing bags for a 3 month trip to India til 2am the night before the flight.
Every single time.
It drove my sisters nuts but I thought it was hilarious. She was good at it — never forgot one thing. Rolled the socks perfectly. An artist.
My dad liked to get to the airport insanely early, lest we miss the flight or even have to break a sweat and run for it. It probably had something to do with the fact my mum had always overpacked too so we’d have to negotiate the excess baggage fee — classic Indian stuff.
But the older I got, the more flights I missed, the more anxiety I felt in the TSA Pre-Check line that is NO SHORTER THAN THE REGULAR LINE, the more I decided getting there super early was awesome.
I love strolling in at a leisurely pace, getting through security, heading to the lounge to do some work on my laptop and then ambling to the flight when it’s called. It’s the state of living I aspire to generally — I don’t want to rush things. I don’t like pressure, I like to take it at my own pace.
I still pack at 2am though. It’s sort of like an homage to my mum. Difference is, I pack severely under the limit, usually just hand luggage because I’m so traumatized by the excess baggage days! Mum would not be impressed.
Eating expired food (mum)
If something was past it’s sell by date when I was a kid, I’d throw it straight in the garbage, much to the chagrin of my mum. The older I got the more I realized even big companies just make shit up, so why trust their sell by dates?
Like nobody has an actual bloody clue when said milk or avocado will be undrinkable or inedible. Each one is different. Is there an oracle, ceremoniously inspecting each piece of fruit or each carton of milk at the factory? Is it like Minority Report where they see the expiration before it happens?
My mum hated waste. Mold on the bread? Cut that little bit off. Something stale? Toast it. We never ate ‘bad’ food, my mum was a master chef and loved us, we never ate badly. She just didn’t want to waste the good bits of the food or be a slave to expiry dates.
I am now the same way. Maybe it’s because I don’t trust corporations and it’s my ego, maybe because I have to pay for groceries now, maybe it’s another homage to my mum. I think partly it’s also a response to the wasteful culture we find ourselves in and the knowledge that someone out there would appreciate the good half of the tomato or the good half of the slice of bread.
