Post India reflection for Huzi - Week 9 - May 7

During the journey around India, I reflected a lot on my personal life and couplehood with meh.  We had quite a bit of time while travelling from place to place on trains.  This gave us the opportunity to read some books and had a lot of soul searching conversations.

The readings we had ranged from personal development stuff to the struggles of the Tibetan people.  These knowledge and the interaction with the various facets of India impacted our thinking quite a bit. We had chosen to embrace the beauty of India.  The beauty of her backwaters, beaches, desert, mountains, rivers, forts, temples etc never failed to enchant us.  However, we never tried to escape from the reality that there are so many homeless children that we saw who lacked basic things.  Sadly, circumstances caused many of them to beg.  We felt really sad that these children lacked so many things that our kids back home take for granted.  

The volunteering sessions we had with children reminded us how innocent and sweet children are, no matter where they are from.  Of course, there are rapid developments going on everywhere but we kept sensing that the previously contented man in the streets had given up to the greeds of development.  In small towns and villages, we encountered many helpful and sincere people.  In major cities, like many in the world, people are all in a hectic life to get where they want.  Along the way, we also kept hearing news of conflicts in the world such as Thailand, Nepal, Ukraine etc and freakish weather in China, Iceland etc.

I have been trying to be contented with life and now I understood that first and foremost, I have to simplify my life.  To appreciate the simple things in life and treasure every moment I have with my family and friends.  These will help me to be contented with life and not fall into the vicious cycle of chasing after something.  I will try to live every moment as if it is my last.  I feel so blessed that I have everything.   

As a couple, we realised that the world is really big, too big for us to cover all.  After a while, it is just monuments after monuments.  However, there were a couple of trips in the past that we really enjoyed.  After analyzing further, we realised that it was the company of friends and family that made the big difference.  The experience of taking a journey with friends and family is different from trying to see sights after sights.  

With the Nepal riots worsening, we decided to take refuge at Suzanne and Wouter place in Amsterdam!  They totally rejuvenated us.  As such, we changed our journey objective and plans to meet friends and family instead!  We felt that there is no need for us to see the world.  Singapore is really a blessed country.  With no natural disasters, political strife, strikes, riots, we could not have asked for more.  Of course there will still be some places that we will still like to visit that will touch our hearts, either now or in the future with a different perspective.  That is why we are heading to Manchester!

To close, we have some loose criteria that will guide our future travels. First, to fulfill a dream we have.  Second, to enjoy the delicious food cos we are foodie! And last, the company of friends and family to experience something new and have fun together!