Happy New Year
Wishing you the best for 2024
I’m starting this newsletter while I’m waiting for my flight back to Palmerston North. Since Christmas day, I’ve been strolling around Perth. The main reason for attending was for a friend's wedding and to reunite with some university mates, but also, I also had some days to myself to explore Perth and embrace solitude in a city I had never travelled to before.
The first few days were consumed with loneliness. When I used to travel solo (which is not often), I had this weird obsession that I had to make the most of it by performing some activity or I would be missing out. I felt like most people would be travelling with friends or as a couple and they always knew what to do, while I would be a bit clueless about what to do.
This time was different, sort of. I made the intention to go with the flow and not worry too much about doing things to build a rap sheet of things I got up to. Activities like walking around an unfamiliar city, sitting in a coffee shop on my laptop, and using the opportunity to break up the normal routine being by myself will suffice.
While I was away I was able to rework one of my web applications. It contains calculators for optometrists.
The inspiration to create this type of application stems from the fact that I would at times misquote spectacles for patients. Often I would quote the stock lens option instead of the grind lens option (which is more expensive). This came down to not calculating the minimum blank size. Oops! It wasn’t a fun conversation to have with patients, I can tell you that!
Here is the live demo of the application: https://optom.tools.
Some other success:
I found this nice Thai restaurant. The staff there were so lovely that I went back again and they remembered that I was attending a wedding.
One of favourite things I did was visit the WA Museum Boola Bardic. There is so much to do, I wish I could do more of it. They had audio tours as well as a live tour where I learnt about Aboriginal culture — particular of the culture close to Western Australia. I also learn that Rottness Island, which is a popular tourist spot, had Aboriginal prisons and labour camps.
The initial accommodation I stayed at wasn’t particularly great. But that wasn’t a worry because it was adequate for sleeping and that’s it. This forced me to get out and about, which I’m grateful I did.
A few days of solitude was finally met with catching up with friends at a wedding. And these friends I’ve known for a decade. I know the goal of solitude is to be comfortable with your own thoughts, but at the the same time it was a lot of refreshing to see familiar faces.
It’s so great to be a part of your friend’s special day. Congratulations!
At the wedding I met some interesting individuals:
A person opposite me was writing their first book which is due to be published this year
I also met a person who switched careers from dentistry to property development
To top it off, we had a few days to catch up after the wedding (minus the friend getting married, of course, who had other obligations).
Some interesting conversations and thoughts did crop up:
Proposed marriages
Having children
The difficulties of communication as an optometrist
Maybe I can talk about them in futures issues. What do you think?
Have a good new years! And good luck for 2024. It’s 10:40pm on New Years day. It took me 2 days to write this due to procrastination. I’m hoping it won’t be the case for the future. I plan to journal more and note down more of my thoughts of the week but the motivation to bang these newsletters out in a single sitting is dwindling.
Enough complaining.
Stay focused and talk soon,
Shivan
My Favourite Things
Book — Doing It by Hannah Winton
I just finished this book and it’s a book I wish I had growing up. Hannah Witton is a YouTuber whose channel focuses on better educating the masses about sex. My key takeaways from this book talk about being single and being okay with it. There is this concept of the “other half”, but we are in fact whole already. Cuddles and having someone to share life with would be amazing, but we should be okay with ourselves. We should be okay with being alone — else we pick abuse over being alone.
Movie — “The Rabbit-proof Fence”
Keeping in themes of Western Australia, this movie follows three half-white, half-Aboriginal individuals, Molly, Daisy and Grace. We see them taken from their families due to the current laws at the time that result in individuals who are half-white and half-Aboriginal to be taken away from their families. This was in the effort to “protect” Aboriginal populations.
Quote of the Week
