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Comfortably uncomfortable

My latest adventure through India

Here we go again. I’ve been on another long adventure. It’s been a special journey that I feel incredibly fortunate to have undertaken. I told myself in the summer of 2022 that this was a winter I wasn’t to spend at home. The bleak lockdowns during the previous two winters and general robotic routine of working from home had caught up with me. I’d been…

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Run, Shonak, run!

My journey preparing for a marathon

Running for the first time during the first COVID lockdown proved to be transformative to my physical fitness. It became a staple in my weekly exercise routine – in fact, I can’t recall skipping a week in over a year. The rush and high at the end became quite addictive. I was quite content running my weekly 5K/10Ks, quietly setting a new personal best week…

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Looking up under lockdown

Keeping spirits high during these strange times

Yikes. Over a year without writing a blog post. Rest assured, I’m still alive and well, and I hope you are too. It’s probably the understatement of the year to say that life for us all has changed markedly over the past few months. It’s like we’re all stuck in a holding pattern, our lives seemingly on pause with lots of whispers of this being…

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Samboja Lestari

Giving a helping hand to some friends in Borneo

Those who know me well often groan when I subject them to my frequent ramblings about orangutans. As I’ve remarked on this blog before, I’ve long had a fascination with the human like tendencies of these great apes. Back in October 2019, I embarked on a two-week volunteering experience in Borneo. It was an action-packed trip, so brace yourself, this post is a long one….

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A rustic retreat

Research and relaxation in Bali

Back in October I jetted off yet again to South East Asia for a month-long combined holiday, volunteering and business trip across Indonesia and Singapore. Little did I know with the coronavirus raging across the world, this was to be my last overseas trip for some time to come. Here’s a recap of the first part of my trip as I visited the volcanic island of Bali…

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Rewilding Dundreggan

Joining Trees for Life on a conservation week in Scotland

The state of Earth’s forests has been of growing concern to me over the past few years. As the planet warms from the impacts of climate change, forests are our greatest natural weapon to counter rising carbon emissions and help us adapt to more volatile temperatures. Not to mention, they are home to over half of the earth’s biodiversity and wildlife. While the causes and rate of deforestation across the Amazon…

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Turning the tide

Success in my fight against single use plastics

We’ve been inundated this year about the impact of plastic pollution to the environment. Whether it’s images of sea creatures trapped in throwaway plastic containers or once pristine beaches now overcome with mountains of waste, it’s hard not to feel a sense of anger at the devastation that our wasteful society is inflicting on the natural world. As I’ve become aware of the plastics crisis…

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A fruitful endeavour

Building an irrigation system for some freshly potted plants

With spring in full bloom, this was the year I’d try my hand at gardening. What started off as a Sunday stroll through a garden centre ended up being quite a sizeable project. Over the course of this summer I’ve been busy planting my own fruit and vegetables, and – in part due to my own laziness – building a solar powered irrigation system to…

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Pastures new

Embarking on a new career opportunity

Yesterday I concluded my 7-year career at US investment bank J.P. Morgan. Since joining as an intern in the summer 2011, my experience with the bank has fundamentally built the platform for my future career. Looking back, I’ve grown in more ways than I realise. But this year I promised myself to find my passion and look hard for a new challenge. My time at…

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Big Sur

A heavenly drive along the Pacific Coast Highway

The final destination on our road-trip was further up the Californian coast in the serene region of Big Sur. The Pacific Coast Highway was closed due to a major landslide in 2017 which buried part of the road, so the satnav suggested we stick to Highway 101 North for 100 miles which I wasn’t particularly excited about. After a brief visual inspection on Google maps,…

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