witsandnuts

Oh well, I have been absent for a long time. Again.

Life has been so colorful, crazy, zombie-like, more than busy, but overall happy the past months. One of the reasons for this is being so consumed by my post-graduate studies. I have been at the last stage of thesis writing and now jumped to the exciting yet quite agonizing stage of waiting for my final mark.

Atlantic City, New Jersey

New York skyline after sunset viewed from Top of the Rock

San Francisco skyline viewed from Twin Peaks

Los Angeles skyline viewed from Griffith Observatory

I am still not over the fact that I finally had a close to a month (including the weekends) break from work, i.e. when I travelled to US . And I do not think that this length of vacation will be granted again. Haha. My annual leave history shows that the longest I have been away is 10 working days. Hence, it became so normal to me to be taking whirlwind holidays outside the UAE, even as short as 5 days. I sometimes think that it is a curse (though most of the time I look at it as a big blessing) being indispensable.

Wall Street, New York

Anyway, you probably know that we have got a four-day weekend in the UAE because of Eid Al Adha. Hence, I promised myself that I would really blog at least one entry this time. I thought I will share some snapshots from my US trip last July.

Grand Canyon, Arizona

It was my first visit to US and I flew on 4th July. As I am pursuing a work-life balance (aha!) and peace of mind, I thought my trip would entail some sacrifice so that my thesis completion will not suffer. Therefore, a portion of my 13-hour flight from Abu Dhabi to JFK airport (New York), few nights or dawn in between, and from Los Angeles to Abu Dhabi have been spent working on my thesis. Onwards to US while in the plane, I wanted to punch myself because it was like self-punishment. But what is a ‘small’ sacrifice for a non-cramming mindset while walking on the streets of US and minimized cramming when this grand vacation is over. Of course, postponing this much deserved unwinding was never an option.

The ever enchanting Times Square, New York

In summary, I moved from East to West. I was able to visit New York, New Jersey, Sacramento, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Arizona, Los Angeles, Old Temecula and other areas nearby, before finally heading back to Abu Dhabi.

I would be writing more about the US trip in the coming weeks. For now, I am just so pleased that I have finally started sorting some photos from this trip. Well, apart from packing and unpacking, the sorting of thousands of travel photos from the GoPro, camera phone and another digital camera has become one of the milestones of a traveler’s life nowadays.

Sausalito, California

A bridge in Oldtown Temecula (California) which is equally charming as the bridges of Golden Gate, Brooklyn and Manhattan.

It will be October soon yet I still have separation anxiety about this trip. That means that I enjoyed the entirety of it. But the key to it is the people I spent time with while there.