Travel Guide

Travel Guide: Southern California

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For about three years, I’ve been saying that someday I’m going to fly to San Diego, rent a car, and drive up the California coast to San Francisco. For whatever reason, I always envisioned spending two or three weeks alone and contemplating life’s purpose along the way. Somewhat of an On the Road dream, I suppose.

This year, for the first time, I didn’t spend the holidays with my family. Instead, I flew to LAX, rented a car, drove to San Diego to visit a friend who I haven’t seen since June, and then drove up the California coast to Costa Mesa to visit another friend who I haven’t seen since September, venturing further north to Malibu from there. Over the course of the week I met a number of people who had me laughing more than I have laughed in months. I felt light, carefree, happy, and optimistic about what is possible. The second half of 2016 was really tough for me and I could not have been happier to feel like my old self again.

San Diego and Around
With the aid of a cute little red rental car and a San Diego native (with whom I traveled to Laos in June) as my tour guide, I saw quite a bit of San Diego County and ate the most delicious Mexican food item I have ever had – a chile relleno burrito! Some of our stops included:

Del Mar, my first California beach experience:

Mount Soledad, with beautiful views of San Diego:

PB (Pacific Beach), where I got a real kick out of  winter Christmas decoration with palm trees and the beach in the background:

Coronado, which was just stunning:

Julian, an absolute gem of a town that looks like time forgot about it:

The interior of that used bookstore looked like this:

And you know how I feel about books!

We took a beautiful drive back from Julian along Route 78 and I took a break from driving to gaze out the window at the stunning valley:

Sunshine, blue skies, mountains, oceans. It’s no wonder everyone was so friendly and welcoming and actually seemed to care about the answer to the generic, “Hi, how are you?” that I heard everywhere I went.

Costa Mesa and Around
After three nights in San Diego, it was time to drive north to Costa Mesa. I’d originally driven south from LAX in the dark so it was nice to see the same roads in daylight. The blue skies, beaches, and mountains adventure continued with a best friend from high school (also a travel partner in Hong Kong and Thailand) who moved to California three years ago. Our exploring included:

Top of the World hike at Laguna Beach, which was the warmest day of the week:

A drive to Long Beach to meet some more people, eat dinner, and have a night out:

Driving to Long Beach

Santa Monica, which we visited on a damp, chilly day that was still iconic and beautiful:

Los Angeles, where we took a quick nighttime walk around Staples Center before seeing a concert at the LA Convention Center:

Newport Beach, which was adorable and thoroughly enjoyable even though we got caught in the rain:

County Line Beach in Malibu to watch a stunning sunset on New Year’s Day:

This week was the perfect way to put a positive spin on the end of a strange year, as well as the perfect way to begin a new year – time with friends, full of laughter, exploring beautiful places.

I didn’t realize how much I needed this week and time with these people until I was fully immersed in it. As soon as I got in a taxi on the way to the airport in New York I felt a weight lift that I didn’t realize I was carrying. There was a physical lightness in my body for the week that I spent in California. The tension I normally carry in my back went away after a few days. Being around such good friends in such a beautiful place was physically and emotionally rejuvenating, which is all I can ask for.

Newport Beach

Hopefully in a summer or three I’ll fly again to LAX, rent a car, and drive up the California coast to San Francisco. I’m already excited for everything there is to see and experience. And something tells me I won’t be doing it alone.

Education

My (Mostly Accurate) 2016 Reading List

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Over the summer I started making an effort to keep track of what I’d read in 2016. But since I only started that list in July, my accuracy is questionable. I’m confident about what I’ve read from July until now, but the first half of the year is a bit of a blur. Some of these may have been 2015 reads. Real 2016 reads may have been left off the list. I’m not necessarily a proponent of New Year’s Resolutions, but I will do better next year.

For those who saw the list when I originally put it together back in November, I’ve added three asterisks (***) before each title that is new since then.

Nonfiction
The Age of Sustainable Development – Jeffrey Sachs
Altruism: The Power of Compassion to Change Yourself and the World – Matthieu Ricard
The Art of Happiness – Dalai Lama and Howard Cutler
The Art of Loving – Erich Fromm
***At the Same Time – Susan Sontag
Being Peace – Thich Nhat Hanh
Blood Oil: Tyrants, Violence, and the Rules that Run the World – Leif Weinar
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed – Jared Diamond
College: What It Is, Was, and Should Be – Andrew Delbanco
The Consolations of Philosophy – Alain De Botton
Creating Capabilities – Martha Nussbaum
Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead – Brené Brown
Doing Good Better: How Effective Altruism Can Help You Make a Difference – William MacAskill
Empowering Global Citizens: A World Course – Fernando Reimers et al.
Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less – Greg McKeown
Ethics – Benedict de Spinoza
***Ethics in the Real World: 82 Brief Essays on Things That Matter – Peter Singer
In Defense of a Liberal Education – Fareed Zakaria
Inside Coca-Cola: A CEO’s Life Story of Building the World’s Most Popular Brand – Neville Isdell and David Beasley
Moral Failure: On the Impossible Demands of Morality – Lisa Tessman
The Moral Landscape: How Science Can Determine Human Values – Sam Harris
***On Inequality – Harry G. Franfurt
On Writing – Stephen King
***Paddle Your Own Canoe: One Man’s Fundamentals for Delicious Living – Nick Offerman
Peace Education – Nel Noddings
***The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress, and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies – Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee
***Sex at Dawn: How We Mate, Why We Stray, and What It Means for Modern Relationships – Christopher Ryan and Cacilda Jethà
Stubborn Attachments: A Vision for a Society of Free, Prosperous, and Responsible Individuals – Tyler Cowen
Sustainable Well-Being: Concepts, Issues, and Educational Practices – edited by Frank Deer et al.
What Kind of Creatures Are We? – Noam Chomsky
Who’s in Charge?: Free Will and the Science of the Brain – Michael S. Gazzaniga
Zen in the Art of Writing – Ray Bradbury

Fiction
11/22/63 – Stephen King
***Back When We Were Grownups – Anne Tyler
The Beautiful and Damned – F. Scott Fitzgerald
Black Tickets – Jayne Anne Phillips
The Bridge of San Louis Rey – Thornton Wilder
The Brothers Karamazov – Fyodor Dostoyevsky
The Course of Love – Alain De Botton
The Dharma Bums – Jack Kerouac
The Idiot – Fyodor Dostoyevsky
***The Imperfectionists – Tom Rachman
Hard-Boiled Wonderland and the End of the World – Haruki Murakami
***Horns – Joe Hill
John Dies at the End – David Wong
The Martian Chronicles – Ray Bradbury
Mister Pip – Lloyd Jones
People of the Book – Geraldine Brooks
Rabbit, Run – John Updike
Sharp Objects – Gillian Flynn
The Stranger – Albert Camus
Tender is the Night – F. Scott Fitzgerald
This Side of Paradise – F. Scott Fitzgerald

Happy reading!

New York

‘Tis the Season

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Celebrations in all cultures take place throughout the year, but we are particularly aware of that in December. My family joins about 8% of the US population in not celebrating Christmas, but we do have our own traditions over that holiday that are as stereotypical as one can imagine.

Like most of my friends growing up, we eat Asian takeout (Thai on Christmas Eve and Chinese on Christmas Day) and go to the movies. Sometimes we go bowling. We look forward to it and are excited about it. However, since Judaism follows a lunar calendar and our holidays move around it is also always exciting when Chanukah coincides with Christmas. Chanukah began on Christmas Eve this year, which is only the eighth time this has happen in the last century!

In my family, that meant a lot of traditions at once. Thai food, the new Star Wars movie, and opening the usual first night gifts of a holiday themed tissue box and a box of Chanukah candles. Unfortunately, I missed it. I leave tomorrow to spend my week of school break visiting friends who I haven’t seen in a while and I’m very much looking forward to it!

Our week off started yesterday (not a day too soon, considering the number of students and teachers out sick) and one of my best girls from Singapore who is visiting her family came into Manhattan for a day and a night. The weather yesterday was beautiful and sunny so we spent most of the day wandering around downtown and stopping for shakshuka, coffee, mulled wine, and Mexican food. I love the parts of Manhattan that don’t match the glitter that makes Manhattan a tourist destination.

One World Trade Center as seen from Chinatown
Little Italy
Chinatown
Manhattan Bridge Arch
Greek Orthodox Church in Chinatown

And then there’s my ongoing obsession with street art like this one on the Lower East Side . . .

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. . . and these in Little Italy. . . .

Today is day two of school break and it has been equally delightful. As is any day that begins with bagels.

I passed by this church in the East Village today that reminded me what actually matters not only during the holidays, but on especially on the holidays:

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At the end of the day, we’re all just trying to make a living in the best ways that we can. My holiday wish for all is that it gets easier.

To the cashier at Trader Joe’s today who folded my receipt into a paper airplane and zoomed it into my shopping bag;
to the Nepalese woman I met this evening who told me about the devastation last year’s earthquakes wreaked on her family;
to the baristas who made my hot chocolate, asked about my day, and told me that holiday overtime pay doesn’t exist in New York City;
to people everywhere putting one foot in front of the other, day after day:
Happy holidays, from my home to yours.

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On loving, learning, and living