Category: Uncategorized

San Diego, CA- Ocean Beach

Okay, so it has been a while since I moved to San Diego permanently from LA for my current job. I have been to San Diego a few times in the past. Now that I am a local, I still take the time to tour around this vibrant place like a tourist. I have also briefly lived and traveled to northern California. The first thing everyone asks me is how do I like it here so far, especially compared to L.A.? My answer is, I freaking love it here. There is no place like San Diego for me in the US, hands down. I still get to enjoy the crisp So. Cal weather, while it is not too extreme because of the proximity to the pacific ocean. The traffic is way better compared to LA and San Francisco. The whole environment is a lot more relaxed than L.A. And should I mention that the San Diegans are a lot more chill as people. It perhaps has to do with the nice view and environment.

Whether you are taking a trip here or a local, there are always some hidden gems even in the most visited destinations. So I will share my San Diego (as well as other places) tour experience in series. I love taking snaps and I always try to hit some nearby places to check out the food. So if you are like me, this post is for you.

When I first moved to San Diego permanently, the first local places that I checked out was the ocean beach area. It has this nice, touristy and hippy vibe. There are few tourist hostels and it is always hustling and bustling with foreigners and Americans traveling from other states.

When I was taking a walk to the beach, one day I noticed a sand merman made by an artist. The next day he made a mermaid for the merman (in a photo below you can see the artist working on them). I did not continue there for the rest of the week, so I don’t know if he added some babies for the couple, LOL.

Lonely merman
Merman got his mermaid, thanks to the artist

Some more pictures-

I went to the Ocean Beach Pier Cafe to try some seafood. This is a no-frills place. But the view and food are amazing. I usually share my travel and food pictures on my Instagram

I loved this ice-cream waffle sandwich place so much. It is called Lighthouse Ice Cream.

I went to a cafe nearby, with a nice view. This place is called Shades Oceanfront Bistro-

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They also have great lobster soup.

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#seafood lobster soup with dipped bisuit

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Another place I did try to go is called Hodads. This place is really popular at Ocean Beach for its burgers. I went on Sunday and I found a long line waiting outside of that place.

There are many other food places including gourmet seafood to local Asian food. I have not tried them all yet.

Forgot the name of this place but it is in Ocean Beach, on the same left lane that Lighthouse Ice Cream shop is. This place has some really good Asian plate combos.

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#asianfood

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I hope you have enjoyed this blog post. I will come with more posts later.

Check out my other posts in San Diego:

San Diego, CA-Mission Beach and La Jolla Cove

Cabrillo National Monument & The Rosecrans National Cemetery (San Diego, CA)

Thought of The Night- Law of Attraction

10/20/2016

8:56 PM

I’m writing another weird post before going to bed today. Two days ago, I was expressing my opinion about reincarnation. If you have not read it yet, then read it here: Reincarnation

Today I want to talk about the Law of attraction. No, I am not giving tips on how to attract people to make romantic relationships. I am going to emphasize how, with our positive thoughts, we attract more positivity in our lives and with negativity we do the complete opposites. Although, that goes for relationships as well.

One day I was going to my work, it was a perfect sunny morning in San Diego and the view was amazing. I was thinking about a personal problem that I was facing at that time. Then I realized, the state of well-being is generated through our mind. And if you are unhappy, it doesn’t matter whether the surrounding area is like a paradise, you still don’t enjoy it. It becomes really important at that point to shift all your energy to a positive state. Life is too short and everything is temporary. I asked myself, why am I not enjoying the morning with this great weather and ocean view on my way to work? I should be rather grateful that I am alive and well.

When I go through some stress nowadays, I tell myself that it is nothing and I have had tougher times in my life before. With patience comes ease. During my dark times, when I was not finding any hope and I was almost losing my confidence in me, there is one verse from Al-Quran that changed my whole outlook towards life. There is no bigger truth than this for me.

“…..And whosoever fears Allah(God) and keeps his duty to Him, He will make a way for him to get out of all hardships.
And he will provide him from sources unimaginable to him. And whosoever puts his trust in Allah, then He will suffice him.” (65: 2-3)

At the core of my concept of the law of attraction is thanking God almighty and asking him for help to make positive changes in my life.

Thought of The Night (about reincarnation)

Yes, not a thought of the day. Every day I plan at work, when I get home I will finish a lot of housekeeping tasks. But when I finally get home, after taking a shower and having dinner, I lose all the energy. I just feel like curling up on the bed while reading something or writing something in my diary. Recently I have started blogging. But I leave story/article writing for the weekends. So I have decided to write “thought of the night” before going to bed (once in a while at least, if not regularly).

10/18/2016

9:02 PM

I do not believe in reincarnation. But in physics, according to the law of conservation of energy,

“Energy can neither be created nor destroyed; rather, it transforms from one form to another.”

We are all made out of energy. Our souls are energy. Perhaps when people die, people’s souls transform into different levels or types of energy. My mom says, “dreams don’t come true in one generation.” We have come this far in evolution through the sacrifices of our ancestors and some of us are probably finishing our previous generations’ unfinished business (or un-achieved dreams). This goes on and on from generation to generation. We pass our passion through our DNA to our off-springs as a form of some already-existing information imprinted into our consciousness (not only in our genes). It is also possible that each of our souls is a transformation of the collective consciousness of many souls, not just one soul.

Now, there are true stories of people who remembered their past lives incidents and have been able to prove their claims. I am not saying it cannot happen. God almighty can make anything happen and some people might have been given those rare chances. But if you believe in monotheistic religious concepts, I would like to ask the age-old common question: that if there is a day of judgment, heaven, and hell, then for which of our lives we will be punished or rewarded, if we had many lives? If we really had many births, why most of us cannot recall those past lives? What is the point of being born many times if you cannot remember what you did right or wrong the last time?

My opinion is, it is partly due to our DNA from our ancestors and partly having a developed soul from previously transformed soul(s), we feel like we are being reincarnated. But each of us is given only one life on earth and this is a test for us. Our spirits are part of God almighty who is the supreme source of energy, we came from him and eventually, we will all go back to him after death.

What is your opinion on this?

Life Hack Tips: HOW To Make Good Decisions

Previously I have posted an article about when we should avoid making important life decisions. If you have not read it, then check this out:

Life Hack Tips: When you should NOT make a big decision (by Tasnia Ponkti)

As I promised there, I am writing a follow-up article on “how” to make good decisions in life. It is going to be a long post, so bear with me. These are the 7 vital steps to make good decisions in life:

1. Know what you want in your life:

Some people find it really difficult to figure out exactly what they want in life. Everyone should have an underlying constitution in their life. What do I mean by that? The Constitution does not change very often with every small change. So your personal values should not change with every step that you take in your life.know

For example, let us think about career options. Well, what kind of person are you? What really hooks you when you think about career planning? Is it money, fame, honor, wisdom or is it power? Do not do something because the rest of society is doing it or your family and peers want you to do it.

2. Do your own research:

It is important to be resourceful and informative before making a decision. This is related to the previous point. My mother says, “In order to know what you don’t know, you must know something.” It is important to ask the right questions. How do you start asking the right questions? By knowing your available options and gathering information about those options. Evaluate the pros and cons of a decision.

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For example,  I frequently answer this type of question on Quora. People ask questions like what are the minimum requirements of a certain university in a certain department? The real answer is, it should already be listed on that university’s official website. That is where doing your own research and gathering basic information comes into play.  Now suppose you are deciding your options of attending colleges and you have already been selected into a handful of them. Now how do you make the final decision? In no particular order, the aspects would be major/field, educational value, the rank of the school, ROI (return of investments i.e the current prospects of alumni), cost of attendance and cost of living in the area, weather, vibe and atmosphere of the campus, professors rating, etc. Note that you have to re-arrange these options based on your priority and you also need to physically tour the campus to make your decision.

3.Seek an expert’s opinion/help:

It is more like seeking experts and experienced people’s opinions, but at the end of the day make your own decision. Whether it is about education or renting/buying a house, or starting a new career (I have found from my personal experience that) sometimes there are options available beyond what people think they know. Everyone’s advice is somewhat subjective based on their own experience or personal hidden motives but still, it is important to ask the same question to many people around to get different perspectives and honest criticism. From my harsh personal experience, I have faced many discouragements and many rejections, and sometimes heavy criticism from people including closed ones. Whether it was about moving to a new place or applying to a more competitive university or a job- I heard a lot of “no”s because people thought I simply did not have what it takes. That is when my own resourcefulness came in handy. I still kept trying via different options and finally got what I wanted.expert.png

Another thing I have learned, just because someone thinks they are the expert or spent some time in a given career field, does not necessarily mean they can correctly predict everything about a new career option. Which means sometimes there are just no experts and you become your own expert. Have you ever read the monkey’s story? Sometimes people also discourage because they think you cannot do it, as they have never done it or they just don’t want you to do it. So if you are pursuing something very ambitious, keep your ultimate goal to yourself, while you still seek advice from different people. Take advice but do not get persuaded by one-sided strong opinions.

4.  Think rationally but do not over-analyze situations:

While it is important to think rationally and seek different views from people, there are certain things in life we tend to make worse, when we over-analyze. Especially when it comes to selecting a partner for a long-term relationship. Trust your instinct or gut feeling. If you have doubts about a certain person, chances are there is something wrong. Our intuition is a gift to us, so it is better to use it when it is required. It is important to listen effectively, observe people and situation analytically. We have to use a balance of rationality and intuition in most cases. There is nothing wrong with being emotional but it needs to be in check.

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5. Take action:

Now that you have researched all your options, asked for advice, thought about critically using your best judgment, narrowed down to your final decision about what you want in your life-finally it is time to simply just do it. This is the hardest part for many of us. With the advent of the internet and so many online resources, we sometimes spend a lot of time trying to find a solution but somehow still put the final action on hold. Chances are, if you are reading this, you are doing it as well.

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For example, I have spent some time thinking about blogging. Like many of you, I searched many online posts about how to blog, top topics to blog, how to make money by blogging…blah blah, etc. Finally, I thought, isn’t it enough that I love to write as a hobby? And should I just do it for the pure fun of writing and sharing my thoughts? Then I started doing it. Once you start on something, it gets easier to continue even after some initial trials and errors.

6. Be positive, patient and persistent:

Everyone wants to see the result quickly. I was talking about blogging in the previous point. But it’s not just blogging; anything, almost anything good in life, takes time to prosper and grow. Nothing happens overnight. It is really hard to be positive and patient while you are going through a lot in life and want to see the immediate results. Persistence is a whole new level of skill which transforms an ordinary newbie into a successful expert in the field. I have seen many intelligent people lack this skill, which reminds me that persistence is more important than talent or intelligence to succeed in life.

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For example, suppose you are looking for a job in your career and have sent hundreds and thousands of applications. You are unemployed or under-employed for a long time. It is hard for you to smile with positivity and act like you are fine while deep down you are feeling the burning of financial stress every moment. No matter how hard the battle gets, keep doing what you’re doing. Keep tweaking your process. If you are sending so many applications and receiving no interview calls, chances are, you are desperately trying almost anything and not what you are really good at. Narrow down your job search based on your field of specialization and your area of interest. Do not send the same generic resume/CV everywhere. People talk about networking so much these days. What is it really? It is about finding the right-minded people in your career who will guide and champion you to your next career destination. Find those people and keep sharing your goals and ideas with them. I personally got into places just by having a conversation about my ideas.

7. Accept the failure and keep moving on:

Did I mention trial and error in one of my previous points? One of the biggest tests of patience is accepting failure and keep going. The reason why we spend so much time seeking answers and not taking action is that we fear failure. Learn from yours and others’ mistakes, make the changes you need to make in your approach and no matter what happens, keep moving on. Never change your goal but be ready to change your methods to reach it. Never stop. You never know how close you are to your destination. I have seen many people giving up when they were very close to reaching their goals. Remember, the final few steps are always harder.

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Note that numbers 5, 6 & 7 are part of being a farm in the decision.

Thanks for reading.

A Date Night On Mars

A Date Night-

Lana is sitting next to a giant oval-shaped window in a cafe called “Cafe Blue Moon”. She asks Kee, her boyfriend, in her thoughts (through her implanted bio-cell chip) how long Kee will take to come. While waiting for him, she is looking at the vast Martian reddish landscape with a bright greenish tint of the artificial earthlike atmosphere layer created from the nearby ozone-house.

She had a chance to go back to visit Earth a few years ago. Earth is not the same anymore. Even with all the damage that human species caused to Mother Earth, she is still far better than Mars in Lana’s opinion. Although quite extreme and unpredictable, Earth still has a breathable atmosphere for humans. Lana is nostalgic about the moonlit night experience she had while staring at the present otherworldly scenery. It was the first time she stepped outside on Earth’s surface without a special suit and an ozonic helmet. She breathed fresh air for the first time in her life, but was informed it is not fresh anymore, still, it reminded her as if she is home. Now she is telling herself, “Cafe Blue Moon what an ironic name for a cafe on Mars!”

Back Story –

It is 2233 now, 200 years since humans first made a manned journey to Mars. Lana and Kee are middle-class Martian people, but their ancestors were privileged earthlings who left Earth in the face of catastrophe. She read from the diaries of her great grandparents that it took human civilization many years to make a major leap from landing on earth’s moon to step foot on Mars, and eventually colonizing Mars through a lot of trial and error. There were a lot of socio-political and economic obstacles against this great step of human evolution. Some people even mocked at this idea, saying, why do we need to spend money to die on Mars when there are so many real problems we should fix on our earth? But by 2050 things had gone so out of hand that now rich people were spending money to relocate to Mars, to escape away from the horror of wars and terror. Some people till this date blame the oil industry behind the demise of our beloved earth. They say the oil industry is a key player behind the environmental disaster, politics, wars, terror, greed and the major cause of keeping the advanced energy-saving and space-based technology away from the general public for a long time. There are still a few under-privileged humans left on Earth who are trying to survive in harsh, extreme weather without much help from technology.

When Lana landed on Earth with her crew, from far away she was observing some people riding horses and wearing a primitive outfit made from animal skin. She read in the history book, that is how human civilization started and that is where earthlings are left to be now!

By the year 2100, a large number of people from Earth permanently left for Mars and some for other inhabitable planets. But Lana thinks the power play of human species never stopped. There is still a social division based on economic status. People who belong to the wealthy and privileged upper class are trying to colonize the Earth-like planets in nearest neighborhood galaxies. This is not a recent breakthrough. In fact, it has been going around for a while, in parallel with the struggle of artificially making Mars-like planets habitable.  The people in power want to control who takes the journey to the special habitable planets. They have already sent selected people to spaceships, putting them to sleep in cryogenic hibernation. There are only rumored stories on how far these spaceships have gone. But these are classified projects that are beyond the reach of people like Lana and Kee. Some say, Martian humans, have mastered the technology of artificial warm whole and anti-matter propulsion systems a long time ago and has already put it into use to travel to very far places in the universe. Again, there is no way to verify this by middle-class Martians, this might be another rumor. Lana thinks that history is repeating itself, that instead of making all innovation and knowledge accessible to the general public, the upper class is controlling it for their own selfish agenda.

Every human baby born by now on Mars is genetically engineered and people’s life expectancy, thus has increased dramatically eliminating all possible hereditary diseases. Some WiFi enabled bio-chips are installed in their bodies which help them to communicate through their mind without using any words. They can search for any information in their head and they can also create holographic virtual screens to project information through their body parts. This widespread technology uses human’s coherent thoughts to do things that early computers or cell phones would do. Because of all these bio-implants, people argue that they are not fully human anymore. They are artificial human beings, previously termed cyborgs. The physical, demographic and capability of each individual is controlled by the authority- creating differences or diversity among people.

The sophisticated AI  industry has changed the game of the private transportation industry completely, while public transportation is a majorly Hyperloop technology-based. All private/individual transportation modes are fully autonomous. Whenever a person calls his or her mode of transportation in the head, it appears at convenient locations and it reads fingerprints of the owner to get started for the journey. It is almost like owning autonomous horses who can also switch gears to fly. Some of this technology was already developed on earth, human species just have taken it with them in outer space and have been modifying it ever since.

Back at the present moment-

Lana and Kee, unlike the current Martian youngsters, are very romantic. They love to read about the world’s and human civilization’s ancient history, poetry, literature and like to enjoy old classic films together. They often do things to create the old world charms and romanticism.

Lana is just about to ask one more time, what is happening to Kee? Although Kee can easily reply through his telepathic concepts, he decided to do something different. He sent a robotic bird with an envelope to Lana. When Lana opened the envelope, a holographic screen came out of it and it reads in Kee’s voice, “Something important came up at the last minute sweetie! I cannot come today. I am sorry… I love you.”

(©This blog post is not for reproduction without permission)

Photo courtesy: SpaceX Envisions Building a City on Mars. Seriously.

Read Next: Martian Tabloid (Game of Thrones)

Also, read:

Space Dream!

Kora-The Heavenly Cat

Kora was my brother’s cat. She was adopted when she was a few months old. She is a very sweet and shy cat. You probably have seen countless mischievous cat videos online. But she is an exception. She does not give a hard time to anyone, stays mostly indoors, she has a few favorite spots around the house to sit and scratch. Her favorite list keeps changing but her all-time favorite space is always next to the windows.

She hides underneath the bed or sofa when she sees a stranger. She does not mingle with everyone but if she picks you then that means you are special. I’ve always loved cats but never had one of my own. So whenever I would go to visit my sister’s place (my brother lived in my sister’s home), I would spend time with Kora. My sister has two very sweet dogs as well. I am not a very big fan of big pets. All three of them (cat: Kora, dogs: Cheeky & Woofy) are small and very sweet animals. Spending time with Kora means basically watching TV or doing something on the laptop while she very cozily sits next to me slowly wagging her furry tail. But I never have seen her asking for attention, well, she did occasionally from my brother but not from the rest of us.

I would only see her occasionally and hear stories about her from my brother. Then a lot of things happened in my life. I finished my electrical engineering degree and went through a lot of job interviews. That time of job seeking and unemployment (or I should say underemployment) was rough. No, it was not like a fairy tale as everyone believes, you don’t always land a decent engineering job right away even if you are the best of students, come from a well-known school, have many “relevant” experience under your belt. That is a whole different story of how I overcame that short dark period and landed in something that was beyond my expectations at that time. So fast forward to everything that happened, let’s assume I got two job offers: Job A & B around the same time.  While I was at job A, I figured out in a few days that I am in a wrong place, got an offer from job B and was going through the employment process of Job B. Job A is not what was promised, career-wise not very fulfilling, pays a low salary and makes people work for an insane amount of hours without overtime pay (on exempt salary). Job B is a dream job for many to start their career in my field, it pays according to industry standard, great work-life balance, career-wise provides meaningful work and is located in a ridiculously gorgeous area. Job B takes time to process due to security clearance requirements. I was tired and fed up of being at A, it was sucking the life out of me and I was praying to God almighty to get me out of here ASAP. Finally, I could not take it anymore and decided to quit A and spend the remaining time of the job B process at my sister’s place.

My brother had moved to his college dorm, so I was staying in his room with his cat Kora. I did not inform anyone in detail except my mom about the job B offer. Because of the things that I have been through, it was hard to grasp at that time that this was happening to me, that I got an offer from them and it is just a matter of time to finish the clearance process. I have a clean slate so passing the extensive background check was not an issue for me. But I was still going through a mild depression because I did not know how much longer the process would take. There is a general time frame but because it defers for each individual, the officials would never say anything specific in an email or on the phone. There was another prospect of job C but they would only go forward if for some reason I would not finally go with job B.

So when I came to my sister’s place, I was an apparent idiot in my siblings’ eyes who quit her only job at that time. I said there is a possibility of job B but did not reveal yet that I got it and just waited for the process to be over.

The first day when I entered into my brother’s room I turned the light on and I saw Kora continuously meowing. I closed the door, sat on the bed and she is asking for attention, which is very unlikely of her. I texted my brother and he replied how Kora misses his company because my brother is not home anymore except for the weekend. Kora does not mingle with other family members. I think cats have this strong sense about who loves them and they would only seek those people. I took her in my lap and rubbed her belly and as she was purring, I was crying. I knew deep down that I did not do anything wrong by quitting that job but I was stressing on the fact that “what if” something goes wrong and I don’t get a start date from job B? Vacationing in a relative’s house is different than living in there during your hard time.

In the middle of the night, Kora would wake me up, tap my hands asking to pet her, kiss my nose with her nose and rub her scent on me with her head. I would gently pet her and calm her down. I would imagine if I die now I can go to heaven with this cat, I would contemplate she and I are sitting next to a heavenly tropical waterfall. Then I discovered, whenever I was depressed, she would ask me to pet her. As if she is trying to divert my attention from negative thoughts. Animals do have telepathy. I believe that.

That evening was her playtime. I would point laser light on the floor, on the wall and she would try to catch it. There were other cat toys too, to play with her. Every day she would very promptly during that time ask me to play with her. At first, I did not understand, why all of a sudden it seemed like she was trying to verbally communicate through her meowing. My brother said she is asking for something. She does not do that to everyone but asks me because she knows how I was taking care of her. I thought that was very adorable.

Then finally that day came when I heard the good news of getting a start date from job B. Thank goodness it was only a few weeks and my prayers were answered. It was time for me to move on. I was supposed to adopt Kora in my brother’s absence. That seemed most appropriate. But renting in San Diego is a whole different story. I live in northern California. While San Diego is not San Francisco, I know, it is still very expensive, especially the main San Diego county area. And why wouldn’t it be, it is the happiest and the most vibrant place in the United States. The beauty, the beaches, the Pacific ocean, the crisp and wonderful weather, so many things to do here. But bringing your own pet is a special struggle for a renter, most properties don’t allow pets if they do they must be cats or small dogs but with a high deposit and monthly extra fees. I could not afford it at that time. One of my co-workers suggested that I could adopt her as an assistive animal. And why not, she is a very therapeutic cat. But I thought about that and figured out, I am very busy and I don’t have much time to look after her. She would have to spend all day in a tiny apartment that I am currently in. It won’t be much different than her current situation in my brother’s absence. I want her to stay in a better place where she is better-taken care of.

So we decided to give her up for adoption. She is in a different place now. Wherever she is, I hope she is having a great time, getting all the love and care that she deserves. Thanks, Kora for giving me company during a tough time!