Sleepy in Seattle

#213

After several nights of contemplation, and a year of trying to get a work permit to work in the US, we’ve finally made it! Made the move from a 35 degree Celsius (95 degree F), sunny city to a 50 degree Fahrenheit (10 degree Celsius), rainy, gloomy one. Battling few days of jet lag, “midnights” literally “became my afternoons”[2]. Though the entire day looks and feels pretty much the same, we needed to get our sleep times fixed and start working from Monday onwards.

Almost everything’s different - from the size of the dishes to their flavors (yes I’m gonna type in American spelling from now on) to the water to the spellings to the weather to the way people greet each other to the culture and diversity to the prices to the socket type to the driving direction to the metric system and several other things! There are fun parts and there are challenging parts. How to have fun while tackling the challenging parts is the main objective.

In our first week, we tried Mexican cuisine at Chipotle, Thai at Thai Ginger, Italian at Tutta Bella, Pizza at Zeek’s, and a vegan salad at Evergreens. No matter what, Chipotle will always rank #1, in terms of the price, portion, and flavor, probably because of its similarity to Indian cuisine (rice, beans, spices and sauces, spice level, and veggies). We're averaging 10,000 steps a day just by walking to different places - as long as you have your woolen gear on, good shoes, and the will and proclivity to walk, you will enjoy exploring the city. We shopped at Target and WFM (Whole Foods Market), spending the first thirty minutes in bewilderment of new kinds of things like rainbow carrots and new types of fruits and veggies, and the latter thirty fumbling with self-checkout. Well, there's a first time for everything, and following John 16:24 ("Ask, and you shall receive"), we have asked for help, and promptly received useful assistance and gotten by.

Week 1 verdict: so far so good. Accomplished quite a number of things related to house and work setup, meeting a number of people, and purchasing winter wear. Looking forward to a more productive Week 2.

Notes:

1. The title references Sleepless in Seattle, a rom-com movie starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan

2. “Midnights become my afternoons” - 2nd line in Taylor Swift’s song ‘Anti-Hero’ from her latest album Midnights