Hello World!

Welcome to my first blog post!

During 2020 we've all faced difficult and different challenges. Some people have felt completely isolated and bored, furloughed from work, alone at home unable to go out or meet people. Others have been working extra hard, like key workers providing already stretched services covering for sick colleagues. Anyone with school age children has faced the mad rush of trying to balance working from home, home schooling the children and trying to keep up with the housework for a home that is fully occupied 24/7.

However before all of this started I joined an authorship programme to get back to the joy of writing. Over the year the programme was completed online. Early on we were putting some small pieces together about our thoughts and motivations. Eventually we put these together on Medium.com - here's my first piece published back in May:

https://medium.com/@gauravprinja/the-joy-of-reading-and-writing-3e931f568d27

On Star Wars Day ("May the fourth" ~ "May the force") my wife and I decided to start watching through the Star Wars films. It took us over a month to watch the eleven films - stealing 45 minutes or an hour after the children were asleep. My wife and I juggled working from home and home schooling taking two-hour shifts during the day. We'd often "finish work" at seven or eight o'clock - just in time to get the kids fed, bathed and to bed - though with the lack of physical activity this would often be after 9pm. After this I had writing assignments and my wife needed to revise (She's a medical registrar and planned to sit her final exit exams in September 2020). To find a way to calm my mind from all the stress I tried chanting a mantra. The obvious choice at the time was “I’m one with the Force and the Force is with me” from Rogue One: A Star Wars Story but after a while it dawned on me that I was mindlessly muttering: “I’ll do the dishes, and then the laundry” - Sadly I did not experience a sense of calm and oneness with the Force!

Around this time we were assigned a task to write an argumentative piece about how the Covid-19 pandemic would change the world. Seeing this as an academic assignment to test our abilities to convince the reader of a view point that they may not share, I decided to try to argue exactly the opposite of what I thought. Writing a piece arguing that Covid would not change anything. I gathered evidence, data, statistics and put together (what I thought) was a relatively convincing argument - then we were told that this piece was also meant to be published online! Not really wanting to come across as devoid of any sense, I modified the article a bit before publishing - you can see it here:

https://medium.com/@gauravprinja/covid-19-will-not-change-a-thing-ee1bf5865286

Our next and final assignment was to write a narrative piece. We had to interview someone and tell their story. Specifically someone who had faced some kind of struggle in their lives. I'm a naturally introverted person, I "get my energy" by being alone, and whilst I can hold a perfectly comfortable conversation with someone who is willing to talk, I find "making conversation" quite trying. I also don't like prying into people's personal lives, this was a tough one. Given we were in lock down these conversations would have to be via video calls. So I thought the safest bet would be to talk to a family member. Strangely I struggled to think of anyone in the family who would have a story to tell, but then my wife suggested I interview and write about my uncle. My initial reaction was one of disbelief, almost asking her "but he's great, what struggle has he faced?". But I immediately realised his was a story worth telling. I got on the phone to him (on father's day no less) and eventually wrote this piece telling his story:

https://medium.com/@gauravprinja/the-importance-of-family-fad8e9936b30

Our main project on the authorship programme was to write a book. I had suggested a few topics in my application but the one that the team liked best was to investigate veganism from a perspective of a vegetarian Hindu. I'd seen a lot of chatter around about veganism, but everytime I tried looking into it a lot of the arguments seemed to be aimed at meat-eaters with a side note saying dairy and eggs are also bad. I also thought that, at the core, vegan values are about value and respect for all living beings, which, at its core, is what Hinduism also purports. As Hinduism is so broad and relatively non-prescriptive many Hindus choose to eat meat. Only very few are vegan and many Hindu rituals use dairy products. Having worked on the project "on the side" whilst doing the writing assignments, the summer was the time for the main push. Thankfully the lockdown restrictions eased and during the summer holidays my wife was able to take the kids and go to stay with my in-laws. We were both still working remotely, but I could finish work on time and spend the evenings writing. Throughout the whole process I had regular interaction and feedback from my mentor, and got the final draft submitted a day after the deadline.

I thought I was done but there was several more months of back and forth with typsetting and a professional editor. At each stage, whilst ostensibly just reviewing comments, I would keep 'fiddling and re-writing whole paragraphs!

It's been tough but also fun, and hopefully kick-started me on a journey of writing more. This blog should help - as it stands I don't know how often I'll be posting, but let's come back in about a year and see!