I realize that I was a different person when I entered the bar earlier in the evening, and that I’m a completely different person now, after coming out of it. Sometimes, all you need is a little change from your everyday routine to understand where you’re going wrong. Because it’s the little things that matter in life.

As we enter my apartment, laughing and chatting away, it dawns upon me that taking a relationship for granted creates distance, and that this distance is not just physical, it’s also emotional. Just like it’s important to water a plant every day, investing in a relationship and nurturing it despite the distance is crucial.

When things go wrong, we often tell ourselves that we’ve hit the lowest point possible and that nothing worse could happen, until it happens yet again. So, what’s the point? The point is that our frame of reference is always the past, but if at all we consider the possibility of things going well or even not so well in the future, we’ll have so much more acceptance and gratitude for our present, won’t we?

Do I Know You?

Nirvaan

Sunday, 15 January 2023
Seychelles, Africa

‘I feel complete.’

When your first love abandons you, it leaves a void that can never be filled. It leaves you wanting. It’s like that summer vacation trip to your grandmother’s house that you never want to see the end of, or that favourite movie you play again and again. But then nothing lasts forever. Not that summer vacation, and definitely not your grandmother.

Today, however, is a special day. It’s the kind of day when you turn on the radio because you’re bored of listening to your favourite playlist and want something new instead. The kind of day when you spot a heart-shaped cloud in the sky and it makes you choose to look at life with joy and goodness. All of this because you’re deliriously happy within. And why am I deliriously happy? Because I’m meeting Kiana today, virtually.

White noise fills my head as I adjust the straps of the VR headset around my face, ready to embark on a new journey to paradise. I had received a courier from ULIC last week. It was labelled fragile, and I had opened it very carefully in spite of my excitement. Inside was a virtual reality headset and a leaflet full of instructions on how to set it up and enjoy my first virtual experience on the AILENA app. I’ve used a similar Oculus module while playing VR video games, so I set the whole thing up rather quickly, with a custom avatar I created for myself to impress Kiana.