Category Archives: Contemplations on New York Life

Corelle: my preferred dinnerware in my 30s

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When I was a young child, I used to have (very riveting) fantasies about the future fancy china I would own. I wasn’t sure if it would be English or Japanese or Chinese, but I did know that they would be handcrafted, in some cases hand-painted, and very beautiful to look at. Back then, I never thought about important things that adults would usually think about when making a big ticket purchase on something like dinnerware… such as, is it durable? Is it dishwasher-safe (most bone or fine china absolutely are not)? If I knock it against another dish, will it be quick to chip? So when I finally became an adult and actually looked at how much these things cost (a lot) and how durable they are (not very much — AT ALL), I started rethinking how important a beautiful, fancy set of dinnerware really was to me. And I got to this point where I realized that I would rather spend more money on better ingredients for the food I put into my and my family’s bodies than invest thousands of dollars on a bunch of plates and bowls… that my child would likely break someday sooner than I’d like, or (gasp) I myself would break because of general wear and tear and the occasional clumsiness.

I had moments when I was in Taiwan, salivating over some beautiful hand thrown pottery that was hand painted (most definitely not dishwasher safe. And if I remember the price, a single tea cup from that set was around $80-100 USD). The tea sets and teeny tiny serving bowls and plates in Japan enamored me both times we visited, but both visits, I knew I was never going to buy any — they were merely eye candy. Then, when we were in Portugal, which is world renowned for beautifully crafted ceramics and tiles, I gazed longingly at all the shiny azulejo ceramic bowls and plates, all hand painted. And while the prices for ceramics in Portugal were relatively reasonable, nowhere as frightening as they were in Taiwan or Japan, I just thought of the hassle of carting them back to the U.S. (not to mention the luggage space they’d require, plus the anxiety I would have at them potentially breaking en route), and I quickly decided – nope — not coming home with us.

Now in my 30s and as a parent, I’m a lot more pragmatic about dinnerware. Sure, I want the dinnerware we have to look good, but I’m more focused on cost, durability, and the ability wash them in a dishwasher. And that’s when the oldie-but-goodie Corelle comes in: it’s what I grew up with (along with many other practical Asian families), and it’s so durable to the point where if you drop them, they may not even break! They’re all dishwasher safe! They don’t scratch or get bent up easily! They’re well-priced! And they’re very lightweight, so if you’re suffering from even temporary carpal tunnel, you will still be able to hold them and carry them to the table! They basically tick all the boxes. So when we returned a holiday gift back to Amazon in January and I remembered I wanted to replace two of our broken bowls from last year, I didn’t even hesitate: I immediately did a search for “Corelle bowls,” and I found a simple white bowl in the size I wanted. It was six bowls for $24 — where else are you going to get a deal like that…?! I ordered them, and I never looked back.

The oldies are oldies for a reason — they are goodies.

Homemade soy candle from candle-making kit is tunneling

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A couple months ago, I used the soy candle making kit I ordered for a holiday team building event. I spent an afternoon melting wax, mixing in essential oils, and hand pouring into my candle jars with a glued-on wick in each jar. I made four candles and gave three of them away, keeping a lavender-sage scented one for myself. I was especially excited about mine because I added some extra pure lavender oil that I’d gotten during a New Zealand trip back in 2013, when we visited a vibrant lavender farm and I purchased a tiny vial.

Unfortunately, as I burned the candle the last couple of nights, I quickly realized that the candle was not of the highest quality: the wick is not big enough for the diameter of the jar (which really isn’t that big!), and so even when you burn it as long as you should, so 3-4 hours, it’s impossible for the wick to burn the wax fully and evenly to the ends of the jar. I went back to the Amazon listing and saw that only one reviewer noted this and posted a photo for proof. It looked exactly like my candle tunnel! The only plus side is that the scent definitely does carry well.

I spent last night using the foil method to try to reduce the tunneling; it helped a little, but not much. And today, I finally took out my heat gun that I use for heat embossing to lightly blow heat on the candle to even out the wax buildup on the sides of the candle jar. While the heat gun was far more effective than the foil method, now, my issue is that my wick is fully covered. So my next step, once this wax fully hardens, is to carve out some of the wax (that will unfortunately mean wax and essential oil waste!!) and burn the candle as evenly as I possibly can. These are definitely first-world problems.

Diner food, with a Thai spin

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Growing up, I never really understood the obsession with American diners. I hated that Mel’s Drive-in was always so popular for meals. I disliked that I would even go there with friends as the “no-brainer” place to hang out and eat a relatively affordable meal (while in middle and high school). I was never excited by the generic food with the generic decor and okay-to-subpar service. I had no idea why anyone would *love* a diner.

Then, Chris found this place called Little Grenjai in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn, which we visited today. It’s a Thai-style diner that recently opened in Bedford Stuyvesant. It’s kind of all the fun, quirky parts of an American diner, from the booth seating to the bright lights, with delicious Thai-inspired food. The kaprow burger is the go-to for lunch, which we got with a Thai-style fried duck egg. And it was kind of the perfect burger: a thin, pork-based meat patty, spiced exactly as pad kaprow is, with a lingering heat at the end and slightly crisp edges; fresh Thai basil inside in lieu of boring, flavorless lettuce, two fluffy sesame buns, and a perfectly deep-fried Thai-style duck egg with super crisp brown edges and a yolk that literally exploded all over my hands after I took a single bite. Pookster was even amused, as we ordered a side of fries, which to our surprise, came out in a pouch of large coin-shaped potato disks. Pookster happily ate almost the whole bag while people watching in the diner.

If diner food were this good at Mel’s Drive-in, maybe I wouldn’t have disliked it so much growing up in San Francisco.

4.8 earthquake in New York today

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Earthquakes are something I grew up with. Given that I was born and raised in San Francisco, while we were in school, we had earthquake drills as often as we had fire drills, so anyone growing up in San Francisco, or California for that matter, was well versed on what to do in the event of an earthquake. We always knew to get under heavy tables/desks or stand under load-bearing door frames. We also knew that if we had to evacuate a building, to never, ever use the elevator during an earthquake, but instead to take the stairs. I suppose that’s the same advice to heed during a fire, as well.

In 2011, New York City experienced an earthquake. I still remember I was at a work lunch when all the tables and chandeliers above us started shaking. Everyone was freaking out. My colleagues complained about it for days and talked about how scared they were. I was a bit nonchalant about it and barely said anything; that shake was nothing to me.

Well, we had an earthquake that lasted a couple seconds this morning. It was just past 10:30am when I was at my desk working. Suddenly, I noticed my entire desk shaking, plus the mug of hot, steaming chai I just made about to spill. It ended pretty quickly, though. But within ten minutes as I checked my Instagram, almost every other post was about the earthquake that hit us. The New York Times and BBC reported it was a 4.8 magnitude earthquake that originated about 50 miles outside of New York City, in New Jersey. Everyone in my Facebook groups were wishing each other safety or sharing how scared they were .

My reaction is still, “meh.” I had a meeting today where I had to present, and a few of my colleagues asked if I was okay and how things were in New York. I just smiled and told them it was a little shake, no biggie.

“Okay, I think Yvonne is the only calm person in all of New York City right now!” my colleague declared, laughing.

Honestly, when you’ve dealt with far more frightening or traumatizing things in life, you cannot sweat the small stuff. And the small stuff, for me. is a 4.7 earthquake. I raised my eyebrow for a second, then I let it go after the shake stopped.

“Mummy not here!”

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People always say with children that the days are long, but the weeks / years are short. All the cute, sweet moments are often forgotten and lost in the depths of your mind. That’s partly why I write about them — so that if/when I do forget, I will always have a log to go back to and remember what cute, sweet things Kaia did that gave me warm and fuzzy feelings.

The last few weeks, I’ve been trying my best to get to the gym by 6:30am for an hour-long workout. It always makes me feel much more productive to start the day earlier, and it also means I don’t feel like I’m in a rush every morning to get my workout, shower, dressing done before turning on my computer, after Kaia leaves for school. This also means that sometimes, I can walk Kaia to school. It also means I can have a more leisurely morning preparing my tea and reading the news.

Kaia tends to wake up sometime between 6:50-7:15, and when she does, she will usually go to her book shelf, grab a book, then mozy her way over (still in her sleep sack!) to our bedroom. Sometimes, she goes to Chris’s side of the bed first, and other times, she goes to my side. As of late, she’s been going to my side, but alas, I haven’t been there since I’ve been at the gym. So she thinks I’m “hiding” underneath the covers, which I find absolutely hilarious, and she’ll pull the covers down to “find” me. When she realizes I’m actually not there after pulling the covers down to see no one, she will say “YThi not here,” or “mummy not here.” And then Chris will respond, “YThi at the gym.” Then, Kaia will repeat, “YThi at the gym.”

And when I return from the gym about half an hour after she wakes up, as soon as I open the door and put my keys in the basket, she will happily yell out, “Hi, mummy-dear!” before she even sees me. Then, I go up to her to kiss her and give her exaggerated “sniffs” on her hair, which makes her giggle. And I ask her if she slept well.

Witnessing these moments of innocence of young childhood never ceases to warm my heart and makes me think that becoming a parent is more than worth all the effort and exhaustion.

Sweet Malaysian freebies at closing time

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Once upon a time, there were a number of bakeries across New York City that would offer deeply discounted baked goods within 30 minutes to an hour of closing. Manna House Bakery on Mott Street in Chinatown used to offer all pastries and bao at 50% off if you arrived about 30 minutes before their closing time; I only found this out by chance when I popped in one evening many years ago, and the lady behind the counter quoted me half of the amount that I was expecting to owe. The much loved and venerated Balthazar Bakery would offer their elaborate pastries for a discounted amount, and sometimes they even had random grab bags that would have a set (low) price. Eventually, though, all good (and cheap) things come to an end, and both bakeries put a halt to their slashed pre-closing prices.

I was reminded of this last night when I was in the East Village for dinner with a friend. On our way to the subway station, we passed by Lady Wong, one of the best (and rare) fancy bakeries in the city for Malaysian-inspired desserts, including the famous kuih. As we stepped in, we weren’t sure if they were still open, so we asked. The man behind the counter looked up, greeted us and said he would still be open for five more minutes. Then, he smiled and said, “Take it all!” We thought he was just joking given the closing time. So we each chose two items each and paid. As we were about to leave, he looked at us quizzically.

“You don’t want any kuih? I’m serious: if you don’t want it, I will throw it all out! You can take whatever you want, just tell me which ones…. just not the serimukkah because those are my favorite.” He smiled as he said this. He explained that it was highly unusual to have this much leftover at the end of the day; usually, they are almost sold out. But today was a weird day with the grey, cool weather, and they didn’t get as much foot traffic as they normally do. He couldn’t eat all of the remaining kuih, nor would he be selling them the next day. So my friend and I got really excited and told him which ones we’d like. He got them all ready in two separate boxes for each of us.

We thanked him profusely, and being very Asian, he brushed us off. “It’s okay… if you didn’t take them, they’d just be going into the trash bin!” he insisted. As he was boxing these up for us, a group of friends walked in, obviously having read about the place since two of them were explaining to their friends that this spot was “known for Malaysian dessert.” The guy behind the counter, who I *think* is one of the co-owners, told us in a near-whisper, “Don’t say anything, okay?” So in other words, he was going to give us all these freebies, but he definitely had plans to charge these folks!

We walked out with our paid and free sweets. I wasn’t sure what cracked me up more, the fact that he said we could take any of the kuih, *except* the serimukkah since they were his favorites, or that he was happy to give us these freebies, but was planning to charge the other group of people who came in after us!

Good Friday eats near New Brunswick, New Jersey

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New Jersey is quite far from my favorite state. I think part of the reason I felt strange about New Jersey was how so many of my colleagues have been from New Jersey over the years, and how they only looked at New York City as a place for “work” and pretty much nothing else. They didn’t see the glitz and glam that I saw when I looked at New York with all of its incredible diversity in people, culture, food, theater, and entertainment. They didn’t see it as a land of opportunity, excitement, and fun. Instead, they just saw it as a polluted urban jungle with too many people, too much garbage, and too much pollution. A number of them had said to me that they’d “never” want to live in New York and were completely repulsed by the mere thought of living in the city; one said he’d rather die. Part of me wanted to respond, if you feel that strongly against New York, maybe you shouldn’t work here at all and just get a job in your own state! While not everyone I know who lives in New Jersey thinks this way, enough of my New Jersey-based colleagues over the last 16 years have expressed this sentiment that I just found them to be banal.

So for me, New Jersey has been exciting really only for two main reasons: the delicious Indian and Korean food. Most of the incredible Indian food has been around Edison, New Brunswick, and Princeton, where a lot of people of Indian descent live. For Korean food, the majority has been around Fort Lee and Palisades Park, which also have a large Korean population. Every time we go to these areas, I always marvel not only at the high quality of the food, but also how much cheaper the meals are in general. I can’t believe X dish costs 25-30% less than what this costs in New York City, even in Queens!

Today, we took a day trip and rented a car to go to the New Brunswick area. Chris picked out a “pure veg” Indian restaurant called Indian House of Dosas, and I loved the food so much that I almost licked my fingers and plates clean at the end of the meal. We had two tiffin combo plates of idli, vada, pongal, poori, and masala dosa, which came with peanut chutney, coconut chutney, a rare but interesting ginger-tamarind-jaggery chutney, sambar, and a semolina halwa. And they cost $12-13 for each combo! Along with two Madras style filter coffees and a mango lassi, tax, and a 20% tip, we paid $48. And I was stuffed to the brim at the end of the meal. The food was so fresh, well spiced, and flavorful. I really though the medu vada we had were some of the best I could have had in my life; they were all clearly made to order and extremely fresh. The vada were so hot that they felt like they came straight out of the fryer. If this place were close by to us, I’d likely want food from here at least once a week. I’m still thinking about it long after we have left.

Pre-baby, I would have been happy to occasionally go all out and make dosas and their fermented batter, along with the different chutneys. I did it a number of times, including one interesting variation with a quinoa dosa, which Chris begrudgingly admitted was good. But now, it’s such an event with all the different steps and endless little side dishes. I’d rather just leave it up to the professionals now. Maybe one day I will revisit it, but probably not anytime soon unless something inspires me.

High-end candles: a sign of being in my 30s

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On Saturday, I was supposed to take my friend on a food crawl around Jackson Heights as a day out during her visit. Unfortunately, the weather had other plans for us. I didn’t want to deal with the stroller in pouring rain, nor did I want to risk experiencing any subway flooding, so I suggested to my friend that we have lunch at the Singporean Urban Hawker center instead, and then figure things out from there. The MoMa, which was our original after-lunch plan, was immediately x-ed out: the line wrapped around TWO BLOCKS, even with the pouring rain. So instead, we went window shopping at Nordstrom and in Time Warner Center instead. We spent at least 15 minutes inhaling every Voluspa candle on display in the home wares section; the Saijo Persimmon and Mokara were definitely my favorites. I told my friend about how I’ve been burning a scented soy or coconut wax candle every night the last few months while I’m reading before bed. Everyone likes the mood and ambiance that real lit candles bring, and the scent is always soothing at bedtime.

My friend laughed. “This is such a sign you are in your 30s; only people in their 30s-plus can appreciate high-end, fancy candles!” she said. She agreed, though, and said that she also started appreciating them in the last few years.

Okay, so maybe it is true. In my twenties, I never thought anything of candles and didn’t understand how they could be so expensive. I didn’t understand how Diptyque could have multiple boutiques across New York City, JUST selling one item (candles!). It always evaded my comprehension. Then, I didn’t understand the difference between paraffin and soy/coconut wax. The idea of spending $50-75 on a candle was insane to me. Now, while I still think that price point is high, I do appreciate them so much more. A high quality, perfumed candle is not just a thing, an object to display in your home; it’s also an experience, a somewhat sensual one at that. The one candle I own now that I did buy before I turned 30 was a lavender soy candle purchased at a Tasmanian lavender farm in December 2015. I still burn it occasionally and am obsessed with the scent, though I am sad I’m reaching its end. What was also remarkable about this candle was that despite it being very high quality and having a good “throw” (that is candle speak for “the scent travels through the room it’s in and isn’t weak”), it was actually quite inexpensive in U.S. dollars after the conversion from AUD. Now, I may end up seeking high quality, scented candles elsewhere where I can get them cheaper. 🙂

Kindness: often appreciated, not often duplicated enough

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I was on a work call earlier this week with a customer who I was meeting for the very first time. He actually let me know that he was leaving the company in two weeks, but not by his own choice. The company was going through a reduction-in-force (RIF), aka a layoff, and unfortunately, he was one of the unlucky “chosen” ones. He had been at the company for over 40 years and never worked anywhere else; he said he wasn’t sure what his next steps were going to be and who would want to hire someone at his age. We spoke a bit about that and I shared my concern and tried to wish him the best.

“Yvonne, I’ve just met you, but you have really made my day,” he said. “I really mean it. Not to say that people at your company aren’t kind, but you are incredibly kind, and I will remember your kindness. I feel like even though I just met you, we already really know each other. It’s really going to help me get through the day and my remaining days here.”

It’s so easy to be kind and supportive, whether it’s for a second or a minute, whether it’s leaving a door open for someone, helping someone with something they’ve dropped on the street, or even saying a few supportive words in a time of vulnerability. Not everyone does this, though, because they think it’s “an extra effort,” an inconvenience, or just won’t be received well. But when this man said this to me, I could tell he really meant what he said. We’re essentially strangers on a video call who will unlikely ever meet each other in person, yet he said my words really helped him. Sometimes, it really is the small gestures that we perform that stay with people. And they really are worth the extra effort or seconds it takes us to do them. As much negativity is shared on social media and in the news, I feel like almost every day, someone random on the street, all strangers, does kind things for me, whether it’s a little smile, making extra space for me in a crowded elevator, playing peek-a-boo with Kaia to get her to cheer up in the midst of a tantrum on the train, or assisting me with the door at the daycare when I’m struggling to keep the door open while also getting the stroller in/out (and they’re just a passerby, not even someone trying to get in/out of the school!).

Kindness is its own circular economy, one that each of us needs to contribute to in order to create a better world for us all.

Cheerios and Quaker Oats linked to reproductive issues – God help us all in America

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Even when you try to be healthy in the U.S., you are still slowly killing yourself.

CBS recently reported a study that a chemical called chlormequat has been detected in 92 percent of non-organic oat-based foods that were tested in May 2023. This includes mainstream foods that many Americans, especially young children, eat, including Quaker Oats and General Mills’ Cheerios. Chlormequat has been found in studies to damage our reproductive systems and to disrupt fetal growth in animals. The chemical is supposed to only be used on ornamental plants only, not on food crops. Yet somehow, the chemical is being used as a growth regulator for the commercial production of grains to make it easier to harvest crops.

It’s deeply unfortunate and horribly infuriating to learn of this news. We are just getting through a 10-pound package of oats that are Quaker brand. We’ve been buying Cheerios for Kaia since spring of last year since Solid Starts had said that of all the “O” cereals available that Cheerios had the highest amount of vitamin/minerals being fortified in it. Even when you are trying to do the right thing by feeding yourself and your children seemingly “healthy” foods, we are still damaging our bodies. It’s like we can’t trust anything in the food supply in this damn country. Now, I need to switch to organic-only oats and an organic version of an “O” cereal – this will obviously be more expensive, but I need to have better peace of mind around this crap. And you know what that means: if only those who can afford it can have healthy, organic, “clean” food, then we’re in a truly screwed up state of this country where the poor and less fortunate are left to suffer.