2018 was a year of simplification. Buying fewer things, consuming less in general, and making small changes to my immediate environment to improve overall quality of life.
Moved into a new house, built as 3 units, with the mom in the ground flr, in-laws in the 1st & us in the 2nd flr. In addition to bi-lingual, free day-care & regular multi-cuisine food, it’s also a soberingly practical long-term setup considering the parental units’ advancing age.
The father in law started a roof garden that now yields a healthy harvest every week. I’ve also stopped stocking large amounts of vegetables in the fridge, instead buying fresh everyday on the way home. Much less wastage & better tasting food.
I installed rooftop solar with 2KVA storage that lets me run all 5A plug points + LED lights + fans without grid power. Only A/C, Fridge & the oven run on the grid. My in-laws pay an astronomical Rs. 50 every 2 months to the electricity board as a result.
Since my commute is now 5-10 minutes, I sold one of the cars & bought a fully electric Okinawa Ridge scooter that does 80 km on a full charge. My cost per km is zero. Why? The Ridge charges out of a 5A plug point, which is solar powered in my case.
A gas cylinder in my kitchen has lasted 10 months because we pretty much exclusively use Induction stoves for everything that doesn’t require an open flame (like chapathis). And oh, the induction stoves are also powered from the solar setup
No cable TV connection, just a fibre internet connection that seems to be used rather exclusively for watching Masha & Bear, Peppa Pig & Casey Neistat (who my son is obsessed with)
Deleted my Facebook account & exited all WhatsApp groups (except one named Londonistanis), turned off all notifications on my phone and freed up close to 2 hours extra every single day as a result.
The surplus goes into more playtime with the son, cooking dinner every weekday, newer hobbies & productivity at work. Skipping lunch and having access to a gym at work has meant that I’ve worked out almost 250 days this year (& @Freeletics lets me workout anywhere without a gym)
I do realize that lot of these simplifications come from the privilege of being able to invest a fair bit upfront and the fortune of having parents & in-laws in good health.
But if I have to pick three of these ideas that I think are applicable to a wide range of middle-class folks, it’s
1. Learn to cook
2. Delete your Facebook
3. Replace your internal combustion two-wheeler with a fully electric one.
1. Learn to cook
2. Delete your Facebook
3. Replace your internal combustion two-wheeler with a fully electric one.
On that note, wish you a happy near year
