Sundaze 191

Happy December!! I can hardly believe we’re in the final month of the year. I’m writing this post tucked under a blanket, beside our Christmas tree with its erratic lights – not quite twinkling, more like random blinking every now and then! – and finishing up The Crown. I’ve spent the latter part of the week making like a Christmas elf and running present-buying errands. Now that lockdown is over, there definitely seems to have been a pick-up in mood all-round! I popped out on Friday afternoon and couldn’t wait to get home tbh; it was SO busy that I ended up exhausted and anxious. This week has felt a bit all over the place, but when hasn’t it in 2020, eh?

That being said, I’m really getting in the festive mood now. The presents are almost all bought, plenty are wrapped and under the tree, and I’ve been busy making festive candles and décor that we can enjoy throughout December! It’s so rewarding to make our own Christmas candles this year and enjoy our fragrances warming up the house.

… It doesn’t feel like December

Most of all, it doesn’t feel like December. When I got in my car on Thursday morning to drop some of our & Chai parcels off, I couldn’t get over how cold it was. But of course none of us can really grasp a concept of time this year. It’s winter now!! Time to dig out my thicker jumpers and scarves and proper boots out from hiding (or where they still remain packed from our move in February). It’s definitely made me consider how I personally used to keep track of time and how important everyday tasks and outings here and there are to creating real pockets of meaningful time. My sister and I laughed yesterday because I usually film a 1 Second Everyday video to document a second from every day in the year, and this year’s would’ve been a 10-minute video of the same clip from March onwards!

Fragrance testing fun!

We’re still selling our Scented Candles over on the & Chai Etsy, for Christmas! Non-UK, international orders can be placed until tonight to ensure delivery for the holidays, whilst UK shoppers can place Christmas orders until the 13th. Louise and I are already hard at work finalising some new fragrances for 2021, along with some new products. I truly can’t wait to share what we’ve been working on.

Shop & Chai on Etsy >

On labelling non-Western cuisines as dirty…

A few days ago, a conversation was sparked on Instagram about a Masterchef: The Professionals chef and their niche apparently centred on East and South East Asian food with a ‘dirty food, refined’ tagline. Lots of us in the East Asian community have found it to be pretty offensive to be honest. I’ve spoken a few times about how I was bullied growing up for being a kid of parents who owned a Chinese takeaway (or four!), and for the weird food that I supposedly ate. It’s pretty demoralising to know that even in 2020, this still stands? Like I said in my accidental Twitter campaign back in March, the takeaway culture is ingrained in my life, and it’s pretty grim to think that most non-Western food is still essentially up for the taking by Westerners. I’m considering putting these thoughts into a more coherent post, if anyone fancies reading that?

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How has your week been? Are you starting to get in the festive mood?

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