Some reflections on 2025

Dec 31, 2025

2025 has been a monumental year. I got married to this beautiful woman called Tamanna.

Given the importance weddings assume in our culture, the preparation and the event consumed me entirely. It is imperative that much of this reflection revolves around the observations, thoughts, and feelings associated with this milestone.

But where to begin? This was not an isolated event on a one-off day but an accretion of consequential and not-so-consequential moments–each one adding its own layer of meaning.

Companionship is a core human desire, and like any other person, I had grown up manifesting the idea of an ideal partner and consequently attempting to find her. When you are young, you go about this very nonchalantly. You meet people, organically bond with them, have fun, and get into or out of relationships on your whims. The hopeful exuberance of youth and the comfort of having time on your side allow you to be yourself and explore freely. However, this dynamic dramatically changes when you cross your mid-twenties. That is when the parental, peer, and societal pressure start mounting. While some of it may be very well-intentioned, it gets to you.

I was not in a prospective relationship when I crossed the threshold age, and that meant I had to pivot from hopelessly yearning for Cupid to strike, to a meticulous search process. I had little idea that it would go on for a couple of years and prove to be highly agonising, emotionally draining, and profoundly humbling beyond measure.

Given this premise, the wedding was actually a culmination of multiple character-building days. When you go through the meticulous search process in despair, you understand that you liking someone–and them liking you back enough to spend their life with you–is an extraordinary stroke of chance. I don’t take that lightly, and I am eternally grateful that it happened this year.

1. On the Red Fort date

I met Tamanna as part of the “process” on a dating app in 2024. But it was on January 4, 2025, that we had the most important date of our lives.

We started the day with brunch at Cafe Lota in the Crafts Museum, and took a long auto ride to Chandni Chowk to explore the used camera market, before heading to the Red Fort. We are both culture fanatics who love the charm of Old Delhi. We were already having a great time, but as the sun was setting, we decided to stay and witness the light and sound show.

We walked around the dimly lit fort in the bone-piercing Delhi winter, before heading to the lawn to catch the show. We sat there huddled together, in a shared shawl. Amidst the narration of history in Bachchan’s distinctive baritone, the interplay of lights and immaculate performances, we sat there in eerie stillness–feeling a connection that is rare and otherworldly. And we knew that this was something special.

It was only befitting that I ask her to marry me at such a special and monumental place, and so I did later in the year.

2. On Republic Day

I watched the Republic Day parade live from Kartavya Path. We woke up early in the morning and took the metro to Central Secretariat. After multiple rounds of security, we made our way to the seats.

Sitting in the winter sun, watching the President up close as regiments marched past and state tableaux rolled by, followed by the defence equipment exhibition–the whole experience stirred something deeply patriotic.

The highlight, however, was the climactic ending where a Rafale streaked past overhead before pulling up into a high vertical maneuver with a sonic boom. I marvelled at the extent of human ingenuity for its ability to create and fly machines that operate at the edge of engineering limits.

3. On Jaipur Lit Fest

I attended the Jaipur Lit Fest. It had been a bucket list item for a long time, and I am glad I checked it off this year. It is a very interesting set-up that is graced by intellectuals from different walks of life. It has everything from panel discussions and book exhibitions to interesting culinary experiences and concerts.

Of the celebrities there, I got a chance to hear from Huma Qureshi and Shashi Tharoor. But the true highlight of the experience was Kailash Kher, who serenaded the crowd with his soulful music.

I was pleasantly surprised by the cross-section of the attendees at the event. Almost everyone was well-dressed and well-spoken. It felt like I was amidst the social elite of Lutyens’ Delhi–the accounts of which I used to read as a kid in Khushwant Singh and Vir Sanghvi’s columns.

It was a pleasant and stimulating experience. For anyone who likes reading in any shape or form, the fest offers a lot to think about, feel, and enjoy.

4. On film photography

I noticed a creator posting pictures taken with disposable film cameras, and it caught my attention. I might have casually mentioned this in some conversation, and was gifted one on my birthday by my wife.

Since it was a use-and-throw camera, it had 27 shots, which we very carefully saved for clicking important moments in our lives. When I got the film developed, it turned out poorly. I am still unsure about the exact cause that led to this, but I was slightly disappointed. This was not what I had seen online.

When I went to Japan later in the year, I bought the Ilford SPRITE35-ii film camera. This is still a very basic one that requires a lot of good natural light to click decent pictures, but the remarkable design was reason enough for me to buy it. I supplemented it with the Kodak Ultramax 400 ISO film.

While film photography is relatively obsolete in India, it continues to be a big part of Japanese culture. We snapped pictures throughout the trip and got them developed in Tokyo. I was astonished that they completed the entire process in one hour. The results this time were great.

I have always liked the idea of photography–of capturing key moments and mundane things artistically. But the cost and complexity associated with it have been limiting. You need to get the right camera or phone, master the different settings, learn framing, and then spend an inordinate amount of time on editing.

Film photography, on the other hand, is simple, refreshing and fun. You just have to find good lighting, point, and shoot.

I am in love with the images that come out of the development process. With their bright exposure and grainy overlay, the fuzziness makes them idiosyncratically nostalgic.

5. On the wedding

The wedding experience has a lot of disparate realisations that I have listed below:

The Instagram and celebrity influence has distorted the idea of weddings in people’s minds. It is less about the celebration, the rituals, and the pause–to acknowledge perhaps the biggest milestone of our lives. It has been reduced to a spectacle. I am not saying that it is bad by any means, but I do believe that the templatisation of weddings is a signal that a lot of us are expressing our borrowed wants.
There is disproportionate demand for good products and services and extremely constrained supplies. In addition to that, everything comes with a wedding tax. I was surprised to learn that there are a million small things that go into hosting a wedding. And I was even more surprised to learn the prices of these trivial things.
That being said, negotiation becomes a key skill. It is easily possible to get services at half the initial quoted prices by vendors if you work smartly. Having read Chris Voss’s Never Split the Difference stood me in good stead.
Learning to be patient is the biggest skill that I have gained in the process. In my circle (and I believe it applies more generally), women are very finicky about their choices and will typically want to scour all possible options across stores (across the city and maybe even cities) before deciding. If you are a man reading this, please refrain from applying logic and let them explore. You will thank me later.
The process of preparing for the wedding is all-consuming and puts tremendous pressure on your physical, mental, emotional and financial well-being. I had to forget the concept of “me time” over the weekends and that was incredibly hard–especially for an introvert like me.
The biggest takeaway from the wedding was seeing everyone I love–family, friends, colleagues–make time in their busy lives to be there with us. They took flights and trains from different corners of the world to celebrate our special day. It’s surreal to realise you have people who think about you, care about you, and are willing to leave whatever important thing is happening in their life to be with you. It makes my heart full. I’m grateful beyond measure.

It completely changed how I view relationships. It’s about the goodwill and genuine good intentions you hold for people–supporting them in happiness and despair, wishing them well without conditions. If you do that, you get a lot of it back. That’s the most amazing feeling there is.

People talk about spending on weddings, and I’m not one for grand affairs. I kept things at a reasonable level–good times with people I love, nothing extraordinary or out of the blue. But if you have people you care about, please celebrate with them. Don’t settle for a court wedding or a very small-scale affair just to save money. The feeling you get from having everyone come together is something you can’t replicate anywhere else. Every penny spent is worth it, even when it hits you financially. That’s what life is for. You can make money again, but there won’t be many moments where everyone you love gathers to celebrate you. That was the most beautiful thing about the wedding.
Finally, it’s nice to be starting this new chapter. Here’s to companionship, and everything that comes with it.

6. On Japan

We went to Japan for our honeymoon, and it was exactly what we needed to reset.

Japan was an unconventional choice for a honeymoon destination, but we found it to be such an ‘us’ place–filled with history, culturally strong, naturally diverse, technologically modern, and extremely consumerist. It has something for everyone, and I am glad we visited.

Here are a few notes from the visit:

There is a lot of order everywhere. Streets are squeaky clean even when there are no public trash cans available. Public toilets are immaculate–better than what we have at home. People follow rules, they queue up, and there is no honking in the streets. Other foreign countries also have order but there is something about the way things happen in Japan–it feels utopian.
Loneliness and depression are a growing crisis there. You find extremely old people working or doing chores by themselves. People eating alone in solo booths is culturally normalised. They work long hours and seem visibly tired. They are extremely quiet and believe in minding their own business. Talking on the train is frowned upon.
The transportation system is too complex to figure out for tourists. There are different companies that operate different types of trains and subways–it is hard to make sense of what goes where, what kind of tickets you need, and how to enter and exit. For all its advancement, the navigation signage is poor, which made me realise how much more intuitive the Delhi metro actually is.
The touristy spots–especially historical monuments and temples–aren’t particularly tourist-friendly. We struggled to understand what they stood for or their history. There’s no concept of guides or audio tours, and they have minimal to no descriptions or placards. I spent my time googling and ChatGPTing while visiting. I was slightly disappointed.
Given my limited experience of the world, I strongly believe that no one gets design better than the Japanese. I wrote about hodo hodo (just enough design) in my last year’s reflection and it was great to witness examples of it in person. If you are observant, you see it everywhere. Chopsticks are simple yet highly functional. Toilets are futuristic with features like seat warming, button controlled jet streams, and automatic drying. Bullet train seats have enough space for big bags in front of the legs. There are sushi restaurants that have conveyor belts carrying all kinds of sushi–you can pick up whatever plate you like. Vending machines and self-checkouts are ubiquitous and extremely intuitive to use.
They have amazing daily use products, electronics, and food options. We shopped a lot and realised amazing value for money.
- GU, the sister store of Uniqlo, has jackets and long coats at half the price of what you would get at a Zara or Uniqlo in India.
- We racked up great stationery at Muji–their characteristic pens, sticky check lists, calendars and planners.
- We got extremely high-quality nail-cutters and umbrellas (with UV protection).
- I loved a Panasonic hair dryer at one of our hotels–they use “electrostatic atomized water particles” that kept the hair hydrated and set it in place without applying extreme heat. It is a shame that we could not find an overseas version of the dryer (as the Japanese version wouldn’t have worked for Indian voltages). But they were truly distinctive and technologically superior to even the best in class Dyson.
- And of course we ate and bought a lot of Kit Kat in matcha, salted caramel, vanilla and peanut butter flavours.
Eating was a very taxing experience. They are a predominantly non-vegetarian society with pork and beef as the primary and secondary meat sources. They add it in some form (either whole meat or extracts) to almost everything. As a chicken and seafood eater, even I struggled. We spent a lot of time on translating food labels and restaurant menus as everything was in Japanese.

Restaurants are typically small and either require reservation or have long queues. It is not easy to simply walk in and eat.

We later discovered that they have Uber Eats and that turned out to be a lifesaver. We could sit comfortably in our room, research restaurants, understand the menu in detail and get our food within 20-25 mins of ordering. Surprisingly, this was never mentioned in the countless YouTube and Instagram vlogs that we had consumed before our trip.
We visited Tokyo, Fuji five lake area, Kyoto, and Nara across 10 days. We did some touristy things and some not-so-touristy things. The highlight of the trip was spending a couple of days in rural Japan near Mount Fuji. We were in the middle of nowhere. Roaming around the idyllic countryside with Mount Fuji in the backdrop was among the most peaceful and memorable experiences of my life.
Here are some postcards:

Fuji san

Dear & deer

Aesthetic tree

Temple

Sukoon

Vibes

Japanese

Japanese with cycle

7. On standout things & experiences

2025 has been transformative, centered around the wedding but marked by moments that will stay with me. Here are some other experiences that stand out:

I bought a car on my birthday–a dream I’d been carrying since childhood. Financial wisdom says cars are depreciating assets, but I disagree. Investing in a good car with safety and comfort is something worth doing for yourself. My quality of life changed drastically. No more depending on unreliable Ubers or dealing with the worst of public infrastructure. For me, it has become a sanctuary where I can relax, think and exist on my own terms.
I took my parents to watch an IPL match–Rajasthan Royals versus Delhi Capitals at Arun Jaitley Stadium. It was their first live match. My dad, a cricket fanatic for over 50 years, had always been intrigued by day-night matches and how things looked under lights. Being able to give him that experience made the evening special.
One evening, Tamanna and I sat by the water streams at India Gate. It was peaceful and exactly what we needed—a pause from the wedding preparation’s chaos to just be with each other. Central Delhi has these pockets of calm that remind you why the city matters.
I had some incredible culinary encounters this year. Paneer and Gulab Jamun at ITC Rajputana (Jaipur), Curry Udon at Ebisu (Saket, Delhi), Chicken Lazeez at Taj Mahal Everest (Kyoto), Vegan Ramen in Tokyo, Gnocchi at Colocal at Dhan Mill (Delhi), and Spinach & Ricotta Ravioli at Cafe Delhi Heights (Cyberhub, Gurgaon) really stood out. Ebisu became our ritual spot. You sit cross-legged at low tables, and the flavors closely resemble authentic Japanese food. Both of us love Asian cuisine, and frequenting Ebisu contributed, in some part, to our decision to go to Japan for the honeymoon.
I upgraded to an iPhone 16E after three years with my iPhone 11. The battery life alone made it worth it. I also got an Ultrahuman Ring to track sleep and steps. The ring’s form factor isn’t entirely comfortable, and the tracking isn’t perfect, but it gives a good directional picture.
I bought a new desk for my study. If you have multiple devices and use a monitor, I can’t recommend a large desk enough–it is such a productivity upgrade. I got the largest one that I could find which measures 160 x 80 cm.
The best book I read this year was 4000 Weeks by Oliver Burkeman. It reframed how I think about time and what deserves attention. A timely read, given everything that happened.

2025 taught me that the best moments are often the ones you can’t plan for–they just happen when you’re paying attention. As I step into 2026, I want to stay intentional about what matters while remaining open to what I can’t predict.