2020
“What a year!” - Everyone
But it has also been an incredible and emotional decade full of changes for me.
2020 has been hard for everyone. It has been especially hard for the people who are working through the pandemic to make our lives a little easier. Stress is balanced, as all things should be, but one part of society has taken the brunt of it all for the sake of everyone else.
A few important things I’ve been thankful for in this decade: My work and my health. The new friends I made. The incredible coffee I’ve had the opportunity to taste, my newly found interest in whiskeys, but above all: my wife.
2010 - Prelude
This was a crucial year for me. I decided to finally go to college until I later realised, I didn’t want to be in college. It wasn’t for me. I knew what I wanted to do, so I left it and decided to go full time indie as a Software Designer.
2011, 2012 and 2013
The first three years of working indie, full of surprises (I was only 19 in 2011), as I set out to establish my identity and brand in the world: Dezine Zync.
2014
I picked up some great clients in 2013 for some freelance projects which went throughout 2014. As I got busier, I spent more and more time working, studying new things and working on my first iOS App.
I ended up getting disconnected from my friends during this time, which cost me a lot emotionally and mentally.
I founded Dezine Zync Studios. Two friends joined, we rocked out some greats projects, iOS and Web, my gaming frequency increased and I got into Pro-Amateur gaming in the local scene.
I also bought my house!
2015 and 2016
Work began on the new house, so I had to split my time between work and the construction. It was tricky for the first two months, but I quickly got a grip on things and was able to manage things better since.
2017
On the first of January, I moved in with my family to our new house. It felt like a huge accomplishment.
We had a great family trip to Norway in June. My brother also skipped to Sweden for a day just to get a feel of the land.
Unfortunately, in December, I lost my grandfather. He had been ill for a while, and passed away quickly.
2018
This was an incredibly dry, uneventful and sad year for us. A few months of mourning and then getting our things in order, especially for my grandmother took up a huge chunk of my time.
I also decided to get married.
2019
This was the year things started getting back to normal for my family and I. It was still stressful, but we coped up. I found someone wonderful to marry in February, we got engaged in April and married in December.
We travelled to Turkey for our honeymoon. It’s a beautiful country with amazing people. One of the warmest receptions, as a foreigner, I’ve experienced.
2020
My brother-in-law was getting married in March, so the first three months were all about that.
In February, my wife and I travelled to Mahabaleshwar, a small yet busy hill-station close from my city (I went there after a lapse of 16 years).
The newly married couple (my brother and sister in law) got back from their honeymoon and the very next day, India went into a complete lockdown and utter chaos.
The next few months were very hard for everyone I knew. Somehow, I fared better than most because I was used to working from home, usually alone, and not having much dependance on things outdoors (except for leisurely travel).
We lost some of our relatives, we lost our friends to the CoV-SARS virus.
I lost a close and dear friend of mine (to something else).
Documented instances of police brutality, riots, we even had our own share of anti-maskers and COVID deniers, new laws in some states making inter-faith marriages illegal and void. The first few months saw protests against the new CAA & NRC bills, while the later part of the year against the new Farm/Agro Bills.
These are the last few hours of this decade. And in these last hours, I’m hoping that we enter the next decade with a resolve for peace & understanding, cooperation & empathy, trust & equality.