How/where are you celebrating your birthday and with whom? “More than anything else, I’ve been craving some quality time in Mother Nature, so I’m going on an afternoon hike and cake picnic in the Billy Goat Trail just outside of D.C. The sounds of the river and the rustling trees! Lots of video calls with family and friends in the morning.”
How did you get your start in journalism? “At my core, I’ve always been a sincerely curious person — my nickname in class 3 in Delhi was ‘Mr.Question.’ My first journalism gig was as the op-ed editor of my high school newspaper, ‘The Eye,’ in Singapore. After experimenting with a couple different pathways during the first few years of college, I settled on journalism during my junior year at Arizona State University’s Walter Cronkite School. I came to D.C. in 2015 to be a Washington correspondent for PBS Arizona and have been reporting here since.”
What’s an interesting book/article you’re reading during coronavirus social distancing? And why? “I started reading ‘Sapiens’ by Yuval Noah Harari a little before the pandemic started and have found it to be captivating and comforting to see all the meandering strife and struggle mankind has gone through to get to this point. It really puts things in context and gives one a colorful sense of the many other crises our species has endured throughout history and come out stronger from. On the fictional front, I’m going to delve back into ‘Infinite Jest,’ years after I started it — it panders and plays with my overthinking brain, which is on overdrive right now!”
