More than two years ago I started the blog ‘Everyday Adventures in Asia (mostly)‘ with the thought to share :
- Insights into everyday life adventures in my adopted ‘home’ India and working ‘homes’ all around Asia
- Tales of past travel adventures with a focus on Asia
- General adventures with topics of interest from the perspective of a Canadian woman living long-term in Asia
I had no feel for what blogging meant, just had a bit of time on my hands, enjoyed reading a few friend’s blogs and thought – why not?
My reasons for blogging were purely personal with a vague concept of a ‘online journal’ of current developments and reflections on earlier adventures too. I thought my posts would only be of interest to family and friends, hence the primary goal was to create a ‘bridge’ between the life I have today with various ‘lives’ I’ve met along the way.
Bridging Bandra-Worli
Back from our recent trip to Canada and the UK, I have a renewed sense of understanding about what this blog means. As a ‘bridge’ between different worlds, it is hugely successful! What is ordinary for me is sometimes extraordinary for others. And I’m humbled by how many folks not only follow my journey through various posts, but connect with the content and experiences shared. When we meet in person, they pick up conversation threads linked back to a post that meant something specific to them. How fabulous is that?
I’ve also gained a tremendous appreciation of the blogging community – those emboldened to share their stories, images, perspectives. Through our virtual selves, we have joked and commiserated, finding kindred spirits with elements of common ground. To now say I ‘know’ in real life three remarkable women who are also part of my blogging family is such a joy.
Time to change (yamanemp88.wpblog.jp)
However the only REAL constant in life is CHANGE!
This blog is no different.. and it is time to make a couple changes… beginning with changing the title.
I’m ‘retiring’ the rather large mouthful of ‘Every day adventures in Asia (mostly)’. Some may not have realised it, but a year ago when I shifted from a WordPress domain name to a custom one, I shortened it to EverydayAsia.com. Sneaky, eh?
Belatedly, I would like to now ‘officially’ welcome…. (drum roll please)…
Everyday Asia
Why? Aside from the adage ‘less is more’, for me:
- ‘Everyday‘ reflects the rather common-place ordinary interests with an eye to how it may be perceived by someone not so familiar with my everyday reality… a kind of insider outsider perspective.
- ‘Asia’ reflects of my continued interest in exploring Asia (and yes – beyond too!) while remaining firmly based in India. As I’ve shared before, it really IS possible to live in Mumbai, have a company set-up in Singapore and work around Asia.
While I’m no less ‘adventurous’ and this blog will continue to ‘mostly’ be about Asia, think we can drop those extra words. Can’t we?
Look
I’ve experimented endlessly with other themes but haven’t found one that works as well as Academica’s three columns. However it is equally time for a bit of a ‘refresh’ too.
Expect to see changes in various visual elements in the coming weeks…
Thinking structures (asiasociety.org)
Structure
My content is organised with 2 pages, 5 main categories and a jumble of sub-categories. The top menu currently has a few minor modifications:
- About is a page simply introducing the blog and blogger
- Everyday India replaces the earlier category ‘Everyday’ and in the coming weeks I plan to play around with the sub-categories of India, discovering difference, everyday life, urban village into topics [Now ‘Home‘]
- Travel is for all the stuff outside India with sub-categories by country or region [Now ‘Away‘]
- Arts is all the odds n sods about theatre, music, literature, festivals, various creative ‘arts’ that peak my interest anywhere in the world [Now ‘Play‘]
- Whisky is for my monthly round-up of Whisky Lady posts [Now a sub-category ‘Whisky‘ in ‘Play’]
- Quarterly Review is for posts summarising activities and topics of interest over the quarter
- Start here… Is another page which replaces the earlier ‘Blog Trivia‘ as a suggested starting point for folks new to the blog
However I’m toying with a complete revamp… something like ‘Home‘, ‘Away‘, ‘Work‘ and ‘Play‘….
So far I’ve only alluded to the ‘work‘ element in my life and have no desire for this blog to have a commercial dimension, however a large part of our life is consumed by work and our lives are an amalgam of ‘work’ and ‘play‘… In my case also being ‘home‘ and ‘away‘ so these themes as a way to structure content is growing on me.
What do you think?
About blogs morphing over time… About the change in title… About the approach to categories / topics… About, well, anything bloggers think about when writing??
Come on folks, give it to me!!
27 July 2015 PS – As you can see, I did adopt the approach of ‘Home‘, ‘Away‘, ‘Work‘ and ‘Play‘….
Everyday Asia 
Thanks for sharing your process on this 🙂 Am harbouring similar thoughts with regards to my own blog, i.e. making it more language focused. But without letting the CAKES go, obviously. Perish the thought!
And yes, I had notice the domain/name changes, and I like it. Everyday Asia, short, snappy, focused.
You CANNOT deprive us of cakes!! That simply would not do!
And look at you catching the domain name Ms “You can’t get nuttin’ past me!” 🙂
…unless you distract me with a cake!”
I like it – but which will be home and which will be away?
Hahah! A good question indeed. My initial thought is to have ‘home’ India simply because it is currently where I live and pay rent. 😉 However it is equally try ‘home’ was Canada, ‘home’ for work is often Jakarta and even Singapore is a kind of ‘alternate home’… But India is where I unpack my bags so… India is the one best identified as ‘home’. 🙂
Ooo, very complicated! Might need a definition – as in Home (India)?
Sigh… kinda why the current avatar has ‘Everyday India’… still need to keep that thinking cap on methinks! 😉
“Everyday Asia” is now top of the blogroll on my blog. The links don’t appear on the front page, but just click on any post and you should see them. I’ll tell you that you are my favourite blog, but tell Ladyofthecakes that the list is alphabetical!
Awwww…. hugs!! But erhm… think you may be ‘outed’ with madame Ladyofthecakes. 🙂 And we don’t want her upset and cutting off our supply of cake porn now do we???
I love the new direction! All the best and looking forward to more wonderful posts 🙂
Many thanks! Let’s see how it evolves… all I know is I’m still having fun and hope you are too. 🙂
Oh wow. I LOVE your new header photo. Wow. It completely changes the feel of your site and it’s such a fantastic image.
And as for blogs changing, I hit the one year mark in June and was about to quit but then decided to try for another year. I went back to the theme I started out with but with a lot of changes. I’ve been also changing my categories and tags but found out that this results in dead links. However! I’m going to deal with it and try and be more consistent going forward. It’s taken me forever to figure out how to tag! My other big mistake was rewriting posts and changing the publish date and now I’ve got 5 duplicates on google. Not sure what to do about that but I learned my lesson!
I’m really excited to see what else you change in the next while!
Awww… thanks! I started prowling around photos of Mumbai and in 2 mins saw this one and went – yup! So bid a fond farewell to the Jakarta skyline to welcome an utterly ordinary everyday image of Juhu beach. 🙂
I don’t want to know how many duplicates I have on wherever… what’s been pissing me off with WP lately is when I publish new posts, it seems to get stuck on the date I originally started the draft – typically a day earlier. So it gets completely lost in the WP Reader. Also if I change the title from the 1st draft to something different before publishing, what shows on LinkedIn is the original draft title?! And don’t get me started on issues with the ‘new’ interface that has all sorts of other hiccups and limitations.
Grumble bitch grumble bitch.
Hope you have better luck with your blog ‘tinkering’… I started a bit with the categories from the back-end with sub-categories.. figure if I get that in place 1st, then any change to the menu should work.
I’ve spent ages this weekend on the design of my Townlands blog. That’s why the Index appeared as a new post. It started life as a page, then became a post, and then I inflicted it on all my subscribers…..not the most interesting list, so well done you for making a comment on it!
Distant Drumlin has settled down into a design that I’m happy with…I just need to decide what the content should be.
I think the problem with Townlands is that it’s not quite a blog. I’m building a resource, but I don’t expect many people to follow my whole journey. In the end my readers may be the Irish diaspora tracing their ancestors and wondering what life looks like back in good old Ballybeen. Posting day by day or week by week may not be the best way to create the collection – it’s just an accident, because that’s what I was already doing on Distant Drumlin. I wonder what my regular readers would think if 50 posts dropped on a single day….
I like your “home away work play” themes. It’s not easy sorting this out, is it? We have to consider brand new readers who have just found us from a search engine, and old friends who know us in real life, and people who have followed the blog for two months or two years.
I’ve given up on the WP reader, relying on twitter, Bloglovin and instant emails to alert me to blogs now.
Yes Townlands is a resource, your photos are amazing, I love the trivia about the places… however for me stories about a place, its people or something which happened there connect the most bringing alive across the globe a spot I would otherwise never have a chance to explore.
The ‘weak’ element in the home / away / work / play is the ‘work’ one as my definition is one which are posts that would not otherwise have happened without the work context or are ‘work-ish’ like howling at the universe about mutual fund follies. So not exactly work or career stuff in the promo kinda way many blogs feature. Still debating that one… The others I could implement quickly – whisky, for example, falls under ‘play’ quick easily!
Hmm.. I haven’t used Bloglovin’ – should check it out.
This is very inspirational and I’ve certainly thought along these lines as well, that is, looking towards or seeking a necessary change in certain aspects of the blog. The way you’ve embraced it is awesome and it’s really cool that a trip back home, or one away from your new ‘home’ (however one interprets it) was what pushed you over the edge. Even for travelers who are used to certain levels of change in their lives, it can still be a bit daunting to look at where we’re at and decide something’s gotta give or something’s gotta go. Good stuff and can’t wait to read more of “Everyday Asia”!
Awwww…. many thanks!! And if you are thinking along these lines… perhaps this is the time to just go out and do it! 🙂
Stay tuned for more changes to come here….
I think it’s always fun when a blog has a shake up. There are so many themes and looks out there, and a couple of years down the line you know what you don’t like. So, why not? 🙂
The bigger shake up for me is re-working the categories… giving it some more thought and going through older content to see what ‘fits’. Which is proving to be rather fun as I re-discover past posts. 🙂
I have to admit mine seriously needs that too. I’ve changed a few things but hesitated at a major shake up largely due to the time it would take. It is a surprise though sometimes when I delve into an older post. Did I write that? Probably just the memory cells giving out on me 🙂
Hahaha! I certainly feel that too. And groan at the outrageously bad typos, weird phrasing and grammatical errors!