AAAAH! We are moving to Colorado!

If you were reading a book, this would be the foreword.. so before you dive into the “exciting” life of an H4 visa wife, here’s her story…
3 years ago, I was a lost puppy not knowing if I ever wanted to get married, 2.5 years ago, I met a drunk guy in a bar whose exact words to me were “Minakshi , you’re finally here”, 1.5 years ago, I married the said drunk guy from the bar, 1 year ago we moved from Hyderabad, India to Denver, Colorado and today – I am an H4 visa wife!
When H told me that we are moving to Denver, I wasn’t too sure.. I’d never been to that part of the US, I had lived in LA and preferred the West coast but I was willing to give it a chance. Plus there was the catch of me not being able to work on my visa. For the uninitiated, the H4 visa is a dependent visa that doesn’t allow you to work in the US! For someone who was used to making her own money, I didn’t want to be anyone’s dependent!! Not to mention opinions that people gave me-
“you are going to get soooooo bored there!”, ” have a kid, it’ll keep you occupied”, (that would be a very expensive thing to do just to keep myself “occupied”), go study in a college there”, “wives who go to the US get depressed sitting at home”, YADA YADA YADA! So obviously I feared the worst.
In August, 2016, with three huge suitcases packed with clothes that didn’t fit, sambar and Rasam powders that I didn’t want and Indian clothes I would never use, I flew from Hyderabad to Denver that is 5280 feet above sea level.
I was excited that I might not encounter too many Indians where I live but trust my husband to find the one gated community that feels like I am in Chennai or Hyderabad. I look out my window and there’s Tamil maamis wearing nighties with coconut oil slathered on their hair, taking strolls with their grandkids *facepalm*. It’s not just the older folk, it’s the younger desis too! I kept thinking I should befriend the neighbors but when I went to throw the trash, I heard other H4 visa wives gossiping with a new H4 visa recruit as they took a leisurely stroll “hum naaa, badminton khelte hain, aur phir na, hum yahan ek do round ghoom ke ghar jaate hain” (we like.. play badminton like…and then we walk a couple of rounds and go home!) Errrrr, yeah doubt I’m befriending them anytime soon! *Double facepalm* Lets not even talk about the time our leasing office had a dessert bar and raffle and I saw people walking around grabbing every cupcake and cookie in sight and piling them on a plate because the desserts were free! *triple facepalm*

I spent the first couple of months watching crappy American reality television including shows like The Bachelor (who am I kidding? I watched it even before I got here), Love at First Kiss (don’t ask), Married at First Sight, 90 day fiancé, Naked and Dating but these shows are a topic for a whole other day! And then I thought to myself, what am I doing? I don’t want to turn into the H4 visa wife everyone talks about. Then I decided to focus on something really important – ME!

I got into fitness thanks to my brother in law and now I’m even more obsessed than he is. It started out as wanting to lose a few pounds and that gradually turned into reading and researching more and more about nutrition, workouts and now it’s a lifestyle that I enjoy. At 30 years old, I’m in the best shape I’ve been in a looooong time.

This led to my foray into cooking. I knew I was a decent baker but before I moved here, everyone was worried if I would be able to cook a meal for myself and H. I surprised myself with the food I experimented with including some decent sambar rice (thank god I brought the sambar powder with me- one of those momma told me so moments).

Then I discovered the beauty that is Colorado. I’ve never lived in a more beautiful place in my life. The hikes, the beer, the trails, the beer, the mountains, the beer, the gorgeous weather… ooooh did I mention the beer? While in Hyderabad our weekends consisted of meeting friends to get hammered, here we go on insanely challenging hikes and earn our ONE beer!

Finally, since I certainly wasn’t making friends with the Indians in our community and H and I were spending so much time together that we began discussing poop, squishy pimples, smelly armpits and other gross things (don’t say ewww.. you know you all do that with your significant other), I had to find some friends and so I joined an online fitness community called Fitgirlsguide where for the first time I saw women uplifting each other irrespective of age, size, gender or race and I’ve made some amazing friends who are as goofy as I am.

If you’ve made it this far, welcome and congratulations and if you intend on not coming back, I don’t blame you because I’m going to be talking about Food, fitness, beer, travel, dogs and you got that right – Poop because mentally I’m still a 10 year old.

I’m going to be posting a ton of vegetarian recipes – low carb, healthy, unhealthy and recipes that will satisfy your PMS cravings yet won’t contain a barrel of sureshot diabetes.

I’m going to post all our travel adventures whether it’s hiking, going to Disneyland or simply a walk around my neighborhood because lets face it sometimes our couch seems like a better option than working out.

I’m going to post interesting fitness and health tips and maybe sometimes an entire day’s workout, easy home workouts and generally pretend to be a know it all! (Disclaimer: don’t kill me if your butt hurts after a few squats)

I can’t really categorize this blog but hopefully you don’t have to be a  bored H4 visa wife with wailing kids to look after(with no offence to anyone since I plan on having kids myself one day).

So welcome to the H4 Visa life with the H4 visa wife!