Little Big Things

Old habits, new China

What does it take to change a city’s habits? In Beijing, rising prosperity, better public spaces and ever-watchful cameras are reshaping how people behave — with room for a little old-fashioned unruliness

Little Big Things

My mother’s magic jar of happiness

In a jar of notes left by her mother, Pallavi finds the small comforts of recovery as they become something to hold on to through the untethering force of grief.

Little Big Things

In between the kingdoms of the well and sick

In a clarifying Third Place between illness and recovery, life becomes both stranger and clearer than it's ever been.

Little Big Things

Farewell, good breast

A cancer diagnosis brings more than the fear of illness. It raises difficult questions about how to protect those we love while revealing unexpected reserves of tenderness and resilience.

Little Big Things

A passport to the kingdom of the sick

A breast cancer diagnosis, a journey to the kingdom of the sick and a determination to describe what lies there without metaphor, euphemism or the word “fight.”

Little Big Things

At this wellness retreat, your poo is everybody’s business

Ayurvedagram promises balance through ancient Ayurvedic practices. For four days, I surrendered my schedule, my modesty and, almost, my digestive tract.

Little Big Things

Travels in the land of Gen Z (Part 2)

Beyond the fragility and short attention span, my students proved sharper, more open-minded and more generous than I’d expected. Second of two parts. Read the first here.

Little Big Things

Travels in the land of Gen Z

To become a professor to Gen Z today is to take a disorienting journey to an exotic land. First of two parts.

Little Big Things

The app life

Living in China, where all of life's needs have been telescoped into the mobile phone, feels like the future the rest of the world is queuing for.

Little Big Things

Of cats and writers

After 19 years, a beloved cat leaves behind more than memories: he survives in a family’s lore, two novels, and the peculiar bond between writers and their feline muses.