Tea with Bri - Garden Beds to Golden Arches
A Chai with Ghai guest post
Hello chai drinkers,
Welcome to Chai with Ghai’s very first guest post!
Today’s edition is brought to you by Bri, one of my best friends from Columbia Business School and our first-ever guest writer!
I hope you enjoy your Tea with Bri 🍵
As I sat in my downtown Chicago apartment, laptop open, the jazzy piano notes of Sex and the City sing in the background, I had a thought: What happens when a fast-paced city girl slows down…and actually likes it?
This summer marks a checkpoint. Midsummer, mid-MBA, and somewhere in the middle of becoming the version of myself I imagined when I hit submit on my b-school applications. So, I took stock. A rose, a bud, and a thorn — if you will.
Let’s start with the rose: I landed my dream job. I’m interning with the Environmental Defense Fund, contracted to McDonald’s, working in Sustainability and Social Impact. Every day feels like a mix of McCafé-fueled brainstorms, supply chain strategy sessions, and the kind of corporate culture that actually makes you believe a company can change. I'm working on sustainable water strategy because spoiler alert:
no water = no cows = no burgers. It’s basic math.
There’s something electrifying about being part of a team that’s not just talking about change, but actually making it happen. Consulting gave me the “essence” of impact. Here, I get to live it, breathe it, taste it—sometimes literally. Strategy feels different when you get to implement it, not just ideate it.
As the former McDonald's Chief Sustainability Officer, Bob Langert, once put it, this is practical sustainability. McDonald’s might never be 100% sustainable, but even shifting that global behemoth by 1%? That’s real change. For me, it’s more impactful than preaching to the choir at a 100% sustainable start-up. To each their own, of course.
Something to sweeten the job a bit more: The McDonald's HQ has a rotating lineup of international items. Thursdays have officially become my tasting menu days, featuring items like the Banana Tart McFlurry from Japan, Deluxe Potatoes and McPops from France, and India’s legendary McAloo Tikki.
On weekends, I trade skyscrapers for the sprawling green of my childhood home in Appleton, Wisconsin. There, my mom and I tend to our garden—raspberries, tomatoes, peppers, spinach, cucumbers, squash, and herbs galore. It’s a ritual that grounds me, a reminder that sustainability starts with the soil beneath our feet. Nothing, and I mean nothing, beats a sun-warmed tomato turned into Sunday sauce. It’s farm-to-table, sure, but it’s also soul-to-stomach.
And maybe that’s what this summer has become. A season of rooting — in the soil, in my purpose, in the quiet joy of doing what I love. I’ve found my peace, my pace, and my pantry full of tomatoes.
As I close out this column and sip my chai, I can’t help but wonder:
Can a girl have her garden tomatoes and her Big Apple, too?
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~ Email: kanavghai130@gmail.com