"Silence of Vajra Guru Pema" by Tashi Ram

It doesn't matter if you see me or not.
I am standing right there with no sorrow or delight.

It doesn't matter if you miss me or not.
The feeling is right there and it isn't going anywhere.

It doesn't matter if you love me or not.
Love is right there and it isn't going to change.

It doesn't matter if you are with me or not.
My hand is in your hand and I won't let go.

Come to my arms.
Or let me live in your heart.

Silence Love.
Calmness Joy.

Indoor Sky Diving

Recommended by a buddy, I tried indoor sky diving during my week at Vegas for SAP TechEd. You got in a room, they called it (vertical) wind tunnel. The floor is a made of metal mesh. Underneath the mesh is a huge fan, a fan that has enough power to blow a person up! Around the room are alot of pad and cushioning.

They gave each of us very baggy suit to wear, which suppose to increase lift. The instructor told each person to lie on the mesh floor first. Once it starts, the operator turns on the fan gradually. I started feel being lifted. Yes!, Next thing I know, I am floating in air! The feeling of flying is amazing...

Everything came into play, your body position, your weight...Some ppl struggle to get lifted. Some ppl struggle to get balance. To me getting lifted is no issue, I was so light, and the suite was extreme baggy on me. From the video my dad took for me, I looked liked a ballon in that suit. LOL! For a few times, the instructor had to pull my foot and drag me down, because I flew to high :-PPP

I recommended this activity to ppl all age. It is not scary, very safe, since you do it indoor.

The "Le Reve" Show at Wynn Hotel

I had a chance to go to Las Vegas couple weeks ago to attend the SAP TechEd for a week. During that week, I wanted to watched a show. I did some research online and order the ticket for on of the best rated show at Vegas - The Le Reve.

After watching the show, I have to say. Le Reve is really the best show at Vegas. The Wynn Hotel built a circular domed Theater just for this show, with a deep swimming pool in the center of the stage. It allows performances occur in air, in water and around the theater on its wall.

This is a total 3 dimensional show. Synchronized swimmers swim in water, diver dump from 50 feet above the surface of water. Acrobatic performer doing all kind tricks and form their body to different shape in air.

No need to mention the state-of-art lights and sound effect. The circular theater make even thing looks prettier. And the whole show's choreography is outstanding! It is rated the most artistic and most creative show in Vegas!

In my own point of view, it is better than a Cirque de Soleil show I saw before, because Cirque uses an traditional front stage, audience don't get the all around effect.

In Bellagio hotel, there is another water show produced by Cirque de Soleil called "The O". I saw it's clip on youtube. There is no way it can compare to "Le Reve". The stage is not as good, the choreography is not as interesting. The theme is not as romantic. "O" is about animals and tribes fighting for sacred water resource and a epic of how holy water is thru out history. Because "O" is a cirque de soleil show, evidently, there are clowns, and some cirqus like apparatus.

On the other hand, you won't see much typical circus act in "Le Reve", it is consider a theatrical show than circus show. The Name of the show "Le Reve" is from one of the most famous painting by Picasso, where Picasso depicts his mistress lying in a couch and fell asleep. The show use the name of this painting to set the theme. It allows unlimited space for creativity in the show. It starts with a lady going to bed. Then we entered her dreams. She dreamed about trees, love, sexuality, demons, wedding, etc.

So, my point is, if there is just one show you should see in Vegas, Le Reve is the one! This is indeed the best show in Vegas!

If you are the kind of person who rather watch a nude show than a truly amazing world-class show , I'm not going to comment anything about it....All I got to say is sorry for you.

Olympic Opening Ceremony

The 2008 Olympic Game Opening Ceremony at Beijing was truly spectacular. The visual effect, choreography, costumes, lighting, fireworks, sound were all so amazzzzing.

It's like an big Hollywood blockbuster done by real people. There are 15000 performers participated the Opening ceremony. Now the bar is set too high for any country to match to in future!

The National Stadium (Bird's Nest) was customized with the ceremony in mind. It has an all-around membrane screen wrap the entire stadium and a world biggest LCD screen lays in the center of the stadium on ground. The main dancers, Kongfu masters, and singers performed in the center, with thousands back-up performers formed circle around the LCD screen made stage.

Series of fireworks went off across the city ensembles with fireworks around the stadium lead to one highlight after another. It is designed by the world renowned firework designer.

The most special trait about this ceremony is that it is 3-Dimensional. Many dancers was flying in sky by a steel string ties to them. The final highlights was Li Ning run around the stadium's membrane wall and lit the Olympic Torch!

What a show! I don't think there is going to be any Olympic opening ceremony will able to beat that ever! Only could a country with abundant population, enough fund, and unlimited passion for sport could achieve something like this!

Good read

(1) This is a good article written by a Mongolian Chinese. It's interesting to know the perspective of another Minority about Tibet Movement.

http://members.tripod.com/americanmediawatch/id16.htm

(2) This is another objective article written by an American writer, Michael Parenti, an internationally known award-winning author and lecturer, as well as a leading progressive political analyst

http://www.swans.com/library/art9/mparen01.html

Independence when you can't agree on

Do you get a divorce when you can't agree on something, or try to work it thru?
I think most ppl would say "No, we will try to work things thru." Then how come the Tibetans in China they just want to separate without even try to work things out with the Chinese Government? Do they think the majority Hans not showing them enough love? Do they think the government forget about them?

Oh yeah, they don't have enough freedom! Freedom doesn't not equal to independence. They can send representative to negotiate with the government to get more religious freedom. They can ask for more seats in the central government. China is going thru many reforms, things are so different compare to 20 years ago. There are so many temples in China, if you want to go pray in the temple, no one will stop you. If the riots only ask for more religious freedom, the government won't worry so much about that, it is when they request independence, that is what scare the government.

We see there are Christian in China who complain they don't get enough religious freedom to practice Christianity, but hey, you don't see them say, give me one chunk of land in China and we will build our own country. Why, because, Christian Chinese still consider themselves Chinese. Some Ti bets don't even consider themselves Chinese. It's all about race after all, isn't it?

Btw, there are 55 officially recognized historical minority groups. Minorities lived in China since ancient history. Recent immigrants to China are not considered as minorities in China. Out of the 55 minorities, 53 are fairly happy being Chinese citizen, only riots from two groups constantly trying to gain independence from the past 40 years. There is some in correct info on Wiki saying the communist party invaded Tibet. I'm not trying to defend for the CCP, I don't like them either. I'm simply telling the truth. Before PRC was founded in 1949, Tibet region was under rule of the Chiang Kai-Shek's National Party After Chiang Kai-Shek fled to Taiwan, the CCP took over control of the Region. They did sent some troops there, only to maintaining the local stability, but there weren't any wars.

China is a secular state, same as the U.S. in this aspect, if Tibet Buddhists want to make Buddhism as the national religion, off course the government not going to agree to that! Is they want to separate to build a new country, off course the Chinese government no going to say yes to that either. Are we determined to have a 2nd civil war in the US, if a southern state wants to declare independence today?

Have we get any lessons from the Balkanization in Eastern Europe? Do you really want to split powerful large country to many tiny pieces? Why can't the whole world just become one country? I know in reality it prob is not going to happen, but in theory, isn't that going to be awesome! All races, religions, parties and groups are able to across their difference and live happily together.

Why can't we just pass race and religion difference?

Many who pay attention to new in the Chinese region probably know two of the biggest province in China the Uyghur and Tibet province want to gain independence for long time, even though they have been part of China since ancient time. The main reason being are people live at Uyghur and Tibet belong to different ethnic group from the rest of China. Uyghur people are Turkish descendants and they practice Islam. Tibetan practice Buddhism. For the rest of China, Han ethnic dominate 90% of total population and majority are atheist due to 60 years of ruling by the communist party.

In recent years, riots have occurred several time in Uyghur and Tibet provinces. They are trying to gain independence from China. What I can't understand is how come the Inner Mongolian province is so peaceful, they never attempt to gain independence nor united with The Mongolian People's Republic? The language, religion, and race are all the same between inner Mongolia province of China and Mongolia the country. The would have every reason to separate themselves from China, but they don't want to.

My guess here is Mongols once rule China. The Mongolian empire built by Genghis Khan was once the largest nation on the earth. So Mongols in China can find a sense of belonging, but Uyghur people and Tibetans may not, since Uyghur Empire and Tibetan Empire were never strong enough to conquer eastward successfully. There were several failed attempt in ancient history, and since they lost the war, they ended up to be part of the ancient Han ruled empires in Tang Dynasty, Song Dynasty, Ming Dynasty and Qing Dynasty.

In the western world, there are a lot news that are not in favor of China. I'm not trying to defense China, coz some of those reports are probably true. However I'm just going to tell you what I've seen as kid during the 15 year I lived in China.

(1) Minority kids were treated as superstar in School. Among the 56 ethnic groups in China, 55 of them are consider minority group and they only count as 10% of the total population. Since majority of the minorities live in the west, it is so rare to see a minority classmate at my school in a big city like Tianjin. All the kids think they are so special! We loved them. Chinese Minorities are really good at singing and dancing. At end of each semester, it is the school's tradition to have a talent show, minority kids were always the star in those show. In tern of education, minority enjoy a superior advantage. For college entry exam, the passing score for minorities are lower than the score for Han. And if there are two students one Hans and one minority have the same score, minority have the priority to be admitted first. In many poor areas at Tibet and Uyghur, whole bunch of schools were found. Minority families are allow to have more than one child legally, while the rest of Chinese families have to obey then one child policy! Talking about affirmative action, this is real practice in play!

Since 10 years ago, the Chinese government decide to improve the economy in the western region of China. So many infrastructure were built, such as road, electricity power plants, hospital, etc. The new railway built by the Chinese Central government from Beijing to Lhasa, capital of the Tibet province, is a cashing cow for the Tibet province. It sending millions of tourists to Tibet to boost the local economy. And the Tibetan are saying the government and the Han people are not nice to them? In Uyghur, there is the world largest tomato processing company, China's 2nd largest petroleum field and refinery.

I don't understand how can they not appreciate what the Chinese government is trying to do for them??? Who can explain this to me???

Olympic Game and Tibetan Riot

I don't understand why there are ppl trying to boycott the 2008 Olympic game at Beijing China.

(1) First of all, we should not mix Sport and Politics.

(2) If a state or province in your country trying to gain independence, whT would your government do?

(3) I support religious freedom and human rights, but that is not what those Tibet Riots were trying to accomplish. They were just use religion as a mask and trying to separate Tibet from China and mess up the Olympic game. How evil!

(4) Even the buddeism leader Dala Lama accept the fact the Tibet is a part of the People's Republic of China.

(5) History of Tibet is infused with History of China. Tibet establish diplomacy with Tang Dynasty at 627AD. Controlled by Mongol Empire since 1236, and volunteering joined China in the Qing Dynasty at 1751

(6) So if you going to boycott something, it's wise to understand about the situation and history of that country first before interference.

A new perspective on Asians only hung out with Asians

Recently, someone very special to me said to me that he notices that his Chinese colleagues always talk to other Chinese at his workplace. It is like they form an inclusive Chinese group within the company. I have to admit what he observed is very true and consistent to what I've seen in most Asian communities. Despite the ease of communication in their mother tongue, what else causes this phenomenon? I have to wonder...

Americans are very nice people in general. They are not rude, but not super friendly either. In the U.S., immigrants are pretty much on their own. Immigrants have to figure out their own way to fit in. To an outsider, it is difficult to penetrate the "white" society without any insiders to guide them to the entrance.

China welcomes foreigners with open arms. When a foreigner goes to China, whether it is for leisure or business or study, s/he will immediately find him/herself surrounded by local Chinese, who want to be their hosts. Chinese feel it is an honor to show foreign visitors around, so they have the opportunity to explain Chinese history, tradition, culture, food, arts and music to their guests from far away.

For Instance, how many White co-workers at your workplace pro-actively ask their Asian coworkers to hang out with them? When someone made a joke and people in the whole office are laughing except those Asians in your office, how many approached them to explain the joke to them? Sure, I know probably most the culture or historical references to the joke are missing for your Asian coworkers to get the humor. However without some nice American to explain to them, it will be even harder to understand! And you wonder why they have the tendency to talk to their own people???

When I was in High School, not many schoolmates I knew made attempts to help me understand about American culture. I had to figure out most things on my own, slowly. At least, if I ask someone about something, I would get an answer. That is one difference. Americans expect others to ask first, rather than just start telling. This only works if an immigrant knows exactly what to ask. A lot of time, culture shocks can be so subtle; we feel its existence but just can't name it. So it is possible to not even able to put together a question.

If you ever visit China, you will know what I mean. Every Chinese is so welcome; everyone is so eager to talk to foreign visitors, to help them understand their country, their people. One two-week trip to China, you will absorb more about China and Chinese than any immigrant in the U.S. can understand about this place in a year.

Well, on the bright side, there are a lot TV programs in China discuss about other countries. Sometimes, in those programs, they often invite foreign exchange students studying in China to get on the show and talk about their experience in their own country and in China. Many American TV shows and movies can be found in China too. There is also a Chinese version for every American reality show. Otherwise it will be more difficult for Chinese immigrants to interface with non-Asian.

Off course not every American is indifferent about other ethnical groups. There are many I know are very nice and friendly. To those Asians who have American friends and Americans who have Asian friends. Hopefully, they can fulfill the duty of culture ambassadors, cross the culture barrier and tumble down the invisible wall. Asian's lifestyle is not so different to American's anyway. If you want to make an effort, you will find more similarities than differences. :-)

Me and My Randomness

I don't know why I just suddenly have this urge to post a blog with this title. I don't even have a content in mind yet but I already know this is what I want to call it. I've been doing alot things lately, alot random behaviors, reading random articles online, sending random emails to friends at some random time during the day. To me, this is just a very random phase. Even though, it is all very random, I think it all makes sense, at least it makes sense to myself. If some random reader is reading this now, s/he is probably very confused by what I am writing about. Actually I am not even sure I know myself. This is just some random burst before bedtime. People should know, I'm not wierd, I'm just random :-P

Recent Update

Training at Chicago was good. Learn some new knowledge. It was very cold week.
Egypt trip plan is set. Will be going in December for two weeks. So excited!
Went to Hartford. It was nice hanging out with old and new friends, and went hiking.
Business trip to Salt Lake City was canceled, but will still go to DC for 1wk.

Everything is put off

Was planning to go to Indiana Dunes for camping with friends, but two of them are down due to sickness. So plan has be to put off. sucks...
All my post recently are about negativity, not so good, should start get positive about things again. On the bright side, I'll be at Chicago for training next week. That will be fun. :-)

Misc stuff

Egypt plan is up in air now,...a friend is unsure if she can still go due to some realistic reason.

I got hit on by some creep on the shuttle at workplace. And there is another wierdo in the building is stalking me too.

Still waiting on result from the drawing for Olympic pre-sale tickets. No words yet.

This SUCKS!

Oh, Wow, I forgot that Sept 1st is when I first wrote a blog. I can't believe I've been doing this for two years! That's worthed a celebration.

Indianapolis Theatre Fringe Festival + Ribfest

Labor Day weekend were pretty good. Watched couple live performance during the Indianapolis Theatre Fringe Festival. Went to the 12th annual Rib Fest, but didn't eat any ribs. Finally, I watched Bourne Ultimatum after talking about going to a theatre for weeks. Its fighting scenes were thrilling, better than the last two. Also watched couple DVDs at friend's house. The "Prestige" and "Stranger Than Fiction"

The Prestige is such a complicated movie, but really good, kept audience thinking. However I still think I like the other magician movie the Illusionist better, because the stage effects in this movie is more dreamy and artistic. There's also more romance in Illusionist. For those who don't know, I'm a big sucker for romantic films, especially when it has a happy ending. The movie Prestige started to lose me when a Cloning machine was introduced, didn't expect it to become a SciFi, hehe. Its ending was shockingly dramatic with a meaningful moral- Hate ruins everyone. Revenge is not the solution. No one wins at end.

What can I say about Stranger Than Fiction? hmm.., it is indeed very strange. Haha. But it is still a very interesting movie, if you are looking for something different and out of ordinary, i would definitely recommend this movie. Definitely one of the top performance by Will Ferrell.

Autumn Has Started Already In China

I just realized today in Chinese tradition autumn has already started. In Chinese calendar, Spring Equinox, Summer Solstice, Autumn Equinox and Winter Solstice are middle of the season instead of beginning of the season. I think the Chinese way makes more sense since the two Solstices suppose to be the longest or shortest day of the year, hence they should be considered as the center of summer or winter.

Following this logic, 9/21 should be the middle of Fall rather than beginning of fall. That means Summer ends and Fall starts a month and half before 9/21. So 8/7 should be the last day of summer and 8/8 should be the first day of Fall every year. Wow, hence it is already Fall now.

Even though Chinese calendar is basically a lunar calendar, Spring Equinox, Summer Solstice, Autumn Equinox and Winter Solstice are determined by observing the Solar system. Actually there are total of 24 solar-terms in Chinese calendar that are called "Jie Qi", which translates to "Season and Climate". There are two every month to reflect the change of weather and temperature due to change of distance between Earth and Sun. Ancient Chinese peasants use the 24 "Jie Qi" as the key for planning and arrangement of agriculture activities.

The First AC and Automatic Fan at UNESCO China

It started getting cooler here and no more AC is needed till next year. I wonder what people do before AC and electrical fan. Well, my theory is they had higher threshold to heat.

I recall visiting an UNESCO site at Anhui in Southern China. There is a well reserved historical village with intact architectures. It was once home of many wealthy merchants 500 or 600 hundred years ago. They accumulated their wealth by trade Tea and Silk. The planning of village was done before residence moved in. Its roads form an intertwined spider web shape which resembles the Eight Diagrams of Taoism and divide the village into 8 sections. The center is a lake or reservoir. Water needed by the entire village is distributed through 8 canals. Each estate in the village has a unique design with extravagant decoration, yet still in harmony with the overall style of the community.

One of the most interesting I found in one courtyard is an ancient prototype of Air Conditioner and a very original automatic fan. The owner definitely knew how to enjoy life. A cave used to store water spreads underneath the whole courtyard. Fresh water from a closest river flows into this gigantic water tank as old water was dumped out. What is this for? Keeping the house cool! It is the world first AC!

Now let's talk about the fan. The house consists of a mill. At the other side of the mill wheel connects a big palm leaves fan in living room. The big fan would start to spin as river pushes the mill wheel. Isn't that amazing? I think it is such advanced technology for 500 to 600 years ago. No need to mention how environmental it is! No harmful chemical released :-) Oh, besides, the high ceiling and thick walls help to maintain the temperature of the room as well.

Why aren't there more environmental safe cooling inventions these days? And why are modern houses not as energy efficient as they were used to be. I mean they are much better comparing to old house built 30 years ago, since higher quality thermos material are introduced. However, I still think buildings made today are still less energy efficient comparing to buildings made hundreds of years ago. :-P

Myers-Briggs Personality Test

A friend of mine told me about the Myers-Briggs Personality Test that he took at a training. So I was intrigued to take that test myself to see what I get.

Googled a little bit, found this online.
http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTypes2.asp
There are 16 different types result in this self-analysis. http://typelogic.com/
My result: ENFP

According to the assessment, people with ENFP personality are found in 5% of the population. ENFP are enthusiastic, effervescent and spontaneous. ENFPs can become restless quickly if occupation involves too much detail and follow-through over a long period of time. Variety in day-to-day operations and interactions best suits ENFPs. ENFPs enjoy inventing new ways of doing things; don't like repeating experience. Once things become routine, ENFPs will lose interest. ENFPs can be curious just about everything, always try to find what's new and then pass on the information, hence they could make a good reporter, newscasters or journalists. (Now I know why I like to write blogs. LOL)

ENFPs are also hyper alert and always ready for emergencies. They continuously scan the external environment and nothing will escape their attention. They are keen and penetrating observers. At times, ENFPs have the tendency to interpret the hidden meaning of events beyond words or actions.

The evaluation is very accurate and I agree to all of it.

Flat Tire

I got a flat tire yesterday. Right before entering DSCC,...all I hear was a sound "boom" following "pssss", then the car start to limp. Apparently I drove over a huge nail on the middle of road. Hard to spot those kind of things when driving 40 miles a hour.

Luckily there is an auto service right across the street from the DSCC base. So I had to drop my car there and walked to work. Although the auto shop is right outside the DSCC entrance, there is still a long walk from the gate to the building I work at. It is such a coincident that every time I end up have to walk long distance unexpectedly, I have my favorite pair of dress shoes on :-( Well anyway, still have to walk in those heels. Took me about half hour to get to the building and I was late for work obviously. The base is about the size of an airport :-P. It is by the Columbus airport too.

Later of the day, the auto shop called me to pick up my car. I got there the same way i came, on feet. The cashier showed me the nail they pulled out from the tire. OMG, it is huge. Technically it is not even a nail; it is a flat tip screw. It must be approximately 7 inches long, 1/4 inch in diameter. Crazy how that thing stuck to the tire.

Anyway tire was fixed, I got my car back. Did not get another flat tire on my way home. Haha :-D

Recaps for last week

Mid of last week, I went to see a Columbus Clippers vs. Louisville Bats Baseball Game with some friends from the church of my coworkers. Although the game was really long and boring and we were on the losing side. It was still fun to enjoy the summer evening with some friend, just chilling, chatting while watching the game.

On Saturday, I had to work during the day for the cutover of a migration project. It went pretty smoothly, so get every done around 2pm. Went home, took a nap. Two of my friends are leaving Columbus to pursue bigger and more important things in their lives in other parts of the country. So there were two farewell parties I had to go on Sat night. It's just really difficult for me to see people leaving, especially one of them are very good friend of mine. I tried to have a good attitude about this, but it is just hard to have uplifting mood. There is an old Chinese proverb "No banquet that will last forever." I know we will still keep in touch, and our friendship will still remain, but it is just not going to be the same anymore, that's why people alaways need to make new friends.

Unfunctional Family

I heard my mom talk about her friends' daughter's marriage couple days ago. I was really surprised when I heard about the story. Here is the brief in a nutshell. My mom's friends' daughter is Chinese. She married a white Australian guy. Both of my mom's friends don't speak English. Last year, they went to Australia to visit their daughter and her husband for the first time.

The problem is this guy can not stand listening his wife speak Chinese to her parents. He told her that they can not speak Chinese at his home when he is present. It makes him "anxious" when he doesn't know what they are saying. I mean that is NONSENSE. First of all, it is her home too; Secondly, it is their right to speak in their language; Thirdly, they only know Chinese, how he expects them to talk to their daughter? Fourthly, what if he goes to a non-English speaking country? such as Germany or France, can he stop all Germans and French to speak German and French? I mean who he think he is! What right he has to do that!

What is most ridiculous is that their daughter seems OK with it. She told her parents not to speak to her when he gets home anymore. So during those a few days they were visiting, they could only talk once he left for work. After he returned home, they stopped talking. Since they don't know how to speak English, they could only use hand gesture, and shake or nod their head to communicate! This is insane. I can not believe such rude and inconsiderate people exist. I was more mad about the daughter. Why is she so weak? Why couldn't she tell her Australian husband that what he did to her parents are wrong? I know I would never do that to my parents.

Among all the bazaar stories I heard about intercultural relationship, this is NOT the weirdest one indeed. There are a lot of things I heard and read were even worse. Although most of those stories are quite unfortunate, I do believe there are good and bad people in every race actually. It is just when it comes to cross-cultural things, people become more sensitive and skeptical and tend to focus on the negativity much more than the positivity. I'm certain there are just as many successful cases of intercultural relationship, but most people don't pay much attention to those good stories, since to most people horrible ones sound more interesting.

Thoughts after taking online teambuilding training

I just finished an Accenture internal online training called "Cultivating a High-performance Project Team: Building a High-performance Team". There are some new concepts that differs significantly from my previous understanding.

In traditional Chinese culture, the "art of leading" is to keep the everyone in team "balanced", the best leader is the one who can keep the "harmony" of the team. Every since China opened it's door to the the outside world. The westernized influence swept China. Many private new companies adopt the westernized management philosophy since the early 80's. Promoting competition within employee, rewarding individual contribution and etc become popular buzz words used in modern enterprise management.

By completing the training, some of my views about how to create an successful team changed. In this training, it doesn't recommend severe competition between team members, because that "break" the team. When prizing individual contribution, it suggests do it one-on-one. My guess that avoids unnecessary jealousy among team member which can negatively impact team culture. It also said for upper managment should emphasize and reward team achievement rather than individual success.

Majority of the training are agreeable to what I already knew. Couple things that are different, such as, team manager should try to resolve team members' conflict. In modern China, if there is a conflict between two employee, boss would just say: "deal with it, or you both can get fired". It is not a common practice for lead to get involved in team member's conflict, because they think that will just make things become more complicated. What was taught in this course is more aligned with the traditional Chinese management method, which is lead supposes to maintain the harmony among his subordinates in every way.

The training also explained about the importance of informal processes and foster of feeling of inclusion, devotion, dedication, pride and trust among team to further improve team performance.

I can't always get what I want

Growing up, I'm a very lucky person in general, short period of hardship in my teen year, but overall I'm pretty blessed. I don't like pray, because I think GOD is too busy to answer so many prayers, and it is unfair to grant prayer to everyone. I think GOD will do the justice regardless if you pray or not. If it is thing that you are not supposed to get, you won't get it anyway. Nobody always get what s/he wants.

Fast food culture

In today's society, most people are not interested in the idea of long distance relationship, just as most people are not willing to wait in line for their food. This is the result of the fast food culture. Everything has to be convenient.

We all know fast food is tasteless, because the process and ingredients into making the food is too simple and plain. Building a good relationship is like preparing a nice meal. It takes long time to make, and sometime you have to go out far from home to shop for that special ingredient. Only things that you spent a lot of time and effort to achieve that u will know how to appreciate it and cherish it more.

To me distance is more romantic. There are some really good things about distance. It forces guys to make more effort than when they are in the same place. That way they get involved in a deeper way. Sometimes the physical proximity can drive the relationship into a more physical direction and completely stop paying attention to the emotional aspects. If someone wants to start a long distance relationship with you, then you know that person is very serious about it.

Nothing is impossible. I definitely think long distance relationship can be worked out, it just takes more work. Problem is most guys don't want the extra work, because they think they can find someone else soon, but chances are those easy things will fizzle out just as fast. A connection is not something that happens to everyone everyday, and most likely not someone next door. It takes many guys many years to realize how hard it actually is to meet the right person. A person who happens to find someone easily usually ends up having other issues that have to resolve later. Just think about all the health issues people have discovered due to over consume of unhealthy fast junk food.

Great Trip to Hartford

I went to visit my good college friend from U of M who lives in Hartford now. It has been 10month since I last met her at NYC. We got a lot to catch up, and talked a lot, have a lot fun.

We hung out with her friends pretty much every night of Thursday, Friday and Saturday. And we bar hopped. heheh. I've never done that before! It was so much fun. I drank a little bit just enough to get a buzz, but wasn't drunk. Because I don't think it would be fun anymore if get too drunk.

For day activities, we went to New Haven to visit Yale University and ate at the famous Frank Pepe Pizzeria. I order a pizza with clam and shrimp. It was so yummy. The clam and shrimp tasted so fresh. And the spice on the pizza is so good too. The pizza had a very rich flavor. And there is no redundant mozzarella and tomato sauce used on the pizza, which is great decision, all I could taste was the awesome flavor from the seafood.

Saturday afternoon, we went to the very first Connecticut Wine Festival. We tasted many quality local wines. I enjoyed the wine tasting experience :-) We must have tried 20 some different wines. heheh. And when we were having lunch at the festival, there was man who works at the winery at one of the booth at the festival happened to sit at our table too. So we had a nice chat with him, and later we went to his winery to tried a few wines. He was a really kind old man, remind me of Santa. :-D

Other than that, we also had dinner at a fancy Asian Fusion restaurant, and Sunday brunch and the Manchester downtown area. Manchester is this small town adjacent to Hartford. And we got there, we realized an antique car show was holding there. So as we walking thru the old town to our brunch place, we glanced thru some of the cars too.

Overall, it was a very pleasant trip. And I like Skybus airline. So convenient and so efficient. I highly recommend anyone to use Skybus as their top airline choice.

Milwaukee->Firework->SanDiego

OK, this is kind an out-of-date post, but since I have been so busy for two weeks after I returned from my one week vacation, and I had no time to write about my vacation. Finally find some spare time to fuel my hobby.

Weekend before July 4th, drove up to Milwaukee for the Summerfest with four of my pals at Indy. We stopped at Chicago for some authentic DimSum. It was so delicious and we were so full. I contacted a buddy at Milwaukee and he let all of us crash at his place, so didn't have to pay for hotel, which was great.

City of Milwaukee was new to all of us, so we explored the city together. The main event during the trip was to see the Summerfest. It is the largest musical festival in the world. We listen a concert by a band called Fray's. To alot ppl, they are very famous, but I've never heard of Fray's before that. Hehe. It was my first time go to a rock concert. It was pretty cool. On Sunday morning, we also went to the Milwaukee Arts Museum, it was a place I always wanted to visit, ever since i saw its picture in Architecture Review. I'm so amazed by the dramatic beauty of this building and its designers' genuine talent.

The night of Independence Day, my same crew at Indy: Charles, Emily, Robert, plus Muna watched a firework show at Carmel. After the show, we lite the firework we bought. We were like whole bunch little kids playing with fireworks. I was even bare-footed running on the lawn. LOL

The last highlight of my vacation is flew to San Diego for a quick trip. The bad thing is I forget to call my old friend who use to work with me at Lilly to meet me. She lives at LA, so will take 3 hrs to drive to San Diego, when i remembered to call her it's already too late, she wasn't prepared to drive there. That was bad planning on my part. Good thing was i still got to meet another really old friend, by number of years we know each other, not by age. Haha. So we went to Sea World, mission bay, Coronado Island, and Gaslamp district. It was a very short but nice trip.