88% to go...

Man according to TravBuddy, I've only been to 12% of the countries in the world.

Latin America and Africa are killing my stats.

AAPL passes 100

Are you kidding me? How is AAPL's stock above 100? That's unbelievable. I can't believe I sold at 73. That is sooooo sad.

In the meantime, MSFT is still just lumbering along... at least it's back above 30. sigh.

Lemons

Our couch from Dania was delivered this morning, remember the one I was all excited about a few posts ago? Well sadly the excitement was short lived. Firstly the delivery people were an hour late, so I ended up having to move my other call back (great first impression). Secondly, the quality was just crap.

There's spots on parts of the leather:


There's two scratch marks on the back:


The sections don't even connect correctly - it's off and there's a gap:


There are these weird deep lines on the cushsion that you can feel when you rub your hand over it:


There's another scratch mark on the ottoman:


And the leather on the ottoman looks totally used:


Even the delivery guys thought this was crap. The saving grace? I called them and they are willing to deliver another set on Sunday and exchange it out. We'll see if I just happened to get the one lemon from the apple truck, or whether all Dania sells is lemons pretending to be apples.

On a positive note, I was able to sell the 5' and 3' Lovesacs yesterday, so I only have one 5' one left to sell. Bunch of offers coming in so we'll see how much I can get for this last one. The good part is since we deflated the air mattress in her "closet", we can fit the Lovesac there for now, so it's not that big a rush to sell it.

What a small world

This weekend Tae was showing us some funny videos online. Some of them are pretty cool, like this one:



and this one:



but then he showed me this one:



After about 2 mins, I realized - I KNOW THIS KID!!! My parents took me to lunch with him and his grandparents when I was visiting Singapore a couple of years ago. His grandfather even asked me to check up on him while I was in Boston. The video's very creative, and for us nerds that live and die by Final Fantasy's, it's definitely strikes a pitch perfect note.

What a ridiculously small world.

Wake Up Sunshine

Last night during dinner we were talking about how to wake up without feeling groggy (or I guess in some of our cases, how to wake up at all). Eray mentioned that since the average person has 1.5 hours sleep cycles, that you should sleep a multiple of that to get the best sleep. I tried that today, and I think that's a little hard if you have someone else sleeping with you and gets up at a different time.

In looking for other ways to do this, found this guy's post. He has a pretty interesting method that doesn't require very expensive equipment by using a clock radio's 2 alarms. It'll be interesting to see if that actually works. Of course I'd still be screwed when I travel unless I bring an alarm with me...

Of course I could always resort to "practicing" to wake up like this guy. I could see how that could work, but I don't know about practicing it during the day. Probably if you just have enough discipline to do it for a week in the morning you'd be good.

Tale of Two Dinners

So as I said before, Edmund treated on Friday at Nishino, and it was pretty ridiculous. Their food is pretty good - small delicate flavorful portions on par with upper Japanese restaurants in Asia. But when you order like we do, well, I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.


I especially love the picture of the toro. About $145 a head = 4 meals at Todai. Hmm....

Then yesterday Peter treated at Restaurant Zoe. Food was ok. I think it might be because it was a Monday and so their head chef was off? Or maybe it's just not my kind of food. Firstly, food took FOREVER to come out. Secondly, their choice of ingredients were not very good - the steak was tough, the tuna had a string of tendon in it, and their scallops were tiny. Thirdly, their mixture of tastes were a little off - the Foie Gras was good, but then they have this random stuff around it that just washes the taste away. Their menu is "different", so I guess it's good if you are looking for something unique for the sake of uniqueness. About $100 a head.

Hard for me to say though, I'm biased towards Asian food. I still owe a meal I think, so we'll have to see where we go next. Going back to one we've already been is safe, but maybe we'll try something new... hm.... Maybe we'll wait for Kenny and Joe to visit.

Lovesac replacement

It took a few trips to a few different furniture stores, but we found the Lovesac replacement today. Mirano sectional from Dania.

At the end, it was a compromise between the comfort I was looking for (reclining, puffy seats) and the style/maturity my "boss" wanted. (^u^) It arrives Thursday so here's hoping we sell the Lovesacs before then. Let me know if you know any one that's in the market for some AWESOME cushions!

Errands errands errands

Busy week coming home after being out for 2 months. Lots of errands and other things to take care of. Things that happened while I was gone:

- Car insurance expired
- Cellphone bill was due
- Second drive on my desktop died
- Media Center PC got ridiculously loud in my living room
- Fidelity sent me a new end of year summary with some changes
- Relocation bonus and health care reimbursement arrived
- We got a new mailman (who decided to ask my girlfriend out... hm...)
- Renewed our lease at our apartment
- HBS declined my petition to defer admission
- A bunch of my friends at MS got promoted! Congrats!

So spent the past few days getting all settled in, cleaning things up, and going through the errands. Ugh. Not much fun, but had to be done. In between I played a little Lost Planet, DOA Xtreme 2, and God of War 2. Kind of sad that there really aren't any very exciting 360 games out still, although I must say Crackdown is entertaining.

As part of unpacking, I picked out 3 bags of clothes/shoes that we were able to give to Goodwill today. Seems to wasteful to think that we spent so much money on nice branded clothing, and I just end up giving it away. Oh well, so you might see a homeless person with a Armani sweater.

Oh and thanks to Tae, my Media Center is a lot quieter. We had to get a new case and a new fan, but now it's pretty sweet. Yes, I have been asked MANY time why a computer science and electrical engineering major from MIT can't fix my own computer - well I can tell you how the chips or capacitors work, but I can't tell you how to stick a fan on a motherboard. Strange I know. I actually tried to fix my computer before, and I ended up frying my processor and it cost me a few hundred more. Yes, I was VERY annoyed. So after that, I've been pretty hesitant about doing anything with hardware. Anyway, thanks Tae. In case you were wondering, the case is an Antec Sonata. We saw it at Fry's and was sold on it's marketing "Silence is Beautiful". Gotta give them props for hitting exactly what I was looking for. Here's the case:


So Friday night was just crazy. I'll have to describe it later. Let's just say - All you can eat sushi/Japanese food at the nicest Japanese restaurant in town (which is not an all you can eat restaurant) - thanks Edmundo, and a bottle of Captain, a bottle of Jack, and half a bottle of Absolute...

Growing up...

Time to say goodbye to my wonderful Lovesacs (no you pervs). The gf's pushing for a couch.

Check out the ads on Craigslist and Live Expo. Maybe I should try Google Base too.

Precious and fragile...

On Monday I had lunch with my sister and an old friend. He was complaining that he woke up with some pain in his right chest and it kind of hurt while he was breathing, but we all thought it was some muscle pain since he works out 3 times a week. Luckily he was going to the doctor in the afternoon to have it checked out. The doctors sent him home, but told him to monitor it.

Turns out it was a pulmonary embelism - a blood vessel burst. Smart man went to the hospital and he ended up staying in the ICU.

To think though, he's a pretty healthy guy - been on South Beach for a while now, and he goes to the gym 3 times a week - and boom, just like that. The doctors think it's from the changing in pressure from his flights to and from Hawaii last week, but come on, we all fly all the time! I just flew 15 hours to get back to Seattle!

It's pretty fortunate he happened to be in Hong Kong where my sister and mom can help keep on eye on him. He's a single guy living with a roommate he never sees. It's pretty scary to think what would happen in a less developed country and you were really all alone.

Really makes you think about how precious and fragile we really are. All the money in the world can't buy you health or people to care about you when you need it.

Vinny, get well soon big guy.

Buy Kerlon Souza stock...

There's this manga about a this kid that has amazing soccer skills and can do all kinds of crazy moves... Kel just sent me a video of a real kid doing the same. Amazing.



Too bad you can't buy stock in people.

Last night in Hong Kong. Bags are all packed, room cleaned out. It's a bitter sweet feeling. I used to be very depressed about going back to Seattle after an always great time in HK, but nowadays it's not all that bad and there's only one reason for that. 40 hours and counting till I see her. :)

So accomplished...

- Finished Zetman.

- Finished packing.

- Set up my mom and sis's computer.

- Beat Tower Defense on Normal mode thanks to some tips from my chunsa and topped her score (5474), awwww yeah!

Zetman - power comic reading

Ron just lent me Zetman, which only has 7 volumns, but I'm leaving in a day and a half! Time for some power comic reading. That's the way I want to spend my remaining time in Hong Kong... sigh... I am 12.

Exposing Myself

Would you rather have a male or female masseuse for a full body massage (and no, not the ones with happy endings)? I had both while I was in India and I must say both are a little awkward. I wore my boxers for the female one, but it was full monty for the guy. Maybe I'm just insecure?

Regardless, I must say, massages are great. I'm going to miss that back in the US.

Time wasters...

I was going to have some more musings and other more thoughtful blog posts, but Tae was kind enough to introduce me to Tower Defense and well, this is all I'm going to post. Try it out.

More India

I was working out in the gym today and saw this video:

Ah the memories.... it's funny how old songs are replaced by new ones even though they still sound so soothing. I think this was from Nottinghill or something? Maybe that's why I liked it.

Of course it was then followed up by a whole bunch of rap videos from 50 and the likes. Fun to see that American culture has even reached various parts of India. Even more interesting is that the gym attendents seemed transfixed by the videos. I'm guessing the skantily clad women has something to do with that.

I guess rapper's know what men around the world like... smart businessmen.

(btw, you gotta hand it to YouTube - you want it, you can find it there. Damn)


Just came back from dinner party at Sushil's apartment. There were about 14 people there, all very interesting, warm, and everyone spoke perfect English. Felt like a dinner party in the US, except with better food and more waiters. :)

Only problem is, they don't actually serve dinner until 10pm, and we left early and it's 12am now, but I can't really sleep since I'm still full. Super heavy food + eating late = FAT BOY. Dangerous. Gotta hit the gym again soon.

Quality of life and cost of living report

Mercer Consulting just released their latest Quality of Life and Cost of Living reports. Seattle barely made it into the top 50 for quality of life at 49, which is worse than Singapore's 34 but that better than Hong Kong's 70. Shanghai is even lower than that. San Francisco is surprisingly high at 29.

Hong Kong is has the 4th highest cost of living, Singapore is 17th, Shanghai 20th, and San Francisco is 34th. Seattle doesn't even make top 50, although another study found Seattle to be the most overpriced city in the US, so I guess it's cheap, but not worth it?

So where do I want to live again?

At the end of the day, Asia is awesome if you're going to be UPPER middle class/lower upper class, but difficult otherwise. While the US is great for middle class. GO BIG!

Big pimpin - Presidential baby!

Ok, so talk about big time - as promised, pictures of the suite. Full bar, steam room, 2 master bedrooms, monsterous walk-in closets, bar, office, gym equipment...


So some things I've learnt so far:

• Italy is a developing country pretending to be a developed country - corruption, inefficiency, drugged up politicians, crazy driving, gypsies harassing you on the street...
• India is a 3rd world country pretending to be a developing one - "Delhi belly", dirty, street urchins begging for money next to your car, people walking barefoot on the street...
  

9 days to go!

Damn it's hot!

Ok, HK mid-day summer weather at 11pm at night. Welcome to Mumbai. I think I'm going to melt during the day here.

Thank goodness I'm travelling with my dad. Royal treatment all the way. Presidential suite with it's own work out machines, sauna, and massage chair. Oh, and a personal butler who just unpacked my bags and is having my clothes pressed for tomorrow morning when he wakes me up and brings me tea... talk about a different lifestyle. Too bad I'm living a borrowed life, but it gives me a taste of what I'm working hard for.

Oh and I think I have bronchitis. I've been coughing like mad since yesterday and yakking up phlegm. So my allergies have continued to bring me down. It's a little tough to breath right now. wheez wheez wheez... bleh.

Time for some bed rest. I'll post some pics of the insane room later.

The little things...

You never stop to think about how some seemingly miniscule things can sometimes have a big impact on your everyday life. Take for example this most ridiculous AZERTY keyboard. Yes, that's right, I'm sitting in the Air France lounge on their iMac internet kiosk and the keyboard is completely different. This post would have taken me about a minute normally, and it's been about 7 mins already. Unbelieveable. I wonder if it's going to be this hard to adapt to my new job... ;)

10 hrs till my first true Indian experience.

Lazy Rome/Florence/Venice/Paris photo recape

Can't seem to log into my blog from Paris even though Picasa has some way that it can't post things, so just a lazy post on a lazy Saturday afternoon in Paris.

Yes I went on the trip with my mom, dad, and little sister, and no you don't see any pictures of them, not because I'm narcisstic (which I am), but because they are very much against having their pictures online. This whole voyeur thing really is a teen-twenties craze.

Tagging along on my dad's business trip to Mumbai tomorrow. Going to be my first time in India. Sweet.




P.S. It is great to have pictures to help my memory. Although I do miss my other half, I miss her even more when I look at our pictures together and remember how great it is to be with her, even if we're not doing any thing. Only 11 more days! Boy I sound like a girl...

Allergy season - even in Italy...

I travel half way around the world and I still can't escape allergy season. The weather is beautiful in Rome and now Florence, but sadly my allergies are in full force as well! Then again, how can I complain? I'm in Florence staying in the presidential suite at nicest hotel in the city. Interestingly enough, because the hotel is so old, they can't even offer heat and air conditioning at the same time, and so we're without air conditioning here. Doesn't that just seem wrong?

Ah well, it's time to enjoy another Florentine steak - magnifico!