Scribbles

After a long day, I decided to relax and continue with my French training.  What better way to do that than to catch a French flick?  I popped in The City of Lost Children (La Cité des Enfants Perdus), not really knowing what to expect.  Afterwards, I’m still uncertain what to make of it.  I would categorize it as a horror fantasy adventure.  Despite the name, it is definitely not for children, because the horror and violence will give them nightmares.  The movie stars Ron Perlman, our oafish hero who speaks in incomplete phrases.  Hey, it’s not everyday you get to see Perlman play his thug roles (think Blade 2, Hellboy) en francais.  Accompanied by a young orphan girl, he sets out to rescue his little brother from a mad scientist who kidnaps children to perform horrible experiments on them.  The visuals were stunning, from the costumes to the settings, and presented and captured with some fabulous angles.  All of this happens in a dark fantasy world.  What really stood out was the young actress who played the main sidekick, whose charisma and acting absolutely captivated me.  You just know it when you see those truly gifted child actors, and she was definitely right up there.  It was a film that was foreign in every sense, something that made me uncomfortable yet stretched the imagination.

Instead of adding my own review of this best seller, A Slight Trick of the Mind, for which tons of reviews already exist, I’m just scribbling some of my initial reactions after my first reading.

As I kid, I loved to read the adventures of Sherlock Holmes and his sidekick Dr Watson.  Needless to say, those memories made this book very enjoyable to me, as Holmes’ character is close to my heart.  But in allusion to the rave reviews on how Cullin succeeds at portraying his human frailties, part of the famous sleuth’s attraction for me was his superhero-ness, the persona that was beyond ordinary humans.  The deft presentation of this humanity leaves me wondering which I would’ve preferred.  Do I cling to Sherlock Holme’s invincible aura I was so accustomed to reading about as a kid, or do I feel more connected to the being that I can better relate to, one with weaknesses and faults?  Due to the moroseness of these frailties presented, I am tempted to say the former.  But I hesitate to declare this choice unequivocally.  In making me squirm as I read about my hero and question how I really want to remember him, the author demonstrates his mastery in touching the reader on a personal and intimate level, perhaps uncomfortably so.  As I put the book down with mixed feelings about the story, I invite you to enjoy the superb writing and come to your own conclusions on how you feel about it.

In my quest for future housing at INSEAD, I stumbled across the chateau option.  One of the current students in charge sent me some information about Chateau de Tavers.  Technically speaking, it is not in Fontainebleau, where the campus is located.  Most students live in the surrounding villages (of which Tavers is one) and small towns of Fontainebleau.  In these locations, housing options comprise apartments, larger country houses, and finally the grand prize – le chateau.

Chateau translates literally to castle in English, but we’re not talking about those ancient castles you see in movies, complete with moats, defensive walls, draw bridges, and arrow slits.  These chateaux were built for the noblemen to live in, probably circa 17th century (I’m just guessing here).

So for INSEAD students, this option means you live with a buncha (10+) other students and share some pretty fun experiences together – the closest thing I can think of at Fonty to a college dorm.  In addition, this particular one in Tavers has the theme of socializing, meaning weekly dinner and cocktail parties.  In fact, the owner insists on these events.  He is in the process of adding an indoor pool, sauna, and gym slated for completion this summer.  And one of the commonly cited factoids is their arsenal of 300+ champagne glasses.  Naturally, it means a lot of drinking and most likely not too much studying.  Hey, I ain’t complaining.

Two other huge drawbacks: it’s about a 25 minute drive from campus during rush hour, and due to wacky French municipal laws, no Internet access.  The latter is gonna hurt big time for me, being the online addict that I am.  But hey, I’ll have connection on campus, and how often do I get to live in a chateau near Fonty anyways?

I’m going for it.  I contacted the guy in charge of finding fresh fish, er, I mean, new occupants.  Understandably they want to keep a diverse group of interesting folks living there.  So I’m keeping my fingers crossed that my number will be drawn.  Should I get lucky enough to get in, my friends will have no excuse not to visit.

The last few days have just been total immersion en francais.  I’ve been thinking about taking the TEF exam to get my 3rd language requirement out of the way before starting INSEAD.  I was joking that when I pass it, I should apply to Canadian immigration and claim my 8 points towards the applicability score (out of 100), hahaha.

So I arranged a tutoring session with the language institute to gauge my competency before signing up for the test.  In the meanwhile, I’ve been hitting the books pretty hard, both grammar and vocabulary.  Also been listening to Pimsleur on the way to work, but right now level 2 seems a bit easy.  We’ll see how goes when I reach level 3.  As with most people learning foreign languages, my weakest is in conversation.  I really have to get off my lazy butt and go to a few of those conversation club meetings in Menlo Park.

Also, my brilliant friend and colleague gave me this great idea, which is to sign up to Netflix and rent French films.  By watching just a couple every week, I can train my listening a bit while enjoying some foreign cinematography.  The first flick arrived today, Confidences Trop Intimes. I felt the pace was a little slow, and the way the camera moved back and forth between the characters’ torsos and faces during their intimate conversations was unfamiliar (but not disorienting).  But hey, it definitely wasn’t painful to watch, and I got in my share of language training.

Gonna keep this up a few more weeks and see how it goes.  So far I’m feeling pretty confident about my pace.  The only gating factor is the rate at which I can memorize vocabulary.

Spent the last few nights before hitting the sack reading through former GE CEO’s latest book, Winning.  It was easy enough reading but the values he espoused were insightfully presented in the context of his experiences.  I expected it to be more of a blueprint for running a corporation but there was unexpected candor about how people need to figure out what they are really going after, be it money, work-life balance, or becoming the head honcho.

Several points that stood out: To get a promotion, you have to deliver surprising results above what your boss normally expects from you.  Say you’re an engineer, you can’t just complete your component on time with quality.  You have to actively seek out additional projects, such as putting in new features or processes that help the team.  In many ways, I did this in my career but didn’t see it the way it was explicitly spelled out in the book.  I viewed my actions as just doing a great job, but not as a way to force a promotion.  Instead, I would ask my boss what needs to get done to reach the next level, and when I delivered and sometimes still didn’t get the promotion, I was frustrated.  Jack Welch points out that if you only deliver the expected, then you’re just “doing your job” and you don’t get rewarded with fast promotions for that.

Another thing he said, “I don’t know if it’s good or bad, but the world generally favors people who are energetic and extroverted.  That’s also something you learn young, and it’s reinforced in school, at church, at camp, in clubs, and usually at home too…”  He goes on to describe that while not a requirement for success, this helps tremendously in many aspects of life and career.  Again, something I always implicitly understood but never thought about explicitly.  Back in the high school days, the intellectual nazi in me would confuse being outgoing and extroverted with boisterous and juvenile.  Later, I came to see it differently, but seeing it in print really cemented that realization.

Apparently he’s gotten a bunch of flak for touting GE’s practice of differentiation, where people are ranked in the three groups of 20-70-10, the numbers denoting percentile ranking.  I see that at our company, but we don’t even come close to GE’s candor and transparency of the ranking process and how to move within it.  Welch also mentions people actually do get let go from the bottom 10 group, whereas at our company, I always felt that the bottom five percent (BFP) was just an empty threat.

Many other nuggets of goodness included in the book make for great light reading before bed.  If you get a chance, read it and learn something new and interesting about making it in the corporate world.

I had definitely one of the most interesting mahjong sessions this past Saturday night. After repeated requests from some of the players, we decided to go for a game this past weekend. Aside from me (not an expert to begin with), there were two beginners and an infrequent 13-tile player. Let’s take a look at some of the stats from our 4-quan game:

Total time: 4 hours
First quan: 1.5 hours
Xiang gongs (wrong number of tiles, equivalent of purgator for the game): 2
Za Hu (very rare, player erroneously declares victory): 1.5
Guang hua yuan (aka “stroll in the garden” or lost everything): 1 player, on the very last hand no less, in our 100 point system

For those of you familiar with 16-tile Taiwan style game, these numbers should baffle if not scare you. The most puzzling stat must be the 1.5 “za hu” caused by the two newbies. One person placed a nine tiao in place of his six in a 4-5-6 sequence, and called the win on that hand. We would’ve let it slide had he not “ganged” his six tiao. The egregiousness of it just couldn’t be overlooked. Now for the 0.5, our other beginner had a pretty good excuse: she misread the number characters in her wan sequence. Since she never could read Chinese anyways, we let it slide, and she promptly made up for it by discarding her misreads and recovering with a win for that round.

As for me, I’m not entirely proud of beating up on newbies, but I managed to win 200 points with some lucky hands, including a rare “pong pong hu zi mo”, and a few more zi mo’s that helped pad the score.

All in all, everyone expressed their enjoyment of the night, even the guy who lost it all. Heck, it was pretty awesome company and something we never do. Perhaps a few more of these and we can cut the 4-quan time down to a reasonable number. A few less za hu’s would be most welcome too.

After enough deliberation, I finally pulled the trigger. I sent in my deposit, all 4350 Euros worth of it. All I can say is “wow”, “whew”, and “g’yeah!!!”

Truth be told, I had a wonderful time at the Haas reception last night.  Driving through Berkeley brought back so many memories. Even saw my old dorm room right up the hill from the b-school building. One thing for certain about being in Berkeley, I share the same Cal pedigree with the 30,000 people on campus and even numerous future classmates in the program, not to mention my friends still in the area. And let’s face it, Haas is just an awesome program. Beyond the extraordinary curriculum and faculty, it encompasses most of the great things of my undergrad experience (too many to list) while weeding out the bad ones (buying books, parking, registering for classes). The program offers that personal touch I always felt missing when I was barely “a number” there. Yet as wonderful as it is, I realized it was also the very reason I didn’t want to do it. Going back to the sure thing in a familiar and comfortable environment isn’t going to spur the growth I crave. It’s time for something completely new, something that pushes my comfort zone in every aspect.

Cal and Bay Area will always be there for me. I see them in my future ties with Silicon Valley. Until then, it’s time for a new adventure!