It seems that I’m doing a lot of thinking and reading, so I suppose that’s good. One thing I’ve been thinking about a lot is human capital and I believe that is what it’s going to set us apart from others when it comes to hiring and productivity—our levels of human capital.

So I saw this article – California high-speed rail hires CEO for $375,000.

An executive for the company that built France’s bullet trains will lead California’s high-speed rail project for a salary of $375,000, making him one of state government’s highest paid nonuniversity workers.
The California High-Speed Rail Authority board on Thursday unanimously voted to hire Roelof van Ark, 58, of New York as CEO of the $43 billion undertaking being touted as the largest public works project in the nation.

Van Ark will leave his job as president of Alstom Transportation, a role he has held since 2005. Alstom Transportation is the North American subsidiary of the French company Alstom, a corporation with $20 billion in annual sales that built France’s TGV bullet trains and employs 65,000 people.

My first thought was wow, that must be a nice sum of pocket money except the pay is actually low. Van Ark, the CEO, was earning close to a million dollars at his current position. Another thought is that Van Ark only needs to bring himself to the U.S. and his relocation expenses will be covered. How nice is that? Clearly, he’s got the human capital skill that is high in demand and the board is willing to pay him the salary.

That got me thinking and how I can raise my human capital and be more productive.

Phinney (1989) created a three-stage model of ethnic identity development that uses the idea of an Eriksonian ego identity as the foundation for development. Phinney (1989) pays close attention to the evolution of childhood ethnic identity, and how these beginning experiences and conceptions affect later confirmations of ethnic identity in adolescence. Phinney’s model resembles Erikson’s model such that ethnic minorities must undergo crises that later lead to a period of discovery of what it means to be an ethnic person in his/her society. A resolution is then formed as the identity is internalized. It is important to note that Phinney’s model is nonspecific in that it generalizes all ethnic minorities under one identity development process. This sort of ethnic generalization can become problematic not only for the diversity between ethnic groups, e.g. African Americans, Asian Americans, Latino Americans, and Native Americans, but within groups as well.

Phinney’s first stage of unexamined ethnic identity is where the ethnic person’s worldview is dominated by their idealization of Whiteness, European American culture, and White institutions. Ethnic minorities can see themselves through the lens of White society, and furthermore see Caucasian people as their reference group (Phinney, 1989). She divides identification with White people into active and passive categories. Active identification with Caucasians is an underlying factor of the notion of colorblindness. In this stage, ethnic minorities do not perceive differences between Caucasians and themselves and, consequently, minimize their ethnic selves (Phinney, 1989). In comparison, passive identification is when a person realizes that they are not White, but they wish to look like Caucasians and receive the privileges that they do not have as ethnic minorities (Phinney, 1989). While Phinney briefly mentions contextual factors that could impact the reality of this phase, such as parents and ethnic community, she does not truly integrate the idea of “place” into her model. How does the racial make-up of a community, peers and relationships, parents, and schools relate to how much one idealizes White standards? This question will be explored throughout this paper as an important critique of ethnic identity development.

Phinney’s next stage of ethnic identity search/moratorium is encompassed by a situation that changes an ethnic individual’s worldview such that the person realizes he/she cannot completely assimilate into White, European American society (Phinney, 1989). As a direct result of this, the individual feels anger and frustration towards White society, and, consequently, retreats into his/her respective racial group (Phinney, 1989).

The last stage of ethnic identity achievement is when uncertainties and insecurities surrounding ethnic identity are surmounted, and ethnic identity is accepted and integrated with the rest of one’s personal identity (Phinney, 1989). In addition, the individual has made a commitment that will guide him/her in future endeavors (Phinney, 1989).

Since I’m moving to Korea pretty soon and plan to use bike as my means of transportation, I was curious if Korea is a bike-friendly country. The last time I visited, I didn’t see many bicycle riders around.

Seoul, Korea to be bike-friendly by 2010

Good to hear!

Snapped some pics of my ride, Honda Element, on way to Lake Tahoe.

Snowy.

For some reason, I love to drink Gatorade. Not sure how I got hooked on it but probably when I played hockey and was always thirsty. Gatorade seems to be the only beverage that would quench my thrist and it has a taste, unlike water. It even tastes good at a warm temperature so that means I can drink it at any time.

So, I looked it up on Wikipedia.

Robert Cade, Dana Shires, Harry James Free, and Alejandro de Quesada were the medical researchers, at the University of Florida, who created the original Gatorade thirst quencher in 1965.[1] The Gators football coach, Ray Graves, was frustrated with the performance of his players during summer practices and asked the team doctor for his insight. The doctor referred the matter to Cade and his research team, who formulated a mixture of water, sodium, sugar, potassium, phosphate and lemon juice. The drink is now known as Gatorade in honor of the football team, the Gators. The football team credits Gatorade with their first Orange Bowl win over the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets in 1967, and the drink became an instant phenomenon. Yellow Jackets coach Bud Carson, when asked why they lost, replied: “We didn’t have Gatorade. That made the difference.

Cool history!

The personal journal of Doogie Howser, M.D.

This TV show was one of my fave childhood shows and they couldn’t have found a better actor than Neil Patrick Harris. He really carried the whole TV episodes. At the end of each episode, he would turn on his computer and write about his experience or feeling. There were lots of good lessons about life, jobs, love, etc. Many of his words strike true in me. I have a DVD collection of this.

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1989

$100,000, a six-week vacation, and my own air-conditioned office vs. Hector Gonzales… No contest.
POSTED BY DOOGIE HOWSER AT 7:40 PM

This is interesting. Thinks it yields more space but less seating, tho.

Page F30: Seoul to start experimenting with subway cars with seats in the middle instead of next to the window.

While I should be studying for the GRE, I keep thinking about how technology has come to be–there’s an ever battle between Microsoft and Google, also often used as a favorite topic for journalists to spin because after all, nothing attracts attention like a fight during a lunch break or a rare catfight between girls. I remember back in the 1990s, when you wanted to play PC games, you’d need to buy a PC and with Windows under it and play Freecell. So, that was cool till AOL came out, all of the sudden, people were buying PCs like crazy to be on AOL. Windows was underneath these, ofc. But now? you buy them to be on the Internet to show yourself on Facebook, to tweet away, or to Google for information.

Sometimes, I do wonder if there will be a completely new technology that will not require http because pretty much everything is transmitted through http right now. And if you wonder why http? it goes through a protocol called TCP/IP that allows every imaginable device to communicate to one another–from your PC to your pager and even a printer operates on it. Google has foreseen this and made a massive engineering to copy/store everything that’s ever existed on the web and make the information highly relevant and monetize them. Now, Google has recently announced they are going to develop a new kind of OS that will supposedly squeeze everything in between so that you can get on the web as soon as you press on the power button and then go explore on the web like a crazy monkey. Although there are people who spend their days fantasizing about Microsoft going down like the ship Titanic. I’m sorry to disappoint you but that’s not going to happen. Microsoft will remain to do business, largely in thanks to millions of users who play games like WoW, Starcraft, Quake, Counter-Strike, pokers and ofc, their beloved Microsoft Doc. My mom loves to play Freecell on Windows and that’s all it matters to her. It has no annoying pop-up ads, she said.

Once everything’s been said and done, I do have this imagination that the world will end up like the movie, A.I., where there’s not a trace of a human being left and that the only proof of us is to be found on countless hard drives from Google or maybe more like the Wall-E movie that people have long abandoned Earth because of the excessive mess they left and couldn’t be managed.

Actually, I think getting wiped by a gigantic asteroid that’s as big as the sun will more likely happen than I just describe above. Because that’s what happened to dinosaurs.

I just purchased a one way plane ticket to Seoul, Korea and that’s a little over a month from now when I will have stepped my foot over there for one more time.

Like one of my friends’ favorite maxims, “No replacement for displacement.” He’s a big fan of the LS series engine with those big V8 cylinders. At the beginning, I’d argue with him and reasoned that a 4 cylinders engine could keep up with the best of them while being efficient on fuel. He said that’s cool but when it comes down to raw power and torque, nothing can replace displacement. Yep. When you want a go in your car, you just tap your foot on the pedal and a V8 engine will gladly rev up for you without too much effort. Not quite so on a i4 engine, you’d have to bring the rpm up high, get VTEC to kick in to experience some substantial power output. To put it succinctly, he said the Corvette is the closest thing next to a Ferrari that is mass-produced and affordable. Well said, friend.

Well, as luck would have it, I will be returning to the country where I was born in but was “displaced” at the age of three. In the last few years, I have given a lot of thoughts about going back to the country especially after having discovered my family and learned that my sister is deaf too. As I thought about my life and what I’d like to do with it, I realize that I cannot, in my good conscience, leave both my sister (and her husband and my niece) and my brother behind and pretend they are a figment of my imagination. They did not have the same fortune of living in the land of opportunity, America, and get a college education. Sometimes, I wonder what really went through my biological father’s mind when he made a decision to give me up for adoption? He must have made an insight that had I stayed in Korea, I wouldn’t have had same opportunities that I was able to experience. It’d be nice to inquire him about that a bit more but it was hard to communicate with him since we had nothing in common except for the blood and Korea has such a manner that parents do not reveal much to their children.

Another desire to go back to my country is to learn a bit more of the culture and what is culture without language? The language, Hangul, as I have learned, is a very effective language and is the only language to have a national holiday based on. I’ve always got a thing for languages in American Sign Language and English and thought it’d be cool to learn another language and become fluent at it. I often have a dream that I was able to converse in any of four languages. I realize that the image I have of myself has significantly changed after I visited Korea for the first time in 2002. It validated my existence, my identity and saw where I was truly from. Even at this point in today’s society and time, we have progressed enough not to use race as discrimination but our identity still remain important. So, going back to Korea will enrich my identity at the extent of who I am. There’s no replacement for displacement.

from here.

1951

Today

Thought I’d write a short movie review on The Graduate, acted by the young Dustin Hoffman.

The movie was made in 1967 and at the time, Dustin Hoffman was 30 years old but he acted like he’s 21 years old in the movie. For some reason, it also reminds me of another movie, Risky Business, with Tom Cruise, basically thinking abt what you wanna do after you’re done with college and a degree in your hand. While watching this movie, I had to remind myself that this was made in 1967, so the society was quite different back then, and clearly, everyone’s enjoying a rich, materialistic life in Los Angeles and the population was booming. Benjamin Braddock, main character, had his little red roadster revving around.

I’m thinking how I’d like to define this movie and one thing that strikes me is twenty-something syndrome. It’s that gap when you finish college and you need to decide what you want to do, often a situation enlarged if you’re trying to find a job. Benjamin was having that kind of syndrome as he ponders himself to his own thoughts, and his parents are zealous of his past accomplishments and prompting him to go to a graduate school. I’d say that the whole strength of this movie comes from Dustin Hoffman with his acting and have us bought in the story of the movie, though it gets pretty wacky.

The whole movie starts to kick off as one wife of a wealthy family named Mrs. Robinson (beautifully acted by Anne Bancroft) seduces Benjamin, which we learn that he’s a virgin, and well, he spends that entire summer doing pretty much one thing, other than driving his roadster and making himself well-known at the hotel.

As things start to get old, Benjamin realizes he cannot just keep doing this forever till he is persuaded by his parents to take out the daughter of the same family. Not really interested to do that but he was told by Mrs. Robinson that he cannot take her own daughter out (that, I’m not sure why but she probably knew he’d be enamored with her daughter if they went out.) Rather than discouraged, the competitive spirit kicks in Ben’s and he takes her daughter out. Ofc, he falls in love with her but things gets quite ugly when the daughter learns that he’s slept with her mother, now the holder of this slang, cougar. Things fall apart and the daughter resorts to study at University of Berkeley away from Los Angeles.

Back in that twenty-something syndrome mode, Ben thinks about what he wants to do, then he realizes he wanted to marry her and will do whatever it takes including driving back and forth between Los Angeles and Berkeley. In the end, his red roadster finally breaks down, and Ben is willing to use his sprints and energy to prevent the daughter from marrying another guy.

That twenty-something syndrome thing he was having in the beginning? Nah, that’s gone and happily married to a beautiful dirty blonde wholesome girl from Los Angeles, and an experienced one.

-nathan

I’ve been subscribing to Netflix. At first, I was leery of their mail distribution system as I wasn’t sure if I’d be able to send/receive DVDs quickly through mail but lately, it seems that Netflix has been improving their mail distribution where I’m satisfied with their service and time. I’d like to share one tip to make sure that you’re getting your Netflix DVDs quickly enough.

Netflix has two enclosures: one as a mail and another as a DVD cover. On the DVD cover, it has a bar code on it. It’s this bar code that you need to make sure that it gets inserted into mail the correct way so that Netflix can scan the bar code computationally through their assembly line when it receives mail.

One time I didn’t insert the cover into the mail correctly (I had already sealed the mail before I could re-open it), my mail turnaround was much longer, because it got thrown into a bin where staff would have to open mail by hand and scan it in.

It’s easy to measure timing because Netflix will send you an email notification when it receives your DVDs.

One thing I notice about Netflix is that they really do have a large movie selection from new releases to foreign movies. They are efficient enough to cater to any type of movie audience while offering attractive monthly fees, starting with $8.95 plus streaming.

Happy watching!

*I found a nice article on Netflix’s mail distribution. They have 58 warehouses across the nation.

So, I turn 29 years old today. It’s turned into a tradition that I’d write something on my birthday. Here’s the last five.

It’s hard to believe that I’d start a blog way back in the fall of 2004. More than five years have passed since. I haven’t been blogging much lately but have written a few notes on my Facebook, as pretty much everyone is using the Internet and I’m becoming more cautious of what I’m writing here as people seem to be nitpicking pretty much over anything. But I think I shouldn’t be concerned about that and just write for myself. So, I hope to be more forthcoming this year. :)

I seem to be accomplishing most of the goals that I listed last year, which was rather simple and that I want to take life at its face value, and ofc, keep contributing to my work at Google, which has been both productive and fulfilling, kept me busy for much of the time. Last year, I pondered about why we’re here and our purpose, leading my belief to the philosophy of existentialism. To extend that thought, I also thought about physics and realized that everything’s a reflection of light. Without light, we simply can’t see anything including ourselves. So, we’re in this visible light spectrum and since light is made of some electromagnetic properties (photons and quanta) that actually bend toward gravity (mass), that creates time and space. We’re all moving along on this timeline, and thanks to technology like the Internet and computers as a tool, we’re able to record events and express our thoughts through talking, videotaping, or writing. With those recorded media, we’re able to rewind and remember our timelines. All made possible by light.

I’m actually doing a lot of snowboarding (gone to Lake Tahoe and Colorado) and my skill has been improving steadily that I can do some air jumps and rotations. The highlight of 2009 was traveling to five different countries—Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong—and managed to meet a few deaf people along the way. We really do exist all over the world, though not as many as other group identities.

I believe in the next few years, we’ll be more connected than ever, thanks to social networking like Facebook and Twitter. With enough smart motivated minds, we will make some serious progress that will be unprecedented by any time in the past. Equal rights in marriage, better/more education, tools, networking, and transparency will lead to a better management of the economy. No one is going to fix the economy as if he has a magic wand but I think with enough information and assistance, we’ll better able to manage our money and take responsibility for ourselves and our actions.

My goals for this year is pretty much the same except I’d like to be more focused on a few certain things, to make efforts at, and bring my dreams closer to reality. Much of that will be improving my coding skill and outputting more like blogging and taking pictures. Shedding light on my timeline.

Finally, to close this birthday post, someone very important is turning 55 in two days. That’d be Steve Jobs. He was struggling with his health last year and got a liver transplant, and he’s said he’s feeling better. Great. This is written with a Macbook Pro. And iPad is just gonna rock. You just wait and see.

Lately, I haven’t been doing any much running. I’m not sure why but it’s probably the weather and I’ve been snowboarding as well but I think 3+ hrs drive one way to Lake Tahoe is kinda starting to get to me now. It wasn’t really that bad at first because I was pretty excited about being able to ride. If you also fell off track with excising you should consider getting a waist trainer for women that will help you stay fit even when you are not working out. There’s nothing like going down roughly 40 mph downhill on your board. My skill has been improving steadily as I now can switch on both stances and have been doing some decent jumps, though not huge air as to risk myself and my back.

Maybe it’s the Winter Olympics that has gotten me conscious about my own body and I’m starting to see some flab around my tummy, so I’m thinking about getting back into shape more seriously and running too. Out of all workouts, I’ve always felt that running is a tough workout and gives me a good cardiovascular exercise despite how simple it looks. On that thought, I remember the 12k race I ran in the 98th Annual ING Bay to Breakers event. It was pretty fun and my time wasn’t too bad at 1:07 and placed 474 out of 2,070 males between 20 and 29. One thing I remember from that day was that I didn’t just run 12k alone. I had to ran abt 3 miles from a friend’s place where I was sleeping over the night before and another 3 miles to meet my friend after the race was over. So, I ran a total of 13 miles on that day. I felt like I was just running all over the city and despite that, my legs still felt great and felt like I can run some more. I was in a good shape, I supposed. So yeah, I think it’s time to get back into shape.