Becoming an analyst

So...an article was written today... about my job.

"What qualifies university psychology majors, Fulbright scholars or students of medieval history to be part of Co. C? For one thing, they need to be exceptional at their endeavors.

Today, Co. C recruits globally and reviews several thousand resumés annually (for just 5 spots).

How are “smart” candidates identified? Of course, they must be accomplished academically, from a very young age. But that’s just one of many criteria.

“We look for super-curious people who are always exploring new things,” says Will. “We also want them to have strong, demonstrated problem-solving skills. Overall, we’re looking for those who are exceptional and have potential to be long-term contributors, but don’t know exactly what they want to do."

But ... I'm not sure if it's that straightforward as proving your worth as a long-term contributor. I'm feeling so lonely in SF now. This is just Day 3 of a 1 week business trip and I can almost hardly bear it. Maybe it's the dinner too - I hate eating alone. Wenwen told me, "You should not become an analyst, I think it is lonely". I agree.

Stars and Planets out there

A good buddy of mine said this to me today, in the context of a conversation where we were talking about just how uncannily similar we were -

"I have the crazy stamina perhaps for running/outdoors sports...you have the intensity and focus that I could only dream for...you work hard at working/studying....I work extremely hard at trying not to work...so the roots of our energies are similar, but their manifestations, starkly different. If you are from Venus, then I am from Mars. But we are both out there."

I thought it was really elegant. And I'm posting this as a reminder to myself that this is one thing (friend) I'll miss when I have to leave in 2 weeks... But at least something good's come out of these 2 years!

"The stars are out there for a reason, however. To remind us that it is not about us, it is about them...we are inconsequential in the larger scheme of things. So strive to be happy in the moment, and cherish the good times we do have right now:)"

When one door closes,

at least another opens. Or maybe if you look hard enough, a window opens. Hopefully, a window of opportunity? Sometimes you just can't be greedy. You have to say no to things/ people that don't matter, so that you can say yes to those that do.

Just half a month more and I will have to say byebye to the USA...time really flies... I'm feeling nostalgic already!

Fishy Business

There are few things left in SoCal that I want to do before I leave. One of them is to go deep sea fishing, the other is to learn surfing. So last Sunday, I decided to seize the moment and go fishing, even though that meant waking up at 4am (!!!). To put things in context, I had only arrived home at 2am the same morning when I drove to Hearst Castle.

But I know I'll shoot myself on the foot for being sluggish in bed, so I woke up and drove at a speed of 95miles/hour (150km/hr lol) to get to the boat before it took off. Of course, I ended up being really early!

Before the entire fishing trip even started, there must have been thousands of fish on our boat - all live bait transferred from another floating bait boat. (very cool! and you should have seen the birds go crazy!)

It was my first time handling live bait (or actually, even fishing!) and I just love these steep learning curve opportunities! Everything was new from learning how to set up the rods to knowing how to catch a bait, to knowing where to poke the bait so it'd stay alive, to casting the line, to reeling the line in...it was a blast!

Thank God for Jacob - a retired Israeli who taught me how to fish... He was SOOOO SUPER PRO! He ended up winning the jackpot for "Biggest Catch of the Day" and later gave me 4 of his amazing sea bass!!! (so I could bring them home and cook them! hehe)

After the trip (6am-11.30am), Jason and I checked out the Dana Point Harbor and it didn't take us too long to figure out that we had to refrigerate our catch! So...we did something quite, quite creative in my view - see below! Lol! Really C&G mann...Cheap & Good!

Once our fishy fishes were taken care of, we decided to check out San Juan Capistrano, which I have heard of since Oct 2008 when I first started work in Irvine.

It was one of many (29?) missions in California in the early years, but is the only one (and the most beautiful one of all!) in Orange County. You can easily see why -

All these breathtaking beauty aside, here's some....gore once I got home.

Again, I've also NEVER gutted a fish. It's so crazy thinking of how moments ago it was just swimming in the sea, then it got caught, and now it's getting de-scaled and gutted. Being so new (I know, I know...) to it, I emulated what I saw on the boat (the crew were charging $1 per fish to fillet it) and watched some YouTube videos (lol!)

At the end of the day, everything went great and I had my sea bass and grilled saba! Really...unforgettable! Now I need to make surfing happen! :)