life

Goal Reviews: Q1 ’12

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It’s been only 72 hours or so since I’ve been back in DC. What an amazing weekend! So great to catch up with so many peeps, and to meet a few new folks as well! This chapter of my life has just begun, and it’s already gotten off to a great start.

As I consider what I’ll be doing during my period of “funemployment” back in DC, I think now would be a great time to take a look at how I’m stacking up to my goals for the year:

  • Get into graduate school. Mission Accomplished. Got into both schools I had applied to, but unfortunately received no financial aid from either school. I have until May 1st to decide, and am really in limbo with this decision at the moment. I still have a boatload of undergraduate student loans to pay off. Even if I deferred till Fall 2013, I’d be looking at cumulative undergrad/grad school loans in the six figures. Not too interested in having that hanging over my head for the next decade of my life.
  • Get published in an academic journal. I don’t even have a topic in mind. Also, as this relates to grad school, if I decide not to attend, this goal is also longshot.
  • Pass the TOCFL Master or HSK Level 5 (Advanced). The HSK is offered monthly, and I’m taking the HSK Level 4 (Intermediate with Honors) next month. I’ve always struggled to maintain my language goals, and I figured it might be better to take baby steps in order to achieve a much larger goal. To this end, I’m registered to take the HSK Level 4 (Intermediate with Honors) next month. My performance on that test will help me determine what I’ll need to focus on in preparation for HSK Level 5. Ultimately, my goal is to obtain some Chinese language certification by year-end.
  • Get a policy or IR-related job or internship, preferably in DC. Still working on this, though given my current situation I’m more open-minded to positions in other fields (i.e. consulting).
  • Learn to code. Completed the first few lessons of Code Academy, but stopped during the Chinese New Year break. I think I need to find a more tangible goal, such as certification, to keep me motivated on this one.
  • Run a half-marathon. Haven’t registered for one, nor have I gotten back into the running habit since my return. Currently, I’m thinking a better alternative would be to start small and build up: First run a 5k, then 10k, 15k, and ideally a half-marathon by year-end.
  • Blog at least once a week. Fail. Didn’t post anything last week, though had two posts the week prior. Time to get back on the train!

And that’s that. Going through this list has reminded me of what I should be focusing on. Hopefully I’ll have made more progress on all fronts by the end of Q2. Wish me luck!

Book Review: “Man’s Search for Meaning” by Viktor Frankl

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Before I left for my recent adventure to Taiwan, a friend lent me Viktor Frankl’s book, “Man’s Search for Meaning.” Earlier this week, I finally got a chance to read through the book on my flight back to Los Angeles. Whenever I find myself engrossed in books like this one, I usually jot down the page number in my notepad and later write up the quotes that I found particularly interesting. Several quotes struck a chord with me:

On Living:

“Live as if you were living already for the second time and as if you had acted the first time wrongly as you are about to act now.”

Whenever I’ve been faced with decisions, large or small, I find myself going through the pros and cons of each choice. This analysis can take days, weeks, if not longer. Weighing the consequences of the choices available is certainly important; however, after a certain point, evaluating options does little other than to further cause anxiety and promote self-doubt. At the end of the day, a (sometimes irreversible) decision needs to be made. I like Frankl’s advice of approaching decisions. Life only comes around once. But of course, going with your gut is far easier said than done.

“Those who have a ‘why’ to live, can bear with almost any ‘how’.”

This one’s pretty simple, but wow. Talk about deep. I think this statement truly gets at the heart of Frankl’s whole book. Life is constantly throwing new challenges that need to be overcome. Sometimes, it’s so easy to just give up. External circumstances are certainly one factor, but internal causes, such as self-doubt or the belief that things will never get better, are other reasons that might cause folks to throw in the towel.

 Having a “why” to live seems like a great way to think about how to overcome any challenging situation. The question now is discovering what that “why” means for each of us – I’m still trying to figure that one out for myself.

On Success and Happiness:

“Don’t aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself. Happiness must happen, and the same holds for success: you have to let it happen by not caring about it.”

This got me immediately thinking about the chicken or the egg causality issue. Rather than thinking about the “path” towards success, or the “path” towards happiness, perhaps I should be thinking about what I want to do; in theory, happiness and success (however defined) will follow.

Overall, I’d highly recommend reading this book. It’s a really short read and doesn’t take much time. But wow, does it ever leave a mark. At least for me it did!

Winter ’11: Taiwan in Review

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Today marked the last day of class for the winter term at Taida. I can’t believe my three-month course is already over!

Ever since coming back from Shanghai, I’ve always wanted to return to Asia to further improve my Chinese. I yearned to live in the Middle Kingdom. Everything seemed so fascinating. I had the option of returning to Asia for a summer to improve my Chinese, this time in Taipei, at the International Chinese Language Program. But, because I had a firm start-date in mid-June, coming back one more time became a non-issue. I never forgot about my goal to come back, and three months ago I finally returned.

Well, it’s been three months! It’s definitely been an incredibly amazing experience. I mentioned in an earlier that I had mixed reservations about my course. After staying for the full course, I can honestly say that my opinions haven’t changed. However, I don’t think I can fault the CLD for this. My teacher was fantastic. Since I was the only non-Japanese in my class, the focus of the course was on primarily speaking (which is what I wanted) than on writing.

While increasing my speaking, listening, and reading fluency was the primary goal, my goals in coming to Taiwan weren’t solely to study Chinese. Rather, I also wanted to:

1. Learn traditional characters

  • Did this every day: ordering food, watching the subtitles on TV, and of course during class

2. Get a different perspective of cross-strait relations

  • Hard to say whether this was accomplished or not, but certainly got a read on this during the 2012 Taiwan Presidential Elections

3. Climb some mountains

  • Climbed two mountains near Taipei: Elephant Mountain and Seven-Star Mountain

4. Visit the beaches

  • Went to Kending, Nanwan, and Baishawan – renowned beach areas in the south of Taiwan

5. Use the island as a base for traveling throughout Asia.

  • Went to Hong Kong
  •  Will be going to Singapore and Malaysia

Looks like I accomplished everything I wanted to get out of while here. Success!

One unexpected surprise that makes this experience abroad unique from my previous experience in Shanghai was getting to know and befriend people from all over the world.

Unlike the program in Shanghai, which consisted of only American college students, the people I’ve met here are incredibly diverse, both in terms of age and background. Some students here are still in college. Others, like me, have just graduated relatively recently. Others haven’t even started college, or have been out of college for years. I’ve gotten to meet folks literally from all over the world: Australia, Iraq, Honduras, Hungary, Japan, and the UK, just to name a few. All this diversity has taught me so much about the world, some trivial, some fascinating:

– Knowing what words like bogan and woop woop mean to Aussies
– Getting a first-hand account of being buried-alive after a bomb blast in Iraq
– Realizing just how intense the desire to migrate to America still is for many

Overall, I’m incredibly glad as well as thankful that I’ve been able to (financially afford) putting a hold on my professional career for this language program. Besides doing all of the things aforementioned, this “career-break” has really given me the time to re-evaluate what I want most out of my life, both personally and professionally. Moreover, this experience has affirmed my belief that it’s the people you meet, not the place, which makes a city feel like home.

That’s a lot of writing. If you read this far, thanks!

I’m still going to be in Asia through the end of February, but this weekend is the last I’ll be spending in Taiwan. So, if you excuse me, it’s time for me to log off and make some last-minute memories before heading back home!

The Concept of Home

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“Where are you from?”

I’ve gotten asked this question countless times. Even though I was born and grew up in Hawaii, I have a hard time answering this question. Over the past decade, I’ve lived in:

–       4 years in Philadelphia
–       1.5 years in Washington DC
–       Countless weeks in Los Angeles
–       3 months each in Tokyo, Boston, Shanghai, and Taipei

Initially, I considered where I was raised to be my hometown. Under that definition, it’d be Hawaii. But over the past decade, I’ve come to realize that home means so much more than where you were born.

For me, living away from Hawaii has changed what I consider to be home:

–       Extremely familiar with the area
–       Have friends/family in the area that I am close with.
–       See myself living in the area (in the near-term or long-term).

Under these criteria, I now consider two places home: Washington DC and Los Angeles. Washington DC is a fantastic city. There’s so much to do, it’s where I need to be professionally, and I’ve got some great friends there. More importantly, my friends are still located in the Northeast. With Los Angeles, even though I’ve never officially lived there, I actually held a CA drivers license for a couple years during college. I’m incredibly familiar with the area. I’ve gone there more times since graduating high school than going to Hawaii, I have a lot of family there, and above all, the weather is fantastic–it’s a great place to call “home!”