Inspiration from the most unexpected places

Out of sight, out of mind.

I used to wonder whether if it is a valid aphorism or not; I often try to judge things as either "valid" (or right) or "not" (or wrong).

I used to be much more righteous and rigid than I think who I am right now -- known among my friends as a fundamentally a good person, but also a person who sees things strictly as black and white. A dependable friend who could be relied upon to do the "right thing" no matter the circumstances.

For all the things I've gained or missed out because of such trait, I used to wear such distinction as if it were a badge of honor -- something that distinguished me from others -- but as I grow older (and hopefully wiser), I run across many things that makes me think twice about such things.

Tonight, I met up with an old budddy. Through out conversation, we both established that the past few weeks have been a rough stretch at work for both of us -- and we've also both shared that increasingly, we tend to bring home the things that weigh on our days at work, plaguing our personal lives with the negative residual virus from work that wreak havoc in seemingly (and what ought to be) disconnected parts of our lives. Nonetheless, we ended up meeting up tonight for beer because of his unusual persistence to meet up -- he's usually a very reserved and not the type to initiate anything social. It's been three weeks since we've met up, the last time being a very social gathering of six different couples -- friends and acquaintances through friends.

What he's revealed to me during our conversation through five pints of Guinness struck me like a hammer -- good friends are those who take up the slack when I let go. Truth be told, meeting up with him for beer was probably the least 'sensible' thing I could do tonight, given the fact i've been working 12-13 hours the past two weeks, and I really should have either taken the chance to leave work at a reasonable hour to take a rest, catch up on personal commitments, or else, do something 'constructive' in my life. Nonetheless, I was so caught up with my own to-do list that I failed to understand the obvious that he would be struggling with his own overdue to-do list -- yet he took the initiative to call me out for a drink.

"Out of sight; out of mind," he said. He professed how it really applies to him, and how seeing someone once in a while really puts him in an uneasy situation -- "what should we talk about?" "what if the conversation turns awkward?" The reason he dragged me out tonight, he professed, was that since he knows that not seeing someone for a while puts him in such an uncomfortable place, he wanted to avoid it by seeing me as often as possible.

Of many things for which I feel blessed, I'm truly grateful for the good friends I have -- they prop me up both through their strengths and (what they're trying to do about) their weaknesses... and I stand to gain from both things through my friendship with them.

This reminds me to reply back to Marc for an email which i've received a few weeks back, but haven't been able to respond... to call up my buddy in NY who have graciously reached out to me several times the past few weeks, but I was too absorbed in my world to bother reaching back... to catch up on the to-do items that have fallen to the bottom on the priority list (hell, since when commitments to my friends become low priority?).

Inspiration from the most unexpected places... thanks, Aaron.

The Prodigal Son Returns!

Yes, Idlechoongster is back!

After a eight month hiatus -- during which my world has turned upside down, inside out, then back outside in and downside up -- the tiny bits of inspirations began to stir my soul again, and I'm as restless as before.

Surely, there were many changes -- Yelp has has become to forum on which I'd dump most of my idle musings on places where I've doned, and now I'm slowly turning onto Friendster to keep up with my friends network -- but I think it'll just help me take a load off of my entries on this blog and make it much more lighthearted and casual. "Idle" choongster indeed.

Random Quote I Remember Too Often

Wyatt Earp:

What makes a man like Ringo, Doc? What makes him do the things he does?

Doc Holliday:

A man like Ringo has got a great big hole, right in the middle of himself.

And he can never kill enough... or steal enough... or inflict enough pain to ever fill it.

Wyatt Earp:

What does he want?

Doc Holliday:

Revenge.

Wyatt Earp:

For what?

Doc Holliday:

Bein' born.

(I don’t know why I remembered this dialogue from Tombstone as I started pecking away at the keyboard.) Actually... yeah, I do.

Die, you fake Irish Pubs!

While the pure-tech quotient in Slashdot has been inching lower these days, it's still an amusing place to troll around for some real nuggets:

From http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/06/04/0218221&from=rss:

"However, there is an odd shot in the newly released "How- To" iPhone ad, where the screen goes from the traditional 11 icon view, to a new 12 icon view. (See below).

It's a pet peeve of mine that people use the word "traditional" for things which were invented very very recently. Traditional things are generational things, handed down from one generation to another. You can't make it artificially, and you can't make it quickly.

Reminds me of this brand new Irish Pub that just opened up down the road from me. As I am an alcoholic, I was right there belly to the bar on the SECOND day they were open. I was amazed to see that all the walls of the brand new bar were full of photographs of customers having good times with their friends, in this friendly neighborhood establishment. Amusingly, for a neighborhood bar, it was surprisingly inaccessible. You couldn't really walk to it, as there were no sidewalks, just rows and rows of parking spots. I wouldn't want to walk there anyway, because the traffic from the Bed Bath and Beyond next door is crazy.

So, these photos were all over the walls of this pub, showing hundreds of people having an amazingly good time. I was really jealous of those people who showed up at this brand new bar, on the first day it was open. They were the lucky ones, having had the opportunity to both create tradition, and have a good time doing it too. But still, it was a good feeling to see that my neighborhood bar had created in just one day what some pubs in Ireland are apparently still working on after 300 years or more.

I think that the new Irish bar next door really captured the tradition which my neighborhood strip mall holds in such high regard. I'm not sure that these little icons on a phone can measure up to that."

(I hate those fake Irish Pubs where they pour your Guinness into plastic cups and they come served while the foam is still avalanching in a cascade before the proper head forms. And they charge you $6 for it.)

Zoom Zoom...

I assume that those who work on a 8-to-5 jobs fill the remaining hours of their days with some productive activity in pursuit of life’s happiness… whether it be a second job or some self-study to accumulate more wealth, exercise and sports, spending time with family or friends, or fueling one’s passion with a new hobby or a language. Perhaps the reality for most is not as feature-packed as I tend to idealize, but as a consultant who finds himself most often in unfamiliar hotel rooms at the end of the evenings, I often look at others’ lives with a rose-y glass.

Turning the focus on moi once again, one of the expertise that one amasses on the road is travel-related stuff like lodging, dining and flights/rental cars. Practical stuff, though. If you drive a rental car more than your own, or sleep in a hotel room more nights than your own bed, you tend to chortle at the “expert” advices on travel shows or opinions in various forums or magazine columns, because you know which ones were written by people who “researched” a topic for the sake of authoring something, versus the real nugget of wisdom from years of experience.

Here are a few things that I’ve picked up over the years…

Lodging

• There are always cheaper rate than what you’ve paid for. You just don’t have access to it. Often times, the most aggressively bargained corporate rates or desperate weekend rates in business-travel destination tend to be the cheapest, but you can’t get the first one unless you work at the said company, and you have to spend a LOT of time researching.
• Opinions shared in travel websites such as travel.yahoo or tripadvisor.com should be taken with a grain of salt – like most opinions shared on any forum. A common complaint or praise is reliable; one person’s rant or rave is never the “norm.”
• For multiple night stays, leave a small tip for housekeeping the first night, then adjust the tip depending on quality of housekeeping service for the rest of the stay. Admittedly, most of the housekeeping staff are underpaid and they do a lot (especially for me, who tend to “spread out” a little), but some go the extra miles while others do the bare minimum – reward the first, but there’s no reason why the latter deserves a common quota
• Tipping overly-generously at the bar is a common advice to those who wish to establish a good rapport with the bar staff. This is especially valuable for the road warriors – the only person with whom you interact that is not work-related might be the bar staff.
• They can ALWAYS put you in a different room, as long as you didn’t show up at midnight when the hotel is fully booked. This is a cinch if you’re an elite member in their frequent-stay program, but it also applies to the average Joe (requires more persistence). If you find your room to be anywhere near the ice machine or the high school group on a field trip, march straight back to the front desk.
• (Personal rant) The aromatherapy line of products at Marriott hotels is abominable! It’s something like orange-ginger, and it’s way too strong/harsh.
• (Personal rave) Make efforts to get to know the hotel staff if you’re staying there at length. A warm greeting by name at the end of a hard day at the office is priceless.

Dining

• Eating alone at the bar of a restaurant always leads to more opportunity to meet new people (fellow road warriors) or get to know the bartender. Eating alone at a table is probably the worst thing; these people are usually found poring intensely at trashy paperback novel, never taking their gaze off the pages as they eat.
• Only ask “what’s good here” if your server seems has an extroverted, bubbly demeanor. Otherwise, you’ll get, “well, everything is good” or you’ll be advised on whatever their manager asked them to push that particular night. Beware of ones who are too glib – they’ll also push manager’s special.
• Manager’s Special = high-margin or about to expire
• Do not trust the concierge on dining advices – they’ll be happy to make reservations for you at the popular touristy places or chain restaurants. If you do have to resort to them, be specific about your budget (cheap) and what you’re looking for (casual, local watering hole) and you might get somewhere.
• Zagat sucks. Yelp.com is a better source of the low-downs on local restaurants.

Flights

• Seatguru.com. Even if you don’t qualify as elite fliers, you will know which seats offer unexpectedly pleasant experiences. This is especially true in larger aircrafts that tend to have more variance in seating arrangements than smaller (uniform) planes.
• Flight delays is a fact of life. It’s not the gate agent’s fault. It’s either “the man” or God. Think of it as a free time away from work or social/family obligations – it’s a good time to make some major progress in that book you’ve been toting around for months.
• Fact: air quality in flights is about twice better than air quality in a typical household! You just think it’s horrible because its crowded and the air tends to be dry.
• Take off your shoes discreetly. But do take them off.
• Most airlines leave the can with you as they serve beverages, but if they don’t ask that they do, and if not, order three cups. Water, especially.

Rental Cars

• (Personal rave) I love driving Mazdas on the road. They’re fun as heck to drive in just about any model, and I tend to abuse my rental cars. Squealing tires when you take ‘em on a highway ramp at 50 mph doesn’t mean it’ll spin out of control… at least not yet.
• Hyundais are better than you think. I'll take one over a GM car any day
• There are always other cars. Especially if you say you’re willing to wait if an alternate is not immediately available.
• My order of maker preference in mid-price range: Mazda/Toyota, Subaru, Nissan, Hyundai, Ford (recent models), Mitzubishi, Chrysler, GM (recent models), Ford (older models, especially the Taurus!), GM (older models, especially Chevy Malibu Classic). Hondas are a rare find – I’ve only seen a few in Hertz lots.
• If you’re a Hertz Gold Member (you need to pay annual dues), it’s a lot more convenient, and you’ll often find upgrade cars in your name (because they often run out of mid-size cars, especially in busy business-travel locations).
• Excuses to ask for another car if you just plain hate the model/make: (1) It smells bad or smells like cigarette smoke, (2) Some engine check light is on (better if it’s really true), (3) It’s dirty, (4) It doesn’t fit you (better if you’re tall/big or petite). Sound irritated but fair and they’ll often find an alternate.

Bubble Talk

So, back to Gate 29 at the Washington National Airport. I find myself back at the circular communal table clustered around the center of the atrium area, flipping open the notebook while sitting out the half hour delay of my homebound flight. An older business woman takes up a seat on the other side, checks her Treo, shuffles a few things around her person, then settles in.

Chorus of moans greet the PA announcement of further delays of a La Guardia flight. Men in badly wrinkled dress shirts, obviously distressed from the day’s worth of work, peck on their notebook computers. I turn around to a loud voice on a telephone to discover a man dressed in suit with an air of self-importance, barking requests and orders into a blackberry pressed to his ear. (I always find people TALKING on their clunky blackberries somewhat ridiculous.) Haggard faces appearing and disappearing into the crowd, people taking hurried bites out of their burgers, and businessmen chatting about vigorously – it’s the typical scene at the airport on a Thursday afternoon.

I find myself relishing this bit of a breather between one schedule (work and the frenzied drive to the rental car return) and another (the flight, and pending evening plans with friends in Chicago), reminiscing about a woman with whom I’ve shared this very same table just a few weeks ago. We just shared a light hello and a parting greeting – three phrases max – but what she said (“have a good flight”) and the light hint of a casual smile in her eyes was so memorable that it stirred a very foreign emotion that lasted well after we’ve parted ways.

Despite a myriad chance to share light greetings or indulge in a light chat, business travelers rarely initiate a conversation without a suitable excuse. After all, the dozen or so travelers sharing a compact space within easy conversational reach all do their best to erect an invisible, unbreacheable enclosure, using tools of their trade – be it a Blackberry, a copy of the Wall Street Journal or just staring intensely into blank space when there’s nothing handy – and most seasoned business travelers know better than to disturb the defense shield frivolously. For example, say you have a window seat, and by the time you reached your row, your middle seat and aisle seat neighbors have already settled into their slots, and you’re trying to squeeze past them to get to your seat. Even a direct question, “hi, may I pass through?” is usually met with silence and a slightly annoyed stare as they struggle lazily out of their seats like zombies slowly contorting as they rise to their feet.

I don’t recall if that woman at the table was even attractive; I just remember being startled by having my force field pinged by an unfounded greeting – and how refreshing it felt.

I hear my flight calling for boarding. I get up, notice my tablemate staring blankly at the table surface with earphones in her ears, impervious to my packing and shuffling. I drop a casual pebble in her force field.

“Have a good flight.”

I can see its ripple as she looks up somewhat startled, not sure quite why this total stranger would say anything to her. Her puzzled look meets my smiling face.

“Yeah, you too.”

She breaks a bright smile, the whole face.

Thank you, Hallmark.

I realized that I forgot to get my buddy a (belated) birthday card, so to kill two birds with one stone, I dropped by Montgomery Mall after work to catch a quick meal at the food court and to stop by Hallmark.

Since I travel most of the time, and I have no business at the mall after work, it’s a rare occasion when I drop by a mall on a weekday. A bustling place, being jostled in a crowd of families and couples spending their weekend on idyllic stroll in the mall aisles, people milling in and out of chain stores (usually during holiday shuffle to boot) is my idea of a typical mall, so I was shocked to see the mall pretty much deserted as I strolled in through Macy’s entrance.

The loud displays, glittery signs and dazzling lights are meant to compete against a crowd to catch your attention – close to closing hours on a Monday, however, it feels like I’m walking alone through an amusement park in a hallucination.

It’s downright depressing.

The only sanctuary I found was while browsing through the amusing messages on the cards at Hallmark, imagining what my buddy's reaction will be to each of these messages and cracking a smile at the most corny ones, until I chose one that was perfect for my buddy (I usually rummage through the “humor” section for the cards) – I can forgive them for dotting my year with bogus holidays*. Then, I walk out to face the creepily cheerful ambiance again, and quickly scurry out to the parking lot into the cold April night.

* That is, until the next sham holiday when I'm left to wonder if I need to get a card for "National Vending Machine Refiller Appreciation Week."

Another random rambling...

I find myself in a mode sometimes, where I find myself walking through my day with my forearms locked across the chest, being skeptical about every encounter, questioning every motive, and weighing the profitability in every decision. That’s what I’m paid to do, but through all the years I’ve been a consultant, while steady promotions bumped me predictably upward through the corporate food chain and I’ve developed a stock of managerial/technical acumen that puts me in roles of greater responsibility, I have always thought that I’ve maintained a reasonable degree of separation between who I am in my dress shirt and slacks in the office and jeans and t-shirt after hours. Perhaps that’s why “work hard, play hard” culture I’ve been indoctrinated in my firm has always been embraced so wholeheartedly. The “hard” part is always encouraged – dogged determination to “get shit done” when all else have abandoned projects, and incessant obsession to sniff out “opportunity” in every situation requires a mechanical propulsion that never lets up. The toggle between “work” and “play” is rather easy to flip; driving up the momentum to give it all you’ve got all the time is harder to regulate. Consulting company HR’s juggle a fine alchemic balance between stroking naïve career development appetites, tantalizing financial compensation (not too little to drive people away, but never over-compensate), and relentless propaganda that touts work-life-balance.

Of all the damages an impressionable young mind can take through years in such career, the most damaging one is when that separation between “career” and “life” gets blurred – and you go through years without knowing it. Although I suspect that all company HR’s have a healthy arsenal of procedures and solutions to address the “work-life balance” question, there’s no other industry like consulting where the absurdity of accounting for “work” and “life” into separate buckets are never really questioned – and they’re put on opposite ends of a scale for people to balance. Only the ones, who successfully meld one into another, move up beyond a certain ladder to join the gods at Olympus. The rest, are left wondering that this all means at 1AM in the morning while stacking up empty bottles of Sammy on desk next to the notebook computer as he types away – click click click – in solitude, in a strange city, in a strange hotel room.

How the random movies I occasionally catch playing on a random channel in hotel rooms, completely changes my mood sometimes, always bemuse me. (A-ha! The real topic that I wanted to type about finally emerges.) On a “good day” (when clients behave, the team works like a well-oiled machine, and I leave the work whistling a tune), I never sit down to watch TV – I find ways to get some exercise, treat myself to nice dinner or go out with teammates or friends. It’s the “bad days” (when I leave work late at night killing myself to meet irrational demands, team on the verge of implosion, and every new demand by client/team manager is met by infuriated resentment) when I plop myself in bed with a sack of the most disgusting fast food staples, mindlessly flipping through the channels until I numb my brain until I drift into a pathetic slumber. Oops, again, I digress.

On the “bad days,” (“Ah-hem!” trying to get back on topic), it’s not always the latest Hollywood blockbusters I’ve missed that shows up on HBO, or a well-reviewed flick that I run across on a random channel that titillates me – it’s usually the viewing of old favorites on re-run or a completely unfamiliar movie that really helps me put things into perspective and makes me get out the bed, rejuvenated and… dare I say it?

Happy.

Smiling.

Refreshed.

What was the movie tonight? Take the Lead, starring Antonio Banderas. I reckon that the movie had received a review no higher than a “C-“ on any critic’s list, and some of the scenes were grossly forced; the movie must have been a fodder for any critic having a bad day to just “let ‘er rip” and gleefully tear apart. However, I’m not here to harp on the critics’ blabberings. For all the reasons why a critic might hate the movie (formulaic plot, impractical and embarrassingly botched acting, and over-the-top scenes), it was the PERFECT movie to remind me that there are more in life than careers, meeting deadlines and exceeding expectations. I also have to admit that I’m a sucker for “a lone crusader educator in the face of overwhelming odds, redeems him/herself and restores dignity to the lost cause students” type movies. Of course, fanatical dance scenes and feel-good themes that made movies such as Bring it On an unexpectedly enjoyable flick never hurt, and the movie made me ponder about what life is like on a REGULAR job where people can get out at 5 PM and actually take dance lessons (or other life-enriching classes), follow fussy recipes that require more than canned/dry cupboard staples to cook, and actually a leisurely viewing of really cheesy movies with their loved ones.

When Mephistopheles wants to bargain for the zenith of corporate happiness, what he promises might not be worth the asking price. He sure can concoct a mighty intoxicating potion… that sneaky little devil.

We're the soliders of RUF!

Out of all the heartbreaking wretched plight of Sierra Leone as portrayed in Blood Diamond, one of the most tragic plot was the one involving the portrayal of how abducted children (often after their parents are raped and killed in the process) are turned into child soldiers in the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) guerilla army. These children are subjected to incessant barrage of ideology propaganda, war training, sensitivity purge, and forced drugs and alcohol abuse that are designed to eradicate all traces of humanity in these little souls, and turning them into merciless, vindictive killers. Watching the scene where a gang of these children rake the village with their AK-47’s, mowing down screaming villagers with a blank expression on their faces, I was struck with an epiphany.

How are consultants like the child soldiers of the RUF guerillas army?

The consultant candidates are plucked away from the carefree collegiate campuses, handed a notebook computer and sent to a boot camp where they’re preached the virtuous principles of consulting in indoctorinating party line and training drills, designed to churn out consultants that will march lockstep into the gates of hellish client projects, offering themselves on the alter of the glorious cause, burning the wicks of their ephemeral youth into the late nights in empty client offices to “shock and awe” the clients, knocking down every obstacle with relentless intensity and determination, until the “objective” is reached. They do not know why they do it – it's certainly not for themselves in reality – and any paltry rewards doled out by the commanders are just gratuitous taste of the “final reward” (the "big bonus" or "making partner") preached about in the countless propaganda that fills the Inbox, to remind them, that how bleak things seem today is really just transient, and the people (shareholders and firm partners) are grateful for your sacrifices and there’s nothing more virtuous than the “glorious death” for the sake of the cause (make more money for the partners).

I shared an uncharacteristically cynical view on this, but on the verge of reaching my eight year in a global consulting company, I reflect often these days on my own journey so far in this profession. Being exposed more to the wheeling and dealings that happen at “executive level” these days often leaves me disillusioned about the “cause,” and it disgusts me that I often find myself consumed more with power struggles and Machiavellian maneuvering on the orders of my “commanders,” or finding myself diving head first under the table like dogs with the next guy, fighting tooth and nail for the spoils and booties thrown our way (more P.C. terms are ‘raises’ and ‘promotion’) -- when you say, "value-added work" to whose benefit are we talking about? A more balanced life (friends! family! get out of work at 5pm!) during weekdays probably helps ward off the illusions, but thinking about how the week days fly by at client sites, being shuttled back and forth between hotel and client office with no life outside the company of the fellow ‘soldiers,’ I’m reminded of the scene where the AK-47s are propped against the table where the child soldiers barely into their teens are smoking, drinking beers and gambling on card games after a day of brutal massacre.

The truth behind the supposed ‘glamour’ of the consulting lifestyle is a lot uglier than your peaceful, boring life in your sleepy little village. Just start praying when you see a dirt smoke rising up from the horizon and hear tires grinding on the gravel roads as the jeeps full of these maniacal killers are speeding toward your village, and you realize... we’re coming.

(Certainly, how I portray the consulting world greatly mirror the type of week I'm having... and I've had my share of peaks and troughs during the eight years so far... perhaps when I'm in my usual happy mood, I'll focus on the positive virtues of this twighlight zone-like universe.)

Mini-vacations

Topics discussed during lunch conversations at work rarely stray away from the mundane work-related issues (mostly frustration over politics or petty rat race woes), and I relish those uncommon occasions that open doors in my imagination that takes me far away from the office. (The obvious interpretation of this, of course, is that I need to find a new job!)

Over lunch today, my buddy was sharing some of his plans for a business trip to Prague and Amsterdam in a couple of weeks, and mere mention of “Amsterdam” brought an immediate smile to my lips – I was already shedding my office garbs and found myself in the line of bicyclists riding along the canals, the locals scurrying along on their daily chores, and me, just carefree, aimless, and thoroughly feeling a sense of being in a strange city. Ahhhhhhh……………

As the Mastercard advertisement goes, certain things in life are priceless. Being able to take these “mini-vacations,” even if they are like fleeting scent in the breeze that stirs up a sudden rush of nostalgia, then dissipate as abruptly as it came, is a priceless delight gained from the eight weeks I spent backpacking in Western Europe last summer. I dare not go beyond this, because I’ll be up all night rummaging through the treasure chest brimming with dazzling memories, lost in la-la land. You see, when I returned from the eight weeks, I’ve put most of the souvenirs from the trip – random tourist maps of exotic cities, ticket stubs, random keepsakes and even my journal – into a box that I haven’t opened since. Every time I feel that I should go through and organize these mementos, I cannot bring myself to do it – somehow, how these remain as tokens in my memories is far richer and colorful than the actual souvenirs themselves -- and what’s in the box are like foils that will turn these mementos and make them fade away to grey.

Secret to most of these little nuggets of happiness in my life seem not to have come to my possession through haggling prices and getting the best deal; I seemed to happen upon them, sorry to say, mostly by (just luckily) stumbling upon them – unplanned discoveries. In that respect, I’ve been blessed that such things in my life that turned out to be priceless have been gained “for free.” It’s ironic to realize that these, out of all things that I thrash and wiggle to hoard, are what I’m willing to pay any price to keep.