It's not a matter of who's right and wrong anymore.

Today will be the 2^nd time I had such a big argument with my mom. There are so big that it usually makes her so sad and depressive. And I just don’t know what do about it. Am I being worst son ever of the 21^st century of something? In the Asian culture, adult always have the last word no matter what, no matter when and no matter how... As for as I am concerned, I only believe in what is right and wrong.

In a conflict, people always think they’re right and its counterparts are naturally wrong. But the real deal is sometimes; people are both right… sometimes they are both wrong and sometimes, one is at least right in this whole damn thing… But what do you in the situation where both believe they’re right? Do you fight your own argument until you prevail? Speak up and make someone’s life miserable?

What happens when 2 unstoppable forces collide? Well, as for us… It’s a never-ending escalation that will make both our lives miserable.

This is what I’ve learned. You have to forget about who’s right or wrong… but rather WHAT is right or wrong.

Even though god knows you’re right and he agrees with you, you will always take the wrong decision by letting things get bad to worst… Especially if you are both related to each other.

Mac Vs PC

For today’s topic, I decided to talk about the new Mac campaign that started several years ago. A campaign where each commercial ads starts with:

“Hello I’m a Mac”

“…And I’m a PC”

These two sentences are now so popular that they are even now embedded in our culture. And to admit, I believe it is thanks to these ads that I have switched from PC to Mac. And I’m quite happy about it. But what I really like about this ad campaign is how the creator and scenarist came up with this idea. How would you be able to show the potential of a PC and Mac? How about making them talk? Therefore, they came up with the idea of materializing a Mac by a cool and relaxed teenager and a PC who’s old-fashioned style not to say “Daddy’s style” and funnily looks like Bill Gates. And then, they make them interact with each other. What a great idea! In almost all the ads, there is at least one weakness of PC that is shown. But it is shown in a way so Mac can pin him down without too much effort. Sometimes it’s totally the opposite, PC pin himself down by trying to be perfect but then looks totally ridiculous.

Here is one perfect example:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOx-lsaAfSo

Another aspect of the ads is that ALL pc users have at least encountered these lacks at least once. We all got annoyed by our PC performance once, how many time did our pc crashed because of a Virus? How many useless software do we take on board when we buy a PC. Why is my PC running so slow? Why do I need to update my software just right after I buy my PC?

The magic behind these ads is the fact that Apple cleverly brings back to our memory all the difficult time we had with our PC, and from a Mac’s point of view it is totally a joke. It is true that Apple’s overdo sometime and they happen to be even ignorant at a certain extend. But Ignorance is bliss. This reminds me a saying of one of my teacher. She once told me that if during a debate, you have the opportunity to make fun of your counterpart, don’t miss the opportunity. Not only will you bring people to your side by making them laugh but also you’ll win the debate even though you know you’re wrong

Power Point

Today, I had project meeting with my mates for negotiation. And like most project, a power point is required. Now, I’d like to talk about this feature. Why? Because I recently discovered that I actually like making power point. Also this Tuesday was a presentation day. And for most presentation, well ... Let’s just say that I almost ended up not understanding any single one. Is it because I’m not paying enough attention? Maybe… Is it because the presentation wasn’t well created? Most likely… Call me old fashion but I believe that presenting your own work should be considered as teaching. It is up to the presenter to make their work interesting. Your audience should not concentrate in trying to follow you. It is up to you me to catch their attention and make them enjoy my piece of work. Many people think is a hassle to create them. Indeed, it may be hard to know what to put in it and it may be frustrating to talk in front of so many people. I have to admit that my first power point was a total disaster. I had to make a 15 min presentation but the teacher threw at my face with his Scare face eyes “ Pfff, finally it’s over, I thought your presentation lasted 2 hours”. I was indeed too worried of how I should say to make people understand me. And when you care too much, you usually end up doing exactly the opposite. From this day on, I decided to get rid of all sort of support in my hands. Only the power point to back me up.

After creating a few, I’ve realized that power point was one of the supports where you can present your work with your own words. You don’t have to be someone else; I believe it is actually your only chance to present the work with your own words and with your own perspective. It is your chance to be interesting and to break the rules. Like you said Bruce about me breaking the rules, I believe presenting your work is a lot like blogging. Some people care too much about the formal style, about how it should be presented “properly”… Most of them have their paper ready during the presentation. And for most of them, I end up understanding almost nothing. PowerPoint is also the only opportunity to explain fact with illustration. Why writing long paragraph where only one picture may be enough and gives you the opportunity to illustrate?

Of course, there will be situation where formalities will b required. However, would rather me speak with a formal way and understand almost nothing? Or speak with my own word trying to explain things my own way?

In both case, I believe that if the message wasn’t sent to the audience, you failed your presentation.

Rockfeller Center

8h30: My alarm is kicking. I’ve set it this early so we could have a little breakfast before we leave to our next destination: the Rockefeller Center. However, since I was so dead tired, I decided to Switch it off and continue my sleep cycle. But to my great mistake, breakfast ends at 9h am and we were starving. To make it up to her, decided to take her to the nearest Starbuck coffee of the Rockefeller. However finding a Starbuck was ironically very hard. Aren’t they supposed to be in every corner of any city? Well I guess not, we had to walk 20 min to finally find one.

After having this late brunch, off we go to the Top of the Rock. I remember asking people where the Top of the rock was, but it was just before my eyes. It’s just that I can’t have the whole building in my sight of vision. This later is not as high as the Empire State Building but the view is so much more wonderful. Indeed, first there is no fence wasting the view. There are big squarish glasses though but it’s much more discrete than metal fence. Second, the view on Central Park is so much nicer. You have a full view of the giant park and all the building surrounding it forming a perfect rectangle. At that time, I couldn’t help thinking about the first field trip we had couple months ago. Wouldn’t be more beneficial to have tall business building instead of this huge giant park? Seriously, it seems that the park just comes out of nowhere (and this is probably why I give so much attention to central park).

Then we came back at night to watch the sunset. As the Sun went down, sky slightly changed from blue to orange and even pinkish. I gotta admit, it was kinda romantic. It is said that during sunsets, the very last ray of sunlight is supposed to be green. Lot of stories are said surrounding this green ray of sunlight. However, I didn’t get the chance to witness any of them. Maybe it was just rumor after all…

Macy's

There is one thing about NYC that strikes me the most. Everything they have is huge. They have one of the tallest buildings, one of the biggest parks, and the biggest Macy’s of the world. And by huge, I mean huge as messed up. I believe they have over 6 stories of items, from cloth, to souvenirs, shoes and even a food court. But the most confusing part about Macy’s NYC is that they have halves stories as well. Yes, that’s right, for example, they have floor n°1 and floor n°1 ½. oO. And to make it even more complex, the ground floor is considered as the 1rst floor. So to put it simple, you never know on which floor you are. Like this wasn’t enough, my phone couldn’t call my friends because of some network problem. I was in the men section, and Helena in the girls of course. Meeting each other in this huge several stories maze was a real hassle. Since we couldn’t call each other, we agreed on having meetings every 30 minutes on some specific floor. However we weren’t aware of halves stories, and we totally forgot how ground level was considered as 1rst story. Shopping in such place was a big challenge, as I was beginning to worry my friend just kept shopping through all the floors. So it wasn’t easy task to find her. However, I knew where her last destination would be, the souvenirs shop. After 3 hours of wondering in the entire Macy’s, from bras, shoes, dresses and underwear… You know what I discovered? Women section will always be much developed than man section somehow. Isn’t unfair for the men community?

Then I finally found her, doing what girls do best: shopping.

Central Park

Central park has always been the only one thing on earth I wanted to visit with my own eyes. I’ve seen many pictures, movies but I never thought that one day, I would be able to jog in it. You may wonder why central park fascinates me the most. Well when I think about New York City, I think about very tall buildings, I think about a very high dense of population, taxi waiting for the green light so they could frustrate by standers, it’s very dynamic and unfortunately, it’s a lot of stress as well.

However, I also think about this huge rectangle in the city that just seems to come out of nowhere. From very tall skyscraper, landscape suddenly changes to a huge peaceful quiet park. A park where people enjoy spending time together. From grey skyscrapers, the colors suddenly turn to all different type of green. From taxi’s honking, you hear birds singing. These are the reasons why I want to see central park, to see the broken line between the city and its park.

Today was at the same time just an ordinary day and a special day. Indeed, I did my daily jogging but for the first time, somewhere else than my usual treadmills. Oh and beside, I can run much longer than 10 minutes now. With me being so stubborn, I’m able to run for 1H20 min ^^.

I woke up at 8AM, took a quick breakfast and went out of the hostel. By the time I went out, I couldn’t help notice how sunny it was however cold at the same time. Time to run to Central Park. Since this latter is so huge, there is no way for me to visit all central park in just one morning of jogging. So I just ran through the north of it. There I saw a huge lake: the Jacqueline Onassis Reservoir. So I decided to make quick tour. Nevertheless, running in a park and on a treadmill is totally different things. I would never though that it would actually be harder to run outside than on our fitrec. The ground is uneven and the wind is blowing on me with a freezing intensity. As for as the landscape, you feel like you are running in a huge forest but when you look at the horizon, you can see the tall building emerging from the park. And that is exactly what I wanted to witness.

Girl Shopping

What surprises me most about NYC is its number of shopping place. From Time Square, the fifth avenue and century21, all the choices are there in this huge city. As of this day, we decided to do some little shopping instead of visiting a touristic place. However, it wasn’t any kind of shopping. It was girl-shopping -_-. Yep Helena wanted to visit some luxury brand such as “Louis Viton”, “Burberry” and Sonia Riquel. As for as I am concerned, I am not into that kind of brand so I guess it is the opportunity for me to learn some piece of info on how they became famous. How did they start and so on.

First we went to Louis Viton. This latter is mostly know for its bag. Girls are really crazy about it. One of its famous products is about 30 year old and they still sell it. It is just a simple bag with no extra pocket inside: The speedy. What is interesting about “Louis Viton is that he didn’t start business by selling bags”. He first sold trunks, those big rectangle boxes where you can put anything in. It was used long time ago by archeologists. Indeed, they had to put minerals and travel on car pulled by a horse. Thanks to this idea of “box in the back of the car”, car trunks were born.

Even though I’m not a fan of bag shopping, if I can learn some piece of history, then it’s totally worth it.

Editorial: Why so much hate surrounding cigarettes.

Smoking is now a day considers as a bad habit that most people wants to get rid of. But it wasn’t always like this back in the days where cigarettes were considered as “The cool things to do”. Movie had a huge impact on the cigarette industry. Indeed, directors had the need to make their actor do something when talking. Now, when someone is smoking, he’s either a psychopath or European. But why so much hate around cigarette? Do you really believe that cigarette is the number one killer in America? Studies have proved that obesity was overtaking smoking. According to CNN, heart disease is still the America’s number one killer in America. Though these proven facts, have we stamps all burger and any cholesterol product with death skulls? Are they as many warning sign on cigarette than on cheddar cheese, the number one cholesterol in America? Well no… Then why should cigarettes?

Some people will tell you that these logos are required to warn the person who’s not aware of the danger of cigarette. Those people are mostly children who tend to be easily influenced and fascinated by harmful product. Indeed, if the adult can do it, why not them? However, awareness of danger doesn’t come from a sign of a pack of cigarette. It comes from education, from teachers and mostly, from parental education. It is there responsibility to warn their children of all the danger of our world so they can decide for themselves and be prepared.

Long time ago, liquors were a big issue and were even prohibited for a period of time. However, this prohibition only worked to a certain extends and now is revealed as a complete disaster. Crime rates surrounding liquor has arisen drastically.

By implementing such harsh rules on cigarettes, aren’t we afraid to redo the mistakes of the past?

Does it really make sense to put some death logo to packs of cigarettes that isn’t the number one killer in America? If yes, why not cheese burger and all other food loaded with cholesterol?

Do people actually know that they are even more dangerous product than cigarette?

Is the tobacco industry to blame or should it be education?

These questions deserved to be asked since there is so much debate concerning the tobacco industry.

The Statue of Liberty

To tell you the truth, visiting the Statue oLiberty wasn’t in my to do list. Indeed, saying “hello” to a high tall spiked headed lady painted in green doesn’t seem really exciting to me. But hey, I’m a tourist, Helena wants to drop by in her island and visit “Miss liberty”, I guess I can make an exception. Perhaps, I may learn why people have decided to paint her in green … (I know, I’m just being silly, I know why it’s green of course thanks to the State House field trip).

But first things first. We went to a small restaurant for a brunch. Pretty nice and old fashion style. Helena wasn’t familiar with the term “Brunch”, a mixed between breakfast and lunch. So I told her that when you skipped breakfast but still want to eat an early lunch, than we have what we called a brunch. Then we took off for Miss hulk… erf… the statue of liberty sorry.

So when you arrived at the border right before taking the boat to Liberty Island, you can have a quick look at the “Statue of Liberty” and … I thought she would be taller. We bought the ticket, and hop on the boat for Liberty Island. On our way, I couldn’t help noticing 2 things. While the city and its huge skyscrapers started to shrink, the Statue of Liberty started to grow bigger and bigger. There… oh wow… I can’t have the whole statue in my field of vision. While we walked around we took many picture of her, many ones were pretty funny.

I also learned some piece of history. Did you know that Mr. Eiffel made the last pieces of the Statue of Liberty? The one who built and designed the Eiffel tower in France. Well this may be the reason why she is so gorgeous ^^. I also notice that she wasn’t built on a socle but on a fort. Indeed, long time ago, the Liberty Island was a military position. It served as a scouting fort to spot incoming invaders. The fort where the statue stands is shaped as a 11 spiked stars to have a 360 field of vision.

Then our next stop was Ellis Island. This place is huge, loaded with historical facts as well as movie facts. Indeed this is where they shot the movie “Hitch” with will Smith. This latter dates Eva Mendes to the island to show her that one of her ancestor was a pioneer. Anyway, the most important one is that it was used as a place where new comers who wanted to live in America had to pass a health check. Two diseases were common at that time. One of them was called trachoma, a disease that can make people blind. The second, well I don’t remember.

On our way back to the Manhattan, there was this guy dressed as Spiderman. His outfit was... hum pretty tight... and he was striking some weird poses for by standers pictures... But I couldn't help noticing all these girl gathered around him. Roughly 10 girls around him, each one of them giving him 1 dollar for a pose. It is really unexpected and now, I believe beeing Spiderman is quite an earning job.

After leaving the statue of liberty, we had a quick look at the NYSE-Euronext. Pretty beautiful. Now a days I believe that NYSE is less croweded because of new way of communication ( internet). Bye bye to all the messy people screaming at each other with pens and paper sticked to their mouth. I also notice one strange thing: very fancy Gym clubs surrounds these stock option houses.

At last but not least, I invited Helena to a sushi restaurant. Since it was her birthday, it was my treat. So Helena is a bit afraid of trying out new stuff. She doesn’t like to go on unknown territory. Since I have some experience with sushi I ordered several different fancy rolls. Why fancy? Because they are not just casual sushi’s such like the California rolls. There are a bit more… well fancy… More topping and so on. Then for our final sushi I made her try something really unusual. The “ Uni Sushi”. Uni stands for sea ursine. It has a very particular taste and a very particular way of eating. You have to put it in your mouth and eat it really slowly so the taste just blows your mind. It kinda feels like the sea is invading your entire mouth. And you know what? She totally agreed ^^. Sharing your experiences and likes is really enjoyable (especially when we both agreed).

The next day… guess what we had for dinner again…

I <3 NYC. Trip day and empire state building

My friend Helena Mignon, a former classmate who happens to study in Mexico for the second semester, decided to come to Boston and New York to celebrate her 23^rd birthday. Now the funny part is that we don’t really know each other very well. Even though we were in the same class the first semester, I realized that we never talked to each other. And now, we’re going to visit NYC together. Wouldn’t you feel awkward to visit such city with someone you don’t really know? Well I guess this trip is my opportunity to know her better.

The main issue is she’s coming right in the middle of the week and therefore, I have to skip some classes in order to show her around. Of course most teachers gave me green light for skipping classes in exchange of extra work. Now the funny thing is that I warned them on the 1^st of April and I would never thought that even teachers would take advantage of this special day to fool me.

The previous day before my trip to NYC was a rough day. I had to buy the tickets as well as the Hostel. This latter is so hard to find especially when you plan to stay for more then 4 days during Easter Sunday. However, with a bit of effort, I was able to find a little hostel right next to Central Park and a nice bus ride.

The trip to Boston lasted 4 hours or so with only one break. When we were about to arrive in NYC, the bus started to stop and go on almost every relight and I started to get really sick. Hopefully, I managed to hold my breakfast in my stomach and finding our hostel wasn’t that hard after all. After unpacking, we decided to visit NYC.

We first went to Ground 0. It was so windy and cold that we decided to go shopping next to that famous century 21. It’s a shop were almost everything is on sale. You can find almost anything you want from clothing to gift with a relatively cheap price. However, good luck in finding your right size. You can chose between XL, XXL, and XXXL (I didn’t know this latter could even exist).

Then we walk up the street up to the Empire state building. Like many touristic place, the Empire state building is an Iconic symbol of NYC. I believe this latter is one of the tallest building in NYC if not the highest. It also has a huge impact on American movie history with King Kong and other old style movie. The inside of the building is old school fashion style and it feels like you are living in a 1960 movie. It is so sixties that the architecture and design deserve big attention.

While we reached the top, NYC was drowning in the dark. Many little white light from tall building were drawing the cities. It was really breathtaking. We spent roughly 1-hour taking picture of the entire city.

Then it was already 0h00 and we ate nothing since we arrived. So we decided to eat at Wendy’s then come back to ou hostel, dead tired.

My apologies

Hello Bruce, I wanted to apology for not updating my blog these later days. I really wanted to post my daily entries in NYC, but I never realized how tiring NYC could be. We walked all day long and I got pretty tired by the end of the day. I know that you’re asking of us only 15 min of bloging but to tell you the truth, I spend much more than only 15 min. However, I’m willing to make it up by writing you every single day I’ve spent in New York in every detail with illustration too. I hope you’ll enjoy it because I’ve got so many things to tell you.

Complicated Subject: Moral Flexibility

During the movie, Nick Naylor, who happens to be a lobbyist on the behalf of cigarette, have this conversation with his son.

Son: “Can’t anyone be a lobbyist?”

Nick Naylor: “No… It requires a certain moral flexibility that goes beyond most people.”

Son: “Do I have flexible morals?”

Nick Naylor: “Well… Let’s say you become a lawyer and you were asked to defend a murderer, no worst than that, a child murderer. Now the law states that every person deserves a fair trial. Would you defend him?”

As for my complicated subject, I’ve decided to explain a particularly term used in“ Thank you for smoking” which is moral flexibility.

Our live is built on decisions and dilemmas. Every actions and calls we make are based upon our perception of what we consider the “right” things to do or the “wrong” things to do. Now the key to moral flexibility is that since our moral in influenced by our OWN perception of the world and society, even though you may come across someone who shares your principle and values, you can always play and bend your morale factor to act without feeling guilty. Why? Because we are all different. And no one is going to blame you for your values.

Now let’s talk about “moral flexibility. What is it? Well first of, it is composed of two words:

Moral: which concerns the principle of “right” and “wrong”.

Flexibility: to be easily modified to respond to altered circumstances or conditions.

As such, moral flexibility is the aptitude to bend our principle to achieve many spins for many purposes. On one hand, people with flexible morale can either come to their end or use it as a “get away” technique from a situation where they would be cornered if they were to stick with their principles. The most interesting part is that by bending your moral, not only you get away but you simply don't feel guilty whatsoever. One the other hand, people who would stick firmly to their principle would in theory, always chose the action they believe to be right.

Do you have flexible morale? Well as for as I’m concerned, we all have some sort of moral flexibility to a certain extend. People cheat, people lie. People download. Let’s talk about downloading, a subject we talked about couple months ago. It is considered as stealing and unethical and therefore the “wrong” things to do. Many people are aware of what downloading represents and how it is perceived. However, so many people still download without feeling guilty. Why? Because (thanks?) to their flexible moral.

In some situation, flexible morale is always used where there is no “right” outcome. Both decisions end up in a “No win situation”. This is where you have to prioritize your principles.

In the movie, Nick Naylor stressed how parental education is important in a children growth during a debate against the health organization. Education doesn’t come from a sign of a pack of cigarettes, it comes from parental control.

Health organization:” Ok Mr. Nick Naylor, what are you going to do when your son turns 18. Are you going to share one lovely afternoon smoking cigarettes?”

From this moment, Nick Naylor is cornered. He has the choice of speaking on the behalf of the cigarette OR as a father.

On one side, if he speaks as a father and say "No because smoking kills" , he would then lose the debate. On the other side, if he speaks on the behalf of cigarette, he goes against his principles. For both case, moral flexibility is required.

After speaking on the behalf of cigarette, Nick Naylor comes out of the conference room with a sense of guiltiness.

Nick Naylor may not seems so flexible when it comes to his son.

Iceskating

Every Friday night, BU has this special night even that takes place at the roof. There it is possible to ice-skate from 6 to 10 pm. One thing to know about me is that I love ice-skating. It is such a great place to socialize, meet people, and have fun at the same time. I believe it is also a romantic place to date someone. If your partner doesn’t know how to skate, just grab her hand and ice skate according to her speed. If she’s better than you, then grab her even tighter. If you’re lucky, you might even fall together romantic style ^^.

What I also like about Ice-skating is the speed sensation. It reminds me a winter sport. I can go relatively fast and do some nice tricks as well. When I went to the roof I was looking forward to get on the ice. However there was a little hiccup. The ice skate they give me was ridiculously old. It was so hard to put them on and after only 5 min, my feet started to hurt like hell. Each step was so painful and I looked so ridiculous too. All I wanted to do is to get rid of these ice-skating shoes, go home and massage my feet. However, my friends seemed to enjoy the rink. So we just stay a little longer and as for me, I just chilled on the ice for a while.

Eye of the Tiger

Since my 2 weeks of work out didn’t really make me lose any weight whatsoever, I’ve decided to push myself harder and focus on cardio. Now the thing about cardio is that it’s only effective when you keep your heart running for at least 30 to 45 minute. Below this time, you basically burn nothing but the energy you have ready at hand.

Me: “So to make it simple, I just need to keep my heart running for 30 minutes? This shouldn’t be too hard”.

Dave: “Well you need to run for AT LEAST above 30 minutes. Only after then, the energy you’ll burn after this lap of time will be depleted from your fat. I also suggest you to run with your sweater on so you can sweat more and burn more fat.”

Me: “Alright”

Dave:” Also remember to play a power song when you feel tired to give you a mental boost… Ready? Alright, let’s go tiger”.

This day, I’ve come prepared with all the required equipments:

• New Nike shoes I’ve just bought for 90 bucks, READY!
• Ipod with arm strap loaded with power song, READY!
• Bottle of water, READY!

Today, there is no way I’m coming back home without losing at least 5 lbs of fat! So I’ve decided to run for one hour on one of those treadmills. I pressed the button “Quick start” and “3…”, “2…”, “1…”. and the tread started to move. Let’s put the speed at 6 for a little warm up…

As I run, I couldn’t help noticing this little timer that tracks my running time, a calorie meter and distance meter. Alright, today, I’m going explode those numbers!

• 2 min 14sec: I couldn’t help notice how boring running was.
• 3 min: My thirst is kicking in… humpff.. I’ve never thought it would be that hard to drink while running…
• 3min 20: My first drop of sweat falls. And my legs starts to get heavy… At this rate, I won’t last much longer. Power song! Power song! I need mental boost!

“Power song played: Eye of the tiger from Rocky…”

Tuuuuduuuutuuuuu… tuduuuduuuuu…!!

Alright baby! I’m back in the game… But lets speed down by a bit...

…

Oh no powersong is over… I’ve got nothing else to do besides running and …

Oh man… NO… Don’t look at the clock… Don’t look… crap…

What the?? oO 4 min 11 sec. How is that even possible? Have I entered in some sort of time distortion or something? At this rate, I’m going to kill myself. Let’s walk a little to regain my breath. All I need is to keep my heart running, so walking a little bit should be fine.

Breath… breath… the key is breathing…

After couple minutes, my body sweated as it never sweated before. My grey T-shirt who was supposedly grey turned black and sticky. I felt like my body was evaporating and that warm thick sweatshirt didn’t help at all. Doh... No wonder it's called a SWEATshirt. From this very moment, I only had one objective… to survive at least 10 min on the treadmill… To survive so I don’t look like an asthmatic rookie. After 10 minutes, tI barely made it alive…the calorie meter indicate 90 cal burnt… Barely enough to burn off a Coke…

Weight check

It's been 2 weeks I've been training and dieting non-stop and it's time to check if my work out sessions has done its magic. And for that, nothing is better than a weight check. So I wake up early in the morning, go for the toilet, took a leak, took my t-shirt out and every possible thing that could made me lighter... Here I go!!! Oo. What the?... The weight machine might have bugged the first time. Let's step on it again... How is it even possible?? Let's try to step on the weight machine with one foot. Sometimes it "does" works...

Well, according the weight machine which I believe it's totally wrong, there is a good news and a bad news. Let's start with the good news, I haven't gain more weight. As for the bad news... I haven't lost neither. It is such a disapointment not to be rewarded from any kind of hardwork.

From this very moment, people usually have 2 options. You either give up or work even harder. So I looked down at the weight machine and:

"Alright, you wanna put me into a challenge? See you tomorrow for mass cardio running! I will not yield.!"

"Yeah! that's the spirit!!"

Well you know, sometimes you gotta cheer yourself up in order not to lose hope -_-

Cover letter for Lucas Film

Lucasfilm University Relations

Attn: Jedi Academy Internships

P.O. Box 29919

San Francisco, CA 94129-0919

To whom it may concerns

I am an international graduated student from Paris Graduate School of Management and it is with great interest that I am applying for a business internship in your organization. I’m interested in any available position but more specifically marketing and advertising to complete my forth year of study. I have also notice an interesting internship position as Project management intern that I would like to apply for the period between July and December.

Academically, my extensive course work in international marketing department at the Boston University and Paris Graduate school of Management has allowed me to gain some knowledge and method and I would like to apply them in concrete situation. I am really interested into advertising and I often find myself analyzing commercial advertisements. Though my lack of professional experience in the marketing area, my team and I created a virtual event agency for a school project. Our goal was to promote and increase the notoriety of a brand name “Chupa Chups”. This project allowed us to be creative in making the company, from its name to its logo, and organized our product campaign.

As for my international experience, I had 5 months internship in Silicon Valley of California. I was to program an interface that would allow people to insert subtitles in any video support. At first, it was rather hard but I learn how to adapt and be autonomous in the company. I also studied for a year in Liverpool John More University and graduated in the computer and control system major. There, I learned how to work in team and improved my English communication skill. Thanks to these experience, I believe I’ve gain a broaden view of the world and its different culture as well as people behavior.

I’ve known the company since my childhood thanks to all Georges Lucas movies and several games I’ve played from The Jedi Knight series to X-wing series. I’m a big fan of video games and the universe involving the mysteries around Jedis. Therefore, I believe I will be fit to work in your environment.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Quang Khai Nguyen

Fenni Chen

This night, I went to the “Fondation bar” for a change. It is located near Kenmore T station. The bar is rather small and the music is ok. I danced a little, didn’t have any drink at all... Well not really an exciting night. However, the most interesting part was on my way home. I was walking with a girl I’ve met some days ago (she’s the one who thought I was gay in a previous party). Her name is Fenni Chen. You may know her since she happens to be an opera singer. She is famous in Taiwan as. And she sang for many events and even for the mayor of Boston. First, I didn’t really believe her at all... I mean it’s not every day someone comes across an opera singer, right? So I asked her to sing something for me own our way home. I expected some boring song. We were walking through the BU campus; no one was there, only the 2 of us…

“Somewheeeeeeere oveeeer the raiiiiiinbow, wayyy up highhhh”

“And the dreams that you dreamed of, once a lullabyyyyy”

“Somewhereeeere oveeer the Rainnbow, bluee birds flyyyy”

“And the dreaams that you dreamed of, dreams really come truuue”

Her voice echoed in the silenced street. After her performance… I just couldn’t say anything. I was just completely astonished. I just heard the most angelic voice in my life. It was so beautiful and I guess, some kind of romantic at the same time. I asked her why she left Taiwan for Boston. Indeed, she’s famous and is considered as a star in her home country… I don’t want to say too much about it but what I’ve learned from her is fame cannot buy everything. It may be better to sometime lay low to enjoy your life.

Walking down boston university

Like almost Wednesday of the week, I have to attempt Bruce’s class. However his class is the only one that starts at 1 pm instead of 9 pm. Does it really matter? Well it’s a great deal in my opinion for integrating BU. Unlike my 6 pm classes, when I walk down the street, I see many students walking the campus. It’s daylight. And I feel most of the student life happens during this period. People chitchat, study, eat together and so on. Even though I don’t know them, I’m doing what they are doing: heading to class. And this makes me feel I’m a part of BU. When I arrived in Boston I expected to do exactly what they are doing. This was supposed to be my opportunity to learn about the American culture by living their life. Not some sort of night program dedicated to foreign students. Indeed, my classes usually start at 6 pm therefore the environment is totally different. The street are not as full and it starts to get dark. It kind of feels like having a night job and therefore, I feel like out casted. To bad “Introduction to management” only happen once a week.

30 sec speech

I don’t know whether my dream job is advertising but I feel more and more interesting in this field. So if by any chance, I was to be stuck in the elevator with someone who handles the recruitment for future advertisers, what was I to say to attract his attention?

Well I would first show my interest in advertising in a concrete situation. Since I only have 30 second to talk about it, these notions will be short and simple. The idea is to show a short profile of mine so I can open another opportunity.

However, the hardest part would be to bring the subject naturally in the table. So what I would do is first to look at some advertisement either in the elevator or in some newspaper and show my feelings about it:

Me: “Oh this is such a good and interesting ad. I’ve been looking at it and now, all I want to eat is an American Cheese Burger.”

Recruiter: “Why do you think this is a good ad?

Me: “ Well if you look at eat, the ads doesn’t just show a burger like most ad would do. It attracts the customer by using a certain sense of humor and only after then, they create some sort of needs to whoever is looking at it.”

Recruiter: “This is such a deep analyses. Why are you so much interest in ads? Many people considers them as parasite”

Me: “Well first, from my point of view, it is considers as parasite because the ad itself failed to fulfill its role. As for me, good ads must be creative and logic. Creative because you first want to reach people and not just claims your brand or product and this requires creativity.

And I don’t especially like watching ads… I like watching good and entertaining ads. Like any movies or books… Some are good, some are bad. If I had the opportunity of creating an ad, I would’ve first focus on how to reach the audience before claiming anything”.

From this last session, I’m showing my interest of working in the ad industry and hoping he’s going to give me his card.

How to Blog Seriously...

This week, I am completely overwhelmed with homework. Not only I have to start with my papers, projects and case studies due for the next week but I also have to write a fifteen minutes blog that usually takes me roughly an hour. Why do I take so long to write a simple entry? Well… This is going to be the subject of this entry… Me bloging a 15 min entry for one hour… In this very post, I’m going to share with you how I proceed in bloging, how I chose my subject and where I get my inspiration.

The most important thing in writing is how to get your inspiration. And this is the hardest part for most people. However, they are many different ways to get inspirations:

If you were to write an essay on specific topic, one way would be to get yourself involved in the topic. I’m not saying you got to put effort into it; you just have to find some elements that connect you and the subject so you can write something with enthusiasm and even illustrate your saying. This part is really important since it makes the job much easier. If you can’t involve yourself than you can involve someone else you know. For example, I had to write something about the mayor of Boston who basically have the power to do anything he pleases. However he can’t do it because it may have bad consequences… And what does that reminds me? Spiderman 3: “ With great power comes great responsibility”. It’s fun, it illustrate the idea very well and it makes me write something… Anything you can connect to the subject is welcome. And if you can’t find anything, LIE. It’s not like there is going to be an investigation about what you’re writing. It generally requires a flexible morality.

The other technique would be to focus on the “how” when you have to write something that doesn’t interest you. As for example, I don’t write a blog about some birthday parties but more over “how” did the party go. Such as my sausage party, which was a complete failure. There several post on my blog where I focus a lot on the “how”.

As for this post, which technique do you think I’ve used?

Dieting

Since I’ve made a post about working out, I thought it would be fair to make an entry about dieting. Indeed, working out is just 50 percent of the job if you want to be cut. It’s rather hard, requires strength, you sweat and stink. The other fifty comes from dieting. It requires patience, a lot of will power, self-control and a certain taste for disgusting food. In my situation, dieting is no easy task. As I’m writing this post, I’m eating a brownie. I should be ashamed of myself… but somehow… I’m not… Anyway I have this 14 days meal plan which means I can eat twice a day at the dinning hall… You know… The “ All You Can Eat” style type of restaurant dedicated for students. So now you understand my frustration… Not only you have to eat healthy but you also have to eat very little. And the fact that it’s all you can eat is not going to help me at all.

As for the healthy part of dieting… It is so unfair. My roommate told me:

Dave: “You have to change your way of life and exclude all unhealthy food such as pizza, burgers, ice-cream and cheese.”

He obviously forgot that I come from France. We, French people, praise cheese like no other food in the world. It’s in our culture; it’s in our blood. There is no way on earth that I’ll be cutting on my precious cheese. So I was like:

Khai: “What? Cheese…”

Dave: “Don’t worry Khai, I knew French guy wouldn’t give up on this one. There is this cheese that unlike other cheese, is very healthy for you. I eat it every time”.

And Dave showed me something I’ve never seen before. It was white… liquid and solid at the same time. He calls it “cottage cheese”.

Me: “ Huh oO? That’s cheese? You’re kinding me right? Looks like a snowman threw up in your bowl. Put that away from my face… I ain’t eating none of his puke”

Dave: “Well you wanna be cut, right?”

Me: “Hell yeah I do”

Dave: “Then you gotta make some sacrifice”

Me: “But this is madness”

Dave: “No pain, No gain”.

Hann man… I hope this is really worth it…

Unexpected outcome

Yesterday, there was a birthday party going on. I didn’t even know who the birthday boy was but hey... A friend’s friend of mine invited me… so it’s not really an issue. All excuses are good to party and beside, I’ve been working out a little, I’m on diet and I’m feeling in shape. There is no way I’m going home empty handed. I had couple drinks… couple beers, couple whisky… couple of… I don’t remember what it was… But it felt so goood…and oh wow… I was feeling hot… My hips, legs… no let me rephrase it, my entire body was just moving by itself. It felt like it had a mind on its own. I can’t help it… I can’t fight it… Just let it go and have the music groove your body. It just moved naturally according to the beat of the music… This night, I was the king of the dance floor… Then a girl came to me. Oh man, I guess working out has done its magic ^^. And beside who could possibly resist to my hip move? So she came and I will always remember what she asked me. She whispered me softly in my ears…

“Are you gay?”… I was like oO? Seriously, that was totally unexpected.

“Huh what are you talking about?

“Well you just dance like a girl… You seem to be on diet cuz you had no cake and you've just been eating carrot since you arrived " ( hum yeah... that was true... Since I didn't want to mess up my diet, I only ate the little carrots in the bowls)… So I was like …

“ Euh no… This is hip hop style… -_-, and... I love carrots... and no… I’m totally not gay… “

“You sure?”

“Hell yeah… I ain’t gay and I’m 110 % sure… I mean cmon trust me… I may be everything, but not gay.”

And I spent the entire night convincing this cute girl that I wasn’t gay. My friend couldn’t help laughing at me… I guess I have to work a little on my dance move as well as my body now… As for this night... Not only I went home empty handed but I had to convince myself that i was not gay too.

Just when you think things cannot get any worse, they will.