8/29

and like that, time passed again.

since the last post:

moved out of East Village and into Midtown (much more space and walking distance to work!)

finished rotations at work and now placed in my final team.

all is well. 

6/14

I guess another heartbeat.

starting going to the gym for the first time since moving to New York.

two years without going to the gym.. time really went  by fast.

6/3

since the last time I wrote--

more time with God,

which seems to slowly bring out a change in outlook. 

let's keep walking. 

as suspected

if I don't write daily,

it seems I don't write at all.

I guess it's the pressure to write something long and thoughtful.

falling plates

today's sermon had a video play towards the end of the sermon--

message was about the book of Hosea and God's love for us revealed in the midst of all the warnings.

4/6

the Michigan basketball team beats Syracuse and and heads off to the NCAA finals. 

Go Blue!

3/31

easter.

message was on life that centers on the resurrection

and looks forward to His coming.


met michigan friends after service.

fellow computer engineering majors--

took classes together,

worked on team projects together.

we all happened to live in New York,

but it was the first time we all met together.


thankful.


ps

probably will start decreasing the number of posts from daily to something less frequent but hopefully more insightful.

3/30

practices.

there was a church event in between practices--

good performances.

more practice towards the evening. 

got macaroons for a birthday present

and got to eat them for the first time. 

pretty awesome stuff.

thankful.

3/29

morning service,

breakfast with small group-centered kids.


no work,

got some sleep.


good friday service,

good message on life that looks upon the cross.


after service,

another surprise birthday congratulations.


dinner with the praise team,


then night with the guys.


oh, and Michigan beats Kansas in the NCAA tournament to head to the Elite Eight.

how awesome is that.


thankful.

thankful.

3/28

left work having done a satisfactory amount of work.

waiting for me in the building lobby were

friends. 

I stared at them for a split second,

not registering that they're really my friends.

I've never had a surprise anything for my birthday,

and it really meant a lot. 

thankful. 

3/27

more work with testing at work.

after work,

I was treated to an opera.

for someone who's never been to a musical or an opera,

it was a great experience.

the theatre was huge.

thankful.

3/26

team's in the process of releasing--

this week will mostly be testing. 

ate dinner with a church hoobae after work. 

talk revolved around faith--

how things that didn't work the way we thought

becomes blessings. 

thankful.

3/25

had a mild case of the mondays,

feeling really tired until a little after lunch.

did get some work done though.


after work,

met with church people for dinner and talked.

talking a lot these days,

mostly on the topic of future dreams?


thankful.

3/24

sunday service,

once again we are challenged to spread the gospel to those around us. 

met with church people after service and ate dinner.

after, we started talking,

and the talk went on for a long time.

interesting conversation in which I was able to find out something new about myself. 

thankful.

3/23

college praise team didn't have practice

since next week friday is a church-wide service,

but we all met and had some bonding time.


the Michigan basketball team got into the Sweet Sixteen

(round of 16 for the NCAA championship tournament).

didn't get to watch the game,

but now there's another game to look forward to.


the young adult praise team leader

lent me one of his electric guitars to use for church.

I'll do my best to become better.


thankful.

3/22

I guess I finished the week of work well--

committed all the code I had to check in,

and they all seem to be working fine.


church after work.

got really tired towards the end of service,

but dinner after it really got the energy back.


bought myself a mechanical keyboard a couple of days ago--

thought that since my profession involves a lot of time typing,

it's justifiable to get myself a high quality keyboard.

and wow, it does feel great.

makes me want to keep typing things.

makes really loud clicking noises though;

I would only be able to use this if I am the only one around the computer.


thankful.

good luck, bad luck, who knows?

http://josephwalla.com/the-rejection-book-good-luck-bad-luck-who-knows

thought it was an interesting written description of the virtues of having a long-term perspective.

3/21

I guess I'm still going through the growing pains of adjusting to the new team.

keep getting stuck on following the server workflow, 

but as it always was with other teams, 

I'll get used to it. 

went to our small group's prayer meeting,

bringing them food to eat. 

spent a good time talking with small group people.

patience. I've been forgetting about that. 

have to start holding it more to my heart. 

thankful.

3/20

got a little tired towards the end of the work day,

but the outside air lifted them away as soon as I got off work.


my good friend came back from Korea after a couple of months,

and we met for dinner,

talking about how things were.


finished the game I started playing yesterday,

figured that I might as well finish it quickly rather than have it drag on.


thankful.

3/19

went home after work,

played some video games.

actually, a lot of video games.

once in a while is fine, I guess.


the cashiers at a Japanese market that I frequent for groceries

have been speaking Japanese to me.

since I can still at least understand numbers,

I didn't bother telling them I don't speak the language--

just handed them the amount,

did a slight bow,

and left.

I guess it's alright to feel slightly entertained by it.


thankful.

3/18

work is starting to stack up--

code freeze is this friday,

and I have a lot to get done by then.


ate dinner with a praise team member,

talked mostly about living away from home.

closer to goal of grabbing food with every member.


thankful.

3/17

church,

I didn't feel tired at all--

I guess the sleep in the bus did count for something.

went to dinner with '89 friends after service.

worked on web work once I got home,

while catching up with tv shows.


thankful.

3/16

rode the first bus to boston in the morning

and arrived there around lunchtime.

had a good time with friends,

but I ended up falling asleep for a big chunk of the day.

I guess I was pretty tired.

nevertheless, it's always good to meet friends.

waiting for the bus back home.

thankful.

3/15

morning service,

work,

then friday service after work.

late dinner with church people after work. 

day trip to Boston tomorrow. 

will be tiring, but worth it.

thankful.

3/14

Pi Day.

only later did I realize it was also white day.



there was a farewell outing for one of the directors in the firm.

he's been around the firm for a long time,

and that was visible through the big turnout to the outing.



after that, I met a church hoobae

and talked and shared QT over tea--

it was a praise team "mission,"

and I think it was a good idea.


thankful.

3/13

was overall tired for most of the day,

but I got by.

met up with a coworker friend after work.

original intention was to give him something he left at work,

but it eventually led to a conversation about faith. 

we talked about it once in a while during lunch breaks,

but I guess this was the first time we talked about it for a long time. 

thankful.

looney tunes

one of the first cartoon series I watched after leaving Korea.

they were pretty musical-ly,

and I can say I got familiar with a lot of classical music through these.

just passed by one while surfing the web

and took the time to watch and reminisce.

3/12

been getting a lot of work done this week,

but I had to scrap most of them before ending the day.

did get familiarized with a lot of things through it though.


second attempt at getting the bass repaired--

I noticed as I walked home today

that there was a guitar/bass shop right across the street from home

that sold only the church bass' brand.

gave it a shot.

made it in time,

but you know that saying that goes something like

broken things work fine in the presence of a repairman?

yeah, that happened.

the repairman made a valid point that we might just have used a bad cable

(which I believe we actually didn't try to check),

and I had to just bring it back to church.

at least it means it's not broken.


weather's been warming up.

hope this keeps up.


thankful.

3/11

I was given the responsibility to repair the bass guitar at church;

I had brought it home,

and after work, I picked it up and brought it to the guitar center.

it appears that the repairman leaves a couple of hours before closing,

meaning that I will have to carry this back tomorrow or sometime soon. 

the house internet stopped working since yesterday for some reason.

because of that, 

roommate and I had nothing to do,

so we went out for a walk.

weather was not cold, 

so it was a good walk.

thankful.

3/10

had announced a '89ers gathering that was supposed to happen after service,

but no one was around for it--

pushing it to a future date.

somehow ended up with a very interesting group 

that was made up of people who were walking home in the same direction.

ate dinner and drank coffee.

livelier conversation than would have been expected. 

thankful.

3/9

ate brunch,

for what I believe is the first time.

rest of the day was practice.

talked to Brother on the phone for the first time in a while,

since now our working hours overlap.

good long conversation.


thankful.

3/8

there was a meeting about internet security at work.

now that I can understand better how these penetrations/exploits work,

I do get the desire to learn more about it.


church after work.

singing praise has been very enjoyable for the past few weeks.


thankful.

3/7

more test case coding during work.

met a church hoobae for dinner--

it's like this week is a week to make amends for my lack of socializing in the last few weeks.

did some finishing touches on the web work I got yesterday once I got back home.


thankful.

3/6

spent the day writing unit tests for the code I've worked on for the past couple of days.

it's actually been a while since I had to write testing code--

previous teams had relied on testers and regression scripts to test new code.


day was panning out to be a quiet day

until I got a call from hoobae who needed work on a website.

worked on that for the rest of the evening.


thankful.

3/5

work was alright,

just rested at home,

did fall asleep for a bit after eating dinner. 

watched "Wreck-it Ralph",

a Disney movie.

it's always amazing how these

Disney/Pixar animation films 

get me to the brink of tears. 

also had a good helping of 

reminiscing the games and candies I enjoyed 

back when I was a kid. 

special flashback thanks to a 

doughnut side character named Wynchel, 

named after Winchell Doughnuts, 

the only doughnut chain in Saipan. 

thankful. 

3/4

ate lunch at the desk

but had a coffee break after work.

met some church hoobaes for dinner after work,

and talked about the struggles they are going through. 

I'll do my best to be of any help-- 

I guess comforting their stomachs is a start.


thankful.

3/3

ate dinner with a couple of church people.

apparently it was "samgyupsal" day,

so we ate just that.

went back home after then 

pored through some code. 

thankful.

3/2

practice starting in the afternoon,

ate dinner with the praise team members after practice.

more practice until near midnight,

after which I went straight home.


read Luke 7 and 8 before heading out to the day of practices,

and the story of the sinful woman who washed Jesus' feet

was very moving.

when the pharisee who saw the woman washing Jesus' feet

wondered in thought whether Jesus is able to know that she is a sinful woman,

Jesus reads his mind and replies with an analogy of two debtors.

when agreed upon that the debtor with the bigger debt will be more thankful  when the debt is forgiven,

Jesus explains how the woman,

who acknowledges her sins,

is able to show her thanks through the washing of feet,

while the pharisee,

who we can dare construe as self-righteous by seeing how he judged the woman,

is unable to show that level of thankfulness.


thankful.

3/1

first,

a big, great thank you to those who fought for what became my freedom this very day.

worked,

then church.

after service,

met people from my old acappella club who came to visit.

though we were all walking different paths, we were still like family.

thankful.

2/28

got work done, 

had japanese-inspired pasta for dinner

and had a good conversation over coffee. 

thankful.

2/27

had a lunch with a friend

who also works in the same area.

went to a relatively small French restaurant--

food was good,

but I think the atmosphere was better. 

spent time proofreading essays after work,

watching tv shows in between. 

thankful.

2/26

got a better hold of the work I have to do

and had a pretty efficient day.

somewhat rushed home

seeing that the weather was starting to get rainy.

didn't really have much to do,

but spent a quiet time in the room

since there wasn't much motivation to be outside with the rain.


found out one of my college roommates

came to New York and found a start-up.

contacted him and agreed to meet soon and catch up.


thankful.

2/25

enjoyed the work done,

but finished the day without being able to reach the amount of work I hoped to do. 

spent the evening resting at home,

fiddling with xterm configurations and watching TV shows.

brother seems to be enjoying work life,

getting that feeling of settling down. 

thankful.

2/24

today's sermon was about Luke 6:37-42,

"why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother's eye 

when you yourself fail to see the plank in your eye?"

went to the monthly English service after the normal services

and had some good time of rest at home. 

thankful. 

2/23

retreat ended.

ate dinner at Fort Lee and went back to Manhattan.

pretty tired.

during one of the recent retreats,

someone played a song with the piano

that just sounded beautiful.

I felt like I've heard it before,

but didn't know the name.

after asking around, 

finally found the song. 

did watch the movie long ago, but don't remember it too well.

thankful.

2/22

got stuff done at work,

then went to retreat.

had a good conversation time with the praise team at night.

thankful.

2/21

got more briefing on the things I will be working on

then got some coding done.

went out with some people after work

and talked.

brother graduated--

wish I was there to congratulate him directly.

anyways it's a relief to know we both made it out of college.

thankful.

brothers

brother recently sent me a couple of pictures of when we were little,

and this one really made me smile. 

2/20

met the new team's manager,

who assigned me to another superior,

who was working from a different office today.

did get in contact with him through the phone,

and I was briefed about the team

and the projects/technologies I will be working with.

already given a sizable workload it seems,

but it does sound interesting.


watched "Pulp Fiction" for the first time,

but it wasn't that awesome-awesome.

thinking about it,

the tarantino movies I've watched so far were all just so-so.

I still want to watch "Django Unchained" though.


thankful.

2/19

first day with the new team,

but my manager was out for the day.

spent the day reading over information about the team.

did get introduced to the team members,

and they all seem friendly.


monitor I had bought around black friday

broke a couple of weeks ago,

but I was able to receive a full refund.

bought myself a replacement,

and it came in today.


thankful.

2/18

no work today.

finally got to do some much-needed laundry, 

got a shirt altered down at orchard street, 

met a hyung for dinner,

then met a group of friends and talked over tea and dessert. 

not much more I can ask for in a holiday.

thankful.

I start the new rotation tomorrow.

excited and hopefully ready for the new team.

2/17

hung out with newport people after church.

got persuaded to go over to newport to hang out more,

and once we were there,

just played cards and talked.

thankful.

2/16

there was less praise team practice than usual--

had a lot of time to just relax at home.

another night out with the Michigan guys,

but I came home early (earlier than them) 

since I have to wake up early for church tomorrow.

thankful.

2/15

it was a good 6-month rotation,

I'll probably be contacting my manager even after I move teams.

really liked my current desk though--

a lot of desk space.

had another Michigan gathering.

stay out til around 4,

doing the usual talking. 

was so sleepy by the time I got home

that I fell asleep while waiting for roommate to finish washing up. 

thankful.

2/14

testers in the London office had stuff for me to fix

as soon as a I got into the office.

fixed them up and got the thumbs up.

met a friend for the first time in over a month, 

ate dinner and talked. 

thankful.

2/13

had enough work to keep my mind busy/entertained during work.

ate dinner with a church hoobae--

very outgoing kid, unlike my first impression. 

finally got myself a cloud server--

found a service that offers a small box (512MB RAM, 1 core, 20GB SSD, 1TB bandwidth)

for an affordable price.

a big step towards pushing myself to start building something. 

thankful.

2/12

thankful for

1) reaching out by my next manager.
my manager in the next team
was one of the people who had interviewed me.
as it is with interviewers,
I always had a sort of fear of him since.
however, he came over to say hello today,
and he seemed a more amiable person than I thought.
but he did assure me that there will be no shortage of work.

2) phone call with Mom.
since Mom's in Korea,
I've only been in constant communication with Dad.
Mom picked up today,
and we had a good conversation.

2/11

thankful for

1) being set for release.
"thank you, the fix is working"
was a relief.
I can now rotate out of the team feeling good.

2) C++ class structures.
gave homework/project help
with topics that I did not completely understand
when I took the course myself.
being able to explain it now brings a sense of closure
from how confused I was with class structures during my projects.

2/10

thankful for

1) the last revival service.

I have been hit hard with so many things during the past 2 days. 

I really hope that these messages were recorded--

I would love to share it for others to listen. 

2) the praise team party.

pretty much all the meat that we could eat.

good laughs from the members

from jokes,

playing around, 

and conversation. 

also, 

Newport is starting to rise as a very likely location for my next living arrangement.

2/9

back to back revival services today,

one covering for yesterday,

which had been canceled due to the weather. 

both messages today were.. powerful. 

I'm going to try my best not to forget what I have learned today. 

2/8

thankful for

1) getting out of work relatively early.

because of the supposed storm coming,

there were a noticeable amount of people working from home

and even those who came were beginning to leave after lunch.

director of our team came by my desk,

offered me gum,

gave me a jokingly stern look,

and said "why are you still here."

gladly, I finished for the day.

2) watching a movie that was better than what I expected.

browsing through movies to watch--

it appeared that I watched most of the recent movies with good ratings 

that came out in DVD/Bluray. 

one of the only remaining movies with a good rating was a movie called

"Seven Psychopaths." 

sounded like some blow-em-up action movie with no plot,

and wondered how it got such ratings. 

as I watched it, 

the plot was, well, better than I thought.

it took some time to start liking it though--

it was only during the second half of the movie that I started laughing from the dark humor that it built up in the first half.

ps.

3) takoyaki.
always passed by a small japanese corner shop call otafuku
that sold takoyaki amongst other japanese street food.
decided to try their takoyaki on my way back from work.
pretty good stuff. 

2/7

I ask myself from time to time

"am I really thankful for these"

and the normal response is

"yeah, more or less" 

but I'm surely not sarcastic in any of these.

anyways

thankful for

1) being able to fix those bugs. 

my go-to boss was out doing interviews today,

and I thought I'd have an easy day;

but alas, 

an email pops up reporting a bug in one of my enhancements. 

took me all day to fix it--

trying to reproduce the scenario,

finding out the cause,

and figuring out the solution. 

got it done though,

and the feeling of a job well done

makes it easy to forget the 

hours of head scratching. 

2) the reggae subway performer.

on my way home, 

a man puts a chair in the middle of the subway car I was in,

tells people to relax

and starts singing

"every little thing gonna be all right" by Bob Marley.

while playing the bongo. 

he then throws an egg shaker to a commuter, 

who started shaking it,

uneasily at first,

then with some attentiveness once she realized that it contributed to the music.  

did put a smile on my face.

2/6

thankful for

1) the sunlight.
went outside for a short walk during work
to get some fresh air
and realized that I haven't had that much sunlight during winter,
since I only saw it when I went to work
and during the short commute to a lunch venue.
just a couple of minutes under the sun made me feel illuminated.

2) outing with co-workers.
it was one of those days I was wondering
"what should I do after work"
when a co-worker asked if I want to join a couple of people
to hang out after work.
had a good conversation.

3) monitor and speakers.
I'm no stranger with watching movies,
but normally I watch with the lights on,
doing some other things while watching.
today I just felt like watching the movie,
so I watched with sound turned reasonably up
and the lights turned off.
movie was Skyfall,
and I had quite the theater-esque atmosphere going on.
movie was alright,
but it doesn't come close to Casino Royale.

2/5

thankful for

1) Michigan winning a game against Ohio State.
Michigan's basketball team suddenly rose to the top this season,
and today, they beat Ohio State.
it was a close game,
and I was jumping around by myself in my room
with every shot that was made.
Go Blue!

2) funny videos.

good laughs are always good.

2/4

thankful for

1) getting first choice preference for the last rotation.
it's known to be a pretty intense team, though.
thought it would be a good experience before choosing a final team.
who knows, I might end up liking it and make it my final team.  

2) being able to help out.
new audio equipment got delivered to the church,
and I got to help out carrying them into the vision center
along with some other praise team hyungs + team leader.
sat around and talked afterwards.

2/3

thankful for

1) good finish to the retreat.
we returned to Manhattan without problems.
I'll try to describe what I learned with action than words.

2) the superbowl.
watched with some friends.
didn't really care who won until
there came a time when the game was close,
and we somehow decided to have a dinner bet on who wins.
I was then cheering close to the degree of a Michigan game.
won the bet.

2/2

second day of retreat.

message really hit home.

plus the events were enjoyable--

these new kids are really funny.

2/1

thankful for

1) january.
good start of 2013.

2) retreat.
probably won't have much sleep, but it will be a good time.

1/31

thankful for

1) granola bars.
bought a couple of boxes of granola bars last week
and have been eating them for breakfast.
they go very well with the coffee or the occasional soy milk.

2) http://youtu.be/aTLySbGoMX0
apparently it's an unlisted video so I can't embed it here.
the animation technique is pretty innovative,
and the story is pretty cute.

1/30

thankful for

1) morning service at the campus town church.
convinced my church/college hoobae (younger friend)
to go to morning service and give me a ride.
the church used to rent a church building in campus but has now moved further away.
met my college church pastor and ate breakfast with him after service.
his vision for campus missions is burning as fiery as ever.

2) zingerman's.
had charlie's burgers for dinner yesterday,
then zingerman's reuben today.
loving it.

3) the career fair experience.
being in the other side of the booth was a valuable experience.

I didn't expect our booth to have such a long line of applicants.

I used to have trouble explaining what I do,
but after saying it for 5 hours,
it is no problem at all.
plus
I got a better grasp at how recruiters look at resumes at job fairs.

4) taxi.
was really tired after the plane trip back,
but I was able to get back home within 30 minutes after landing with a cab.

5) this whole trip.
I was just about to start thinking that
life was getting too routine.
it was just the outside-the-routine event that I needed.

1/29

thankful for

michigan.

too sleepy to write.

will sleep.

maps

Google Maps used to have North Korea as a empty, grey field,

but they now have a map,

with street names, building outlines, and transportation stations.

it's not as detailed as, say, the South Korean map,

but it's amazing how much information is there

considering that they did not get to drive around the country taking pictures with their StreetView cars.

1/28

thankful for

1) homecoming opportunities.
got a call from human resources during work
asking if I can fly to Michigan tomorrow on a recruiting trip.
once I got approval from the team,
it was a resounding yes.
it's only a day trip,
but still,
thinking about going back to Ann Arbor is exciting.

2) basic lessons from the small things in life.
had to print something,
went to an office center.
use of computer: 25 cents a minute,
black print: 50 cents a page.
I suddenly got the feeling of
"hm, let's make this a race to see how fast I can print this"
mentality.
as soon as the computer session started,
got to the email page in 10 seconds and
the print page by 15.
keyboard shortcut to print,
then clicked OK button after OK button.
I then realized that I had pressed OK to print in color,
when the whole page was black and white.
color print: 1 dollar a page.
reminded me that it's better to be slow and careful than be fast and clumsy.

1/27

thankful for

1) coffee.
man, I'm starting to think I'm getting too reliant on coffee,
but it does its job so well..

2) english service.
church has been holding english services once a month.
even with the pastor's heavy accent,
I'd have to say the Word is the Word.
great message about making choices in life--
with God, we should not fear.

1/26

thankful for

1) feeling fine.
was tired enough to forget how I fell asleep after the all-nighter,
but all was well after waking up.

2) food in the fridge.
anything that would make me stay indoors is welcome for cold days.

1/25

praise team did an all nighter practice since retreat was next week.

just came back home,
and I really need the sleep.

watsi

start-up companies come and go,

but I hope this continues on. 

https://watsi.org/

they're a non-profit start-up that helps individuals in third-world countries get the funding needed for medical procedures that they need.

it's arguable that this is not something new--

putting pictures and information about specific individuals who are in need 

has been used by charity organizations in the past,

and some have criticized it as a scheme to earn donations.

with that said,

what made me feel that this start-up is different

is their approach to transparency--

they are willing and able to show that 100% of the donations do go to its intended purpose.

they currently have a public spreadsheet that shows the hospital/doctor/organization in charge of the individual's treatment

and a proof of transaction of funds once the donation is made. 

having Y Combinator support puts more faith in their system,

and it will be nice to see more people coming up with fresh ways to use technology to help others.

1/24

thankful for 

1) music performances.

watched a quartet play in Carnegie Hall,

not the main hall, but one of the recital halls.

they were Korean musicians

called the Novus Quartet.

it was visible they played with their hearts.

2) dinner with church hyung.

had an impromptu dinner meeting.

talked about programming, pretty much, 

and that's always good. 

draft

I've been writing my thoughts on certain issues that caught my eye

from time to time,

but I end up not posting it.

I even wrote about why I think I do this,

and then I didn't post it.

I should try to refrain myself from doing that.

1/23

thankful for

1) scarf and gloves.
lifesavers on a day like today.
first time this winter I had to wear both at the same time.
cold enough to just want to go straight home after work.

2) that Daft Punk song.
keep getting the order wrong,
"harder stronger better faster"?
--just looked it up,
"harder better faster stronger"
anyways,
suddenly remembered it while working
and it did wonders to pump me up to do some work.

1/22

thankful for

1) a coat to keep warm.
it got really cold today.
I have to admit my coat was not thick enough for the job,
but I'm thankful with what I have.

2) leftovers.
it was too cold to go grocery shopping,
but thankfully there were leftovers from yesterday's feast,
and it was as good as it was yesterday.

1/21

thankful for

1) day of rest.
body clock still knew it was a weekday
so I woke up at 8 am without the clock telling me.
I had to log in remotely to the company computer in the morning
just to make sure today was indeed a holiday.

2) one last college moment.
sitting in front of the TV playing Halo with the guys
before Ed left for the airport.

3) the holiday feast.
praise team people gathered and ate.
the people from the team prepared the food,
and it was delicious.
it was a great time to bond.

walk home

shot taken during freshman year,

on the way back to the dorm during the fall. 

happened to be lying around in my pictures folder,

thought it was nice to put it up.

despite being pretty,

walking down that long stretch of road wasn't fun.

1/20

thankful for

1) alertness during sermon.
my mind was more clear than usual during sermon.
things I have been hearing so far have been telling me to
meditate on the Bible more.
and I really should.

2) more time with friends.
Ed and Humphrey leaves tomorrow,
so we gathered once again.
the main topic seemed to be
about missing the college days.

1/19

thankful for

1) fast execution of plans.
was hoping to drop of my shirts to the cleaners before practice,
but I didn't wake up as early as I hoped.
still managed to wash, make myself breakfast/lunch+coffee, and drop off the shirts.
did have to eat in the counter.

2) words of experience from the hyungs.
ate late dinner after practice,
and the hyungs I ate with talked about
things they realize in life,
mostly in terms of faith
and relationship with God.
picked up a thing or two to strive for.

1/18

thankful for

1) breakfast with the 전도사님.

never ate with him before. 

there were other people,

and I had to leave early for work,

but still, felt like finally having done

something that was long due. 

2) future planning with friends.

just one of the conversations we had while hanging out. 

we did talk about this sometimes during college, 

and it was brought up again.

"dude, we should all live in the same neighborhood when we have kids" 

"and we should have kids in the same year" 

I wonder where everyone will end up when they're settled.

1/17

thankful for

1) relatively healthy teeth.
this is considering that I had been avoiding the dentist
for a long time.
had a checkup/cleaning,
and it seems I do have one cavity,
but nothing too serious.
the dentist in charge was good at what he does.
not in procedural skills,
as all dentists should be good in that part,
but in dealing with patients.
his manner of talking
made me comfortable--
if he had told me that I had cancer and only four months to live,
I would have taken it well and said "ah, I'll do what I can with four months"

2) visiting friends.
Ed's in town for the long weekend,
and the Michigan guys gathered once again.
second-hand smoking and all.
doesn't change.
Humphrey's coming tomorrow.
along with church, it's going to be a packed weekend.

1/16

thankful for

1) Dad.
as far as I can remember,
he always had something to teach me/talk to me about during dinner.
whether it was about the history of Korea,
how some device/object was made/invented/came to be,
current/past social issues,
math..
he quenched my curiosities
and fostered my interest in learning.
not to mention how much he loves me.
happy birthday Dad,
I have a sure feeling that you gave up a lot for me,
but I got your back now.

2) motivation.
md of the team told me I've been good with communicating
during my rotation in the team.
let's keep it up.

1/15

thankful for

1) a big brother.
we fought a lot when we're young,
but I realize that if you weren't there,
I would have bothered my friends the same way.
then who knows,
I might not have had friends.

it was your decision to go to Korea
that I was able to come here
and be where I am right now.
back then,
I was naively thinking that
mom and dad can send both of us abroad
and wondered why you chose to go back.

happy birthday 형,
and congrats with graduation and the awesome job!

2) having done college club activities.
watched "Pitch Perfect",
a movie about collegiate a cappella.
taking out the corny "aca-" suffixed words they used
(and of course, everything was exaggerated to an extent),
a lot of the things they did were similar enough to what I went through
during my time with the GMen.
ICCAs were definitely not that super-hyped up when I was there though.
reminisced while watching.

1/14

thankful for

1) reaching my daily work goal.
told myself I'm going to finish a certain task,
but got quite stuck sometime in the beginning.
the actual heavy-lifting was done,
and the remaining work was just a front-end visual change,
but the specific design request given was
not normal.
it was like going through a maze,
and as I ventured deeper and deeper into a solution,
I was starting to worry it might reach a dead end.
(I was extending objects
and overriding methods from swing libraries to try to find a solution)
consulted with my manager towards the end of the day
and together reached a simpler solution.
did get out of work late,
but the goal was reached,
therefore satisfied.

2) "Argo"
movies are starting to take the place of food thankfuls.
a movie about the Iran hostage crisis in 1980,
the plot is about the US government's plan to repatriate
6 US embassy workers who were able to
avoid capture during the Iranian revolution.
the "best bad plan" was to disguise the people
as a film location search crew.
it wasn't too much action,
but the suspense was very well-executed.
towards the end I was on my toes
saying "comeoncomeoncomeon"

1/13

thankful for

1) full recovery.

woke up, 

and it was like a new body. 

6 years of living away from home

really made the body make quick recoveries.

2) having something laugh about.

watched "무한도전" since I heard it was about 

them performing in Times Square with Psy for New Years.

I couldn't stop laughing when they were talking with MC Hammer.

유재석 calling MC Hammer his "cousin" ("you're my cousin")

and 노홍철 calling himself MC Hammer's "dog" ("I'm your dog") 

can interpret to something different than the literal meaning,

also, 

when MC Hammer called 유재석 "the yellow guy",

of course it was in context of his music video outfit,

but yeah, by itself it can mean other things.

I don't know if these were intended, 

but I was laughing hard. 

3) having time for a nap.

came back home early enough to consider taking a nap.

I don't think I had that option for a while. 

1/12

thankful for

1) that "gotta do this" mentality.
woke up feeling weak.
not that muscle-aching feeling,
but more towards the bone.
I have admit,
heading out to practice was miserable.
but I signed up for this.

2) feeling your body feeling better.
maybe it was the dinner forced down myself,
or that pathetic attempt at lying down on folding chairs,
or maybe somebody prayed.
by the end of practice,
I was actually feeling much better.

3) "The Dark Knight"
the second of the trilogy.
I watched it while reading the script,
and goodness,
missed so many things when I watched it when it came out.
a brilliant movie.
the Joker's view on anarchy is frightening
yet reminded me that it is more than possible
that people with such minds exist.

I'm sorry I didn't stop by to tell you

http://www.michigandaily.com/news/engineering-lecturer-dies-53-cancer

my first engineering professor.

for a whole semester,

his lectures were filled with case studies,

class activities, and projects

that honestly,

didn't seem to add up at that time.

"just random general engineering stuff" was my interpretation of the class--

I mean, the class was called "introduction to engineering."

and the activities were ridiculously hard to do--

I don't think we were able to successfully finish any of them.

it was only until the last lecture that he explained it to us.

the theme of this class was

that failure happens.

we learned about it in the case studies,

and we felt it first-hand during our projects.

failures in our field can not only be costly,

but can endanger the lives of many.

he made us understand that from the start

and prepared us to face it when it comes.


despite having a class size in the hundreds,

he knew all our names.


when I couldn't go home for Thanksgiving

and had nowhere to eat because all the restaurants and cafeterias were closed,

he invited me and others in the same situation to his home

for his family's Thanksgiving dinner.


when I became a peer mentor for that same class,

he instilled in us his passion to teach.


I was meaning to stop by your office to thank you before I left school for graduation,

but for some reason I thought that I should wait until I accomplished something outside of school,

tell you how I applied the things we learned in real life.

then I did visit school once,

but then I was slightly embarrassed that I was not working in a true engineering career.

I thought I'd have time.


when you quoted "scientists discover the world that exists; engineers create the world that never was,"

you assured me that engineering is the path I should take.

you made me realize that engineering is not just a skill to learn

but a discipline--a way of life.

thank you.

1/10

thankful for

1) health.
as this article will show,
currently there is an unusually big outbreak of the flu.
realizing this made me start worrying for a second,
thoughts of germ-a-phobia making a brief entrance,
but thought the right mindset would be to be thankful that I'm well.

2) interesting outcomes in technology.
Watson is the name of an artificial intelligence created by IBM
that was able to beat humans in Jeopardy.
when I read an article about how Watson,
after learning the urban dictionary (dictionary of slangs),
started swearing casually,
the thought of it made me laugh and be amazed at the same time.

3) the feeling that I'm not bound to work.
today was one of those days
where, around the time to leave work,
I was thinking,
"no one's going to stop me from leaving,
but I'll just work a little more, just because"

1/9

thankful for

1) knowing my work.
it feels good when your manager responds
"ah, I get what you're doing now--cool."
after I was able to explain to him my fix to a problem.

2) cooking.
cooked something new,
aglio e olio.
still having trouble pronouncing it.
I've never tried it before,
but it must taste like whatever I made,
because it was good.
was pretty proud of myself.

3) feeling something after watching a movie.
wasn't going to watch a movie,
but I was looking through some files
and found a couple of movies that were given to me
to watch during the flight back to New York.
ended up not watching any,
so thought I'd watch one anyway.

Between Calm and Passion
seems to be the working English title.
I've heard about the plot,
which significantly helped me understand
what was happening in the earlier parts of the movie.
I honestly began watching not expecting much
(read: really wasn't in the mood for watching a movie)
but as I reached the end,
I felt something.
my head keeps calling it "a sad relief"--
a slap and then a hug right after.

1/8

thankful for

1) good year-end review.
had the one-on-one talk with the manager before he left,
but today I got the formal report.
let's keep doing my best.

2) friendly barbers.
went to the barber shop I went to last time.
I think I said they might be Jewish,
but now I'm pretty sure they're not.
they speak Russian,
and I noticed today that they have a table with
bottles of vodka in one corner of the shop.
nice.
shop is call "on the mark",
Mark being one of the barbers,
and I never had him to cut my hair until today.
although he never cut my hair,
he remembered me,
"like last time?"
kept mentioning how I have a dense layer of hair,
joking around
and making body motions implying that his arms are falling off.
good atmosphere in that sense.

3) that wine I got yesterday.
it's actually tasting better now,
I guess I'm used to it.

1/7

thankful for

1) delivery of package I forgot about.
it's like getting a present,
only it was me who ordered it and forgot.
Michigan zipper hoodie, yay!

2) small talks.
people came by my office towards the end of the day
and started talking to me,
first a team member from my previous rotation
then my Michigan buddy.
former team member talked about the Caribbeans,
having gone there last week.
St. Martin--
for some reason I want to go there.

3) wine.
haven't bought/drank wine
since November.
manager suggested trying a
particular wine before leaving,
so I decided to see if the shop had it.
I did find it,
but different year.
a bordeaux,
drier than the ones I've normally had tried.
let's see if I get used to it.

1/6

thankful for

1) singing praise.
kept my guitar in a hyung's car after saturday practice,
but he wasn't able to come to church in time due to circumstances.
I kept my place and sang.
guitar/bass/keyboard are all positioned outside of stage,
so no one would notice.
it was great to sing praise
without worrying about which note to hit.

2) a great friend.
he's going on vacation for a couple of months.
we've been such close friends that people are asking me
what I'm going to do without him.
I guess it'll be a time to understand how great a friend he is.
the vacuum will be felt.

3) participating in the Christmas service.
the participants of the play had a (late) after-party.
they ate (I joined after that),
and we spent time talking
and watching a recording of our play.
we also bade farewell to the hyung
who directed the play,
since he will be leaving for Korea in a few days.
he shared his prayer requests,
and we sent him off with a group prayer.

1/5

thankful for

1) free contact lens solutions.
picked up my contact lens prescription,
and they gave me a bag full of contact lens solution.
and it was the brand I use.
yay.

2) not feeling rushed to go to a place.
left home early to go to practice,
sunny day,
no need to think about getting there late.
that feeling of
"should I grab a cup of coffee before going in?"

3) a great leader.
the praise team leader talks to us after practice,
and his honest talks to us
are like the words of a father.

1/4

thankful for

1) french cuisine.
team went to a french restaurant during lunch
for my manager's long absence to san francisco.
the place we went to had just a prix fixe menu,
and it was an interesting experience.
most notable was the appetizer,
which were baskets of fruits and vegetables
and a racks of sausages that the whole table shared
along with bread, mustard, and pate.

2) nespresso.
the kitchens in some of the floors of the office
have a nespresso machine.
we do have to bring our own pods,
and some people on the team do.
the coffee from the machine is pretty good.
much better than the normal k-cup coffee.

3) a pint with the manager.
manager was late to get off work,
but I waited around to wish him a good time in san francisco,
being that this will be the last time I will physically see him while in this rotation.
once he was done,
went to a bar and drank a pint of beer while talking.
life, faith, sports, and work.
gave me some career advice while at it.

1/3

thankful for

1) Korean co-worker at work.
there were three Korean hyungs who came into the company with me when I joined,
and I meet one of them for lunch every now and then.
today was one of the days,
and he is taking all of his vacation days off for this year starting today
to get married.
really happy for him.

2) conversation.
while we did engage in small talk every now and then,
the VP who works beside me and I had never really spoke in a long conversation
despite having sat next to each other for the last 5 months.
I guess that fascinated him,
as he mentioned that and began talking to me.
talked about random things,
but it was a good conversation.

3) places to pray in the middle of the city.
stopped by St. Patrick's Cathedral after work.
as I always say,
not because the location is important,
but it really is a quiet and calm place in the middle of all the cars, pedestrians, and lights.

1/2

thankful for

1) work.
all the rest meant no random bouts of sleepiness,
which meant good concentration.
considering it was the first day of work,
I got some work done.

2) a good manager.
it's feels good when you can be comfortable with your manager,
joking around and all.
but this is the last week I get to be in the same office with him,
as he is going to be in SF until the end of my rotation.
a lot of phone conferences ahead.

3) "Lincoln".
a movie about passing an amendment.
just words.
lobbyists talking congressmen of opposing parties into voting in favor of it,
scenes of debating in the house of representatives.
no action and only little glimpses of the civil war.
but don't get me wrong--
it was really fun to watch.
I would watch c-span if the congressmen today
trash-talked and burned each other like they did in the movie.
and it really substantiated what Lincoln must have gone through
to abolish slavery.
although it is just a movie with the events recreated with assumptions,
it does remind the audience that
abolishing slavery was not a breeze for Lincoln.
finally,
the depiction of his calmness in every situation
was admirable.

work

"welcome back to the rat race"

says a co-worker.

but I think it's better than that.

aja aja.

1/1

thankful for

1) one more Michigan game.
bowl game versus South Carolina.
unfortunately, we lost,
but it was close enough to say
"I guess it's alright,
and the next season looks promising"

2) vacation.
it was a great week of no work.
had a very enjoyable time.
now back to work and normalcy tomorrow.

3) a new year.
feels no different physically from 2012,
but mentally,
it does feel like I'm at least getting a new set of papers to draw on.

2013

to be calm in everything.

12/31

last day of 2012.

thankful for

1) lunch and talk with friends.

talked about how 2012 was for them 

and how 2013 will be.

semi-serious,

and I will pray for them,

2) 24-hour PATH trains.

the trains to New Jersey had been stopping at 10PM for a while 

due to Sandy,

but it restored regular service for the New Year.

it felt good to take the train back home.

3) warm room.

entering your room after a long exposure to the cold outside

just feels like heaven.