Monthly Archives: March 2008

Thursday evening – drinks

Another busy day… the theme for the day was ‘weird liquids’. It began with  breakfast.. with three colorful mystery juices.. all good.. all unidentifiable. 

We then bussed our way to the  IBM site for the day… Here’s Curry dutifully displaying his badge . this is NOT a place to flaunt the rules.

We spent the morning learning more about the emerging business geography of Asian.. that includes Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, the Philippines,Thailand, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar,  . IBM has rapidly growing businesses in the first 6 of those. We met with the IBM technical leaders of those countries today in a combined in person/phone conference It was really fascinating to learn more about the technology and business capabilities of these places. The growth is phenomenal in almost all of them.. the skills are amazing too. there are so many bright technical minds over here.

I personally spent part of the morning exploring a small drink stand next store. I bough one of each weird drink think I could find including:

Jasmine tea (normal)

Coconut juice (yummy)

Sugar cane juice (pretty good)

Aloe juice (really good)

Water chestnut juice (what were they thinking ?!)

Chrysathumumumum Tea (uhhhhhhh just a little strange)

I opened them all and passed them around.. but in the end, I managed to drink most of all 6 of them…

Then we had lunch.. they served us another cool green drink for desert.. this had little green worm like things in it . It was awesome.

Here’s the group we met with today. They were really wonderful hosts.. and very talented technical people.

We spent the rest of the afternoon in round table discussions with the technical leadership.  We were trying o brainstorm on ways that the worldwide IBM technical community could serve them better. It was very good getting their perspective on the company and our technology.  love meeting new communities like this. 

This guy’s name is Chai.. I proud to say that I managed not to say ” I have a dog with the same name as you” , which I think is the right thing to do in this culture.

At around 5:30 the meetings were over. A group of us piled in a cab and headed downtown. I had arraigned to have dinner with my friend Lucy.. and a couple of the gang came with me.   As we drove to the restaurant we crossed the ERP zone.. this is a special system that taxes cars on busy roads during rush hour. It’s designed to cut down on congestion.. and it really works… it was designed by IBM… which I think I’m proud of (though I don’t think I’d like to have this system in Richmond)

Lucy had chosen the restaurant..it specialized in real Singaporean food.

The meal was really good. lots of shredded papaya and chili sauce.. .. Here’s a picture of us.. that’s Lucy to my right .. Diane. Gabe and I came and stayed with Lucy and her Husband Lip when we came through Singapore last October. They were wonderful hosts… Lip is in California now visiting their daughter.   It was great seeing Lucy again.. it was a nice dinner.. good conversation.. we talked about religion. meditation. and vegetarians.

For desert, I just had to order durian just for Gabe.. He thinks it’s disgusting just because it smells like a garbage truck. I happen to love it because it smells like a garbage truck. You think I’m joking ? The bus this morning had a sign in it that said ‘no smoking’ and ‘no eating durian fruit’ . This was durian puree over sweet potatoes.. it was pretty strange and good..

Curry tried some on a dare…

Lucy had to be somewhere by 8 so the rest of us grabbed a taxi and went back to the hotel.   I fell asleep in the cab again..   I’m going to try and get a good night’s sleep tonight. I fly back tomorrow at noon.. another 19 hour non-stop flight. I’m actually looking forward to the quiet time again. I’m glad that I’m heading home. I  really miss Diane Gabe, Chai and … Satori (the puppy’s name at this point…. )

OK.. all for now. More tomorrow. g’nite my friends, g’nite Sam.
-me

Wednesday evening – magnetic

It’s about 10:30 at night on a warm and drizzly night here. I’m just back from a very big dinner.. I’m mega jetlagged.. but I don’t want to fall asleep until I’ve had a chance to digest a little. That’s what blogging’s for !

I’ve got surprisingly little to report today.. it was another productive ll day meeting with my friends. I only stepped outside once before dinner. The food in the hotel is really excellent.. lots of choices . This morning, for example, they had four colors of juice. I was drawn to the green one… I poured myself a big glass

… then started thinking.. the last time I poured myself a big glass of something green .  and we remember how that went

( queue the movie flashback music)

It was  October 21st of last year  and Gabe. Diane and I were in Kovalum India. It was the last day of our vacation. I poured myself a big glass of green juice  from that breakfast buffet.

I took a big gulp and started gagging.. Then offered some to Gabe .. Here’s his reaction:


(que the ‘back from movie flashback’ music)

Well.. no need to worry this time.. this tasted like fuzzy strawberry juice.. maybe it was kiwi or something..

The morning meetings went fine.. then it was time for lunch.. They had this great sashimi bar again.. Yum !

After lunch I had a good meeting with my friends Steve and Bill. Steve’s wife Helen died  about a year and a half ago. Bills wife Linda died last July. We’ve formed a small traveling support group around our shared experience of loss. Today we got together to talk about writing a short personal account of our experiences at work that IBM could give to people who have experienced loss, their management and their peers. Our hope is that sharing our experiences of what grieving on the job has been like for us might help other folks  understand  how they can best help their employees and peers. Believe it or not, there isn’t much material to help people in the workplace understand what to expect with this kind of loss.. Maybe it will help someone.. maybe not. In any case, it will be healing to work with Steve and Bill .

The afternoon’s meeting was interesting and lively. I went upstairs to drop my stuff off  before dinner. I stuck my key in the door.. no green light.. it was read.. I tried again.. red light..

.. then it dawned on me.. My key had been in my shirt pocket right behind the Sam button I always have… And.. what’s on the back of my Sam pin ? A magnet !. I had completely zapped my key… I started laughing.   I had to schlep downstairs and get my key reprogrammed..

Funny trick, Sam…

A few minutes later,some of our local IBM colleagues came by and picked us up for dinner. It was nice driving around during daylight. It’s an amazingly topical place here.. I learned that we’re just 17 miles north of the equator. (or 70.. I wasn’t sure which)

Our destination was a Chinese seafood restaurant overlooking the ocean.

The food was delicios and plentiful.. They started us out on jellyfish

Eventually this guy showed up…

and some chili crab (a regional delicacy)

.. and prawny things..

.. and green stuff with abalone  ( i was about to sprout gills at this point)

then we ended up with seaweed based sweet agar

and finally shaved ice with coconut milk and tapioca..

I had eaten sort of sparingly but I was still so full I could hardly move.. Dinner was great as was the conversation. Here I am with one of our hosts.

and the other folks at out table. (Ragu’s leg, Curry, Lori, Chris, Fukinaga-san, Charlie…)

Here’s one of the other tables from our group viewed from outside.

As we walked back to the car we looked over and saw people water skiing.. but we saw and heard no boats.. as we got closer we discovered that this was a skiing contraption that used a system of cables and pulleys to pull skiers around this large lagoon. It was pretty cool !!  We didn’t have a chance to try it tonight..It looks like fun though.
 

OK.. that’s it for now.. My jet lag is taking over. More tomorrow. Talk to you all tomorrow. G’nite Sam
-me

Tuesday evening – March forth !

Hello from Singapore again. Today is March Forth !.. the only date in the year that’s also a sentence !

It’s about 12:30 at night and I still haven’t slept. I got to the hotel this morning with just 30 minutes to shower before my all day meeting. We just came back from dinner. I’m so sleepy that my eyes are crossing.. but I still fell like saying ‘hi’.

Here are a few pictures from last night . It was great seeing land after 19 hours in the air.. the place just comes out of no where.

The immagration cards say alot about the Singapore culture. How’s this for a welcome ?

This is a very clean, civilized and cosmopolitan place. It’s often very hard to remember that this is 10,000 miles from home. So many things are similar !

But not everything.. for example fermented tofu for breakfast…

Or these unlucky ducks (I didn’t eat any of them !)

Or a noodle sandwich with the worlds tastiest hot sauces…

Here’s my group meeting.. We had a really good and productive meeting from 8:30 till about 5:00.. at which point all of our eyes started rolling back in our heads from jet lag.. so we quit working.

It was too early to sleep so we grabbed a can and went downtown (about 30 minutes) ..  to the bar on top of the 70 story Swissotel.. There were soem awesome views of the city !

And some really funky thinks to drink.. like these ‘mer-lion’ cocktails (not for me !) . hthe Mer-lion is the mascot of the city.

The view was so nice that I stuck a SamStone up there to guard the city..

We then walked around looking for a place to have dinner.. we encountered some very weird art. !

And hundreds of very orderly bicycle taxis

And some very un-oriental architecture…

We finally found a good Cantonese place.. As always it’s fun to read the translations on the menu.

We asked the restaurant to order for us.. they did a great job selecting dishes for 6 carnivores and the 3of us veggies. Nothing too mysterious.. but all very tasty.

From there we walked to the famous (for what ? ) Raffles Hotel and it’s ‘Long Bar’.. the hoe of the famous ‘Singapore Sling’.. We each ordered one in keeping with tradition. It tasted like Hawaiian Punch.. yech.. I’m just not a mixed drink kinda guy..   I stil lhave my marischino cherry.. anyone want it ?

Now I’m back at the hotel and exhausted..   The room is nice.. it even has a windo in the shower.. pretty strange !

I sat down to blog and got draged into some work stuff… then had a good short call with Diane and Gabe.  It was so good to hear their voices.  Free calling over the internet makes it a whole lot less lonely being over here without them… Max just called me too.. He was looking for an easy way to make lots of sparks for a movie project. I love brainstorming about stuff like that with my kids..

Right now, though, I need to make some ZZzzzzz’s.. goodnight to all of you on the other side of the planet. G’nite Sam.. I feel you here !
-me

Tueday morning – howdy from Singapore !

Just got to the hotel.. just enough time to showerand get to my meeting. More later !

-me

Greetings from somewhere over Pakistan.. We’re about 14 hours into our 19 hour trip and so far so good . Last night. I’d had a 7 hour layover at Newark and it passed quickly. I hung out mostly on the walkway behind the elevators to the train.. As I said last night, it’s clean, quiet and totally isolated. The only other person I saw up there last night was Jack  who works on that floor. We talked for awhile. Nice guy.. thinking abut going into website design.

 

The plane boarded right on time at 11PM  I managed to stay awake just long enough to eat…   A good Indian meal, Dahl, a Paneer dish, fresh pratha, raita and chutney.. Yum !

 

Every meal so far on the plane has had some sort of ball things to eat.. Las nights were so sweet they made your teeth hurt

 

And even some of Vermont‘s Finest to remind me of home. (We saw it here last time too) 


I also managed to wear about 10 percent of my dinner… I’m quite fragrant now

 


 
I fell asleep right after dinner  and slept until we were over England. Singapore air coach seats are almost as nice as most other carriers business class.. and I have a free seat next to me. So I’m pretty comfortable. ..  There’s a huge number of videos and music you can watch / hear.. but I’ve basically been reading and listening to my own music.

 

 I’ve loved the thinking time on the plane. I’ve loved staring at the seatback

 

 I also finished listening to the Echkardt Toole book called ‘The New Earth’.  I found it very powerful. The central thesis of the book is that all of mankind.. actually all of the cosmos is awakening to it’s own consciousness  as part of its own evolution. We are part of that consciousness   so we’re doing it as well.. in fact, we’re the instruments of it.   He does a really good job of describing that awakening.. it happens gradually… it happens when you start to realize that the voice in your head.. the ego  that drives all your wishes and expectations for the future and your regrets from your past  is not really who you are.. It’s the consciousness below the ego that is you.. Further you can awaken that consciousness to realize that separation.. ie. You are not that voice in your head. That ego is a construction that lives on fictions created to give itself definition. It feeds on expectations of ourselves that we pick up from other society.  It drives wanting, greed,  regretting, pride and always  leads to some sort of suffering.   Once you really get that, you can begin to free yourself form living only for future gain/happiness, health etc.. or from living life by reliving  either good  or painful memories .. When you detach from both the past and the future.. you stay here. In the now.. Right where I am when I write this.. and you are when you read this. Tolle describes this whole transformation through examples from many religious and philosophical traditions  through intense lifelong meditation. .. All major religions recognize the wisdom someone gets from separating from the ego.. He describes how people come to that moment of awakening.. Some slowly after years of disciplined training of the mind.. some suddenly after a great revelation.. or a great personal tragedy.  On that point everything Tolle says resonates so much to me. Sam’s death has fundamentally altered the way that we look at the world. The detachment we have from the past and the future really keeps pushing us back to that awakened moment  in the now.  It’s the only way we can live.. And.. that’s  a very, very cool thing.

 

Anyway.. If the last paragraph sounds like new age gobbledygook  to you.. I suggest that you might not like the book.  If instead you sort of get what I’m trying to say.. I suggest you get the book and read it soon.

 

Ah.. where was  I ?   Oh yeah on a plane over Pakistan. Since finishing the book, I’ve dozed on and off several times  ..

 

and started at the seat back

 

and stared at the air vents

 

Which then started staring back at me !

 

I watched the flight map as the plane took us over Vienna where I used to live

 

Then on towards Iraq and Iran

 

Note Sam in the corner

 

And Afghanistan

 

You  look down and would never know of the strife and suffering that’s going on down there now. There by the grace of 3 miles go I. It is an interesting perspective to note that from this short distance above them. Whatever they/we are fighting about doesn’t come though.. It doesn’t mean much up here.. How can our perspective on ideas be so warped that we’d be willing to kill or die for them like this ? 

You see.. you can get pretty philosophical when you don’t move or talk for 19 hours.

Did  I mention  my great seat back ?
..

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OK… time for me to try some more sleep.. More from Singapore this evening.   G’nite (or day ?) all.. Good day Sam.

-me

 

p.s.  Gabe.. guess what it’s going to be the Durian festival when I’m there. Want me to bring some of it back fro you / everyone ask Gabe just how much he lovvvvves durian fruit . (Hint.. it looks like a cactus, has the consistency of custard and tastes like sewage… Really good sewage, though.