“Life should be epic and adventurous. Why wait?” — from my 15 Personal Lessons in June post
Outdoor clubbing at the Pacific Coast Highway
The quote above pretty much sums up 2009 for me. If I had to string all the highlights into one storyline, it would be about demonstrating how enjoyable life can be if you proactively pursue such a lifestyle. Here goes the highlights:
Trip to Japan, China, Vietnam, and Cambodia: epic adventures all over Asia with Anthony. My best memory would be catching a sunset atop a temple in Siem Reap, and then taking the tuk tuk back into down for a relaxed dinner. The capsule hotel in Tokyo, partying with John in Wudaokou, and the sunset in Ha Long Bay were also memorable. Shout outs to everyone I met or met up with during the trip: Yang in Japan; Sandy, John, Michelle, Jasmine,Tiffani, Wendy, Gary, Lesley, and Julian in China/HK; Mike and Kenny and all his friends in Vietnam; and Quincy, Chris, and Chhorpoan in Cambodia.
Great times getting to see everyone during my East Coast trip: Annie, Dagny, VanLin, Quincy, Patrick, and Caitlin in Boston; James, Aaron, Ryan, Sarah, Jessica, Swetha, Jeff, Brian, Karla, and Gaby in NYC; Jessica, JoAnna, Varun, Helen, and Geetha in Philly; Hayes, Amy, Jeniffer, Diem, Jay, Caroline, Jude, Cheng, and Sandy in DC. I thoroughly enjoyed catching up with all of you. Also big thanks go to my hosts in each city!
Bay Area super fun emporium adventures with Rebecca/Howard/Cliffton etc.: Hearst Castle, white water rafting, SF Restaurant Week, berry picking, Cherry Blossom Festival, movie nights, happy hours, birthdays, bowling, etc. I couldn’t have done so much on the weekends without this group.
UNA-USA MUN 2009: Always wonderful to be back in NYC to see everyone and to staff the conference, and Parsa’s awesome for coordinating a tour of the NY Times headquarters and a Rick Neuheisel event.
Sproul reunions, specifically David and Julie coming up to visit me in SF (it was like I went on the trip myself!) and also KJ’s return to LA!
Trip to Austin: Andrew knows how to show off a city, Bilal is very a gracious host, and it was great to see Sofia, Casey, and Zaid again.
Other random Bay Area get-togethers, especially: EAP reunions, having high school friends in the area to hang out with, enlightening convos with Frank, and re-living college life when Irene was at Stanford (late-night rounds of Settlers, anyone?!)
All the LDP-related events, particularly the Finance Conference in Atlanta (which included a nice SMP reunion) and the Diversified Business trips to Dallas. I would also include the National ERG Conference in Dallas as a highlight along the same lines.
Volunteering at Junior Achievement and Special Olympics: the most touching moment was from Junior Achievement when a 2nd-grade girl walked up to me at the end of the day to give me a hug and then the rest of the class rushed up to give me a group hug.
Trip to LA during Spring Sing weekend: Millie is a fabulous host, and the late night BCD tofu run after Spring Sing followed by the late night drive on Wilshire with Angie/Tiffani/Jasmine evoked memories of chill times from senior year. This was possibly my best trip to LA since graduation.
Advertising Solutions: being proud of accomplishments that my sales reps made, filming a hilarious parody of “24″ for a sales rally, getting to teach about social media, and hearing appreciative comments from the sales reps at my going-away lunch.
Other highlights include:
• Celebrating the holidays with friends: thanks to VanLin for inviting me to join her family for Lunar New Year and Vikram for inviting me to join his family for Thanksgiving.
• Sharing my experience on a tough decision that my UCLA mentee had to make that I also once had to make as a freshman in college.
• Realizing I am quite content with where I am at after seeing friends living different professional and grad school lives that I had wondered about.
• Organizing an Asian Pacific American Heritage Month mixer with my CAAEN project group.
• Running a successful Contra Costa County MUN Conference.
• Going to SF Giants, Oakland A’s, and Golden State Warriors games.
• Getting an iPhone!
• Throwing an enjoyable holiday party in LA.
• And of course, being able to share my experiences by starting my monthly 15 Personal Lessons posts!
Pretty epic and adventurous indeed. Thanks for helping make it wonderful!
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Travel recap: LA x6, Dallas x3, NYC x2, Boston, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Atlanta, Austin, Sacramento, Hearst Castle, Tokyo, Kyoto, Osaka, Nara, Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Hanoi, Ha Long Bay, Ho Chi Minh City, and Siem Reap.
