To Sacrifice

With the global economy struggling right now, pretty much everyone's being affected in one way or another, and our company is no different.  Earlier in the week, we had an announcement of a small re-org and unfortunately, a few people had to be "rationalized", "streamlined", "rightsized", "surplussed", "offboarded", or whatever other stupid euphemism you've heard recently..

Regrettably, one person from our creative team had to go.  So obviously the mood in our department wasn't great.  But amidst the bad news, silence, awkward moments, disappointment, and sadness, something pretty amazing happened that showed us the true meaning of friendship and sacrifice.

My boy C.L., who is on that person's team, stepped up and offered to be let go himself so that his best friend could stay.  We were all shocked, but in a way, not surprised, because that's just the type of guy C.L. is.  He just felt that when he compared their two personal situations, he thought he might have a slightly easier time transitioning, so after a few discussions and meetings, they decided and were allowed to make the switch.  Yesterday was C.L.'s last day, and sad as it was, it was also inspiring and uplifting to see the rarity of someone doing something purely for the well-being of someone else out of love, respect, and friendship.

C.L., you're the man.

I'm not too worried about him though, cuz he's got talent.  But if anybody's looking for a good industrial designer, hit me up and I'll put you in touch.

How Do You Spell PAIN?

R-O-O-T  C-A-N-A-L.

For some reason, one of my back teeth had been hurting all weekend, and by Monday morning, it was pretty much unbearable to the point where I just wanted to take a pair of pliers and yank the thing out.  So I went to the dentist to have it checked.  And long story short, I needed to have a root canal.  I was pretty bummed, because up until then, my teeth had been in pretty good shape.  But as the saying goes, every cloud has a silver lining (or in this case, a gold one).  Because then I realized that I was gonna be able to get a gangsta looking gold tooth!  I'm actually getting a little psyched about the whole idea, and am almost a little disappointed that it's one of my back teeth, cuz no one's gonna be able to see it!

Bust A Move

While in Beijing, we did a few days' snowboarding at Wanlong Resort. It's actually a good 250km away and takes about 3-4hrs to get there. The boarding was good, and the nightlife was...memorable!

There wasn't actually a village at the mountain, so we stayed a few kilometers away at the nearest town. Next to our hotel, there was a "club". It looked more than a little suspect, but we had no other options after dinner, so we decided to check it out. We had no idea what to expect - but looking at the characters hanging around outside, I only hoped we wouldn't get jumped in there.

However, as I stepped inside, to my surprise, we'd in fact walked into a roller skating rink! Complete with disco lights and music. There were people of all ages there, from little kids to grandparents. I have to admit, I was somewhat relieved that we hadn't walked into a drug den or something. But then we saw another staircase that led down..

We hesitantly descended the stairs and here we finally ended up in the "disco". We all just stood there for a sec, not quite sure what to make of it. It's hard to describe what it was like. It looked like the inside of one of those haunted house rides at the carnival. They blasted really bad techno music. And it was freezing cold in there, so most people were dancing their sexy dance with their winter jackets on. Here's a photo of the dance floor..

Of course it wasn't really our thing, and we laughed and made fun of a few people. But you know what, they were probably thinking the same thing about us. It makes you wonder how they can be so cut off from what is the norm of cool, in terms of music, dance, etc. Yet you see these guys busting a move to any beat, getting crunk on dollar beers. They're just having fun in their own way. They aren't worried about what's considered cool. They're not jaded in that respect. In some ways, I wish I was more like them..

Fix Your Fade?

Old skool barber shop I found as we were walking around one night in Beijing.