To be a shokunin

It's been a while since I've posted on this blog, but I'm hoping to be a bit more regular with it (I'm sure much to the delight of a certain someone in New Mexico...) Anyways, I want to talk about a documentary I saw about a week ago that has made a huge impression on me.

It's called Jiro Dreams of Sushi and chronicles Jiro Ono, who must now be an 87 year old sushi master. He is the owner of Sukiyabashi Jiro and he was the first sushi chef to receive three Michelin stars. Jiro has been making sushi for over 75 years.

Yes, the movie is about incredible sushi... probably the best in the world. It also includes incredible detail about how much attention is given to every single aspect of the meal. This includes things like the order in which he presents his 18 or so pieces of sushi, the roasting of the seaweed, and the rice.

Oh the rice... which honestly is my personal kryptonite and why I could never completely cut out carbs (come on, I'm asian). The rice used here is bought from a vendor who notes that he will only sell to Jiro because only he knows how to properly cook it. I've long known that the best sushi restaurants often spend just as much attention, if not more, on the rice than the fish. But the expertise, mastery, and dedication to only the best quality rice that this rice vendor exhibits is inspiring.

Likewise the documentary will introduce you to a shrimp vendor and a tuna buyer, men who have also devoted their entire lives to mastering their craft. The tuna buyer's expertise is to an extent where he can take a small sliver of tuna, mash it between his thumb and index finger, and then use the look and feel on his fingers to determine the quality and taste of the tuna. Honestly it's mind boggling.

 They use a term in the documentary called shokunin. The best translation of shokunin would be:

"The Japanese word shokunin is defined by both Japanese and Japanese-English dictionaries as ‘craftsman’ or ‘artisan,’ but such a literal description does not fully express the deeper meaning. The Japanese apprentice is taught that shokunin means not only having technical skills, but also implies an attitude and social consciousness. The shokunin has a social obligation to work his/her best for the general welfare of the people. This obligation is both spiritual and material, in that no matter what it is, the shokunin’s responsibility is to fulfill the requirement.”

Here's a clip where you may get a sense for Jiro's dedication to his craft:



This documentary made me think about a lot of things. It made me jealous that these people have found something that they are so incredibly passionate about, to the point where they strive every day to be better than the last.

In one sense it did make me wonder whether I should complain less about my current job and just decide to commit myself to it for a certain period of time, trying to be the best that I can be at it. Haven't we become a society where we think the grass is always greener on the other side? Perhaps if I commit to my job and not constantly wonder whether there is a better job out there, I would be happier?

Or perhaps I need to find my true passion... something that I would be willing to become a shokunin in. Ultimately I'd like to find something that I'm truly passionate about, something I'm excited about, and where I feel that what I do makes a meaningful difference in the world. I wonder if I'm asking too much?

Or perhaps everything is about perspective and how you look at something. Perhaps my current job could be my passion and could make a meaningful difference in the world, if only I make the choice to look at it that way.

Ok now my head hurts. And I'm hungry for sushi.

Job and Seattle update

So I'm at the end of my first two weeks of work. It's going well so far, though I'm at that early stage where I don't really have enough work to do. I'm sure I'll be missing this stage very very soon. Perhaps as soon as next week when I am slated to have 43 hours of billable work across two projects.

The other change for me is that this office, or maybe its a West coast thing, seems to be a lot more flexible in terms of work hours. People come in between 8:30-9:30 and leave between 4:30-5:30. This is crazy to me! But I think people are given the flexibility to work out or do whatever family things they need to do, then they work a bit in the evening.

I fly back to Chicago tonight, though I'll be back here on Monday for another two week stint until the 14th. I will probably try to nail down an apartment here next weekend, the weekend of the 7th. I'm looking to get an apartment within this neighborhood that would be a 20 minute walk to the office. How awesome is it going to be that I can walk to the office?

When I get back here next week I definitely need to make a trip to Trader Joes because the constant eating out is getting to me. I'm also trying to balance wearing more sensible shoes, especially with the hills in the downtown area. It reminds me of the 4 months I lived in San Francisco and how I was in the best shape of my life when I lived there. Perhaps I can get back to that again...

But despite the hills, you just can't take the shoe addict out of me. Thus, I have gotten so many compliments on these pair of really cute heels:

Finally my condo officially went on the market last week and has had 6 showings, with another one scheduled for tomorrow. I am definitely keeping my fingers crossed...

Remembering 9/11

Reposting my 9/11 story here so my friends can read it. Picture above is from a dinner cruise I took around the city just about a month before 9/11.

In the fall of 2001, I was living in New York, in my last semester of my first grad program. I was living in a student apartment on Columbia's Health Science campus up on 168th and Broadway where my program was located. Half of my classes that semester were during the day and the other half were at night. Thus, I was also working part time where I had interned the previous summer. This office of a public NYC agency was located downtown, about 8 blocks from the WTC towers. I used to go down in front of the towers quite a bit while I worked there, because my favorite department store, Century 21 faced the towers.

The three years I lived in New York I was pretty crazy about shoes. I used to wear 3-4 inch high heels or strappy sandals all the time. That Tuesday morning, I walked out of my place and headed to the elevator. While I was waiting for the elevator, I was kind of shifting my feet in place, because my feet were still a bit sore from the previous day's beautiful, but killer pair of sandals. The elevator came and the doors opened up, and I thought to myself, "You know what? I can't do this again today. I have to wear some sensible shoes today". While typically I would have just stuck with the shoes I had chosen to wear, that morning I actually walked back into my place to change into a really comfortable pair of flat sandals.

Once I changed my shoes, I got myself back out the door and onto the subway to head downtown. I got off the train at the Chambers St station and headed up the flight of stairs that I always walked out of, a flight of stairs that opened up to a clear straight on view of the WTC towers. Now as I'm heading up the stairs, I see and hear a woman wailing and crying at the top of the stairs. My typical NYC thought? "Oh gosh, there goes another crazy person". When I got to the top of the stairs, I quickly realized she wasn't just a crazy person. It was about 8:50 am and the first tower had just been hit.

I stood there confused, wondering what was going on along with everyone else near me. I asked some one else what had just happened. What? A plane? How could this have happened? The mood in the group of people I was standing with was one of confusion and shock. As we were standing there, talking to each other, trying to grasp the reality of what we were seeing 7 blocks away, we heard a very very loud sound. People ducked or whipped their heads, the sound was so loud and felt so close to us. I then saw first hand the second plane hit.

The mood in the group quickly turned to fear and panic as people quickly realized this wasn't an accident. People started screaming and running. I headed into my work building to touch base with my boss and the office director. I was told that because our building was a federal building, it was being immediately evacuated. My boss told me that I should probably get right back on the subway and head back uptown because she was certain that the subways would quickly be shut down. We left the building and I said goodbye to my boss and director, who both immediately got on the subways to head home.

But I couldn't leave. I'm not sure exactly why. I'm not sure if it was curiosity, wanting to know what was going on, or seeing if I could help somehow. But I just couldn't get myself to leave. Instead I got a cup of coffee from my steady every day coffee cart guy, and walked back south, to an open area about 6 blocks from the towers. I found myself back in a crowd of people who perhaps also couldn't get themselves to leave.

We stood there watching a scene that my eyes told me was real, but my brain told me had to be a movie. We stood there discussing how this could have happened, who could have done this. We stood there sharing information, as someone with a radio was telling us the Pentagon was just hit. We stood there feeling helpless as from that distance we could clearly see people hanging out of the windows waving their hands, some piece of cloth, their clothes, anything to try to ask for help. We stood there in horror with hands over our mouths as we saw multiple people make the decision to jump.

While I was in this crowd, I struggled with the decision of whether I could do anything. At the time I had an active EMT certification, and while I hadn't practiced in a year and a half, I knew that I could perform basic functions. So I would start walking closer to the towers, thinking that perhaps I could help. But then I would look up at the magnitude of what was going on and wonder how much I could really do when I knew there were emergency personnel all across the city already responding. Since 9 am you heard constant sirens heading south. So then I would walk back north to the open area I was standing in before. But then I would see the people desperately waving from the windows, and I would start walking south again.

I probably did this back and forth two times or so and had returned to the open area. What I heard next is something I will never forget. It was this low guttural rumbling sound. It started out really softly at first, like a whisper. It was such an unfamiliar sound that everyone was looking around trying to see where it was coming from. I then looked up to see that it was the sound of the first tower collapsing. Since we were about 6 blocks away, people really started to panic, some were screaming, and most were running north.

Thinking back, one thing I learned about myself is that I am pretty calm in the most stressful situations. People were screaming and running around me, but my thought process was more like "Oh, maybe I should walk north now?". Or maybe I wasn't calm, maybe I was just dense? I don't know, but I stood there for a bit looking at the huge smoke cloud that was now rising from where the first tower stood, looking at a smoke cloud that was starting to expand out. It took a police officer waving his arms and frantically yelling at us to head north for me to put some speed to my walk.

On my walk north, I stopped at Canal Street and remember looking to the left and right, to see an incredible stream of thousands of people pouring into the streets and sidewalks, all heading north. I also distinctly remember seeing one woman who was so distraught that she was sitting on the sidewalk, hysterically crying. It was comforting to see two strangers tell her that she had to keep walking, help her back up, and give her a bottle of water.

During my walk, there were incredible lines at the few pay phones since all the cell phones were down. I remember seeing 30-40 people in line at some pay phones. I stood in one of the lines for a little bit, but then quickly decided it wasn't worth it and kept walking north. This was about when I marveled at the fact that I had made the unlikely decision to change my shoes that morning. There was no way I would have been able to walk so far if I had my original shoes on. There were tons of women around me who were walking barefoot with their cute shoes in their hands. Some manicure/pedicure places along the way were giving out those foam flip flops you get when you get a pedicure and a number of women were wearing those.

I got to midtown around 12:30 pm, and headed for the place where I had interned the previous fall. My cell phone was still not working, and mainly I wanted to get hold of a land line so I could call my family. I stepped into my old office and called my dad's office. I knew that my mom and sister would gather there with my dad to wait for me to contact them. Now I mentioned before how I had been pretty calm this whole entire time. While I teared up as I saw people in the windows of the towers cry for help or jump out, I hadn't really cried yet. But talking to my family, I guess I could just let it all go, and I just totally broke down.

I stayed at that office for a while, as everyone I used to work with wanted to hear what I had seen. They also wanted to make sure I was ok and that I got something to eat. I left around 2 pm, and headed for the subway which was running again. I remember getting on the good old A train and seeing folks in my subway car who were covered in gray dust. I also realized that I still heard sirens in my head, which I had heard constantly since 9 am. I knew that I couldn't be hearing sirens down in the subway, and I was a little concerned about that, but hoped it would go away.

When I got back on campus, the word had spread that they were calling for volunteers. At this time, we all figured that there would be thousands of injured people. Because there was a medical, dental, nursing, and public health school on campus, along with the Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center, everyone mobilized to help out. I went to sign up and list my skills as well as my cell phone number. I remember seeing how long the list of volunteers were. Little did we know how few survivors there would be.

Now that semester, I had class every Tuesday night. I figured oh, given everything that had happened, it must be canceled right? NYU, other colleges across the city, colleges all across the country ended up canceling classes that day and many the next day as well. Nope, not Columbia. I had class that Tuesday night. I remember sitting there in my Epidemiology class not listening to a word, replaying everything from that day in my head.

Soon after class let out, the phone calls started. That first night, my closest friends were finally able to get their calls through. The next day, it was friends and relatives who I didn't talk to as often who called, followed up the subsequent day by long lost friends and international relatives who I hadn't spoken to in forever. It blew my mind how many people ended up contacting me, and I realized then how big this was and how much it touched everyone.

That night I lay in my bed in the dark, watching the constant TV coverage. It was difficult not to just start sobbing. It was strange to see on TV what I had seen first hand, and I started to wonder what I had seen first hand vs what I had seen on TV. I finally realized around 2 am that I needed to stop and that I should go to bed. As I was trying to fall asleep, I could still hear the sirens in my head. I thought to myself, "Seriously? Am I going crazy? This better go away tomorrow!". Luckily the sirens did leave my head the next morning. About two days later I was meeting up with friends for dinner and I freaked out because I heard sirens again, even though I didn't see anything. I turned to grab my friend's arm and asked, "Oh my gosh please tell me you hear that too", then two seconds later an ambulance passed by on the street. I breathed a sigh of relief.

Starting that morning and for days afterwards, there were military fighter jets flying over the city. After seeing the first one, you knew the military jets were there. But every time I heard another one fly by, I'd tense up and remember what it was like to hear and see the second plane hit. The reaction was instinctive. Seeing the fighter jets protecting the city was quite a vision. This wasn't some air show. It was real. We were in a war zone of sorts. Also for months afterwards there were military personnel with automatic weapons all over the city, especially in the subways.

No one was allowed south of Houston Street for a while afterwards. Houston St became a spontaneous memorial of sorts.

My co-workers and I had to work in a temporary office in midtown. When we were allowed to go back to our offices about three weeks later, I remember tasting a metal taste at the back of my throat from the air. My eyes, which are pretty sensitive, were itchy. People who worked downtown were then allowed south of Houston Street to gather stuff from our offices. This was when I had the chance then to walk down to the site, which was still a complete disaster area. I remember looking into the storefront window of a jewelry store that faced the WTC towers and seeing a display case that was completely empty except for a thick layer of dust. Realizing what that dust was, I cried.

The other thing I remember immediately after 9/11 was the thousands of flyers posted all over the city, from people looking for their loved ones. These were people holding out hope that their loved ones were one of the very few who had somehow made it out alive and were in a hospital somewhere. It was heartbreaking to see these flyers all over the city. It was difficult not to tear up.

Typically the 9/11 stories you get from the media are those who lost loved ones. I think about those who lost loved ones. I was so incredibly lucky that no one I knew died that day. Soon after 9/11 the New York times started running a new section called Portraits of Grief. It gave a face, a story, a history to the number declared dead. I read these portraits religiously, eventually buying the book when it was compiled.

When I think about the families, I think about not only how devastating it must be to first have lost someone, but how excruciatingly difficult it must be to have lost your loved one on such a public tragedy, one that gets so much media coverage. To be haunted by the constant images of the towers being hit and collapsing, knowing that you are watching your loved ones die... I can't even imagine.

I especially think a lot about seeing the 5 or 6 people who were forced to jump from the smoke and the heat and I wonder who they were. What were their stories? Where were they from? Who did they leave behind? I've also mentioned several times hearing constant sirens heading south that morning. I've wondered how many of those emergency personnel I saw made it out alive. How many of those fire fighters and police personnel I saw driving south were in the towers when they fell?

9/11 was such a historical event, that everyone has a story. Everyone remembers where they were that day. I've verbally told a condensed version of my story many times when people talk about where they were that day. Recalling all of these details and writing my story down, it's almost like I can feel again my emotions from that day and the subsequent weeks. I can hear the constant sirens from that day. I can see the billowing cloud of smoke as the first tower fell. I can remember the smell of the burning metal and how it tasted in the back of my throat. I close my eyes and I'm right there again, ten years later. I wonder if it'll still be as vivid in another 10 years.

There is no way I could ever forget. For me that day is the closest that I have been to that much death, pain, and evil. But if there's anything I take from it, and what I also remember each 9/11, is to be grateful for what you have and to try to live your life fully.

Pictures below are from Ground Zero about 3 weeks after 9/11

So...

It's been about two full months since I posted on here, much to the chagrin of a certain someone, I know. So why didn't I blog on here for a while? Well I think for a while there a lot of what was going on revolved around the job in Seattle and honestly a part of me didn't want to jinx it by talking too much about it.

So going back to the interview at the end of July. It's kind of hard to look back on it objectively now knowing that I got the offer. An offer I somehow got despite screwing up on the written case. So during the interview day I spoke with 4 or 5 consultants, had lunch with the lead partner, then had two cases.

There was an excel case with several tabs of data and 10 questions that I had to either answer or manipulate the data. Then there was a written case where you were presented with a problem and related data. You then had to analyze the data the way you saw fit, then write some conclusions that you've made as well as discuss what additional questions that you'd want to ask.

The written case took about 90 minutes or so and it wasn't until the last 15 minutes when I was reviewing it that I realized I had completely misunderstood a major assumption of the main data set. Basically I had written my entire case off a wrong assumption. Sigh. Anyways, all's well that ends well I guess.

The pic above is from when I was there during my interview. After dinner on Friday night I spent some time walking around the downtown area and walked down to market place. It's difficult to explain clearly and sounds kind of cheesy now, but as I was walking around I just quietly knew, very deep down inside, that I was going to end up here. That I belonged here... that it was going to end up being home. I think its the same intuition that led me to turn down the offer from the Chicago firm for the opportunity to interview in Seattle.

There is still a ton that I don't know yet... such as whether I'll be able to sell my place, where I'll live in Seattle etc etc. If I really think about all I have to do, it freaks me out a little. Well, a lot. But same intuition is telling me everything is going to work out.

Going with your gut

Wednesday was my interview with the Chicago firm. It was an interesting interview because I definitely went into it with the mindset that I was already getting the job because of the two people there that I already know. But I think that mindset put me at ease, lessened any anxiety, and ultimately made me more confident, which probably helped make a good impression with the two new people I met. I need to remember this for the Seattle interview.

Oh so funny story about the interview. After interviewing with these two guys, the three of us went out to lunch to continue a more casual conversation and just to get to know each other. We went to this restaurant in downtown Chicago that is a pretty big business lunch place. We walked in and I was surrounded by men in suits.

Now for my lunch I ended up getting this pretty yummy salad. It comes to the table, and I start on my salad. I had had a couple of bites, when I see this little black spot on one corner of the plate. I'm like huh... what is that? I look closer, and I kid you not, it was this tiny tiny bug. I was surprised and kinda grossed out, but I was more freaked out that the two other guys would find out. I could have made a scene and called the waiter over and sent it back, but that would have made these two guys really uncomfortable. There they are trying to take a prospective hire out to lunch, and they find a bug in their food?

So I told myself, nope, I don't need to put them in that situation. No need. They would have been really embarrassed, needlessly, and it would have taken away from the conversation we were already having. So I kinda shoved the little bug down underneath the salad on that corner of the plate and then proceeded to eat about half the salad, on the opposite side of the plate. Maybe I ate another bug or two, but eh, I could always use more protein. :)

Anyways. So yesterday I am out to lunch with a friend who I hadn't seen in a while. And I'm telling her all about the interview and the circumstances with the Chicago firm. And I kid you not, as we're talking about the firm and my relationship with this partner, my phone lights up and this partner's name comes across the screen.

When I saw her name, I was glad but also filled with dread. Because I knew exactly what she was calling for. I knew that she was calling to give me an offer, but that she was not going to allow me to wait a month to interview with Seattle. I know this partner pretty well and know how she handles things. She is a business woman who knows what she wants and is not scared to go after it.

So I listen to the voicemail and she's telling me what I already knew... that she'd love for me to come join them etc etc. Then she says something to the effect of, 'I would like for you to come work with us and I need to know what I need to do to make that happen'. Yeah. Whoa. She doesn't mess around. It did get me thinking about what kinda crazy salary I could demand! :)

When I called her back, she told me pretty much what I already knew. That she can't wait for me to decide if I like the Seattle firm or if the Seattle firm likes me. That she is turning away work now and needs someone now. She said that I should think about where I want to be compensation wise and that she'd give me a week to make a decision. She also said that she can't guarantee that there would still be a need whenever I finish up the process with Seattle. But that if there was, she would still be open to that.

After talking to her, I spoke with two former colleagues, one at the Chicago firm and the other at the Seattle firm. My issue was that my gut was very strongly telling me that I needed to go through the interview process with Seattle. I wanted to make the best decision possible, and not feel like I was pressured to pick one firm. And yes, there is no guarantee that I would even get an offer from Seattle. My greatest fear is that that might happen, and that the Chicago firm would feel pissed or hold a grudge, feeling like I put them at second place, and not want to take me in 6 weeks.

My former coach at the Seattle firm told me that if she does hold a grudge, would I really want to work for someone like that? And that while the Chicago firm has an immediate staffing need right now, this is a big career decision for me. I am looking to be at my next firm for a while, so I have to feel comfortable with making the decision.

I knew what I needed to do, but knowing that I needed to call this partner today filled me with dread. This morning I did what I typically do when I am faced with a tough decision, consulting the I Ching. And as always, it was right, telling me what I already sensed... that everything has its proper time and that this is not the right time right now. That I need to trust that everything is as it should be and that everything is being prepared to achieve what is in my best interests. And that I just need to trust in that and be still and relaxed and confident.

So I called the partner shortly afterwards, explaining to her how I don't take her offer lightly and that I really do respect her. And because I respect her, that I want to be completely honest and tell her where I am. I told her that I want to maintain a good relationship not only with her, but the other person I know at the Chicago firm and the person I know at the Seattle firm.

I explained that its not really the case that I'm preferring Seattle over Chicago... that its two very different firms and opportunities that would put me in two different circumstances, circumstances that would affect my personal life very differently. I said that I do want to finish out the interview process with Seattle.

I finished up by saying that I don't know how things are going to end up, but I would hope that she would still be open to hiring me if she still has the work and the staffing need, not just in 6 weeks but in the future as well since I see myself in consulting for a while.

I think the conversation went as well as it could have, and she said she did appreciate me telling her so they didn't have to go through the work of putting together an offer. I don't know if she really means it when she says she would hire me again if they still had a staffing need, but I can't really worry about that at this point. She did say to keep her updated on how things go and perhaps in 6-8 weeks the Chicago firm may become more attractive to me. I kind of took her saying that to mean that she really does feel that I'm putting her firm as a second choice. Oh well.

I then talked to the other guy I know well at this firm and explained my decision and the conversation I had with the partner. He told me that they had actually had dinner last night and discussed this a bit, and that she knew that I had called him to talk about this yesterday as well. He said that she told him that she hoped that I did not get a bad impression of her from how forward she was with the offer and saying that she can't wait for a month. So that's a good sign, I think.

He told me that he really does anticipate that the work is only going to increase. While they are now going to hire this other guy, their second choice, that he feels that they would definitely still hire me in another 6-8 weeks if I was interested. He told me that I need to do what is right for me, and that he believes in the quality of my work so much that they would rather wait a bit than not have me at all. I have to hope that he would help advocate for me if I needed it.

So all in all, after a drama filled day yesterday, I think things worked out for the best. I still have no clue what will happen with Seattle. I may not like them, or they may not like me. And by then I may end up not being offered a position with the Chicago firm. Isn't there a saying like this? A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush? But anyways, that is the chance that I have decided to take. I can't make a decision because I feel forced into it. If I had accepted the offer, I would have always wondered about Seattle.

And something in my gut is strongly telling me that I need to at least interview with Seattle. So we'll see what happens!