Quarter Life Crisis

been super busy at work this week.  The Kauffman Foundation is going to be around hanging around the von Liebig Center for the next few days to determine whether our model is fit for their funding.  This lady is the point (wo)man: Christine Gulbranson.  She’s pretty young and achieved quite a few things. What have I done with my life, I’m already 23!!!!! =P

Anyways, Just spent 12 hours preparing a presentation, not really a presentation, just 1 slide.  LOL. Basically they wanted me, of all people that they could talk to here, to talk about myself and what I’ve been working on as the intern.  Now, I’ve been working on about 7 or 8 different projects from nanowires to color cosmetics and I only had about 5 minutes to speak.  Now you know why it took so long to put it together.

Anyways, it went well.  I’m starting to get this public speaking thing. Never would I have imagined myself being so comfortable speaking in front of people.  Preparation is the key - in my case 12 hours for 5 minutes. Not very efficient but you do what it takes to get your point across. It just takes lots of practice - basically if you cringe at the idea of speaking in front of people, then you need to make yourself do it more.  I was like that just a few months ago. I recommend that you join Dale Carnegie or Toastmasters or something if you are looking for a way to practice. If not just join a student org for free to get that experience.

Heres a list of variety of 6 figure paying jobs that you may not know of.  Here are the 25 best paying jobs out there.

I just found out some interesting career facts about the former interns of the von Liebig Center. It looks like I have some big shoes to fill.

1.) McKinsey Consultant

2.) Medical Device Sales

3.) IP Lawyer

4.) Goldman Sachs Analyst

5.) Soon to be millionaire tech guy (IPO)

I think I’m doing a good job here, but it’s a good thing much of the staff is also relatively new to the center to keep those expectations in check. =D

Networking has been paying off lately. I’m learning the play the role of ambitious, non-intimidating, vulnerable and mold-able student that successful business people like to be around. After going to a lot of these networking functions you start to get comfortable and things start to happen. I’ve got a couple of informational interviews set up over the next couple weeks. Though I wouldn’t really call them interviews. They’re more  networking, get to know you, career guidance, mentee/mentor type deals.  I think this will help my career. At the very least, I’ll meet some people and practice my professional skills because I need it.  Here’s some stuff to consider for info interviews.

The Top 25 from Vault’s ranking are shown below.

Had a contact malfunction on my way to work today.  Halfway through the bus ride to campus my contact dried up and fell out of my eyeball.  Couldn’t get it back in so I kept it in my mouth for the next ten minutes till I got to the nearest bathroom. I even managed to stop and have a conversation with an acquaintance with it in my mouth.   Now I have a partially digested contact lens in my eye. However its feeling more comfortable than it did before it fell out.  Try it next time you have a contact lens malfunction.

Tips for newly grads getting their first taste of work. Basically, work hard and stay positive because thats all you can do really.  The article’s not bad, but the comments are better.

Nanothis Nanothat. Heres a good outline of nanotech for nanonewbs.

I eat a lot of curry. Its probably not a surprise for an asian american college student living off campus. Curry and spaghetti are my main staples. We all know tomato sauce is good for you (lycopene, duh… you’ve probably seen it on a Heinz bottle near you), but did you know that curry can fight off cancer and Alzheimer’s? I am curious to see what the cancer/Alzheimer’s rate for the Indian demographic is.

Well, preliminary results are not promising. Look at this map- record breaking levels of a variety of cancers are observed in India! Check out Pondicherry, where they have the highest rate of mouth and tongue cancers. Are they not eating their curries in Pondicherry?

As far as Alzheimer’s goes,  theres some research that shows that diet in general may have an effect on the onset of this disease at old age.  Many non-Western countries (including India)  have substantially lower Alzheimer’s rates when compared to US.

Anyways, the take away is to watch what you eat to prevent elderly forgetfulness and to not live in India, cause the curry won’t save you from whatever’s mutating people’s genes there.

“the Chinese word for “crisis” is composed of elements that signify “danger” and “opportunity.”"

Many investors like to use this bit of ancient chinese “wisdom” as an investment philospohy. When the markets are down and everyone is peeing in their pants and selling off, you should see this “crisis” as an opportunity to snatch up undervalued securities. The first time I heard this, I was in a seminar listening to an unnamed non-chinese venture capitalist talk about how he survived the bubble and I thought to myself, “Wow, Confucius must have had an awesome portfolio. Not only is this VC a shrewd business man, but he’s also really cultured! I want to be a VC when I grow up!!” Then a couple months later, I heard it again, but this time coming from a angel investor here in SD. Again he was not chinese and this time around, it wasn’t quite so inspiring so I decided to look this up and see if it really is what everyone thinks it is. Evidently, this is a case of people looking for meaning where none exists.

“The ji of wei ji, in fact, means something like “incipient moment; crucial point (when something begins or changes).” Thus, a w?ij? is indeed a genuine crisis, a dangerous moment, a time when things start to go awry. A w?ij? indicates a perilous situation when one should be especially wary. It is not a juncture when one goes looking for advantages and benefits. In a crisis, one wants above all to save one’s skin and neck! Any would-be guru who advocates opportunism in the face of crisis should be run out of town on a rail, for his / her advice will only compound the danger of the crisis.”

Sorry guys, its time to look for a new anecdote to start your speeches off with.