Poconos!

I admit that I have been really lazy but my days have been really packed lately…somehow I just don’t have the motivation to blog anymore. But realizing the need to note down somewhere what I have been doing, for the benefit and reliving the wonderful memories later, I shall start blogging after each vacation trip or any life’s lesson that I experience for the rest of my 5 months in the US. So for this weekend, I went to Poconos with my batch and the junior batch. It is especially meaningful, as it was after a week of relentless and hectic days at work. It’ time to let down our hair and have fun!

I had a mad rush on Friday, when we were supposed to meet at the Towne building of Upenn at 630pm. I was still at the Coach store at Center city (10mins away from where I live by subway) at 6pm, exchanging some items for ZJ. After it was all settled, I was practically flying to the subway. Luckily I caught the train just as I reached the platform. I rushed home to stuff all the stuff into my bagpack then frantically tried to close the window which was stuck for two min before realizing that it’s impossible. I was in such a haste that I forgot my sweater. Imagine how profusely I was perspiring by the time I arrived at the meeting point.

But everything went smoothly and we finally reached the Split Rock resort after a two hour and a half journey. As most of us were already starving when we reached there, we’re expecting a full course buffet as we were provided with the previous time when we came here to ski. But the unexpected happened when we realized all we had for the night was pizzas and cookies! We then had an hour long session introducing ourselves and listening to Joe Sun before making our way back to the resort rooms, where our beds beckoned us. Everything was wonderful, the bathrooms were clean and welcoming while the beds were washed and comfortable. Ah, this is life. I had a good uninterrupted sleep till morning.

We went down promptly at 830 am, not hoping for much after last night’s nightmare but we were pleasantly surprised by the sumptuous spread, consisting of bacon, sausage, potatoes, house fries, fruits like strawberries, cereal, buns etc! It is to no doubt that our favorite dishes were the made to order omelette and waffle =)

After a hearty breakfast, we were ushered into the Harmony room where we had a 2h long session on Business ettique. I was pretty sleepy then because of the plates of stuff that I gorged on but on the whole it was really benefial as we had found the answers to some of the common questions we face when it comes to networking sessions and interacting with our American counterparts in the workplace.

We adjorned for lunch at 12noon but I found no appetite except for the desserts. The buffet was great but the highlight of the day was the paint ball game! Excitedly, we marched to the Galleria where we boarded the classic yellow school bus towards Skirmish where the paint ball center is located. However, I was greeted with an unpleasant sight, we have to wear the army uniform as part of the protection gear for the game! It just set forth a rush of memories from my army times. But it didn’t bother me much when the game started as we began to realize how fun it was to strategize. The scariest thing I found about the game was that we had to start shooting our friends.and it is not our concern now if the bullet we fire would hurt them. To each of us, our friends have merely become target boards and I found myself happily firing at their exposed heads when they hid behind those fences. That is creepy. No wonder in war, it is so easy to just send a spray of bullets, even at helpful victims, as now it is about self survival. There was this particular instance when I sneaked up on my friend and I was pretty close. I simply shot at him even though it was so close before he discovered and shot at me. Luckily I still had the rationality of shooting at his butt and not anywhere else that could have resulted in major injury. There were in fact two cases of injury in our group as one got a gash from the close rang shot in the neck and the other had a huge blue black on her thigh. I shuddered at how cruel one can become even in a game like this.

After the 4hours of firing and being shot, we went back, starving this time. We had a beachside bbq buffet, where we had sweet bbq ribs and chicken. It was just awesome. Crispina and I went to the pool after our hasty dinner, as I was feeling so guilty from the stuffing sessions I had over the past two days. In the end, we didn’t swim much too as we’re smply too full, just soaked in the Jacuzzi and chatted in the sauna room. Now that’s life!

At 9pm we had the usual NCBV drinking session at one of the guys room. This time I was fortunately not the target and poor lionel was taking shots after shots till he vomited in the toilet. The guys refused to let him off even after that and forced him to keep drinking till he was totally wasted. Poor Lionel! The rest of us continued playing and it was evident that everyone was getting quite high after just half an hour. I cooked up an excuse to go back and remove my contacts so as to avoid the drinking incident that I still regretted till today.

I had again a deep restful sleep till 830am in the morning. Showered then headed for breakfast. But it was a rushed one for me as I had to settle the UO order before I proceeded to the dining room. My sister was mad at me for not ordering the items earlier as her item had gone out of stock. Sighz.. it is hard to please people sometimes.

After lunch, the feelings of remorse and unhappiness started to engulf me as I realized that I had lost the hotel room key. It’s $100 for this mistake! But thinking back I really shouldn’t have let it got to me too much as it sort of ruined my bowling session and the rest of my day. I played really badly at bowling, scoring only 28 for the entire game! At least there was horse riding to distract me. It’s the first time that I’m trying it! Like a fairy tale come true =) but still everything was just less fun than it should be and all I wanted is to bury my head till the housekeeping tells me that the key is found. Fortunately, I managed to push those thoughts aside and enjoy the rest of my time after horseriding. Crispina and I went to the beachside to find the other people and then walked around the resort area to take photos and stuff. It was very therapeutic in a way.

Dinner was good enough to make up for the lunch that we missed in the afternoon after our bowling game. I finally had salmon, after what seemed like ages. I had not one but two servings of it as it was just so delicious =) after dinner, my room mate Fiona told me that the receptionist would most likely waived the charges and I felt like a fool, to have worried so much in the day. Anyway, it was a good getaway trip on the whole and I’m absolutely looking forward to the Chicago trip next weekend!

Disruptive technology

From Dennis McDonald's blog,
'My first vote goes for social networking technologies and the ability they give people to communicate and collaborate across many of the traditional boundaries around organizations, neighborhoods, professions, associations, countries, and other traditional ways of organizing work and relationships. It will be interesting to see, for example, if the Chinese government can continue its current level of political control over its population without also increasing control over how people form relationships and interact with each other both socially and professionally.'

Social networking is already revolutionizing the way we think, communicate, shop and even sleep. When you buy a bedsheet, mattress, or pillow, would you feel better if your friend has assured you on facebook that Brand X is the brand to buy as it gave him a good night sleep? When you shop, do you first consult your friends on where are the good places to hit? Never underestimate the power of collective knowledge... Many companies are jumping on this bandwagon now to harness the power of social networking but the question is how. What does this disruptive technology mean to you?

Orbius

An extract from my Colleague, Andy's blog and more insights about my internship company...
We're proud to be in Orbius!

Here are a few reasons why Orbius stands out:

Orbius is different from other players in the market because it is specifically designed to support not just individuals but groups - companies, brand marketers, clubs, and organizations. We call these community sites Orbs. It's really easy to create an Orb, apply themes, configure security and start communicating with groups of people.

Orbius is designed to support multiple Profiles. For instance, I have a public profile that everyone can see. I also have a Family Profile, a Friends Profile, and a Professional profile. I can decide who get's to see any of my personal information. For instance, in my Professional Profile I have my resume, links to technology sites and blogs that I like, etc. In my Family profile I can keep family photos and a calendar that keeps track of where we'll be for different holidays, etc. In my Friends profile I share pictures with Friends and I have a comment wall so we can joke around. But these Profiles would be useless if I couldn't control who had access to each of them. With Orbius it is really easy to organize my connections into various groups and then allow them access to whichever profiles I want!

Orbius offers a unique way to join communities and "hide" your identity through Personas. While this may not be useful in all situations, in many communities members share sensitive information about themselves (medical information for example). In these Orbs, members can safely discuss important issues because the other community members will never know their real identity.

Orbius provides a simple dashboard view of changes and updates to all of the communities you belong to. In addition, all messages among Orbius users come through a central inbox, even if the communication is from different Orbs.

By the way, Orbius is free to use. Anyone can set up Orbs and/or Profiles. However, companies who wish to take advantage of extra features including advanced themes, removal of advertising, custom applications and more can do so with a Premium, Corporate, or Enterprise Level Edition of Orbius.

West Coast travel part 1

This is no doubt my longest trip ever, 6 states, 9 cities in 2 weeks. My traveling companions? My university beties =) it seemed just a while ago that Huiling and I were planning the trip and it’s the trip has already ended. But the memories are really here to stay.

Gwen arrived in NY to meet Huiling on 9 july and for the next 2 days, they did lots of shopping and sightseeing. Having been to New York and is limited by the number of leave I am entitled to, I only joined them on 11july. The Pacific Hotel at Chinatown is simply amazingly value for money. For just $67 per night, we get a queen sized bed in a 2m by 2m room. But a small hotel in NY would fetch usually $200 a night. We departed at 7am the next day to catch the Niagara Falls bus and the hilarious error we committed was to take taxi to go down 5 streets. It is different here compared to Philly, when the streets run in sequence. As the hotel is at 100 something street, one would expect 60 streets in between the position of the tour bus which is at 42rd street but apparently, we’re wrong.

Soon we embarked on our journey to Buffalo, Niagara. After sitting on the bus for 3hours. It seemed that the bus would never arrive at the destination. It was already evening time by the time we arrived. A light drizzle began to fall but nothing could restrain our excitement to see the much awaited Niagara fall. The falls were actually noticeable from a distance, as there were some mysteriously large clouds of mist. Niagara got its name from its thundering sound of the falling water and no other name could have more aptly described it. We wore our poncho and stepped onto the maiden of the mists and almost as soon as it began to sail, the majestic view of the falls came into view. The falls are nothing like those I have ever seen in my life. The sight of the pure glistening water pouring down from heights was simply incredible. It looked so beautiful, like a painting, so surreal. We were soon drenched by the drizzle and the gushing sprays of water from the shore but even if it means risking our camera to take photos of the falls, it was worth it.
The rest of the trip didn’t occur as smoothly but it was a unique experience together. While I returned to Philly to work, Huiling and Gwen stayed on to go Woodbury to shop the next day.
For the next 2 days, I could hardly concentrate on my work, as there were so many things to settle for the west coast trip. The juniors had also just arrived on Mon and all the memories what I experienced in the first few weeks in Philly came rushing back to me again. All too quickly, 6 months had gone by and we’re seniors already.

Before I knew it, Wednesday arrived. At 4pm, gwen and I practically raced to the 30th street with our luggages and all. In retrospect, maybe it was an omen that we’d always be rushing for our flights and to meet deadlines for our trip. I was sweating profusely by the time we boarded the regional rail to the Philadelphia airport. It was in the nick of time that we reached the platform actually. Phew…
Everything else very much occurred smoothly after that. At the Las Vegas airport, we rented a Toyota Prius, which is supposed to run on only one gallon per 45 miles, which is simply amazing. As we drove down the strip, the sights around us were amazing. Even from the airplane, we could see the dazzling lights of vegas, the city that never sleeps. We recognized the hotels as our car crawled along the road, as there were so many cars on the narrow road. The famous pyramidal Luxor hotel, the grand Bellagio hotel that hosts fountain shows, the Paris hotel with its Eiffel tower lookalike. Circus circus was the conventional kind of hotel but it was nevertheless an enjoyable experience staying there. The room was clean and spacious, just what we needed after a horrible experience at the Fallside inn at Niagara Falls.
Our regret is that we could only stay one night there and a short one for that, as we had to set off at 7am for grand canyon the next day. If I am given the chance to change our itinerary, maybe we would have missed going to LA altogether.
There would be no argument for which why Grand Canyon is recognized as one of the 7 wonders of the world. It took a gruesome 5 hours to drive there, passing over 3 different terrains along the way, the desert, the savanna areas and the green hilly regions. But as we set our eyes upon the place, all our fatigue just melted away. The scene was just so breathtaking. The canyon looks different at every angle and nothing can certainly battle this piece of natural avante garde in front of us. We could only spend hour there but it would take a lifetime to forget the wonderful sight of Grand Canyon.

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