A serious topic - really, i'm not joking

So I was reading this article. My first thought when I saw the headline - before actually reading the article - was, "Princess Diana didn't have AIDS, did she?" So as I read on, I realized she was a huge AIDS activist, not a victim.

I'm not sure how one thought led to another, but somehow I started thinking about "celebrities" that have had AIDS. The first name that popped into my head was Magic. No last name required for most of you reading this. Although Magic's HIV never turned into full-blown AIDS, I think he was the first big celebrity to be diagnosed with the virus, at least in the U.S. I still remember the day the announcement was made, and how shocked everyone was at school the next day. [sidebar - i just tried to remember the year that the announcement came, and I thought it was 1991. Sure enough, it was November of 1991 - I am not a Lakers fan, so I was impressed with my memory]

So I pose a question to anyone and everyone out there - was what happened to Magic a good thing? Maybe it's an obvious "Yes", since it brought a lot of attention to the disease, safe sex, etc. Maybe it's an obvious "No", since a hero to many people was forced to retire from the game to battle this tragic disease (though he did later un-retire). Maybe it's somewhere in between.

As for me, I lean pretty strongly towards the Yes camp. I am not a Lakers fan, so Magic was not really a hero to me, though as a huge NBA fan, I obviously admired his game and success. He has gone on to live a relatively healthy life (though he is quite fat), and is now a very successful businessman in Southern California. Most importantly, without having any statistics to back this up, from my naive perspective, I have to assume that what happened to him somehow lowered unprotected sex and thus HIV incidence somewhere - maybe throughout the US, maybe throughout California, or maybe just in Southern California, or Inglewood (always up to no good). On the other hand, if he hadn't retired, maybe that God-awful late-night show he hosted, The Magic Hour never would have happened.

Anyways - I'm curious to hear people's feedback/thoughts on this. Especially the doctors out there.

Operation Falcon II

First, read, or at least scan this article

Is it just me - or is anyone else troubled by the fact that "the arrests were...timed to coincide with National Victims Rights Week"??? Sure, this probably makes for a better headline. But shouldn't law enforcers arrest violent sex offenders and get them off our streets as soon as is humanly possible?

And for anyone who responds that the timing this year is merely a coincidence, "Last year's sweep netted more than 10,000 fugitives, 10 times the average in a week"

Usually I only say this when Smitty is preparing to attend an 18+ Indian party, but mothers and fathers, PLEASE, lock your daughters at home

Free Gas in California

No, not the kind inspired by 39-cent taco night at Del Taco. Check out this article from cnn.com. It sure would be nice to have all that nice, juicy Iraqi oil flowing through right about now, wouldn't it? Sheetal, hope you're having fun in that gas-guzzling, overcompensating monstrosity you drive around in.

2nd Weekend in London

This weekend was painfully short. After getting 4 days off for the Easter holiday the previous weekend, a 2-day weekend just didn’t suffice. But it was a lot of fun and I managed to do quite a bit in the condensed time. Enjoy:

Friday Night

Friday night I met up with Trishna and Seema, two of my good college friends, and Trishna’s husband Deep. It’s funny how every one of the college friends I have that now live in London are females. Two because they met British guys (and, like women should do, followed their men to their native countries) and two others for work / school. Not one guy friend. I know it sounds gay (not that there’s anything wrong with that), but I really would have liked having at least a couple male friends to go partying with while I was here. Maybe it was not meant to be. I’m trying to view it in a positive light. Maybe, just maybe, I’ll actually learn a thing or two about women in the next couple of months. Granted, in 26+ years, I failed to learn anything about them, but you never know.

Anyways, we first met up for dinner at a semi-chain Indian restaurant. Dinner went quite quickly, as Seema and Deep in particular seemed EXTREMELY eager to move on to the ‘main course’ of the evening, i.e. a trip to one of the local casinos. After dinner, however, Deep and I realized we both needed a couple drinks to a) wake us up, and b) give us at least a half-ass buzz before heading to the casino. I’m not sure why it is, but I just can’t gamble sober. At least not in a casino. Admittedly, I acknowledge I shouldn’t always be as drunk as I am in Vegas casinos, when I sometimes forget the chips I’m playing with can’t in fact be bought at the local Duane Reade. Anyways, I digress. We headed to a bar/lounge called Meza, in the SoHo area of Central London (between SoHo, Chelsea, the ridiculously expensive prices, and the minimal work I actually do, I really feel like I haven’t left New York). When we got to the bar, I was excited as it was the first place I’d been to in London that serves Grey Goose. Of course, at £8 a pop, I had to savor every last drop. After 4 Grey Gooses, I realized I just wasn’t gonna get drunk, so at about 1 or 130, we decided to hop in a cab and head to the Victoria Casino on Edgware Road.

Some of you have probably been to casinos in London or elsewhere in Europe. Quite a contrast to Vegas or AC. Firstly, you have to be a member, or the guest of a member. So Deep (who seems to have as much of a gambling problem as I do, only he actually has the income to afford it) signed up as a member and the rest of us entered as his guests. Secondly, you have to be dressed up. No jeans and flip-flops, my standard Vegas gambling attire. Instead: slacks, dress shoes, and a collared shirt. Not comfortable.

When we sat down to play blackjack, I noticed that it was a casino where other people could bet on your hands. I’ve heard about this from people who’ve played blackjack in Canada, but had never experienced it firsthand. Quite a bit of pressure, when I’m playing a £10 hand, and some random is betting £50 on my hand. I can imagine other people letting this affect the way they play. Fortunately, I don’t give a flying fuck about some random dude’s money, so I played as I would have anyways. If they wanted to bitch and moan, they could play their own damn hand. Pussies.

Third annoying thing about the London casinos: no free drinks. When the cocktail waitress came around, I ordered a vodka soda, and then turned back towards the table. She taps me on the shoulder and says “Sir that’ll be 3 pounds 50.” Fuck. I pull a 5 out of my wallet and hand it to her. Fourth annoying thing: she comes back 5 minutes later with my £5 note and tells me the bar has closed for the evening. Fuck again. What kind of operation are they running? Don’t they realize that drunk gamblers are more stupid with their money?

Anyways, I should stop complaining, because by the end of the night, I was up £325. And if I had been drunk, I probably would have gotten cocky and kept playing only to lose it all. Fortunately, I was dead sober and knew my luck would run out eventually so I wisely walked away. Still, I ended up the big loser in the group, as Seema and Deep each won around £500.

Saturday Afternoon

Not much to report here. Since I got home Friday night at like 4:30 a.m., I pretty much spent Saturday sitting at home, eating and watching TV. The Seinfeld marathon was key, though I really wish they would stop just showing all the Season 1 episodes over and over. I love Seinfeld, but I liked it a lot better in the later seasons, when George became a loser of epic proportions, and when Elaine became a bitch.

Saturday Night

Carol and I decided to start Saturday evening off with a comedy show. We tried to go to a relatively popular place called The Comedy Store, which of course was sold out as it was a Saturday night with great weather to boot. So we ended up at this place called The Upstairs Comedy Room or something like that (we found out about it from one of those guys on the street corner with a big sign). It was basically a tiny little room of maybe 30 seats on the second floor of a pub. Admission was £5, so we figured we’d give it a shot. To sum it up, you get what you pay for. Some of the acts were decent, and some just plain sucked. After 5 of the 7 acts, we decided we’d had enough and that we needed to continue drinking in a different environment, so we peaced out and hopped on the tube to meet up with some of Carol’s LBS friends.

In London, like the casinos, a lot of the popular clubs require memberships. So one of Carol’s LBS friends is a member at this club called Westbourne Studios. London is more of a pub/bar town, so this was the first real club I had been to since I got here. Definitely a unique place. Extremely diverse crowd – large groups of Indians, Asians, white people, black people; as well as people dressed up in proper clubbing attire, some dressed in suits, and some wearing t-shirts and baseball caps. The club had a large open area, a small dance floor, and a lot of sofas / chairs for just lounging. A lot of American music was playing – ranging from Kanye to Jacko. One unique aspect was the pool and foosball tables in the middle of the club (yes, with people enthusiastically playing). The REALLY unique aspect was the fact that this place doubled as an art gallery of some sort. There was even a small room with a bunch of paintings that you could actually buy. I walked in and took a couple pictures, telling the artists how much I admired their work, but pointing out that I am visiting from California, hence providing a built-in excuse to not have to buy anything.

When we walked towards the bar, I was elated to see that, for the 2nd consecutive night, I was at a place that served Grey Goose. Hooray!, as the 3 double vodka-sodas I had at the comedy show had failed to give me anything more than a weak buzz, which was pretty much gone after the tube ride (yes, I realize the term ‘tube ride’ sounds really really gay). Of course, by the time I squeezed my way through the crowd to order, I noticed the Grey Goose bottle was missing. What the fuck??? I tried ordering Goose anyways, and the bartender hit me with the painful news that they were out of the good stuff. Of course, the Indian dude next to me apologizes and says it was he that killed the last of the Goose. Motherfucker. So I had to settle for a Ketel (pronounced in London as ‘Katel’, i.e. ‘Patel’ with a K)-soda (a double, of course). After 3 double Ketel-sodas, plus the 3 I had earlier in the evening, I was still pretty much sober. In fact, in the 2 weeks I’ve been here, I’ve still yet to be drunk. I know – quite a shocker for those that know me. I’ve been buzzed, tipsy, etc. But not drunk. And I really miss it. So I’ve made the important decision that starting next weekend, I’m cranking it up a notch. That’s right. Triple vodka-sodas. I don’t give a damn what kind of dirty looks I get from bartenders. I figure if I’m drunk, I can shrug off those looks a hell of a lot easier.

At around 2 or 230, we were all pretty tired and decided to take off. Of course, we were kind of in the middle of nowhere, and there were no cabs to be found. We headed to the nearest tube station/bus stop – but of course the tube is closed from like 1 a.m.-5 a.m. to give the cab companies some business. We tried calling a cab company, who informed us it would be 30 minutes to an hour. Not expecting to wait that long, we told him to come anyways, figuring that if we decided to leave, there’s no loss for us. Of course, the cab company was a step ahead of us and basically said he didn’t believe that we’d still be there. What to do? So I hop on the bus with all the LBS students. It’s important to note here that I live nowhere near LBS. In fact, I live south of where the club is, and LBS is north. This doesn’t make sense to me, but I still don’t know London all that well and my phone battery is on its last legs, so I figure I’m better off at least being with some locals. So finally, we got off at the bus station near where the LBS people live, which happens to be an easier place to find a cab. I hop in, and about 20 minutes (and £20) later, I’m finally home. Man, I miss New York.

First Weekend in London

I gotta admit. I could get used to this. Arrived in London last Sunday. Then 4 days in the office. Then a 4-day weekend for Easter, and now I begin a second consecutive 4-day work week. I even realized that, based on when I plan on using my vacation days (a short trip to LA for my cousin's wedding, and a few random days off for long weekends), I am probably looking at a maximum of 3 5-day work weeks while I'm here.

Anyways, on to the weekend. Unfortunately, nothing terribly exciting to report. As I've mentioned, I only have a handful of friends out here, and several of them left town for the long weekend.

Friday I basically spent relaxing at home, which was much needed to finally recuperate after the many weeks of partying in NY.

Saturday, I wandered the area of what I call "central London" - Leicester and Trafalgar Squares, Piccadilly Circus, etc. I'm not really sure why this appealed to me, as I've roamed this area countless times on my previous London trips, but at the very least, I managed to refamiliarize myself with the area. The best part was that I discovered that I actually live within walking distance of this area.

Then I met up with my friend Carol from Berkeley, and we went to the Earl's Court Exhibition Center (not 'Centre') to check out the Bodies Exhibition. Since I spent most of my weekends either sleeping or drinking, I never managed to check it out when I was in NY, but it was well worth the trip and highly recommended to anyone that comes to London while it is still here. Hard to describe the exhibition in words, but I'll refer you to Ali's blog as he posted about it a while back. Here's a couple pictures:




After this, I proceeded to drink for the first time in a week (seriously), and eat yet another bad steak. After going 0-for-2 with steaks in London, I've vowed to myself that I'm not gonna waste the artery-clogging calories on any more London steaks. However, I did manage to try 3 new beers on Saturday, which I'm pretty sure is a personal record for new beers in one day. My favorite was Kronenbourg 1664, a popular British beer (the Kronenbourg White Beer, which I tried on Monday, was even better and Carol actually preferred it to Hoegaarden - which I consider sacreligious).

After waking up with the inevitable Sunday hangover (why did I switch to Grey Goose after starting with 4 beers???), I attempted to do laundry in the washer/dryer in my apartment. The washing seemed to go okay, but drying was another story. I'm not sure if I just wasn't using the machine properly, but I ended up having to dry my clothes for like 200 minutes before they were sufficiently dry. I think I need to find one of those wash & fold places.

Then, the last 2 days of the weekend was spent pretty much wandering a lot more. The only places worth noting were an area called Camden Garden, which is a very Berkeley-like area of markets, shops, tattoo/body piercing parlors, and restaurants - complete with the Berkeley-like goth vibe; and the Mexican restaurant I went to for dinner on Monday night. Can't remember the name of the place, but I was very pleasantly surprised that there is at least 1 place here that serves proper Mexican fare. Obviously it doesn't compare to Del Taco or most other California Mexican restaurants, but it was relatively authentic Mexican food, with good drinks, and the only place I've seen so far that serves Patron. Needless to say, I will be back.

Lastly, just to answer the typical questions that people have been asking - the weather has been surprisingly good, with very little rain (although I still carry my umbrella with me practically everywhere I go), the food, generally, sucks, and the people have overall been nice. Now that people are back in town, I hope to pick up the pace of partying and actually entertain the 3 of you that read this regularly with some better stories.

Business Trips - Then vs. Now

Work has been reeeeally slow since I started on Monday. So I've basically been looking for an excuse to post something and it just hit me.

From an outsider's perspective, I think my current business trip (technically called a "secondment") is pretty glamorous. Round-trip business class flight. Three months in one of the biggest, most exciting cities in the world. Corporate housing in a hotel-like building. A per diem that more than covers my food and transportation expenses. A healthy, guaranteed bonus at the end of the stint (I can not emphasize the guaranteed part of this enough as it makes me very unmotivated at work).

So yesterday afternoon as I watched the clock waiting for an appropriate go time, my mind just started wandering, and I thought about my very first business trip. I was a first year analyst at Wasserstein, and it was October 2001. My MD and a Director had a meeting in Seattle, and I was working on the pitchbook. For a West Coast trip, standard practice would be to work all night, finish the books late morning/early afternoon, print them and then bring them up to my bosses' office before their late afternoon/early evening flight.

Problem was, my bosses had a meeting in Boston the day before their meeting in Seattle, and were flying straight from Boston. So, after pulling an all-nighter finishing the books, scrambling to get them printed in the late morning, and then having to bind them myself for some reason I can't recall right now - you guessed it. I hopped in a car and headed for La Guardia. Delta Shuttle to Logan. After being "randomly selected" for additional security screening (granted, this was a month after 9/11 and I was a brown person who hadn't shaved in over 24 hours), I boarded the plane, passed out since I hadn't slept yet, and woke up in Boston. Since my bosses were flying out of a different terminal than I was, I literally had to run from my terminal to theirs carrying a bunch of pitchbooks. I found my bosses, gave them the books, and even got a couple "trooper" compliments for making the trip.

Fortunately the trip wasn't a complete waste, i.e. I DID manage to leave the airport and grab dinner with a friend in Boston. Nevertheless, it was one crappy trip, and it makes me realize how far I've come in the last 4 1/2 years.

Gotta love being a first year analyst. Memories to last a lifetime.

Across the Pond...

Before I get to the London part of this post, I just had to say that I had a fantastic time at Reena and Smitty's Bday/my going away party on Friday night. Granted, Reena and Smitty picked about the worst possible place to have it - 2 floors and only 1 bar, no Patron or even semi-decent Tequila, and only 1 bathroom on the top floor, which, as many of you know, became a major issue and eventually forced me to leave early. F'in Smitty!



My last Saturday in NY was also memorable - a great brunch with the usual crew and the usual amount of drinking at HK, then some hookah. Even though I'm positive she doesn't read this, a special shout-out to Shef for calling me and preventing me from being iPod-less for 3 months. I owe you big time.



Got to the airport early, so continued my drunkenness by downing a couple brews at the BA lounge. Very useful as I was able to pass out before the plane even took off and managed to get a decent night's sleep on the plane.

Arrived Sunday morning in London. After spending an HOUR waiting to go through passport control (lazy Europeans only had like 3 of 10 booths open), I was rushed to a car by the driver of a car service. He literally said "no, I'm in a rush" when I asked if I could stop at the ATM for some cash. Normally this would not be a big deal, but I'll explain later.

Got to my apartment and was just amazed. Since it's corporate housing I expected it to be pretty nice, but still I was impressed. The building has a very hotel-like feel, with the concierge, porter, gym, business center (I refuse to spell it "centre"), etc. My apartment was even more impressive...1 bedroom place, with a big living room, separate dining/work area, and fully-furnished kitchen. The place even has a washer/dryer. Needless to say, it will be a great place to crash for any and all who decide to visit. As I told Shashank earlier today, "Corporate Housing 1, Living with Smitty 0"

Spent the rest of yesterday roaming the residential area I live in looking for an ATM, eventually having to walk like 10 minutes to the nearest bank (Barclays baby!), doing some grocery shopping (essentially milk, water, diet coke, cereal, and a couple frozen dinners), buying a cellphone, and watching whatever American TV was on (limited to The OC, Friends, and Everybody Hates Chris...no ESPN in the apartment).

Today is the first day of "work" at the new office, and fortunately I haven't had much to do outside of setting up my computer and opening up the obligatory Barclays bank account with the help of the obligatory Indian banker. There are literally like 5 people in the office right now, in a 20-odd person group. I honestly don't know where anyone is, and don't really care as long as no one starts giving me work to do.

That's all for now. This weekend is a 4-day weekend here in the UK so hopefully I'll have some interesting stories to tell.

Countdown to London

It's Friday, 7:11pm right now. I'm sitting in my room, which is largely empty save for a couple suitcases and all the furniture I am leaving behind for my roommates. My flight for London leaves in 25 hours and 19 minutes.

The last couple weeks have basically been a nonstop party. My last day of work here in NY was last Friday, and then a bunch of out-of-town friends came in for a weekend full of sunshine, Patron, brunch, Grey Goose, bowling, more Patron, beer, partying, Captain Morgan, picture-taking, Scotch, dancing on bars on Sunday night/Monday morning at 4am, and just a little more Patron. I'll spare the details, as Terence's post has got the weekend down cold. All in all, a FANTASTIC time.

Then this week has been low-key partying, sleeping in, and packing. It all culminates tonight, with the combined bday parties of Smitty and Reena as well as my going away party (I suspect there is a bigger going away party planned for tomorrow at 831pm.)

So for the last couple of weeks, I hadn't started getting sentimental. But on Tuesday, when I was at a reception for NY-area Anderson admits and alumni, it started hitting me, as whenever anyone asked what I'm doing for the next several months before school, it always started with "I'm leaving NY on Saturday to go to London for a few months." And now, with the empty apartment, packed suitcases, and going-away party that starts in a few hours, it has FINALLY officially sunk in. I am leaving New York tomorrow. 4 years, 8 months, and 30 days since I moved here (yes, I remember the exact day that I moved here - July 9, 2001). OK, I realize I'm just rambling at this point.

To all my NY friends, whether still in NY or not, it's been an amazing time. I couldn't have survived these years in this city without you and all the alcohol we've shared together. To the Cali peoplez, i'll be home and ready to tear it up in the sun on June 30.

Goodbye New York. I'll miss you :(

Now that I've figured out how to add pictures to this (really not that difficult), here's some good ones from my last full weekend in NY. Enjoy.