Weekend in Las Vegas

Since Monday was a holiday (Memorial Day), me and my LA friends drove down to LAS VEGAS to have some fun. I had a really great time gambling, shopping, and eating (what else do you do in Vegas?).... But I think I ate too much this weekend. We first started out with seafood buffet (great lobster tail) on Saturday night, then we had the Rio World Carnival buffet (crab legs - yum) on Sunday, and then we ended the weekend by driving back to LA to Koreatown to have Korean BBQ at this place called Manna. So stuffed.

We also managed to do some outlet shopping where I bought few sweaters for the cold winter of Ithaca. I also played Blackjack and slot machine. Overall, I came out about $30 under -- which was not bad considering that I had expected to lose a lot more.

We also visited the new luxurious Wynn hotel on the strip. Wynn was pretty impressive with all of the luxurious feel of an upscale hotel, but minus the "uppidy" feel of Bellagio (in my opinion).

It was nice to hang out with my LA friends once again. It has been awhile since I went on a trip with them although we use to go everywhere together (and I still try to with my schedule). I wish I can go to Cancun with them in July but hopefully they'll take lots of pics so I can live vicarously through them. They are my closest group of friends whom I have known forever. Even though I haven't lived in LA for few years now, its always good to know that whenever I'm back and we hang out, it feels as if I never really left LA.

After the seafood buffet


Inside Wynn Hotel


Cool lights in Wynn


Interesting shoe store in Wynn

Negotiations Class

Yay! I just found out that I got an A in my Negotiations class! :) This class was definitely one of my favorite and probably one of the more useful classes that I have taken so far. Hopefully I'll be selected to be a TA next year! This totally made my day.

Day in LA

I spent the day doing typical LA thing -- shopping, going to the gym, eating out, and being stuck in a horrendous traffic. I went out to 3rd Street in Santa Monica around noon and the Beverly Center in the afternoon for some shopping... picked up few things that would come in handy for my internship (all necessities of course) :)

On the way back from LA, I was stuck on the 101 and 5 for the longest time. It literally took me about 1.5 hours to drive around 30 miles (!!). Being stuck in the horrible LA traffic brought back a lot of bad memory of when I had to drive all around LA to client's site during my consulting years. I miss a lot of things about LA but definitely not the traffic. It seems like the traffic is getting worse and worse everytime I'm back.. either that or I'm just use to the driving in Ithaca. I mean what city has traffic around noon time? Ridiculous. Then at night, I attended my youngest brother's award ceremony for academic excellence at his High School. He was one of the few who got an additional medallion for his achievement. Very proud of him.

Call from Professor

This morning I got a surprise phone call from my International Entrepreunership class professor that I took this past semester. I was quite surprised because no professor has ever called me before, let alone on my cellphone. Apparently he wanted to discuss with me about my final project that I did for that class - which was to come up with a business idea and plan to start an international business.

At first I thought I was in trouble but it turned out that he really liked our business idea that we pitched. Our business plan/idea was to establish a profitable western-style bakery & confectionary chain in Mainland China. He asked me if I was serious about this business plan and whether or not I'm going to start it while in business school (!). I told him that it was an idea that I've always thought about but not something I want to jump into immediately (perhaps after b-school?). I was surprised by the call because I thought we just did an OK job with the final project. I'm glad that he thought it was a good business idea.

Weekend in San Francisco

Friday Night - after driving 6 hours, I finally got to SF. I had dinner with Paigie at this sangria & tapas place called "Cha Cha Cha" in Haight/Ashbury. Eating tapas reminded me of Japanese Izakaya except instead of sake, we had sangria, and instead of yakitori, we had calamari. The place was really busy and happening on a Friday night which made it more fun. We drank a huge pitcher of sangria and needless to say, I was a bit drunk after dinner. For dinner, we had fried calamari, jerk chicken, pork chop, and side of plaintains. Then we had caramel flan wich was awesome - it tasted just like the ones I use to have in Tokyo during my "flan phase".


Domaine Carnero Vineyard (Napa Valley)




Saturday - On Saturday morning, me and my friends drove to Napa for some wine tasting. First, we stopped over at a vineyard called "Domaine Carnero" for some drink. The drink was very good and the view of the surrounding area from where we were sitting was fantastic. This was my 2nd time at this particular vineyard and its probably one of my favorite one in Napa. After our drinks, we had a nice lunch at Bistro Giovanni. The food (and the dessert) was excellent. Then we went to another vineyard called "V.Sattuci" for some more wine tasting. Bought my parents two bottles of wine and spent the rest of the afternoon shopping at the Premium Outlet before we drove back to the city. Then at night, Bea, Doris, Claudia and I had dinner at this Buck Wheat Crepe place in the city. Basically what it is a a giant warm crepe made out of Buck Wheat with various stuffing that you choose. I had the shrimp, mushroom and carmelized onion crepe and it was REALLY good. After dinner, we drove around the city until about 1am when we decided to go home. It was a long day but I had a great time.

Garden at Bistro Giovanni


Wine Tasting at V. Satucci Vineyard (Napa Valley)


Sunday - Drove back from SF to LA just in time for my dad's 60th birthday dinner with their friends in Rowland Heights at this Taiwanese restaurant. It was my second time there but probably my parent's Nth time. They absolutely love that place. The food was pretty good but what I really like about the restaurant was that they are super clean. Okay, maybe not as clean as "Ding-Tai Fung" in Arcadia but clean enough with pretty decent ambience which made the dinining experience much more pleasureable (at least for me - although my mom's favorite line for me is "you can't eat the ambiance anyways").

It's funny how time flies so quickly because as far as I can remember, its been around 3 years since I last visited San Francisco. Visiting SF this weekend has made me realize how much I missed the city! I was feeling all nostalgic while driving across on the Bay Bridge on Friday. Before this weekend, I never really considered moving back to SF to work/live after MBA - but now, I'm totally open to the idea. I think it would be fun to actually live in the city.

Officially done!

As of 4PM today, I am officially done with my first year of MBA!! This year went by super-quick. Looking back it was definitely a memorable year. Hopefully, next year will be even better.

Bea's Surprise B-Day Party

To celebrate Bea's 2xth birthday, we decided to throw her a surprise birthday party (also a great excuse to party on a Tuesday night!). What threw her off initially was the fact that the party was a week before her actual birthday (May 16th), and she looked baffled right when she walked into the house and we yelled "Surprise". After few seconds of confusion, somebody had to yell out "Happy EARLY birthday, Bea-ah!" before she realized what was going on. Hillarious. Needless to say, the night ended with lots of alcohol fun... Good times.

Some of my favorite pictures from the night:

the birthday girl:


the birthday cake


i like this picture...


group picture


we had a bit too much to drink...

a year older, a year wiser

Tonight, me and about 14 of my close friends/classmates went out and had dinner at Thai Cuisine for my birthday. The food was good but the company was even better. I had a really good time catching up with everybody and it was nice to unwind over good food and friends after what it seemed like a very long day. The dinner really made my day :)

It's about 2:30am, and I'm watching the new Britney Spears DVD that my friends got me for my birthday. I also got lots and lots of chocolates, a journal, wine, and gift card to Borders for my birthday.

Better go to bed.. gotta wake up early for my presentation that i'm giving for my Entrepreneurialship class

Pictures from Dinner:

ITH --> LAX

I just booked my ticket home for the summer. I'll be flying from Ithaca to LAX on Tuesday, May 17th. I'm excited to go back home. Hooray! :)

Hollywood in Ithaca

Tonight was our school's annual Sammy's Award night. Sammy's is an award ceremony(named after Samuel Johnson, CEO of SC Johnson - our school's main sponsor) for various kinds of group and individual awards. The event was pretty cool because they set it up so that its similar to a Hollywood-esque Grammy's award...equipped with Papparazi on site, and with red carpet. The dress code was "Rock Star Chic", which was a new concept for us business school students. Nevertheless, people came dressed in all kinds of funky rock star outfits. The most outrageous (and funny I thought) was a guy who came dressed in a Darth Vader costume. Darth Vader = Rock Star Chic?! Funny.

Darth Vader:


pictures with some of my classmates: