Awesome Halloween in Taipei

We were at Room 18 on Saturday night celebrating Halloween in pirate costumes. It was super fun night with new friends, great music on a roof top under 101 and amazing display of costumes. People had really worked hard physically, mentally and monetarily to come up with costumes.

Zombies are common in every Halloween party, but zombies I saw this year looked so real and so much in character. Good job, Taipei Zombies!There was a couple with their skin zipped open only to show blood and flesh underneath.. eew. There were plenty of cute and scary black and white swans. Also, jumping around were few LMFAO Party Rocks carrying that hot suffocating golden boxes on their heads all night. There was one super hot Eve who walked around with her apple,  little leaves to cover up and all the eyes following her back. We met a few fellow pirates and we exchanged some sword wars or friendly hugs and pictures. Cleopatra, belly dancers, nurses and maids looked super hot despite of the cliche get up. Alice in wonderland group was fantastic with complete makeup and costume. My Japanese friend was dressed creatively as a flower, she had a real flower stuck around one of her eye. She looked gorgeous and elegant. I thought "7-11, always open dude" and 'One night stand' (yeah he was literally carrying a night stand around his neck, funny but not sure of many locals got the joke;) ) were really funny.

Thank God for not a single Playboy girl! Taipei Halloween got some bonus points from me on creativity for that one ;)

Age no bar

Mountain hiking, biking, running in the park, gym, swimming.. you name it. I see 60 plus people everywhere engaging in the respective activity with so much passion and energy. I went to run in the Da-an park yesterday and this 60 plus man passed me thrice in my one 2.5K round. Seriously??

Mandarin: Once Optional, Now a Must

I have been in Taipei for two years but honestly I never got serious about learning Mandarin. In my defense, my super crazy work load prohibited me from giving justice to any formal training of this daunting language. Day to day work did not require me to know this language at all as employees were expected to know good English in American company where I worked. It was always convenient enough that only thing I had to really learn was to slow down during conversations to allow English-Mandarin translations in the background. Chinese maybe optional today but 10 years from now I am pretty sure that tables will be turned. If you want a coveted job in the market then you will be expected to know Chinese as these jobs will now be listed by Chinese companies.

Don't believe it? Well, China trip that we took few weeks ago was a big eye opener. The mere scale and pace of the city, including infrastructure, technology and international presence was simply overwhelming. It is really hard to fathom how strong China has become behind their closed doors and hence you have to see it with your own eyes to believe it. World-class metro, high speed trains, city bus, twelve lane roads, overpasses, skyscrapers, Olympic park, numerous malls for luxury brands, international hotels, cosmopolitan restaurants and beautiful historical and tourist spots that seemed so successful in attracting the global mass for trade and tourism. This country is growing at a very fast pace and very consistently for last decade. 9.6% GDP was recorded in the first six months of 2011 while USA was around 1%, if the trend continues then guess which side of the table will be heavier? Neighboring countries such as Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia etc with significant Mandarin speaking population are also growing at a much faster pace than any country in Europe or USA.

In next decade, Mandarin will not be an optional language in my opinion in the world of business