nan | 楠木

So, we finally get to the point where we actually get to debate!
Well, that was what I thought when I woke up in the morning. I was rather excited, after seeing yesterday’s masters. I thought I could bring some new ideas to the debate, and it would be an interesting experience sharing them with peers from other countries. The interaction would be very enlightening.
Of course, the fun part only starts when the debating starts. So meanwhile, we had to wait. And wait. And wait.
The waiting starts right after we get off the bus. Because we have so many people, we jammed the whole dining facility up right away. It was probably a 45 minute wait to finally get to the serving area. And then there was no food. Which lead to more wait. There’s probably a host of things the organizers can do to have prevented this, but I’m not going to get into that argument.
Then we moved to a fine sports hall, which was the main convention grounds where the motions are announced. Not enough seats were laid out for everyone, and the 3 projector screens were not really big enough. But enough of this moaning. We waited another hour while the organizers kept reminding us to sign in. Then the first round started.
The motion was whether state funding for religious schools should be banned. We were Closing Opposition. I thought it could have been a close debate, but we made quite a number of mistakes, which lead to us being last. But since it was our first ever British Parliamentary style debate, I didn’t really mind. I just wanted to get myself familiarized with the style and format. The Opening Opposition was quite solid: basically they had a clear structure and some very good ideas. They deserve to be first.
Lunch, and things were more smoothly done this time. Then more wait.
Second round was whether the UK should abolish its nuclear arsenal or not. We were Closing Government. Since the second half teams have to make extensions, I tried to make that my focus as I prepared. Unfortunately the Opening Government had a lot of the same arguments, and I think I was quite unclear myself which points I really wanted to talk about. That lead to my speech not really having clear extensions. Oh well, last place again.
More wait. We became literally quite exhausted at this stage. But I badly wanted to salvage something out of this day.
Which we did. The 3rd round of the day was over whether South Africa should support accelerated land redistribution. We were Closing Opposition. Well, frankly, we knew nothing about the background of this debate (and there’s a big big background apparently, as I researched it just now). Lucky for us, nobody else in the debate knew either. The Korean Opening Government and the Japanese Closing Government probably had a hard time preparing. To make things even more interesting, the Opening Opposition decided to quit, and we had a temporary swing team, which only had one person. She talked twice.
Anyways, because of all those twists and turns, I did feel like it was a comfortable win. We had some good arguments, and I think I did a better job organizing them.
After dinner, it was supposed to be a women’s night, with some theme activities, but most of us were too tired for that I guess. We hopped on a bus and got back to the hotel, where I crashed into the bed immediately.

After the hectic registration day, you’d think that the organizers would get themselves organized and get their act together. Well, that apparently wasn’t the case.
The day started off with 2 Masters rounds in the morning. It was supposed to start at 0930 as listed on the schedule; nothing really moved until 1000 or so, and the rounds didn’t start until 1030 or something. That being said, the rounds themselves were good and entertaining. The first debate was over whether we should have one permanent host city for the Olympics, the second was over whether the government should set up legalized safe injection facilities for drug addicts.
The first debate inevitably led to someone mentioning China’s human rights issue. Oh well, I can live with that. The second debate I witnessed was far more interesting, where I saw some good demonstration of speech skills covering up limited ideas. It’s probably also worth mentioning how excited the debaters can appear to be. I don’t know if they are acting or not.
In the afternoon we had briefings, and that’s where we got to know the organizers a bit better. Well, this is where the fun part starts. Not only are they disorganized, they are also disrespectful. Actually I don’t have a big issue over that – my own experience tells me that when you meet some people who you just don’t like, you just have to live with it; but coming from a country where respect is a big deal for a lot of people, and a university where student-run events are hugely efficient and organized, I do have to say that I’m getting plenty of laughs out of the current situation.

It’s a bit ironic. I thought I could get over some of the mistakes I’ve made, that I could live with it and accept the fact that sometimes I don’t get the best result I could’ve achieved. But today when I met some “friends and foes” from prior matches, I couldn’t help torturing myself again, scrutinizing the little bits that lead to the ending outcomes.
Grow up, I tell myself. But it’s not easy to face these inner demons.

Yeap, it’s official, I’m in Canada, taking part in the Worlds Debating Championships 2007.
Staying at the Sheraton in Vancouver. Room isn’t as good as should be expected, but anyway, since I’m not paying, probably shouldn’t be complaining.
The organization is a bit messy, but I guess I couldn’t really complain about that either, since there are 339 teams in this year’s competition. Took us a good few hours to get registered and checked into our rooms.
But I was able to sneak out and do some walking around. Vancouver’s very clean, and the street’s quite quiet too. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t traffic or commotion; just that the cars are very orderly and refrain from honking.
Witnessed an interesting demonstration today too, in front of a fashion store. A girl was wearing only underwear, protesting against fur clothes that the store allegedly promoted or something. The temperature was quite cold, so I admire her courage. A policeman stood nearby.

I read a column on Hexun today, talking about how the world was flat, but not equal. Personally I wasn’t too interested in the article. It was the usual talk on how unequal the world was, what inequalities existed, and how nobody was doing anything etc. I stopped reading after about 10 seconds.
However, one fact got me thinking. Friedman’s book was an international bestseller last year. It only entered China this year. Talk about the world being flat, when you’re intellectually one year behind the whole world.
If there is anything that we should learn from the book, it’s that in this era of globalization, we need to be open to ideas, and let information flow as much as possible. Friedman credits China and India’s success to the playing field being leveled by advances in IT and such. Because of the free flow of ideas, a person in China can make himself just as competitive as a person in the US.
If this is the case, then we should be especially critical of the barriers that still stand between us and free communication. For a book to be made one year late to the public, that’s just against the very notion of the book itself. While it’s arguable that it takes time to negotiate a deal with the publishers and do the translation, there should be no barrier on bringing in the original English version to English book-stores across the country.
And yet, I searched in vain last year to find a copy. I don’t know what the details behind that (is it purely a case of economics, or are there more political restrictions? Personally I think it’s the latter), but I ended up buying a copy in Seoul.
I understand the concerns of the government over what publications are allowed or not. But for competitiveness’s sake, let’s not make the world round for ourselves.

www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm
“He also feels his agency failed to challenge green opposition to DDT, a once-controversial chemical that works safely against malaria when sprayed inside dwellings.”
-Arata Kochi, head of the World Health Organisation’s malaria programme

Well, it just aggravates me every time I read about the DDT debacle. What a shame.

This weekend I had some spare time, so I did some catching up with one of my favorite TV series: 24.
Having not watched the series in a long time, I found it hard to recall what happened to all the characters at the end of Season 4. However that soon ceased to pose an issue: many of the old characters end up dying on their first appearance. To the extent that I began to hope that certain likable characters, such as the lovely Kim, do not appear, in fear of them suffering gruesome deaths.
Having finished the 5th Season in 2 days (well, there really isn’t any other way to enjoy 24, is there?), I found myself in the usual after-24 mood. I was wholly satisfied, yet still hoping for more. And because of the ending, which is never “happily ever after”, I knew I could count on it that there will be more action coming.
As far as my memory can recollect (to form a comparison with previous seasons), Season 5 has to be one of the tightest seasons. The plot is well crafted, and I can’t really recall one hour where there were was a short let-down. The action just keeps rolling. And the plot stays true to the tradition of constantly providing surprising twists. Unfortunately the sheer amount of twists makes it impossible to make certain characters look and act consistent: one hour they were the protagonists, the next they turn out to be really big bad-asses. However, I’m sure most audiences can forgive this, while they’re busy devouring the action.
The music in Season 5 seems to be more fast-paced, with a slight cyberpunk (?) feel to it. It’s very fitting to the occasion and serves well in keeping the tension.
Cast-wise, this is still an one-man show, and as long as Kiefer is at the top of his game, the rest doesn’t really matter. Some previously minor characters get bigger parts, such as the loyal SS agent Aaron Pierce. Others are on and off, with no explanation where they went (or where they’re hiding, in some cases). It’s a small issue but I do get the feel that the plot is not water-tight enough in this respect.
Anyway, 24 Season 5 delivers on all fronts. If you’ve got the odd 16 hours to spare, this is definitely worth the time.

4 months isn’t a long time for me to form any conclusive judgments, but I’d like to summarize some of my first observations of the industry.

• Data is important only to the extent that it serves to make a point.
  • As an entry-level employee, most of my time will be spent on juggling with data. It’s not a pleasant job. The data could be faulty. There might be no data at all. But in the end I’m not judged by how much data I could find; I’m judged by if I’ve proved the hypotheses or not.
  • Sometimes I devote too much time on one specific piece of data, trying to make it perfect. I should always keep in mind the bigger picture.
• You should be comfortable with your own analyses.
  • Often the approach for an analysis is given by the supervisor. The approach should be fine in theory; in execution, you should not be too rigid and end up not using your own judgment. As the person with the most exposure to the raw data, you should go beyond the defined approach and check if it makes sense; if there are any gaps; if there are any better approaches.
  • Some times the outputs of the analyses do not prove the case, or aren’t strong enough. You’ll be under pressure to adjust. While it is perfectly legitimate to revisit the analysis and try to make the result more robust, you should always be comfortable with the steps you’re taking.
  • Be rigorous and don’t be satisfied at the first output that seems to serve the purpose; it’s very tempting to call it a victory and wrap it up, but you’ll find that it’s better to check it again. The last thing you want is to have to be responsible for fixing it at the last minute, after the client has found an issue with it.
• It’s all about effective communication.
  • While as a junior employee you won’t be responsible for a lot of client interaction, you should realize in the end that the project’s success relies on effective communication.
  • As outsiders to the client’s company, we have the advantage of the fresh perspective; however we should bear in mind the client’ s own perspective. We are not trying to prove them wrong on every issue. Instead we want to help them make informed decisions about their business.
  • Unfortunately, we are not insulated from the office politics of our client. This means that we need to be extra careful in our client communication.

I had read Gladwell’s books a while back. The Tipping Point was the first I read. I found it enjoyable, and entertainingly satisfactory. It was a bit wordy and redundant, quite a lot of examples were given to illustrate the same point. Nonetheless it was a good book.
Blink is also good enough – to the extent that it had enough of the same “wow” factor found in The Tipping Point. A lot of the points it started off by making were innovative, and challenged conventional thinking. Just as the previous book had done. However, I felt that this time around I was not going to be satisfied just by being offered a lot of examples which illustrate the power of our unconscious rapid thinking. The book goes off in several directions, but never comes together to bring a unified meaning. And as a guy working in a industry which is obsessed about making the point, I find the book to be unsatisfying. I kept asking, what’s the point? What’s the implication? What’s the big picture? Unfortunately, those questions are not well addressed.
So while these two books makes for entertaining reading, be prepared to be frustrated. You’ll finish them with a lot more questions unanswered than when you started.