Your Own Business

Business time

Having been in the working world for a few years, I have often heard from others how powerful having your own business could be. This came in the form of phrases like "freedom from the job" and "storage space for one's own ideas." With this document, I would like to make sense of this concept as part of the foundation for my own business.


Having started my career as an independent software consultant for two and a half years and now having transitioned to a full-time software development job at HP for 8 months, I have had the opportunity to experience both sides of the spectrum. From this experience, I can say that there are quite a few differences between running your own business and working as an employee for another company.

Below, I list what running your own business means:

• You can choose the field you want to work in based on your interests and skills.
• You can choose who you do business with.
• You can structure your own working hours.
• You are in full control of the integrity and standards of your business.
• You are more prone to lawsuits from clients.
• Much of this relates to who you do business with.
• There are ways to protect your personal assets, such as forming an LLC.
• Your tax situation is more complex (self-employment tax, business deductions, etc.).
• You are responsible for marketing your business and finding clients with whom to work with.
• You are responsible for your own medical insurance and other benefits.

Job freedom

In short, your own business is the storage space for your own ideas, while other businesses are the storage space for others' ideas. Running your own business grants you a great deal of flexibility and freedom, but, at the same time, requires a lot of "smarts." To be successful, you need to not only understand your field, but to also understand the business world. For example, I could work as a software developer at HP solely with my knowledge of Computer Science, relying on the managers to deal with business. However, for me to run my own software consulting business, I would need to open up to the big world, keeping in mind things like customer support, marketing, business law, business taxation, product documentation, quality assurance, and company reputation.

Learning Indian Cooking - Mushroom Masala, Aloo Gobi

I have always had a craving for Indian food, but have had to resist the urge due to the extreme level of spice used in most Indian restaurants I have experienced. Having taken a step into the world of cooking, I decided it was time to learn to cook some Indian food for myself, where the spice level would be in my direct control. In my earlier online research, I had found I Heart Curry, an Indian cooking school. Perusing the website and seeing Fharzana's (the teacher) excellent cooking philosophy, I decided to enroll in a class.

Entering Fharzana's home, I was greeted with a hot chai... which I refused to drink due to lactose intolerance ;). Anyhow, in the class Fharzana took the time to teach us about knives, oil, nutrition, ingredients, cutting, spices, shelf life... really everything there is to cooking. As we cooked, Fharzana gave us the opportunity to ask questions and take an active role in the class. Not only this, she took into account everyone's sensitivities, particularly bringing the spice level down and keeping separate non-dairy portions for me. By the end of the class, we had created Masala Toast, Aloo Gobi, and Mushroom Masala. All three dishes felt very good on my system, with Masala Toast being my favorite. Overall, I felt very comfortable in the class.

Apprentice Chef Amil in Fharzana's kitchen

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Knowing that practice makes perfect and that we remember recent things better, I decided to replicate these dishes on my own as soon as practical.

First, Mushroom Masala. With the help of some spices Fharzana gave me and an Indian market,I successfully replicated the dish. It turned out quite well.

The ingredients for Mushroom Masala (note the coconut milk)

The finished product

The mushrooms were begging for some rice on the side ;)

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However, I didn't stop there. No... I became hungry again. The time was right for Aloo Gobi (Potato Cauliflower). Using fresh ingredients from the farmer's market, I took a shot at it. Aside from the improperly cleaned stainless steel pot in which my corn oil caught on fire (hey, I'm still new to this!), everything turned out well.

Fresh Farmer's Market ingredients

The finished product... resting on top of Fharzana's top-secret recipe ;)

I'm really enjoying learning how to cook. It's an Art. Yet, at the same time it is a survival skill... fulfilling our fundamental need for food.

Learning to Cook

Through my training in the Martial Arts, I have become very sensitive to the food I eat. As opposed to taste, I focus more on how food feels on my body. As I am learning, food can have a huge impact on energy level. With good food, I can have an excellent day.

Unfortunately, one cannot always rely on restaurants; for me, it has always been a hit-and-miss experience, with the exception of two excellent restaurants I know of. Many places compromise the freshness of food to save money; others sacrifice cleanliness. Really, we don't know what is going on in the kitchen or where the ingredients came from. At the extreme, there are people that take food from the dumpster and cook it up for others (I know of two).

Having some time over the holidays, I decided to take it upon myself to learn more about cooking. The basic rice and steamed vegetables I had been cooking for about a year was not cutting it.

Where did I start? By looking for a cooking class. Through Yelp, I found two excellent teachers. The first was Sunshine in SF, who taught me how to cook Pad Thai Tofu, Tom Kha Tofu Soup, and Black Sticky Rice with Custard. Going in as a student, I paid attention to her cooking technique and picked up many tips along the way. Sunshine took the time to answer all my questions and even took some pictures of me!

The second was Emily Dellas in SF, who taught me in a group class how to cook "Gluten- Free Gourmet", which included Arugula & Pomegranate Salad, Squash & Fennel Soup w. Spiced Pumpkin Seeds, Whole Seabass Baked w. Mushrooms in Parchment, and Flourless Chocolate Cake. Emily possessed a lot of knowledge regarding the science of nutrition and explained how to find high quality ingredients and how to cook to maximize the nutrition in food. Cooking really is an art!

Knowing that practice makes perfect, I decided to try to replicate the Thai recipes at my place while the experience was still fresh in my mind. Within a week, I had replicated the Pad Thai twice, which turned out very well both times. My second attempt at Tom Kha Soup did not turn out well, but perhaps my third attempt will yield different results!

Anyhow, I now have the ability to cook delicious Pad Thai!

 

Evil Telco Service - Poster Session

One of the most interesting and rewarding classes I took at Berkeley was CS194, a Mobile class taught by Kurtis Heimerl and Eric Brewer. Unlike most of the undergraduate courses I had taken, this class was structured more like a graduate-level course. We went over many different topics, but our main focus was a semester-long research project.
In fact, I enjoyed this class so much, I decided to do research with Kurtis and Eric in the TIER group.

The project I worked on was one in which my group members (Patrick Tiet, Shirley Wu, and Fadi Haddad) and I set up a 2G cell phone network with the purpose of illustrating just how insecure mobile communications currently are. We dubbed it "Evil Telco Service." At the end of the semester, we presented our work in a poster session with the rest of our classmates.

Our poster

A look from the side

Our table

USRP radio

For reference, I uploaded the poster we used and our original design document.

The poster session took place on Wednesday, May 2nd from 1-4PM on the 5th floor of Soda Hall.
Special thanks to George Chigrichenko for taking these pictures!