Even though I haven’t posted in a while, I still enjoy keeping up this yearly tradition of writing a post on my birthday.
This time I’ll keep it simple and share a few things I did in the past year:
Left Tesla to work on robotics at a startup
- I’ve been learning daily. Reminds me of my first few months at Google where everything was so new to me. I’m glad I made this pivot
Travelled more than usual, most of it this year
- went to places I’ve been before like Amsterdam, Munich (usually quarterly), London (also < ~quarterly), Copenhagen and Poland
- solo travelled Thailand (wow how original). It was the furthest I travelled, and I had an amazing time visiting Bangkok (I think I overstayed by a day), Koh Tao (my favourite by far) and Koh Samui (my least favourite by a mile)
- met a twitter friend in Bangkok which was cool
- Koh Samui was too developed for my tastes
- but Koh Tao struck the right balance for me, I even stayed for 2 extra days and dropped visiting Koh Phangan
- I bumped into 2 people I know from London (colleague from Google) and Berlin (colleague from Tesla) on Koh Tao. The chances are ridiculous
- drivers in Thailand drive like they disabled those assist lines in racing games. In the West they drive too safely
- visited Barcelona for the first time. I liked it and met so many interesting people
- Italy a few times: Rimini, Bologna, Lake Como and Colico
Misc
- competed in my first powerlifting meet
- appreciating fiction a lot more
- dined at a Michelin starred restaurant for the first time. Not for me, I prefer popping into Haji’s Persian grill or Abi’s Turkish Ocakbaşı. Reminds me of this Taleb quote:
As I get older I’m starting to appreciate having a simpler life. Yeah it sounds cliche but people often subscribe themselves to too many things, and they could never focus on few. I truly admire the likes of the late Charlie Munger, living below their means.
But then again I’m the type of guy who’s constantly changing. Tomorrow I might want to live like Future (probably not).
Anyways I’ll leave you with some thoughts from the goat:
