March has and continues to be an exciting month for me and perhaps after reading this entry, you’ll understand why things have been fairly quiet on the journal side. By the time April 1st rolls by, I will have visited California, made an excursion to Manhattan and neighboring New Jersey, and spent well over a week in Louisiana. I guess it makes sense to start at the beginning.
In mid-February, I applied for a position at Apple as a software engineer in the iCal division. As time progressed, I interviewed (over the phone) with several Apple employees and was invited to visit Apple and spend a full day interviewing with the team. So, between March 2nd and 4th, I travelled well over 6000 miles between Clinton, NY and Cupertino, CA, visiting Syracuse, Newark, and San Jose airports on the way. During my less than 24 hour visit to California, I spent considerable time trying to sell myself and my skills to a group of highly talented and genuinely interesting individuals. The interviews were more tiring than I expected but in the end, were a wonderful opportunity to learn more about Apple and the employees that help make it so successful. Perhaps one day I’ll write more about the interviews, but for the time being I’ll leave the topic alone. Long story short, my software engineering skills weren’t really at the level Apple needed for the iCal team (which was my gut feeling throughout) but I’m still in talks with Apple and am hoping for the best. Honestly, the company has such a vibrant atmosphere that no matter what job is offered, it would be enticing: to work with employees who truly care about their products is something that many firms lack.
Moving to the present, for the past five days, I’ve been visiting my parents in Manhattan for the beginning of our spring break. It’s always nice to get back to the city and spend time visiting friends and family, the various ethnic neighborhoods, and of course getting a different taste of life. The hustle and bustle, the fast pace, and the vibe are all a welcome change compared to the speed of life upstate. The highlight of the trip was definitely getting a chance to meet up with friends outside of Hamilton’s social life.
I’m now sitting on an Amtrak train heading back to campus. Tomorrow, I’m leading with a close friend a group of 8 other Hamilton students a trip to Bogalusa, LA. We’re heading down to do some outreach work: light construction, general chores, and whatever is asked of us. It will take two days to get down there on our jitney but with four drivers, the trip should be relatively painless. We’ll be arriving late Saturday and will work till Thursday. Friday, we once again will bundle up in the jitney and spend another two days driving back to campus, arriving late Saturday. Sunday will be a day of rest, with classes beginning once again on Monday. Even with all the traveling, I’m very much looking forward to this trip. I’ve never been this far south and any help that we can provide will make us feel just that much closer with the victims of Hurricane Katrina (and Rita). Moreover, we’re hoping to be able to take the group down to New Orleans for an evening, just to get a first hand feel for the disaster they went through. I’ll be bringing a camera down with me, so I’m hoping to write up a journal entry, complete with photos, once I get back to campus.
So take this as fair warning: I’ll be unreachable via email (I’ll be bringing my cell phone with me and hopefully the charger too) until March 26th (a week from Sunday) and won’t have access to a computer. So any technical support questions relating to High Priority, photo Drop, or HTML Creator will have to wait until I get back. If it’s urgent and you know my telephone number, feel free to leave a message on my cell phone and I’ll try and get back to you in the evenings.
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