I want to be a Kiva Fellow in Cambodia

I live in the USA, land of the free!

California

Economic development is the solution to many hurdles in Third World countries, including improved education, prevention of diseases, and many other issues that are difficult to solve or prevent, such as human trafficking. My general long-term goal is to start a sustainable non-profit that will improve the lives of others. As I traveled to developing countries and saw the great need for aid, my interests became focused on empowering locals of developing countries, specifically in rural areas.

My inspiration to become a Kiva Fellow stems from the cycle of development. I am persistent about solving issues such as healthcare and child abuse; however, I see economic development provided by access to capital the most sustainable solution to many of the issues that impoverished countries face. Although other important causes, such as education, also deserve funds and assistance, I believe education can be achieved by providing the resources necessary for families to make a healthy income and thus attain the potential to provide such services.

I come from a middle class immigrant family in California – however, my parents spent every dime they had on my education and health. We didn’t have money for much else and though I despised wearing hand-me-downs through high school, I look back and feel indebted to the dedication my parents had to provide me with the best resources possible. I was similarly fortunate because when I couldn’t afford to attend college, UCLA offered me a full-tuition merit-based scholarship that allowed me to attend. I have been given opportunities my entire life and I want to give others the same opportunities I was fortunate to receive.

Beyond my passion for going to SE Asia to volunteer in microfinance, Kiva as an organization has been a pioneer in its field, allowing thousands of people globally to have access to capital. Moreover, it has encouraged microfinance all over the world and given the ability for overseas partners to launch successful and sustainable programs. I am interested in better understanding how these partnerships are built and what gaps still exist in the system. Being a Kiva fellow would provide me with the opportunity to not only give back to the community but progress myself as a leader, improve my network of similarly socially-minded volunteers, and build confidence to making wide leaps in social impact both nationally and abroad.

High School Graduation Speech: June 2005

For old memories’ sake, this was 4 years ago for my fellow classmates at Homestead High School in 2005.

Welcome fellow classmates and parents to this wonderful baccalaureate ceremony.

Many of us can remember the first time we came home after curfew.  There sat our moms and dads waiting to give us a lecture on how irresponsible we were for making them worry.  By now, if we come home after curfew, we are independent enough to take the lecture and shake it off.  Others of us spent our time being productive by hiding our progress reports and grades from our parents in order to continue with our social lives.  These rites of passage are now just distant memories. Perhaps not favorable ones, but as we stand here today, the past is irreversible, and this is our final and finest week as students on this campus.  We are now moving on, pursuing careers, a higher education …a life of responsibility we have all proved capable of managing.

Our parents can laugh now as they look back on all of the lies we told them and actually thought we had them fooled.  At the same time, we as graduates get to contemplate all of the secrets we never cared to fill them in on.  Parents, you may still see us as your innocent children who slept with a night light until we were twelve, but we’re more ready for the real world than you think.

Success blooms from a lot of hard work and a touch of luck.  Someone once said, “Luck is the intersection of opportunity and preparation.”  Fortunately for us, we have both with over four years of experience in preparation, and we have learned where to find opportunities for ourselves.  So for us, perhaps luck isn’t completely out of our control.

High school wasn’t just about algebra and reading novels- it was about life.  4 years, 25 teachers, 1100 hours at school.  Realistically, more than half of these hours were spent learning common sense and how to interact with people both younger and older.  If anything, this time here has forced us to grow up, be independent, and make our own decisions.

It has been a long four years, although now it seems short.  We finally realize how much we may miss all of the acquaintances we met in our classes and never got to hang out with outside of school.  We won’t have piles of worksheets to finish or books to color, and after four years, we now have four short days to get used to the fact that we are moving on and reaching towards our futures.

Encourage us as we use our newfound independence to climb the highest mountain even if its dangerous, but be prepared to comfort us if we fall, and laugh with us if we stumble.  We all have memories of high school, but it is our embarrassing moments that have catalyzed our growth.  Now, we can look back and be glad we won’t make the same choices in the years to come…  although the next few years will have its share of embarrassments, too.  Class of 2005- live life to fulfill your dreams, for a mistake can only be a learning experience.  And, we will succeed, at least eventually.

–> Where has this led us? It has been 4 more years, and we are now graduating from college.  What would I say today to my classmates?

Perhaps we shall see, if I ever feel an inspiration to write…

Milken Conference in Los Angeles

-Wind generates more jobs than coal does, as of 2008

-Smart grid: (Largest project I am working on at The Climate Group)  ability of grid operator, as well as consumer, to monitor, manage, and control (allows renewables to come into grid, allows communication, with max efficiency, reliability, and choice) which reduces emissions.

Costs of smart grid are enormous: 16 trillion $ over next 20 years worldwide.

MIT found renewables to be a niche power source if we cannot implement a smartgrid system.

First Day at The Climate Group

I want to note down some surprising facts I learned today, before I forget them.

Highlights of information, in no particular order:

-CA emissions: 38% transport, 23% electricity, 20% industry, 9% commercial/residential, 6% agriculture. This explains why hybrids are allowed to drive in the carpool lane. I believe the gov’t should subsidize for CA residents to buy hybrids. The federal govt should subsidize, in fact.

-H2O! ~Collecting, treating, and delivering water is the largest use of energy in CA, about 19%.

-Offsets are when a company reduces its carbon emissions, and you can buy/sell them

- RECs, renewable energy credits, are totally different – they are just when they take dirty energy and make it renewable.

-a company can buy offsets and claim that they reduced their emissions, since they techinically own them. These offsets only count if they are deemed as additionalities. Additionalities are confirmed by CDM (Clean Development Mechanism) and is an outlined and structured process.

- Bar Camp, started in Palo Alto and used at google often, is like foo camp (foo camp is public, however, vs. bar camp which is invite only with people of certain level of expertise) and is an un-conference wihtout an agenda. invitees come up with topics themselves and an MC is present to field the conversations, but it is otherwise spontaneous and a new hit thing.

-Google plays hard to get, as expected.

-CA’s Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) demands electric utilities to procure 20% of their electricity from renewable sources by 2010. The main 3 in CA are PG&E, SCE, and San Diego something something. This explains SCE’s hiring spree in their power procurement division, and why they assured they would be the last division, and company, to lay off workers in all of southern california. CA government mandates work! It’s scramble time, utilities! However, this is a bit unfair because utility companies, in general, are already leading the clean climate change movement.

-Decoupling – only in CA – utility companies make more profit if their customers save energy – their profits are split from energy sold. Very efficient. Utility companies are valued mainly by their assets and number of customers. Great concept and should be implemented all of the US and the world.

-AB32 passed in 2006, however, plans were not created until 2008. This is how policy works and why it is so slow! Mandates are passed without plans, and allowed to be this way, for politicians to keep a successful image. By 2012, however, cap and trade will be implemented in CA. and it will be involuntary.

-Computer usage per capita in China will be 7x by 2020 of what it is today.

-CO2e from ICT (info & communications tech.)  is 1/4 from its production and materials, 3/4 from usage. ICT footprint is about 2% of global emissions today, and expected to increase. ICT emissions increases will not come from the increase in PCs, but rather data centres (data storage).

Goals:

-Figure out what consultancies promote research studies (beyond publications of short white papers) and how active they are about investing in climate change projects (this encompasses events, studies, analyses, publications, pilot funding, etc.)