Languages have always been one of my primary interests in life. In addition to taking almost 3 dozen college-level language classes, I have spent more than 15 years traveling to more than 60 countries around the world and obtaining firsthand exposure to languages and the cultures in which they evolved. I have been able to meet people from very diverse cultures, while following my passion for exploring relationships among the grammars of the languages of the world and pondering the influence that grammar has on thought.
For the most part, I now lecture and teach for a living. I have lectured on language and other topics to more than 12,000 people, in more than 150 cities, in 34 states of the US, and in 27 countries, on 5 continents, and in 5 languages.
I like the challenge of dealing with change, and with facing the new and unexpected. I have worked in very different capacities in many different fields.
Over my lifetime, I have written, rewritten, edited, proofread, or translated in all some 15 million words.
I have translated thousands upon thousands of pages of technical manuals, user guides, academic papers, technical articles, patents, contracts, law, speeches, and business communication into English.
I have interpreted from and into several languages in countries around the world, at international sporting events, trade shows, business meetings, business relationship negotiations, and other events.
At the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta, and for the 6 months of preliminary events leading up to the games, I was an authorized interpreter in Chinese, Japanese, and Spanish. I interpreted in several additional languages at the 1996 Paralympic Games. I also interpreted at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games.
I have a Master of Science Degree, and have worked in numerous technical fields, from computers to concrete and from manufacturing to medicine. I have worked several years each, through one of my two successful businesses, for IBM, Oracle, Salesforce, Computer Associates, Hitachi, and 2 branches of the Japanese Government. I have done work at companies such as Yahoo, Cisco, Facebook, HP, VMware, Dell, GE, Genentech, Dow Jones, the Federal Reserve Bank, Bank of America, Citibank, Royal Bank of Canada, FINRA, etc.
I have done software development off and on for decades, developing software in 3 countries, and using a dozen computer languages. I have been working with Java for the past 15 years. In my spare time, I like to ponder the theoretical worlds of cosmology and particle physics, and to explore the nature of evolution. I also find anthropology, archaeology, and ancient history to be fun.
I have visited all 50 states of the United States, multiple times, and have lived in 5 states. I have driven coast to coast more than 2 dozen times, taking all different routes, and to Alaska, and across Canada, visiting cities, national parks, and historical and nature sites. I have hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon and to the top of Yosemite’s Half Dome each more than a dozen times.
I spent more than 2 years in Europe, where I traveled all around, visited numerous historical sites, and worked in 8 countries.
I spent 6 months in Australia, 4 months in India, 8 months in 4 countries in the Middle East, and 5 months in all countries of Central America.
I spent 6 wonderful years in Japan, where I worked as a translator for several companies and government bodies. I traveled throughout the country, climbed Mount Fuji, and visited numerous historical sites, including some 50 castles.
In all, I spent close to 4 years in China, during which time I traveled throughout the country, including 2 months traveling the Silk Road from Xi-An to the Pakistan border and 1 month in Tibet, upon entering which I got off the public bus at a stop in the middle of nowhere on the Nepal-Lhasa Highway and hiked for a week to the Base Camp of Mount Everest. I have studied Chinese history extensively, and I have visited numerous historical sites. I speak 2 Chinese languages. I taught Chinese at the International School in Beijing, and I am government-certified as a chef in Guangzhou. I have attended numerous trade shows in China over the past 25 years, sometimes as an exhibitor, and I have visited dozens of factories, participating in business negotiations with several.
I studied Chinese Medicine in China, and I used acupuncture to treat several hundred people at 2 Chinese hospitals. The basis of Chinese Medicine is the Dao. Science is the analytical model of nature that evolved in the West. The Dao is the corresponding model of nature that evolved in China. Based on a lifetime of comparative analysis of the grammars of the languages in the context of which these models of nature were able to develop and to evolve, as well as two decades of comparison of the evolution of scientific development with the principles of the Dao, I consider myself an authority on the scientific nature of the Dao, as well as on its various subdivisions into Yin and Yang, the Ba-Gua, the 5 Elements, etc.
I travel frequently to China, and I am always looking for opportunities to develop relationships, business, and trade with China.
I am interested in exploring any opportunities that become available that might lead to new and challenging paths in business and in life.