I've been pounded by the realization lately that I am a slave to "stuff", or material processions.

Things are nice when you have nothing, they entertain you via the TV, they inform via the computer, they let you cook food.

But the more stuff you collect, the more they enslave you.  The more you have, the more you have to clean; the more you have, the more you worry about it being stolen; the more you have, the more space stuff takes, until you have no more space at all.

Human nature the way it is, we just like collecting stuff, useful or not.  Therein lies the rub.

"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy, and where thieves break in and steal.  But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.  For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

Hopefully my treasure is in the right place!

Today marks exactly 2 years since I started living a dream.

As a kid I was fascinated by computers.  I loved computer games, I remember starring for hours at my old trusty monochrome monitor playing 3d-tetris.  Very soon my passion was to create my own computer games, which meant programming.

By high school I was learning programming on my own.  I spent lunch breaks and recess programming, understanding concepts like variables and arrays in languages no one hears about like logo and turing.  By then I had a goal, to work for the most famous software company, Microsoft.

For a long time it appeared as a pipe dream.  The first internship I had I saw a posting from Microsoft and I eagerly applied.  Every day I waited for a response on an interview, then I got the answer, NO.  I was crushed, and then my friends told me they got it.  I remember even now how jealous I was, that my friends got the dream that I had.  Later my friends told me it was a joke, that no one in our first year class got an interview.  But it did not cure the crushed hopes.

Things did not get easier in the years after that, I got bad internships and jobs which gave me the wrong background for working at Microsoft.  I finally got my desire in my 3rd year, an interview with Microsoft.  I got the one chance in life to achieve my dream.  And what happened, one of the worst interviews I ever did.  I fumbled the simple programming question, and then I gave up on it....(Tip #1, never give up on an interview).  Well there went my dream, so I thought.

Its moments like this that a mom is truly priceless (they are priceless all the time, but more at these moments).  My mom just prayed for me, asking God for me to work for Microsoft.  She then told me that when I got the offer, I had to take her out to a very expensive dinner for all those prayers.  Fourth year came about and my last chance to get an internship.  I got an interview again, again I did all the programming questions I could find, read all the interview tips I laid my hands on.  The interview came, and I did impossibly better then the first time.  Still when I saw the email that I had an offer, oh what joy!  I was bouncing off the walls, I could not stop jumping in my dorm room.  It was an excitement I will never forget, to see my dream become reality.

The rest of the story is short.  I took my mom and my whole family to a very expensive dinner.  And then I started working for Microsoft, first as an intern, then as a full time employee.  How has it been?  Everything I dreamed about, working with smartest people and the coolest products.  To meet dear friends and be in a true community. Its been a dream, to live my dream.