2024 Aug-Sep Update

Updated on: 2024-10-10

August and September were filled with travels and new people. I wrapped up my work for Heurist in August and started really leaning into my sabbatical.

I made a website https://binaryfiddle.com that is a spiritual successor to https://www.violinstringreview.com, where musicians can review and discover violin, viola and cello strings. I made it with the following tech stack:

• Next.js and TailwindCSS for the frontend
• Express.js for the backend
• Supabase (PostgreSQL) for the database
• Scrapy for web scraping
• A GCP compute instance using Nginx as a reverse proxy for hosting

Next steps:

• Add user signup and authentication
• Add a feature for musicians to share their setups and collections (instruments, bows, strings combos, etc)

🌎 Travels

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🇯🇵 Tokyo and Hokkaido, JP

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I visited Tokyo and subsequently Hokkaido for the first time from Sep 12 to 22. I was quite impressed by the cleanliness, quantity and quality of public services of Japanese cities, from mass transit to the ubiquitous 24-hour convenience stores.

By complete chance, I bumped into Eddy and Brett from TwoSet violins on the street of Tokyo in Ginza. I was waiting in the line outside of a ramen restaurant, and they just walked by and joined the line. We had a casual conversations and I learned later that they had just shot a video at the Nippon Music Foundation, trying a bunch of valuable Stradivari violins.

🇨🇳 Shanghai, CN

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On my way back to the US, I stopped by Shanghai for a few days with my parents. It was during the national holiday week, the city was bustling with people out and about. Other than a quick visit to the Bund, we spent most of our time walking around parks and enjoying amenities at the hotel.

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 People

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Friends at Internet Development Studio

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In an serendipitous turn of events, I made friends with folks at the Internet Development Studio, it dawned on me how how little I knew about software and design outside of the bubble I was in at big tech, and how differently high performers think and execute their ideas. In the beginning of October, I rented a dedicated workspace at Internet Development Studio and made an commitment to myself to show up, learn, and make things.

Beverly Gilyeart and Edward Parker

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Beverly’s been my violin teacher for 6 years and Ed is her partner. We’ve become friendly over the years and I’ve learned a lot from them. Beverly studied music while Ed was an executive at Boeing decades ago. Both share a love for animals. While I was away in Japan and Mexico earlier this year, Beverly and Ed took care of my cat Henry for me.

📅 Happening soon:

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• Oct 13:

  • Rehearsal with Sifei, Beethoven violin sonata no 1, mvt 1
  • Jimmy Lee’s birthday party at Internet Development Studio

• Oct 19:

  • Mechanical keyboard meetup at Internet Development Studio

• Oct 26:

  • Violin recital at Greenwood violin studio