September 2008 Archives

Jinsung Jang (JJ)

I was born July 26, 1976 in Seoul, Korea. 

While the geographical size of my country is one third of that of the Texas State being separated from the brothers in North Korea, her potential is thrilling.  Seoul, the capital city of Korea is very dynamic.  Some economists predict South Korea will become the top 5 economic power. 

* Rankings of Korea

Organization	Title	Ranking
OECD	Annual work hours	1 out of 27
Point Topic	Broadband Internet Access per capita	1 out of 31[91]
OECD	Scientific Literacy	1 out of 27[92]
World Fleet Statistics	Worldwide Shipbuilding Completions	1 out of 15
OECD	Annual export growth	2 out of 30[93]
OECD	Mathematical Literacy	2 out of 27[94]
WIPO	International Patents Granted	2 out of 60[95]
Economist Intelligence Unit	IT Industry Competitiveness Index	3 out of 64[96]
U.S. Energy Information Administration	Oil Refining ability	4 out of 51[97]
U.S. Energy Information Administration	Electric Generation ability	5 out of 32[98]
World Bank	Research & Development spending	5 out of 69[99]
International Institute for Strategic Studies	Size of the Armed Forces	5 out of 166[100]
United Nations	Technological Achievement	5 out of 68[101]
OICA	Worldwide Automobile Production	5 out of 53
British Petroleum	Nuclear Energy Consumption	6 out of 28[102]
International Telecommunication Union	Number of Personal Computers	6 out of 169[103]
International Iron and Steel Institute	Worldwide Steel Production	6 out of 40
World Bank	Worldwide High Technology Exports	7 out of 106[104]
Global Policy Forum	Economic Importance	10 out of 25[105]
World Economic Forum	Global Competiveness	11 out of 131[106]
Economist Intelligence Unit	Quality of Life	30 out of 155
Heritage Foundation	Index of Economic Freedom	36 out of 157[107]
CIA World Factbook	Total Fertility Rate	206 out of 221[108]

* Wikipedia

MOVIE COLLECTOR 
I do not watch TV that much, but I love watching and collecting movies.  My movie spectrum is not so wide.  I usually repeatedly watch movies I like again and again.  I have been watching each of my collection, which are about two hundred in total, forty times on average since I started to collect movies in the VHS format as a sixth grader back in 1988 - some of them I watched more than a hundred times considering my pool was small in the beginning.  

The top ten masterpieces that I thumb up for among my best collection are: 

1. The Usual Suspects (1995)

2. Oldboy (2003)

3. Matrix (1999)

4. Der Himmel über Berlin (1987)

5. The Shawshank Redemption (1994) 

6. Casino (1995)  

7. Dead Poets Society (1989)

8. A Beautiful Mind (2001)

9. The Terminator (1984)

10. Devil's Advocate (1997),  Scent of a Woman (1992)   

I was also a big fan of Metallica when I was a junior high.

I am also a big fan of German Philosopher, Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (October 15, 1844 - August 25, 1900).

OUTDOOR ACTIVITIES?
I am not that crazy about outdoor-activities since I was a little league baseball player when I was eight.  Maybe I will start golfing with my collegues sooner or later.

BELOVED SON & HUSBAND

My mother is already 72.  She is very healthy and humorous.  She is the strongest woman I have ever seen.  She always encourages her son to dream a bigger dream. She is a Christian and her favorite hobby is to growing flowering plants.

The picture below is Nandina domestica (Heavenly bamboo or Sacred bamboo) which my mother has been growing for 23 years.  It is especially beautiful in fall.

I have been married since November 2005.  Marriage is a tough and deep subject, so I won't discuss here.  (Married people would know what I am saying.)  The most important and undisputed thing is that I love my wife, Michelle.  She has been working for the Delta Airlines as a customer service manager in a Korean Branch.  She loves travel and cooking.  She is a talented cook.  She has national culinary certificates in Korean, Japanese, Chinese, and Western food - "grand slam".  For her glory, I had to be her guineapig but I really enjoyed the job.

  
The picture below was taken during my honeymoon trip in November 2005 near the Hoover Dam. My wife and I traveled Hawaii, Los Angeles, Grand Canyon, Las Vegas, and New York. My favorite was definitely Las Vegas. 

The picture below was taken in April 2008 near the Huron River in Michigan when I was attending the University of Michigan. 

Korean Augmentation Troops to the U.S. Army (KATUSA)

Serving as a Korean Augmentation Troops to the U.S. Army (KATUSA) from April 1998 to June 2000, I was in charge of my unit's Awards/NCOER (Non-commissioned Officer Evaluation Report) program.  Taking over a program rated "below average", I began with assigning clear missions on each soldier.  Since soldiers in an orderly room of a military police company should be all-round players in understaffed situations, clear work assignment had not existed as the seventeenth-century proverb has it, "everybody's work is nobody's work."  I decided to do all awards and NCOERs, allotting publications, tax levies, TDYs to others, because planning and tracking was a key element; there were 20 awards and NCOERs to process every month while it took 3 months for each to go through the chain of command from the company, battalion, and brigade across different cities.

On the Battalion Inspection in 2000, the program was rated "exceptional" for error rate lower than 5 percent, processing approximately 500 awards and 100 NCOERs.  I am proud of having taken lead in executing a successful program on the most confidential Army personnel records.  I was awarded an U.S. Army Commendation Medal (ARCOM), the highest decoration for non-U.S. Army personnel.

The people in the picture below were my mentors and friends: SFC Visger, SFC Towery, and SFC Banicki (from the left)

Epilogue

This is the aging process of a man or you might call it a journey: Undergraduate Commencement (August 2002) --> A Rookie Researcher at KFTC (January 2003) --> Senior Researcher at KFTC (January 2005), very stressed!  --> Research Officer at KFTC (April 2006) (clockwise from the top left)

* The last picture was sent to the Stern Business School at NYU on their request.  They "weirdly" requested the applicants send a picture.

I sometimes think about what kind of face I will have when I make 40.  Hopefully, a good face.  I hope I could make a good journey with good people.