Timing the showers in the rainy season

If you travel in the rainy season, you’re bound to get wet a time or two.  With that in mind B and I left the Le Bel Air Hotel on the outskirts of Luang Prabang, Laos in a couple of bicycles borrowed from the hotel.  It was already dark but we wanted to see the night market in town.  The day had been hot and sunny but we already saw some dark clouds in the sky before sunset.  The day before had rained all day and all night so the thought was that the clouds were already drained and it would take a while to fill them up again.    But by the time we climbed on our bikes we could already see the lighting at the distance but we thought it would take a while to get to us.  As soon as you roll out of the hotel the first thing you see is the Old Bridge into town.  A two-motorcycle lanes wide, wooden bridge over the Nam Kham River, a tributary to the mighty Mekong River just a few yards away.  The Nam Kham is dammed just up the river and its controllers were releasing a lot of water in preparation for more rains coming and it was showing unusually strong currents.  To the point that even some locals were mesmerized watching the waters rushing to meet the Mekong.  Impressive during the daytime but at night it sounded as there was a caged dragon under the bridge. 

Bicycling on the Old Bridge you really have to speed up, as the many motorcycles behind you don’t seem very patient and understanding to the slower human-powered two-wheelers.  But there was no other choice; they had to wait until we got through.

The night market was already in full swing.  The first stop was for a custom-made baguette avocado and chicken sandwich being sold for 15,000 Kips (a little less than US$2.00).  I hadn’t had bread in a while so it was a treat.  The bread looked a lot better than it turned out to be but still better than anything I had have in the last 4 months.

Being more familiar with the rain during the rainy season, the locals seemed to have a sensed what was coming.  Normally the rain doesn’t stop the locals from their business but this time the sudden winds and the lighting threatened that something big was coming.

Within minutes of us being at the market, the business women started to pack up their wares and bring down their tents.  We got the hint.  We immediately got our bicycles from where we had them parked and left immediately for the 15-minute ride back to the hotel.

Seemed that we thought of it a bit late as we started feeling a few drops along the way.  The rain started to pick up just as we found the Old Bridge and started heading into it.  The wooden lanes were already wet.  The lose dragon was still roaring.  The boards were shaking a little more than the first time around but we were happy to have made the crossing intime and soon were returning the lock and picking up our hotel room key from the reception.  Just as we were walking from the Reception to our cabin, the rain started coming down in earnest.  Now there was no doubt that the heavens were opening up to torrential rains. 

And rain it did.  That night Luang Prabang received torrential rains for at least 10 hours straight, which we heard later that it dropped at a rate of about an inch per hour.  Quite a night. I was just happy that we timed it just right and made it to our safe place just as the sky began to open up.  I feel for the vendors that night after night wait there for the few tourists that may inquire about something they sell to start their negotiations.  Hope they were able to time it just as well as we did. 

Lucky for us the rain subsided this morning and we were able to keep our schedule for the day.  Hopefully we can time it just as well the next time they are going to come down.  And come they will, this is after all the season for the rains in Laos.

On making (business) decisions

Being remote to our business back home, decisions is all that I make.  Or help make, because our sons back home make a lot of the decisions on the spot and only consult with me with matters of larger impact.

Business ownership is all about decisions.  It was relatively easy to make decisions when I had a boss.  Either you ask the boss, or you decide based on the level of authority you have been granted or based on the rules set up by the company.  However when you’re the boss, the decisions are on you and the outcomes of those decisions falls on you too.

And so is in life.  The product of who we are is almost all based on decisions that we have made throughout our lives.  Of course, the earliest decisions were made for us, our genes.  And later on, decisions were made on our behalf until the point when we felt that we could break out on our own.   But even before we were completely on our own we were making decisions such as the decision to attend a class or goof off with friends, or to do the homework with all the attention it deserved or going shopping to the mall.  All those small decisions shaped our lives to be what we are now.

If we thought about them, decisions are always important.  There are always implications to when, how or where we decide to do what we do.  

In business, the word on the street is that decisions are made based on someone’s gut feeling.  A lot of times the “gut” they refer to is previous business experience but sometimes it boils down to a healthy degree of risk taking. 

In science we rely more on data and facts before we make a call.  Seldom gut feeling comes into play.  Having been trained in science all of my life, business decisions don’t come easy to me.  Often times I find myself suffering from “analysis paralysis” but when I do find the nuggets of knowledge I was looking for, I feel on top of the world, even if the decision that I was supposed to have made with that information is long passed.

As we get older, decision-making becomes easier.  When you’re young you still have to make some basic decisions that are the building blocks that will help you make the big decisions later on.  Let me use honesty as an example.  Early in your life you confront yourself with the decision to be honest or not.  A small “white lie” gets you out of some trouble and this by itself becomes a bit of information that is used later on when you are confronted in similar situations.   If you continue on that path and become a dishonest or deceitful person, your business decisions and your life in general could take a shady path and you shouldn’t be surprise of where you may end up.  If on the other hand, early on you make the decision to always be true to your word, then every time a decision that involves being honest confronts you, it’d be an easy decision for you.

The key to make the process of making decisions easier is to agree to a set of principles that you can use to guide you at all times.  The principles can be self-imposed or can come from someone else.   But regardless, we make the decision to abide by them or not.

People with deep religious convictions have an easier time making decisions than others.  Here in Thailand I have witnessed how some (actually, a lot) base their decisions in their faith to Buddha and where the stars line up for them.  Christians and Muslins also base a lot of their decisions in their faith on the Bible and the Koran respectively.  Of course some times what is written is open to interpretation but when the writing is crystal clear, the decisions they make should be made easily.  The basic principles used by them have already being set for them.  When they were younger, the decision was to follow in their parent’s beliefs or go on their own.  If following their parents, or their traditions, or their culture, then the principles already set for them and their decisions should be based on those principles.

In business it’s the same except that every business is an entity on it’s own.  It is like another person that has been created, either by the sole owner or by a committee.  And like a person, it needs to have its set of principles that “it” will use to make decisions when the time comes.   Having a clear vision for the future of the business and clear operating procedures make the tough job of making decisions a lot easier.