Clayton's Blog

(with all due respect to Rosie, Corona, and Mr. Simon) What a year it has been and what a year it will be. My big news for the year is that I moved to Shanghai, China on July 1st. It has been an amazing six months and I feel fortunate to be here at this [...]

Merry Christmas where ever you are! Tis truly a wonderful time of year… even in Shanghai. Much to my own surprise Christmas seems more visible here than in San Francisco. I have seen more and bigger retail displays around the various shopping centers than I did in even Union Square (.. though I do miss [...]

Well… so much for posting more frequently… I wanted my next post to be when I got a job and things took a bit longer than expected… but now I am happy to announce that I have accepted a Product Manager role with Google in Shanghai. This is the culmination of my first five months [...]

A former manager, and ongoing mentor, of mine once provided me the following advice, “God gave us 2 ears and 1 mouth for a reason”. I will not debate the issue of divine providence versus evolution in this post, but regardless of which side you fall on in that debate, it is clear that it [...]

No.. the above is not Chinese… it is Latin. And it means “My fault, my fault, my most grievous fault”. Consider that my apology for being so negligent with this blog. No grand promises, but I want to do better in the future. Everyday I am growing, and I would like to keep better account of that [...]

An uncharacteristic hush falls on my usually lively companions. Where minutes before we were shouting and laughing about the days triumphs and tribulations, all that is now swept aside as we tense up for the inevitable rush. Our leader barks orders from some unknown locations. She is kind enough to repeat in multiple languages for [...]

EDITOR’S NOTE: Once again a friend was kind enough to share her experience about a new place. Kika Jonsson and I swam together at Bay Masters in San Francisco (along with Christine Tarn… apparently SFO, swimming and international go together!). A few weeks after I moved to Shanghai she moved to Berlin to teach for [...]

Sorry… it has been a while I made the time to post. I am learning so much everyday that is hard to know where to begin, but maybe I should explain the title of this post a bit. On Friday night I went to Muse (one of the happening night clubs here in the city) [...]

EDITOR’S NOTE: While I am still searching for the exact voice and focus of this blog, I think an important aspect of it will be to tell interesting stories from abroad. Hopefully we can all learn together about different parts of the world. While my focus is clearly on Asia, I am fortunate enough to [...]

“Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” – Antoine de Saint-Exuper I have been misquoting this for years (and mis-attributing it to Alexander Pope), but a few days in Korea inspired me enough to look it up and get it right. Chinese-style [...]