Surf’s Up
March 12, 2010

I had lunch with Abran this afternoon. I haven’t seen him for a few years as he’s currently living in China designing packs enabled with solar cells. It's much more than making a backpack and sticking one of those unflattering solar panels on. The UK company that he works for is developing entirely new ways of capturing the sunlight into convenient ways of consumer use. I’ll spare you the details as it’s a little more involved than I can write, but stay tuned in the near future to possibly see something very different…

We went to my favorite Vietnamese restaurant around the way from my office. Where else can you get an authentic Crispy noodle stirfry for $7.95?

Wasn’t that good?

I met Abran way back when he was the lead designer for Volcom. It's great when you meet someone that has just as many wacky ideas as you do. The best thing is that we both have the ADD under control now, or at least we think we do!

I asked him what the hell he does in China for fun?! He told me that besides getting in shape and trying to avoid hanging out with the locals doing the karaoke thing, he surfs! In China, typhoon season hits hard. People in Cali have no idea what a typhoon really looks like. In China, the last thing you want to do is go out into the water and make a few turns. Abran figured what the hell and found some incredible secret spots. Imagine, no one dropping in on you for thousands of miles.

Here’s Abran making it happen (Yes, this is China!). Speaking of China, I’m off to Asia today so stay tuned for some good stuff.