Haakon Moller 340

Zlatan in LA Finally soccer superstar Zlatan Ibrahimovic has made his long awaited move to the Los Angeles Galaxy, and I have to say it has been just as entertaining as I had hoped it would be! If you do not know Zlatan Ibrahimovic, he is one of the most arrogant soccer players in the world, probably one of the most arrogant sportsmen in the world in fact. It is hard to tell if Zlatan's arrogance is a marketing scheme or genuine confidence, but either way everyone either loves him or loves to hate him. When Zlatan announced his going to LA he took out an add in the Los Angeles times simply saying "you're welcome LA", and I think that encapsulates his personality pretty well. Personally I have never liked Zlatan Ibrahimovic that much, but I must say that he is entertaining. Even when he had the talent to back up his mouth (he is a little old now) I thought he was an overrated player who played for himself more than his team. I remember he used to have a rivalry wit...

(Since this post is late, I decided to write about what I did do for spring break, not what I was planning on doing) This spring break I decided to go to Thailand with my friends, and it was a great time! Me and my friends had been planning to go to Mexico together every spring break since we got to USC, but never ended up going, so instead we decided to go to Thailand. One of my roommates is from Bangkok and knows a lot of people there, so he was supposed to take charge and show us around. Our original plan was to go to Bangkok, then Koh Samui, then Pattaya, but we ended up liking Koh Samui so much that we ditched Pattaya altogether and stayed a few extra nights there. In Bangkok we went to the worlds biggest market and I bought a painting of my favorite soccer player, Francesco Totti. We would sightsee during the day and go to bars at night, and though I preferred the nightlife in Bangkok I have to say the highlight was Koh Samui. the weather there was perfect and the beaches wer...

In our video assignments, we learned that Bill Gates told Saudi Arabian business men they would never reach the top 10 in technology if they only use half of their workforce (men). It was on this idea that I founded the Toro Foundation. The Toro foundation, which I named after my dad, seeks to bridge the gap in opportunity between the privileged and the marginalized. We want to enable entrepreneurs who would otherwise never stand a chance due to lack of capital or other resources. Unfortunately, the world is not fair, but the Toro foundation wants to change that through active involvement with local leaders. It is our mission to reach the most influential leaders in marginalized areas and reach their communities through them. It is not only Saudi Arabia that is not utilizing its full potential workforce. All over the world skillfull, talented, and creative individuals are prevented from expressing themselves due to economic or political barriers. Working in developing nations such as ...

In my view, the best way to start making the world a better place is to make yourself a better person. It is also important to take good care of yourself. Although it sounds selfish, I believe that before you take care of anyone else you must know how to take care of yourself. I think we have all met someone who is so nice that people take advantage of them, and it is hard to do accomplish anything big this way. This is not to say that you should not be nice. In fact I really hate people who talk loudly about all their revolutionary ideas but when you talk to them 1 on 1 they are really unpleasant (unfortunately hard to avoid at the Marshall business school). Like Jacqueline Novogratz says, we are all created equal. I believe the biggest thing separating successful people and unsuccessful people is opportunity. Through investing in human capital we can help all parties involved. In Novogratz book it is called patient capital, but I have also hear it called capability building. Invest...

The Beautiful Game? By Haakon Moller “Maybe the game has developed in a wrong direction that way, that when a player goes somewhere and cost £37million and he’s earning £200,000 a week he is happy just to get the money. Maybe the focus of playing football is the second most important thing.“ Samii Hyypia, former manager of Bayer Leverkusen Many say that soccer has lost its passion. Even if increased competition has forced players to dedicate every moment of their lives to the sport to keep up, today’s players are criticized by their predecessors and fans alike for lacking dedication and passion. So, if players are putting in more hours in the gym and on the training field than ever before, how can we say that they lack passion? The Last Bandiera The answer is that most soccer fans still have a romantic view of the way the sport is played. Fans expect undying loyalty from those that have the privilege of pulling on their clubs’ storied colors, and it is becoming increasi...

Throughout my reading of “Growing a Farmer” it continues to astound me just how much of Kurt Timmermeister’s success came by pure happenstance. He just does what feels right in the moment and goes where the wind takes him. I thought his thoughts in chapter 8 were a bit silly, though. He saw no problem in selling unpasteurized milk to his customers and seemed to think that the e.coli outbreak on the neighbor farm was due to their poor hygiene on the farm, but I think that outbreak could have just as easily come from his milk before he started complying with the Agricultural departments regulations. His thoughts about milk being pasteurized only to make poor milk drinkable also struck me as somewhat unfounded. I am no expert on milk but I am pretty sure it is the standard all over the world (or at least with countries that have good health and food regulation) to pasteurize milk. So for him to suggest that the regulation that all milk should be pasteurized is due to some conspiracy by “...