Omaha

The story went back to Valentine's Day this year. I bought one B share of Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.B) stock for Biajee as Valentine's gift so that we could all go to their annual shareholders' meeting in Omaha, NE.

What an unexciting place to go to! The drive was boring, rainy, windy and miserable. I had thought Kansas was the worst state I've driven through, but Nebraska topped that with no question.

We both took Friday off and started out at 7:13 am. Friday night was the cocktail party at Borsheim's. The diamonds there looked so wonderful that we didn't even dare to inquire the price. Bands were not as disgusting as those sold in Zales. We need to look for a nice piece to replace the one I lost in Castle Rock, Washington. Biajee will let me wait for as long as possible so that I can at least feel guilty for my absent-mindedness.

We had free soft roll cones at Dairy Queen, a wholely owned subsidiary by Berkshire.

Saturday was the meeting. A cartoon movie was shown at 8:30 am for an hour. Then it became non-prescreened open forum questions for Warren Buffet and Charlie Munger till 3:30 pm. No publicly traded company has ever hold such event for the CEO to answer any tough questions raised by shareholders directly. Biajee even registered to ask Warren a question, but time went out before it came to his turn.

All the stockholders are grateful to Warren and Charlie for their intelligent management of the assets of Berkshire without charging 2-4% fund management fee. BRK itself operates just like a fund. I don't understand why people are willing to invest in funds and be charged enormous management fees. If I had invested in a share of BRK stock when I first came to the United States, the asset would have been five times its original worth now.

Sunday was the fun day. We had free brunch with drinks first. Warren Buffet played table tennis with Ariel Hsing, the 11 year old US champion. So did Bill Gates. Bill is one of the big shareholders of BRK and he is on the Board as well. Bill and Warren played bridge after the table tennis. They were with in arm's reach of Biajee, Arnold and me.

Some people worship movie stars, singers and athletes in life. My family is just thrilled to be able to see the two richest men in the world. It's once in a life time experience. And we'll be there next year as well. I hope we can short BRK stock someday. Warren himself welcomes that.

(Biajee is downloading pictures of Bill and Warren. More on investment and our 2007 BRK Annual Shareholders' Meeting later.)