Can Bill Gates dance?

This is the burning question that is on everyone's mind. Who cares that million are dying needlessly but can the richest human being on the planet dance? Does he pay others to dance for him? Does he pay people to say he can while he just laze around doing...nerdy stuff! The answer is...no. I worked in Microsoft for almost 10 years and I have had the fantastic pleasure of meeting the King of the Revenge of Nerds. In a nutshell, he is just like a geek. A person that is brilliant, thinks many steps ahead of everyone and is just excited about new stuff. I remember reading the founder of Hotmail who said he was not impressed by Bill (we are on first name basis) in their negotiations. He asked very ordinary questions and seemed very shallow for Bill Gates. Let me tell you, he is like that when he is disinterested or he already knows all that needs to know about the subject.

He can be very impatient and even bad tempered. He speaks in a high pitched school girl voice and can put you to sleep faster that 10 elephant tranquilizers but the guy has presence, character and a lot of respect. So one year during our annual get together, I had the pleasure of being on the dance floor with Bill. Every year we congreagate at a different US city for our annual conference. So you get about 5,000 Microsoft geeks raiding a different city.

That year, we had it in San Francisco which is my favourite city to date. We were at our annual party, partying to Huey Lewis and the News. I was dancing with a new found female friend from Israel when I dance a little too enthusiastically and stepped on someone behind me. I turned and realized that my shoes just stepped on about USD7 billion. I had stepped on Bill Gates' toes.

I stammered heavily and was lost for words for about 30 seconds when my dance partner apologize for us and shook his hand. After cranking my jaw close, I managed a very feeble sorry. He was real cool about it and asked where were from. When I said Malaysia, he asked how was Mahathir (whom he met at de IAP meeting) and a bit about the MSC. We actually then spent the rest of the nite together with his "homey and posse". It was very cool and he had a great sense of humour. I tot he was also very cool for hanging out with his lowly staff from an obscure country like Malaysia.

So no matter what the press or his competitors say about him, Bill Gates is one of the coolest and definitely more approachable persons i know.