Hi there! I’m Kelly :)
I’m trying to figure out how I can help usher in humanity’s coolest era yet (all the while making sure that we don’t kill ourselves during the process). I’m currently physically based in Hong Kong 75% of the time and Japan 25% of the time (though I’m always spiritually in some alternate version of the Heian Imperial Court).
Here are some things that I’ve gotten up to in the last half a decade:
- Worked at a fast-growing Voice AI Startup for over 2 years. Mainly looked after our hotel concierge voicebot product, among other things. This was my first job and I learned loads! I will never forget the two week Orlando trip we took to visit our partners (so many alligators! also Universal! so much fun! also found out that I’m horrible at bowling!!). Also met some super lovely people there 💚 Did a year of ‘Social Data Science’ (as one friend put it: “is that data science for sociable people?”). This meant I finally got around to picking up some basic technical skills/knowledge - mainly programming in Python, basic ML and stats; I was literally spoon-fed frequentist stats but was taught on the side for a bit by a die-hard bayesian. Loved the interdisciplinary nature of this course! Too bad it was during COVID 🙁
- Studied Linguistics for 3 years. On top of tons of reading, this entailed drawing syntax trees, (failed) attempts at making strange noises (clicks are fun!), dissecting the meaning behind ‘meaning’… also spent a summer helping construct an NLP dataset. Areas that I found the most interesting: syntax (! !! !!!), semantics + pragmatics, language acquisition, cognitive neuroscience of language, language acquisition (first and second). My only regret was that I didn’t learn more about Linguistic typology.
- Spent way too much time in Japan. Tokyo, Hakone, Osaka, Kyoto, a handful of places around Hokkaido (multiple times), a handful of places around Kyushu… Shikoku is on the bucket list. As is a pilgrimage hike. Hit me up if you need recs!
- Jammed literally everywhere 💃🏻 Anyone who has spent more than an hour with me knows that I can’t keep still when I hear music. I’ve literally been called out for bopping to the sound of the London tube. Back in London, I went to Pineapple/Base for Commercial + Hip Hop (and the very occasional wild card class like Chinese dance). Did some Latin+Ballroom dancing for a year back in Uni as well. Trying to find some good dance studios in HK - if anyone has any recs, please send them my way~
- Did a research project at the intersection of China and AI strategy for a longtermist think-tank in China
- Interned at an early-stage startup one summer. Did everything from marketing to user research to product. My first proper foray into the world of tech.
- Helped organise two Hackathons (same one, two years in a row) - always had so much fun during the actual event!
- Learnt (a bit) about Learning Engineering + hosted an EdTech Careers Fair w funding from Schmidt Futures
In a previous life, I wrote an unhealthy amount of fiction, tried learning lots of languages and regularly jumped around on ice with very thin blades attached to my feet (with all due seriousness: blades on figure skates are only ~4mm thick which is actually insane).
Feel free to reach out to me at lkw33cam [at] gmail [dot] com - I love meeting new people! I’m absolutely abysmal at replying messages/emails though so please expect a delay in my response (it’s nothing personal!).