It’s been over a year and a half since I took the test, so some tings are a bit hazy. Still, it was the first interview I did in person, and it’s still pretty vivid.

I started talking about the process of getting an interview in this piece right here, so check that out if you haven’t.

So after securing the car, I drove up the mountain with a nearly dead phone and no map. One of the first things that struck me was the place was beautiful—this was something I noticed right away once I looked out the window at the Ontario airport. When I started driving towards Big Bear and made it out of Ontario, all around were these massive mountains, and they looked unreal. I was awed, and that doesn’t happen much for me. I was also in constant awe as in “Ah shit, I’m fucking lost” because my phone died shortly after I started driving.

The instructions the car rental person gave me were good, but I got lost somewhere along the way because I didn’t take the right exit. So I just had to wing it. I ended up completely taking one of the weirdest and most backwards ways of getting up the mountain—having lived here for a year and a half I still have no clue which roads I went through to get up here. Once I was on the mountain, I pulled over to ask for some directions from a very nice real estate agent, and with those instructions, I managed to find my way to Big Bear Lake. Once I got up the mountain though, I had a hard time finding my damn hotel. I drove on what seemed to be the main road, and I thought that if I followed it, I would eventually see the hotel.

While searching, I got a good look at the town. It was really depressing. The town was going for that “Hey, look this town is old and make out of wood!” look, there was no Chipotle, and there was a Kmart (RIP). It fucking gave me shivers. Not to mention, I didn’t really see any non-whites. It made me think there was some Children of the Corn shenanigans going on here with any colored people. Eventually, after driving for a while, I realized I went too far as I ended up a hillbilly looking area (Big Bear City), so I pulled over at a gas station to ask for help. I found out that my hotel was in the village, and I drove at least 15 minutes past the damn thing.

I retraced my tire tracks, and I eventually pulled into a really nice looking hotel. Not 4 or 5 star quality but really nice. The room was like the inside of a log cabin. While I usually find that stuff tacky, it was actually pretty tasteful here. My interview was the next day around noon, so I had time to chill as it was around 5 PM. I grabbed some dinner at an Indian place called Masala Craft that Yelp said was great, and it was. I’ve eaten there a dozen times since, and it is the best restaurant in Big Bear Lake.

The crazy thing about this night is that I was in talks with another company about getting a job, and I was scheduled to talk with the recruiter the night I arrived in Big Bear. I had talked with them a bit, and the company, SSE, made it sound like I had a sure in for the job. I ended up talking with him, and it made me feel even more positive about me getting the job. It would be in Jacksonville doing Unity simulation work for a Boeing flight simulation program for almost double the pay of what Farsight would pay me. So not only would the money be better, but it would go further in Florida given California is expensive as hell and Florida is cheap as hell. And although I would end up programming for stuff that wasn’t a game, I felt that everything else outweighed the benefits of being a game programmer at Farsight.

Regardless of which company I preferred to get a job at, I was going to go through with the Farsight interview because having multiple options to choose from is a must just in case things fall through for the other jobs. Not only that, but people changes.