About Philip Arthur Moore
It was during a trip to Cambodia that I purchased a bootleg copy of Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist from a bookseller while enjoying a night alongside Tonle Sap River back in 2005. I was homesick and restless at the same time. Returning to the United States would rob me of the everyday excitement and newness that I had grown accustomed to over the previous few years, but not coming home would force me to endure more of the very homesickness that I was trying to stave off.
At the time that I came across The Alchemist, I felt like no one understood the off-keel emotions that I was experiencing. Then I read about Santiago, the Andalusian shepherd boy whose only wish was to fulfill his destiny and find his Personal Legend. I was touched deeply by this story of realizing one’s dreams and exercising one’s own freedom and self-reliance. To this day I carry my copy of The Alchemist with me wherever I go.
The five adjectives that most accurately describe me are loyal, introspective, trustworthy, respectful, and spiritual. I desire freedom in every sense of the word and believe in the power of self-reliance. I believe we all have our own Personal Legends to realize and I believe that life is too short to wait for life to happen to us.
A Brief Bio
My name is Philip Arthur Moore and I was born and raised for the first eighteen years of my life in Longview, Texas. After saying goodbye to my hometown, I relocated to Houston, Texas to attend university from the fall of 2001 to the end of 2006. I obtained my bachelor’s degree in the field of Asian Studies from Rice University.
During my five-plus years in college, I traveled abroad twice to Vietnam. It was during those trips to Ho Chi Minh City and Can Tho that I learned a great deal about who I am as a person. Living in Vietnam for approximately one year had an immense, transformative effect on the way I view myself and my life. Vietnam is my second home and I will be returning soon.
With the exception of a few professors who immeasurably changed my life, Rice University taught me very little. In the last several years I have learned more from street vendors, mothers, book sellers, beggars, bartenders, motorcycle drivers, and fellow travelers than I have from text books and lectures.
One of the greatest lessons that I took away from traveling and chasing after my dreams was that my dreams matter, no matter how untraditional or odd they may seem. I learned from Vietnam that I can be exactly who I want to be if I am willing to put in the time and effort to be that person. The person who I desire to be right now is independent, self-reliant, self-employed, and self-aware. With these things comes a liberation that feels otherworldly.
A Note About My Skills
Everything that I have learned about standards compliant web design and web programming has been self-taught with the aid of brilliant online documents and many helpful bloggers who care about their craft as much as I do. When I entered into Rice University, I was heavily involved in the sciences and math as an Electrical Engineer, which explains my obsessive interest in CSS/XHTML ’stuff’ and Open Source platforms.
I am passionate about web design. It is not simply a means to keep food on the table but a hobby and a lifestyle. I am constantly educating myself on new techniques and new paradigms with which to approach web development.
The Big Square Blog will combine three of my loves: writing, blogging, and web design. I will also occasionally throw in some topics that may seem to come out of left field but matter to me nonetheless. I hope you enjoy what you read, encourage you to stick around and engage in the discussion, and thank you with all of my heart for stopping by.
Dream big.