Home Office TV

Good morning and welcome to another episode of Home Office TV. I'm Amy Bibeau and today my guest is the wonderful Karla Garcia. Karla, thank you for being on our show. Very welcome. Thank you for having me. Karla is on my team. She is a front desk coordinator at Cloudflare and you've been here for a while. How's it been going? I love it. I tend to brag a lot about my work and it's because I love it. The company, the people that work here, everything about it just makes me be so happy. So every time I talk to somebody, I'm like, I really, really love where I work. It's just that. I love it. Everybody here is so nice and they make you feel seen, they make you feel welcome, they make you feel wanted. It's good. That's so great. I know that you have another family member that works at Cloudflare. Yeah, that's my mom. She's a porter in the headquarters in San Francisco, which is one of the reasons, you know, that I knew about Cloudflare and how I got into it because she's really good. I think she's been working at Cloudflare for two years, two years and a half. So she's a porter, you know, she's taking care of the snacks, she's taking care of the cups, she's taking care of everybody, you know, everybody has everything that they need around the office. She's definitely taking care of everything. She's making sure that the breakfast is out. She's making sure the fruit gets put away. And she was very, very, very, very much an advocate of getting Carla, you know what I mean? I remember the first time, I think there was something that she wanted to say to Corey. And she like, she was so frustrated because like, English is not, you know, her first language is Spanish. And she called me, she was like, Can you help me say something to my boss? And I was like, yeah. And I talked to Corey, and he was such a wonderful, like person, such a wonderful being. And I think ever since that's how like, they started talking about me. And I think he liked me too. So that was good. Obviously he did, because you know, you've been on our team. How has it been going, like working from home? It was at the beginning of it, it was very hard, just because I recently moved out of where I used to live. I used to live in a small studio with my family. So it was like a small house with seven people, you know, I usually compare it to the Loud House. It's that's a Disney Channel show. And it was hard having everybody at home, you know. So after I moved, it has been so much better. Now I get to stay at the house. My wife at work because it's only for me and my mom. And I have my little space that I can work on. So it's, it's, it's much better. But I definitely miss being in the office. I miss the commute. I miss the people. I miss having breakfast, breakfast next to you, seeing you with the fruit bowl. Right? I know I used to make my fruit salad. It is, it is. How do you keep the momentum for like working from home? You know what I mean? Like, how do you stay focused on it when we don't have our normal routine? Yeah, I tend to wake up at the same time every day. Also, because I have to walk my dog in the morning before my meeting starts. So he helps me to keep like a routine normal. Then I drink coffee, which is something I didn't do much before pandemic. But I guess now I like coffee. I like coffee now. But yeah, and then I start, you know, our meeting, it's early in the morning, which also helps me like see like, it's like that, that relief of seeing everybody's face in the morning, you know, our team, even though I don't get to see everybody in the, you know, and say good morning to everybody and see their happy faces on Friday, you know, when they're going home for the weekend. So I definitely miss that. But it's, I adjust it well, you know, and Cloudflare has helped a lot in that. And so you're, you were saying your mom's first language wasn't English. You did not grow up in the United States. No, I was born and raised in El Salvador. And so was my mom. My mom actually has learned a lot of English through Netflix, watching movies, you know, she watched, watches them in English with subtitles in English. So she learns and she's like, what does this mean? And I personally, I have always liked English for some reason, since I was little. And I used to listen to Britney Spears, Sebastian Boyce, and Sink, Agustin Aguilera, and all the movies, like I used to know every single word from this Hilary movie called The Cinderella Story. So I knew every line and I knew what it meant. So like, those are the things that helped me and actually my brothers and my sisters because they don't speak Spanish much. So speaking to them actually helped my English get better too. Okay, um, so you learned a lot of English before you came to the States. And then how long? I did because also in my university, we were having English, both classes in Spanish and English. That's awesome. It's nice that your mom's also been able to learn a bunch of English and that she has you to be able to help her. You know, because I'm sure, you know, being an immigrant to this country has its own challenges, you know, and the language barrier obviously is is one of the major ones. Yeah, no, it's it's also hard to live. You know, I came here when I was 21 years old, which, if you think about it, I was like my whole life was in El Salvador. You're my friends, my studies, my, my house, my bed, my stuff, my dog, you know, and it was hard. But being with my mom, and my dad and my siblings, I think that makes it all worth it. And I get to go back whenever I want to El Salvador, you know, it's good. That's, that's awesome that you're able to go back and forth and that, you know, you found a good path. And then you've been like working full time, going to school. Yeah, I, I really, going back to the immigrant thing, I was just thinking that it was my first time voting for president. So it's really, it was really exciting. Oh, this in this election was your first time voting? Awesome. So yeah, the excitement, you know, that the opportunity to be able to do that. So if you have the chance, please go out and vote. Yeah, now is the time to participate in our, you know, our democracy that we want to hold on to. And, you know, somebody posted a good thing the other day on social media. And it was like, you know, a vote isn't a valentine. You know, it's like, if it doesn't mean you're in love with the candidate, you know, I mean, it's just like, that's like the path that you want to be moving towards, you know, someone else likened it to like, it's like getting on a bus. Like, you know, if the bus that you're trying to get on, like, if there's not a direct one way, you know, direct route bus, you might have to change buses several times, but you don't give up on your destination, you don't give up on your journey, just because you're like, okay, well, maybe we have to vote, you know, I mean, for this person, and then, you know, vote for, you know, the next person, you know, like, as it moves us closer to our desired, you know, platform. Yeah, so yeah, I think it's really important to do it, you know, whichever your, your political views are, it's important to raise your voice. Yeah, definitely. I definitely agree. I am someone just calling my phone. It's my birthday. I was gonna try to let that out to our viewers. Thank you. I'm trying to get people to call in. We have a call in. We have a call in feature. So the phone number to call in is 380-333-5273. So if you have any questions, this is our first time doing a call in. I don't know if we'll get any calls. But if anybody has any questions for me or Carla, or they want to say happy birthday to me, you know, they can call in and leave me a message. And, you know, I'm going to text this phone number to a friend really quick because they just called me. Have you been receiving a lot of calls for your birthday? I've received a lot of messages and calls this morning. I've got a lot of Facebook messages. It's you know, it's the only reason we all hold on to Facebook, right? It's just because once a year I want to hear from like the vast, you know, my 1900 friends, you know, like I want them to reach out to me. That one day every day on your birthday, they're always in your wall. Right, exactly. That's good. That means they you know, that you're cared, you're loved by a lot of people. Because you know, it's you feel disconnected during the pandemic. Right? So I think we both went through a birthday. You had your birthday just a couple weeks ago. So we're also celebrating Carla's birthday. You know, and so it's like having, having, you know, this pandemic and all this disconnection, I think, like, at least, you know, to see the birthday messages on Facebook, I'll be like, Oh, that's right. Like, I have community, I just feel a bit disconnected from them during this pandemic. I was blessed enough to be able to see my sister, you know, a few days after her birthday in August. And it was weird, because we barely we couldn't go anywhere. She was like, you know, I felt bad. And she was like, you know, it's fine. Like, I just wanted to hang out and he will be responsible of us to be going around. And given that she's a nurse, you know, she just wanted a few days off because it's been a few like, a little bit hard on her. But um, she got tested before she she went back, he came back negative her my mom and I so you know, we try to stay distance and you see we went to the Golden Gate Park to see the Ferris wheel that's opening soon. So yeah, it's it's pretty intense how much this lockdown and this this COVID thing has really affected like especially the landscape of San Francisco. I mean, like it's really changed so much about the city. So many restaurants have closed and so many parking now. Yeah, there's so much parking. That's definitely a highlight. Speaking of optimism. Is there anything? I mean, like 2020 has been an intense year. But is there anything that you're optimistic about right now or for the future? Or do you see anything good coming out of this experience that we're going through? Um, yes, I see. I think that people's gonna be a little bit more self conscious when it comes to touching things touching your face, you know, and washing your hands properly. Because I feel like I even do before I usually do wash my hands when I get into a place and after because I used to be a CNA. So I'm used to like always being washing my hands. But I think I was actually talking with a friend that's gonna make the future generations maybe a little bit germaphobic. You know, for all of these, like no handshaking, no hugs, no kisses on the cheek, you know, which is as a Latino, when you meet somebody and like, if I was outside, I mean, a Salvadorian, I want to hug, you know, and like, we were like, Oh, I'm Salvadorian, too. And yet again, so it's gonna change. But I think it's gonna be it's gonna be good. We're gonna go back to a new better. Yeah, well, hey, I we have a message. So let's let's play it. Let's see. Let's see what what our what our caller has to say here. Hi, this is Lee calling from Austin. This message is for Amy Bebo on home office TV. Amy, I had a little bird tell me that today is your birthday. So I wanted to call in and wish you a wonderful and happy birthday today. Thanks, Lee. Lee is like my favorite. For those of us who work at Cloudflare, we probably know her and she's amazing. So yay for my first ever. That's my first ever like live like live call. I mean, someday we might get questions, but I'm all about the birthday wishes. So thanks, Lee. To celebrate my birthday, like some people are not, you know, they're not really into their birthday. But I like it. I feel like it's a good milestone. Thankfully, we got to another year, you know, we, we get to do new things. I was like, one of my new, you know, being 31 new things was eating less red meat and walking more. So I'm doing that, you know, running at night, which is not even running on piece walking, like a few blocks and then I'm back because I'm doing it little by little. But um, yeah, I think it's good. I think birthdays are really good. And it's good to celebrate them. Yeah, I used to celebrate for like the whole month of October, you know, I used to really want to like, you know, um, I remember one year for my birthday, when I turned 40, we did a cleanup, we did a cleanup of this beach in, in Minnesota on the Mississippi River, because I used to be part of this group called singing waters. And we would, we adopted a stretch of the river that we would clean up. And so I remember my 40th birthday, we like, we did a big like morning cleanup, and we cleaned up all this garbage, we found so much. And we found somebody's weird, like campsite in the forest. And it was, there was like a cat carrier there, you know, by the end of it, we're just all kind of covered in dirt. And I was like, carrying the cat thing, like, pretending that I was like, no, there was no cat. I was just pretending like I was like a lady who lost her cat. It was a good time. You know, you went out and do something good for for the environment for the for the, you know, it was a productive birthday. What's your favorite birthday memory that you can think of? Um, I would think I think it's this one this year, because I wasn't expecting my family to do anything. And I, on a Saturday, when I was walking my dog, I just saw all of them done down the park and they were like, already making some carne asada. And, you know, they had, um, they had pollo asado going, they had a cake, you know, because it was my birthday, my cousin's birthday and his girlfriend's birthday. So they were celebrating all of us. But we didn't know, we were just walking our dogs and like walking down this, you know, walking down the park and seeing your family and it was like, what are they doing here? So it was really nice. It was cute. That's a fun birthday. I think I celebrated my birthday in Brazil once. That's what my backdrop is right now. I'm celebrating that I am going to go to Brazil at the end of the month here. We're going to do a modified retreat that's going to be very outdoors and, you know, responsible. Is there any guidelines, different guidelines to drive to, to drive to, you know, fly to Brazil? Right now, Brazil has opened its borders. They were, for a while they were requiring anybody that comes like show proof of health insurance, um, for the, like their entire trip, but now that just got rescinded. But so they are letting people in, but there's several airports that you can't fly into. I think part, certain parts of Brazil is getting hit hard. I saw some of the ones that were in the south, um, and some other ones. So, you know, it's certainly, it's not totally open, but they are, you know, letting people come in. And since I'm an American citizen, um, I'll be able to get back in. But if you're Brazilian right now, you can't travel to the U.S. Like we have a ban on, but Brazil for people who do maybe ever want to travel to Brazil, there used to be the barrier of, um, needing a visa. So you used to have to go and get a Brazilian visa, which was a little bit complicated because it was either really expensive, like you have to use a service, um, or you would go down to the consulate and it would be really hard to get an appointment. Um, and my 10 year visa expired like maybe a month ago. So I'll be, I'll be getting, um, but now they don't, you don't need one. So American citizens can go to Brazil now without a visa. So that's exciting. So some news for the people. Before you needed a visa, even though you are Brazilian too? I'm not Brazilian. Oh, you're not. Anybody that, just in my heart. Hopefully you know, I always thought, but you know. I'm Brazilian, like my spirit is very Brazilian. It's like Indian, Brazilian. And what, I mean, the spirit doesn't have a nation, you know, like I'm a citizen of the earth. Yeah, I was about to say that. Yeah. For how many days are you going? What, for two weeks? I hope you enjoy. What kind of weather is it right now? It's going to be warm. Oh, that's nice. Okay. Like springtime, springtime. So, um, let's see. So you're working from home, but we're getting the office ready, right? For our limited. That makes me very excited. Yeah. Are you excited to have some time back in the office? Yeah, I actually, um, I, I, I like sitting, you know, like I said, being on the desk, getting to see people, you know, when they come in and they talk to you. So I really miss, I don't know how, you know, how many folks are going to come back, but, you know, for the ones that are welcome. And I'm really excited to see you working. I know. I'm, I'm excited too. I, I'm a little like, it'll be weird without any snacks. Yeah. I mean, not that that's the only thing that makes the office great, but like without even just having like the fruit, you know, like to like have, have coffee in the morning, you know, talking to you, I used to love getting yogurt, granola, and I put some strawberry jam in it and then I would eat it, you know? I know, I know, but, but it'll be nice. I think, um, my, my concern with going back to the office and like being at the desk for the whole day is just kind of like, what used to make the day go fast is we were so busy. Yeah. There were so many people that like needed everything, you know, they're like, it's too cold down here. It's too hot over here. Like we need this, you know, and we were really busy helping. We had to also do, you know, set, um, conference rooms for a big, for a big meeting and stuff like that. Like set up the yoga room. Right, right, right. We had all kinds of, so many more like, but luckily there's still mail-in packages. Plenty of. And that's good that we still have that, you know, cause we still have something to do that, that feels like, like a normal that we were doing before, like a routine. Right, right. And like, you know, Cloudflare really needs us. We're very valuable members, you know what I mean of Cloudflare. There's a lot of work for us to do. We just want Cloudflare to know that, you know, we keep real busy. Don't worry. Don't worry. Um, what is your favorite part about working from home? Um, being with, honestly being with my dog, like he's, he's one of the best, he's one of the best co-workers I've ever had. Not, you know, shout out to all of you, all amazing. And I love being with you too, but he's just so cute and I love being with him. He, he, he really makes my day better. He's, he's so well aware of everything when I'm in a meeting and sometimes, um, Nico goes, buddy, he's like, you know, he, he knows what's happening around. It's actually, it's really good to see him and he's happy. I'm really con, concerned of where, when we'll go back, you know, for, for, like for the full eight hours, he's going to be a little bit upset, but. He's going to be like, this isn't what I've become used to. This isn't nice. This is what I want to, this is, this is, um, this is not what I signed up for. Right, exactly. So what do you think about Cloudflare? Like, would you be pro dogs in office? Now, remember we're on the facilities team. Yeah. And your mom is a porter. Yeah. No, I will, I would say it would have to be, you know, really studied just because there's a, there's a lot of folks who have allergies, you know, and just the dandruff of the dogs we have, because my mom has asthma and, and the dandruff of him was affecting her. So we had to buy an air filter, you know, so it's better. So I think it'll have to be a lot of study and maybe make a section where the dogs and the dog lovers are going to be, you know, and the dogology and not in another place, but no. All right. All right. That's, that's, that's a good, Oh, wait. Looks like we have another, another message. Let's, let's see. Let's play that. Hi, this is Christina calling for Amy for the segment home office TV. Amy, just calling in to wish you a happy birthday. Have a wonderful day. Thanks, Christina. That's, that's that executive assistant to our wonderful COO. And that was so kind of her to call in. Thanks, Christina. You know, it's like, it's kind of fun. Test the call out feature with birthday messages. You know, if anybody has any actual questions that they want to ask us about anything, um, the phone number is 3 8 0 3 3 3 5 2 7 3. So let's see. What is Jason sending me a ping here, but I can't read it cause I'm busy. Cause I made my little window very small. Um, so you're gonna, you're gonna miss being with buddy. Once we go back to the office. Definitely. But I, I bought a, um, a furball cam. So I'm going to be able to send him treats and see what he's doing. Cause now we live alone. You know, we live in a different place, but there's an apartment. So it's going to be different, you know? So, so one of those cameras where you can talk to your dog while you're not home. Yeah. And he, and he, and actually I'm sure it's a treat to them too. So I got, I'm going to get to play with him, talk to him, you know, see him. I may seem a little bit obsessed, obsessed with him because I am, but you know, just, I love him so much. If I had a pet, I would be obsessed with it too. I wanted to get one. I was pretty close, you know, when we were really in the throes of how long is this pandemic going to like last? Am I ever going to go outside again? You know, I was thinking about getting like a cat. I think one of the good things about the pandemic is I've read a lot about shelters, like, like having no more dogs to, you know, for adoption and, or like to foster because people, people feel lonely, you know, and they, they need a company and a dog, a cat, anything like that. Even a guinea pig, which my cousin has two of them, like the little, the little squeaky, it's cute. You know, it makes you feel that you're not alone. Yeah. I mean, I think, I think that that that's definitely an upside of the pandemic is if more animals are getting, and hopefully there's not a big glut of animals back to the shelters when people have to go back to work, you know, because sometimes people do things without a lot of foresight, you know? And I think it's because like the prefrontal cortex with like our impulse controls, you know what I mean? Like, I don't think mine is fully formed. I'm not sure what I did as a child, but you know, my impulse control is, it's not like going to win any contests, but you know, like, cause people be like, oh, I want a pet and then they get one and then. Yeah. But it's, it's, it's a financial responsibility to, you know, like I have to pay his insurance $57 a month to make sure if there's any accident, you know, I take him to the bed every six months. He gets the, he gets shots and they're expensive. He gets, he jumps out of the window and breaks all of his nails. So he has to be real. He has, they have to be removed. So, you know, it's, it's, it's his nails jumping out the window. It's, it's, it was so funny because I just heard his little paws walking down and I was like, mom, that's buddy. And she was like, no, he was inside. And I was like, yeah, that's buddy. And he was coming down and said, what's that? Where are we going? You know? And I was like, no, you're not going anywhere. But he jumped out and he had to be sedated. And his nails, some of these nails have to be removed because they were broken really badly. But thankfully he didn't go. Cause my window looks down the balcony that looks down to the garage. So he could have jumped all the way down and, you know, go two floors down, which thankfully it didn't happen, but. Buddy, don't jump out the window. Hey, we all, we all feel it sometimes, you know, the pandemic's really been dragging on for a lot of us, but don't jump out the window. I really thought it was going to be, I was like on March 16th, when the, when the shelter in place order took place, I was like, we'll be back in May. You know, we'll be back soon, April. We will going to be back in a couple of weeks. And it's October, your birthday. I know. I know it's, it's, I wasn't sure, especially those first few weeks, you know, like, especially with our, you know, role, like before we were getting like other projects from other teams and stuff like that. I was just like, how are we going to keep this, you know, like, like even just having that daily routine, I don't have a dog. So it was just kind of like, okay, like, what is my, what does my routine look like? How do I know when I'm done for the day? When, when do I sign off? When do I close my computer? Like, and you didn't get to enjoy that much that you were near the office, you know, your commute wasn't bad. You were really near. It's true. It's true. I, I used to live by the office, but you know, that's one blessing. I think that the, the housing situation has, has been better for me personally, because like a lot more inventory opened up and I was able to find a better, like a home that was a better fit and, you know, not have to commute every day yet. Yeah. I mean, at some point we're going to be commuting every day again. I can imagine how that's going to go because of people being terrified of being on the bus, you know, no wanting to be, you know, near other people. So they're going to drive their car and it's going to be local. Right. I mean, I think we're probably not going to have mass commuting until we have like mass vaccinations. But again, like we're talking about the virus, coronavirus is similar to the common cold virus. How many, you know, how long have they been trying to probably find a vaccine, you know, against the cold? So it's like, you know, how successful, you know, not all of us can have a miracle antibody cocktail, you know what I mean? That's of experimental drugs created, you know what I mean? Like by the top doctors. Yeah. But, you know, I guess all of the green juices my mom has given me work because my immune system has been really good. You know, I'm really like afraid of, you know, being getting sick with that. And even more my mom, you know, how bad she gets sick. So I get tested frequently and I always have my hand sanitizer with me, you know, I try to have everything around and, you know, be safe. But it's scary. Yeah, I mean, people that I know, you know, who've gotten sick and then we still don't know all the, you know, effects that it might have on the other body systems and the organs on the brain. Yeah. My dad is diabetic and he had it and he said that he felt like a truck had just run over him and his lungs. You know, he said it was hard to breathe. My sister who's a nurse also had it, but she didn't, you know, she didn't feel like more than a headache and pain on the back of her eyes. That was about it. It makes you different. Yeah, it's still a very, it's still a very frightening prospect, I think for a lot of us, which is why we're still, you know, going through this process of, you know, figuring out how to be in the world and be safe and not endanger anyone else and keep our own families and circles safe. So we're still on that journey. So we have just a couple minutes left. Is there anything else that you want to, that you wanted to share or like any, any other fun birthday members? Just a shout out to you for your birthday. And to everybody at CloudFlirt that, you know, to everybody that, that Rita, Dina, that always asked for my mom and give her love to her, to Rina, Nicole, Cody, all of them, Corey, Caroline and everybody who really make everything a little bit easier because imagine having Zoom meetings with people that make you work hard, wouldn't be so fun, but having with them is such a fun and refreshing thing. We have a fun team. We have a, we do have a fun, you're my first guest of our team. So thank you for being on the show. And I think it's true, like work, you know, like this is something that we're doing for 40 hours a week. If we don't love the company, believe in the message, believe in the, the, the overall mission, you know, of like what CloudFlirt is about, as well as believe in, you know, our team and, and that, you know, that we are going to open our offices better and safer and that we're putting thought into that and that we're, you know, caring about sustainability and all the fun stuff that our team gets to work on in the next year. I'm excited about it. I'm excited for 2021 and all the, you know, all the good things. Going to be better, you know, hopefully so. Yeah. I, someone recently sent me a Bitmoji. I sent them, you know what I mean? Which was like crushing, we were crushing 2019 and we were all excited about 2020. And they like, they like sent it back to me and I was just like, yeah, it didn't, you know, it didn't pan out yet, like to what everybody was hoping, but I think it's also been a wake-up call in a lot of ways. Like, hey, there's a lot of stuff, you know, that we need to pay attention to. Yeah. The earth got a little bit of a break from us. So that was good. You know, there was a little bit of break from some of the garbage making. May it continue. Thank you so much, Carla. We're done. Bye.