It's a great pleasure indeed to welcome to the great last podium, Alice Schroeder. [ Applause ] Warren Buffett likes to say that when he gets up in the morning and goes to work, he feels like Michael Angela going to paint the 16-chappel. And of course his 16-chappel is Berkshire Hathaway, the company that he has spent decades building, which on the one hand is the standard by which he invests, and on the other hand, is the way that he thinks a business should be run.
非常榮幸能歡迎愛麗絲·施羅德登上這個偉大的講台。[掌聲] 華倫·巴菲特喜歡說，當他早晨起床去工作時，感覺就像米開朗基羅要去繪製西斯汀教堂。當然，他的西斯汀教堂就是波克夏·海瑟威，這家他花費數十年打造的公司，一方面是他投資的標準，另一方面也是他認為企業應該如何經營的典範。
As he said to me one time, he considers the best argument to be a good example, and that's what he means Berkshire Hathaway to be. But at the same time, you've probably seen Warren on television, you've probably read interviews, you've probably heard him speak, attended at Sherholder meetings or read some of his letters, and he likes to describe how he did it. And he always does that in very simple and straightforward terms. It always seems like something that you ought to be able to emulate, and yet nobody ever has.
正如他有一次對我說，他認為最好的論證就是一個好榜樣，而這正是他賦予波克夏·海瑟威的意義。但與此同時，你可能在電視上看過華倫，讀過他的訪談，聽過他演講，參加過股東大會或讀過他的一些信件，他喜歡描述自己是如何做到的。而他總是用非常簡單直白的語言來描述，聽起來總是像你應該能夠效仿的事情，然而至今無人能及。
In all of this time, with all of the teaching and coaching and explaining that Warren Buffett has done, there has never been anyone who has been able to replicate his achievement of creating a company of $300 billion by putting together a conglomerate or investing and compounding at the rate that he's done by buying value investments. So that begs a question. If it seems so simple and straightforward and he can explain it, then why hasn't anyone else done it? And who is this person? It was Michelangelo actually who said, if people knew how hard I worked to get my mastery, they wouldn't think it was so wonderful after all.
在這段時間裡，儘管華倫·巴菲特進行了無數的教學、指導和解釋，卻從未有人能夠複製他的成就——通過組建一家綜合企業或投資，並以他購買價值投資的速度進行複利增長，創造出一家價值 3000 億美元的公司。這就引出了一個問題。如果這看起來如此簡單明瞭，而且他能夠解釋清楚，那麼為什麼沒有其他人做到呢？這個人究竟是誰？實際上，米開朗基羅曾說過，如果人們知道我為了掌握技藝付出了多少努力，他們就不會覺得這有多麼了不起了。
And that is one of the great secrets of Warren Buffett. We're going to talk about how hard he worked because he makes it look easy, and he doesn't want you to see him break a sweat, but he actually has worked incredibly hard, and that is one of the things that I came to learn when I wrote this novel. I actually first met Warren in 1988, excuse me, 98. It feels like forever, but he was 67 at the time, and we won't talk about how old I was ever. But that was 20 years ago, he is now turning 88 this year. And I met him because Berkshire Hathaway bought a company called General Ray, and I was an analyst on Wall Street, and that was a stock that I covered. So I decided that I would take the opportunity to cover Berkshire Hathaway, because now it was going to have a large element of insurance as part of its business, and that was the subject that I was an expert on. But I knew that Warren Buffett was not going to talk to me, because he was very famous. He did not like Wall Street, he did not do interviews, he did not communicate with Wall Street. He said things like, if you want to maintain your integrity, hold your nose when you walk past Wall Street.
而這正是華倫·巴菲特的偉大祕密之一。我們將談論他有多麼努力，因為他讓一切看起來輕而易舉，且不願讓人見到他流下一滴汗水，但實際上他付出了難以置信的努力，這正是我在撰寫這本小說時領悟到的事情之一。我初次見到華倫其實是在 1988 年，抱歉，是 98 年。感覺像是很久以前的事了，當時他 67 歲，至於我那時多大就不提了。但那已是 20 年前的事，他今年即將滿 88 歲。我會見到他，是因為波克夏·海瑟威收購了一家名為通用再保險的公司，而我當時是華爾街的一名分析師，那正是我負責追蹤的股票。因此我決定把握機會研究波克夏·海瑟威，因為當時保險業務將成為其事業的重要組成部分，而這正是我專精的領域。但我知道華倫·巴菲特不會與我交談，因為他非常有名。他不喜歡華爾街，不接受採訪，也不與華爾街往來。他曾說過這樣的話：若想保持正直，經過華爾街時請捏住鼻子。
He was quite to stay in full. And so I embarked on this project, not expecting to have the usual access to management that analysts have to ask questions and get their facts straight. But he got wind of what was happening. Someone must have told them that I was working on this project. And one day I was in my office, and my assistant came in and said that I had a message from Warren Buffett, and handed me a phone slip with a number to call. I was literally shaking, because I couldn't imagine placing a phone call to Warren Buffett, but I knew I had to respond right away. So I called the number and a voice said, yellow. And I said, this is Alice Schroeder, I'm calling for Mr. Buffett. Oh, Alice, thank you for calling me back, and I realized that it was him. He answers his own phone, and he had given me his direct number, which was astonishing, because nobody in his position should be giving out their direct phone number. And I later learned that he does research, and he's very careful, and he only gives his direct number to people that he's sure will not pass it around irresponsibly, because he does answer his own phone, and that he had checked me out.
他相當樂意全力配合。於是我著手進行這個專案，原本並不預期能像一般分析師那樣接觸管理層、提問並釐清事實。但他察覺了這件事。一定是有人告訴他我正在進行這個專案。某天我在辦公室時，助理進來通知我收到華倫·巴菲特留言，並遞給我一張寫有回電號碼的電話便條。我當下真的在發抖，因為無法想像自己竟要打電話給華倫·巴菲特，但我知道必須立即回應。撥通號碼後，電話那頭傳來一聲「喂」。我說：「我是愛麗絲·施羅德，想找巴菲特先生。」「噢，愛麗絲，謝謝你回電。」這時我才意識到接電話的就是他本人。他親自接聽電話，而且給了我直撥號碼——這實在令人震驚，因為像他這樣地位的人根本不該隨意透露直撥號碼。後來我才知道，他會事先調查，非常謹慎，只把直撥號碼交給確定不會濫傳的人，畢竟他確實親自接電話，而他已經調查過我的背景。
But at the time, I had just had no idea, I was just astonished. And on that call, he told me that I had taken the initiative, and not ask him for anything, which he liked. He loves people who don't ask him for favors, and that he had done some work, reading my research, and he likes the way I think. He likes the way I write, and so he would cooperate with me. And he would let me be the only analyst that he would ever work with, who could talk to him, and he invited me to come out to Omaha. He invited me to spend time, see his businesses, interview him, as much time as I needed, and he proposed that the next time he was in New York a few weeks later, that I fly back to Omaha on his private jet with him and his wife Susie, and interview him on the plane, and then he would give me a tour of Berkshire Hathaway's businesses. So this was my first inkling of what Warren Buffett was like, was the phone call, and then this opportunity. Why hadn't never flown on a private jet? So I was very nervous, first of all, about how to even behave, and I showed up and met the two of them at their hotel that morning, and then we drove out, and we got on this Gulfstream 4, which at the time was the world's largest private jet, and I was amazed at this beautiful plane, and then Warren sat down at a table and sat across for me, and then the flight attendant arrived, and said, "What would you like for Berkshire's? We can make omelettes, pancakes, waffles, and eggs Benedict, and start listing all these things, and I was thinking, "Oh, I would love an omelette." Warren said, "I'll have some potato chips in a cherry coke."
但在當時，我完全沒有頭緒，只是感到震驚。在那通電話中，他告訴我，我主動出擊，沒有向他要求任何東西，這點他很欣賞。他喜歡那些不向他討人情的人，而且他已經做了一些功課，讀了我的研究報告，喜歡我的思考方式。他喜歡我的寫作風格，因此願意與我合作。他還答應讓我成為唯一一位能與他交談並合作的分析師，並邀請我去奧馬哈。他邀請我花時間參觀他的企業、採訪他，時間長短由我決定，並提議幾週後他下次來紐約時，我可以搭乘他的私人飛機與他和妻子蘇西一起飛回奧馬哈，在飛機上進行採訪，之後他會帶我參觀波克夏·海瑟威的企業。這就是我對華倫·巴菲特的第一印象，先是那通電話，然後是這個機會。為什麼我從未坐過私人飛機呢？ 首先，我當時非常緊張，完全不知道該如何表現。那天早上我到他們下榻的飯店與兩人會合後，我們便驅車前往機場，登上了當時全球最大的私人飛機——灣流四型。這架美麗的飛機讓我驚嘆不已。接著華倫在餐桌前坐下，與我面對面而坐。這時空服員過來問道：「您想用什麼伯克希爾早餐？我們可以做歐姆蛋、鬆餅、華夫餅或班尼迪克蛋。」她開始列舉各種餐點，我心想：「真想吃個歐姆蛋。」結果華倫說：「我要薯片配櫻桃可樂。」
[Laughter] And I said, "Same." [Laughter] And for the next floor hours, we flew to Omaha and Warren talked, while eating potato chips steadily, just like this, and so I did too. It was the first inkling had I known it of what was about to happen over the next 10 years, which was that I was going to have many meals with Warren Buffett during which I would gain a lot of weight. [Laughter] He held me along in the interview because I was so nervous that I really was tongue-tied, and my questions were all really idiotic.
[笑聲] 我說：「我也一樣。」[笑聲] 在接下來幾個小時的飛行中，我們前往奧馬哈，華倫一邊說話一邊像這樣不停地吃著薯片，我也就跟著吃。這是我渾然不覺的未來十年生活預演——我將會和華倫·巴菲特共進無數餐飯，並因此增重不少。[笑聲] 訪談中他一直在引導我，因為我緊張到舌頭打結，提出的問題全都蠢到不行。
And with hindsight, once I got to know him very well, I can't even believe how bad it was, but he was actually used to talking to people who were tongue-tied and nervous, and so he helped me along, and we had a good conversation. But the remarkable part of that trip was what happened when we got to Omaha, because he took me first to his office. And in those days, it was that institutional green that very much resembles the Department of Motor Vehicles, or maybe what I imagined a prison would be. It was that kind of dirty green, and the carpet looked as though it had not been cleaned or changed in 20 some years. But he was just very indifferent to it all. And we spent a few minutes there, and then we went over to the Nebraska furniture mart. Now, the Nebraska furniture mart was at the time the largest furniture store in North America. It covers acres. Tins of, maybe over 100 acres. And where I was going to give me a tour, he's about six inches taller than me, and his legs are probably eight inches longer than mine. And so he starts walking, and I started jogging along behind him through these tens of tens and tens of acres. And as we went through the Nebraska furniture mart, he would point things out, and he would say, "So this is the grandfather clock department. We sell 48 of that model a year." And then we'd get to the beds, and he'd say, "This is our best selling mattress. We make $2 a square inch on this mattress in profit margin."
事後回想起來，當我真正了解他之後，我甚至不敢相信當時的情況有多糟糕，但他其實已經習慣了與那些緊張到說不出話來的人交談，所以他幫助我放鬆，我們進行了一次愉快的對話。但那次旅程最令人難忘的部分是我們抵達奧馬哈後發生的事，因為他首先帶我去了他的辦公室。那時候，辦公室是那種機構常見的綠色，非常像機動車輛管理局，或者我想像中監獄會有的顏色。那是一種髒兮兮的綠色，地毯看起來像是 20 多年沒有清潔或更換過。但他對這一切毫不在意。我們在那裡待了幾分鐘，然後去了內布拉斯加家具商城。當時，內布拉斯加家具商城是北美最大的家具店，佔地數英畝，可能超過 100 英畝。他打算帶我參觀，他比我高約六英寸，腿可能比我長八英寸。所以他開始走，我開始在他身後小跑，穿過這數十英畝的場地。 當我們走過內布拉斯加傢俱商城時，他會指著各種商品解說：「這是祖父鐘部門，我們每年能賣出 48 座那個型號。」接著來到床墊區時，他會說：「這是我們最暢銷的床墊，每平方英寸能帶來 2 美元的利潤。」
And I started to get this sense of the grasp of the detail. And then finally, he said, "Let's go to the carpet warehouse." Now, the Nebraska furniture mart was a company he had bought from a woman named Rose Blumkin, who was a tiny, meaning forfeit, I think, 10. Jewish immigrant who had come from through Siberia and traveled over 2,000 miles to reach the United States during the pogroms. And was extremely elderly. And the carpet department was her special place that she cared deeply about. Possibly because she grew up sleeping on a bare wood floor covered with straw.
我開始感受到他對細節的掌握程度。最後他說：「我們去地毯倉庫看看吧。」這家內布拉斯加傢俱商城是他從一位名叫蘿絲·布魯姆金的老太太手中買下的，她是個身高可能只有 10 英尺（原文疑為筆誤，應指體型嬌小）的猶太移民，經歷過大屠殺時期，穿越西伯利亞跋涉兩千多英里才抵達美國。當時她已年邁至極，而地毯部門是她特別珍視的地方——或許因為她童年時只能睡在鋪著稻草的裸露木地板上。
So carpet was important to her. So the Nebraska furniture mart sold millions of yards of carpet a year, and they had an enormous warehouse full of carpet. So we went to the carpet warehouse. And as we started going through a worn, walking along, and I'm jogging along behind him, and he says, "Now, that is our best selling carpet in brown." We sell 2,000 yards of that a week, and our margin on that is about 22%. But this week we're discounting it, and we'll only make about 11%. But this one over here, this carpet is not quite as big a seller, but we don't ever have to put it on sale. So we mainly sell 1,500 yards this week, but we'll make our 20% margin. Now, this pile, seeing the corner here, this stuff, this stuff that Rose, she didn't ever like to discount anything below her cost, but I persuaded her that it's better to just move the inventory and get it out of here. So we lose about 20% on what we paid for this carpet. This green one here is our worst seller. We have to move this out at about half of what we paid for. And then we continue to move through the carpet warehouse, row after aisle after row after aisle,
所以地毯對她來說很重要。內布拉斯加傢俱商場每年賣出數百萬碼的地毯，他們有一個巨大的倉庫堆滿了地毯。於是我們去了地毯倉庫。當我們開始穿行其中，一路走著，我跟在他後面小跑，他說：「看，那是我們賣得最好的棕色地毯。我們每週賣出 2000 碼，利潤率大約是 22%。但這週我們打折，所以只能賺到 11%左右。那邊那款地毯銷量沒那麼好，但我們從不需要打折。這週我們大概賣了 1500 碼，但能維持 20%的利潤。現在看這堆，角落這裡的這些，這些貨，蘿絲從來不願意把價格降到成本以下，但我說服她與其囤積不如清倉。所以這批地毯我們虧了約 20%。這款綠色的是我們賣得最差的，得半價出清。」接著我們繼續在地毯倉庫裡穿梭，一排又一排，一列又一列。
with him explaining to me the individual roles and styles of carpet, and how much they cost, what they sold for, how many yards were sold a week, and at what profit margin. And it was at that point that I started to really understand that this was no ordinary human being. Because this was only one of the businesses that Berkshire Hathaway owned. And while we were in the office, he had also shown me some reports from C's Candies, which is a chocolate confectionery chain that Berkshire owns, and I had been a bit surprised to see that they showed sales by store by week for all the hundred-some-odd stores. And he had explained to me why this animonic store was doing better than the Sacramento store on this particular week.
他向我解釋地毯的個別角色與風格、成本多少、售價為何、每週賣出多少碼，以及利潤率是多少。就在那一刻，我開始真正明白這絕非尋常之人。因為這只是波克夏·海瑟威旗下眾多事業中的一項。當我們在辦公室時，他還給我看了一些時思糖果的報告，這是波克夏旗下的一家巧克力連鎖店，我有點驚訝地發現這些報告顯示了所有一百多家分店每週的銷售情況。他還向我解釋為什麼這家位於阿尼莫尼克的分店在這一週的表現比沙加緬度分店更好。
And that level of detail multiplied across 47-odd businesses with something that he mastered, and just voraciously sucked up information. And I found that very unusual and clearly that was the secret of his success. So I went back to New York, I wrote my report. It was somewhat of a sensation because no one had ever really written a big research report on Berkshire Hathaway before. And then five years went by, and during that time, I saw Warren usually twice a year. I would go out partly for the shareholder meeting, and then he'd invite me to a party that he has. And then I usually go out at least one other time a year to visit him.
這種對細節的掌握程度，乘以 47 家左右他精通的企業，加上他如飢似渴地吸收資訊的方式，讓我覺得非常不尋常，顯然這就是他成功的秘訣。於是我回到紐約，寫了我的報告。這份報告引起了一些轟動，因為之前從未有人真正寫過關於波克夏·海瑟威的大型研究報告。五年過去了，在這段時間裡，我通常每年會見華倫兩次。我會參加部分股東大會，然後他會邀請我參加他舉辦的派對。此外，我通常每年至少還會再去拜訪他一次。
And he always said, "Call me anytime, but I never did." Because I thought he must be so busy, and I'm the least important person that could ever want to talk to him. So he would call me, and he called me with great regularity, and we would talk. And as time passed, he became the person who I most wanted to hear from, and I would occasionally call if something important happened, because his opinion would be the thing that I would most want to know. So after five years, something happened. And that's something happened on September 11, 2001.
他總是說：「隨時打電話給我。」但我從來沒有這麼做，因為我覺得他一定很忙，而我是最不重要的、想和他說話的人。反而是他會打電話給我，而且非常規律地打來，我們就會聊天。隨著時間過去，他成了我最想聽到消息的人，偶爾如果有重要事情發生，我也會打電話給他，因為我最想知道的就是他的意見。五年後，發生了一件事，那件事發生在 2001 年 9 月 11 日。
I was in New York that day. I actually saw the second tower get hit. I knew a lot of people that were in it, and it was not a good day, obviously, for many people, as of a lot of bad memories. But the next day, the first person that I called was Warren, because I wanted to just hear his thoughts on the whole thing. And what I found was that he was extremely angry. And that was not all what I was expecting. He was one of only two occasions that I've ever seen him be very, very angry.
那天我在紐約。我親眼目睹了第二座塔被擊中。我認識很多當時在裡面的人，對許多人來說，那顯然不是一個好日子，充滿了許多糟糕的回憶。但第二天，我第一個打電話的人是華倫，因為我只想聽聽他對整個事件的看法。而我發現他非常憤怒。這完全出乎我的意料。這是我見過他非常、非常憤怒的僅有的兩次之一。
And what had happened was he, of course, had absorbed the terrorist attack. He had thought deeply about it, and we would go on to have many, many interesting conversations about terrorism and risk. But why he was angry was that six months earlier, he had spoken to the leaders of the two big insurance companies that Berkshire owned. National indemnity, which was run by a jeet Jane, who you may have heard of. He just went on the board of directors of Berkshire, Hathaway. And he had spoken to the CEO of General Rae, which was the company that Berkshire bought. Who stock I have followed that had led me ultimately to get involved in the first place. And he had told those two people to go and survey how much insurance exposure that they had in the trade centers. How many customers do they have, and if something happened to those two buildings, what did Berkshire have at stake that it could lose? And when he found out the numbers, he told both of those two executives, "Wingel Icons," which is a very typical date to renew commercial insurance policies. I want you to cancel and not renew as many of those policies as possible.
而發生的事情是，他當然吸收了那次恐怖攻擊的影響。他對此深思熟慮，我們後來進行了許多次關於恐怖主義與風險的有趣對話。但他之所以生氣，是因為六個月前，他曾與伯克希爾擁有的兩家大型保險公司的領導人談過。國家賠償公司由吉特·簡（Jeet Jane）經營，你可能聽過這個人。他剛加入伯克希爾·哈撒韋的董事會。他還與通用再保險（General Re）的執行長談過，這家公司是伯克希爾收購的。我追蹤過這家公司的股票，最終讓我最初參與其中。他告訴這兩個人去調查他們在世貿中心有多少保險風險敞口。他們有多少客戶？如果那兩棟大樓發生什麼事，伯克希爾會面臨多少潛在損失？當他得知數字後，他告訴這兩位高管：「溫格爾·艾康斯（Wingel Icons）」（這是商業保險政策續約的典型日期），我希望你們取消並盡可能不續約這些保單。
One of those two people as Jane had done exactly that, and his exposure in the trade center very sharply. The other from General Rae did not, and ignored Warren's instructions. And the end result was that it cost Berkshire have the way $2.4 billion in property losses. Warren was outpplectic that it was what he calls an unforestered error as in baseball. It was something that he had foreseen. He had instructed them not to do this. They had ignored him, and they had lost what he felt was his money, and a large part of it was his money because he was the largest shareholder in Berkshire, halfway.
那兩個人中，珍確實照做了，而他在貿易中心的曝光非常尖銳。另一位來自雷將軍的人沒有這樣做，無視了華倫的指示。最終結果是，這讓波克夏付出了高達 24 億美元的財產損失。華倫對此怒不可遏，他稱之為棒球中所謂的「未預見的錯誤」。這是他早已預見的事情。他曾指示他們不要這樣做。他們無視了他，結果損失了他認為是他的錢，而且很大一部分確實是他的錢，因為他是波克夏的最大股東，佔了一半。
I was astounded by the story, not just by the fact that he was so angry, because the two times I've seen him angry were both when people ignored instructions in a cost him money. And there was a cold rage that came out on those two occasions. But the other astounding thing about this story was that six months before 9/11 he had thought to do this thing. And he would be the first to say that he did not predict 9/11 in any way shape or form, but what he did now is that it had been a terrorist attack before. That it did have a large concentrations of insurance risks, and that the world is generally not a safe place. And so he had this way of thinking about things involving risk that I'd never encountered, and I thought was pretty remarkable.
我對這個故事感到震驚，不僅僅是因為他如此憤怒，因為我見過他生氣的兩次都是因為人們無視指示而讓他損失了錢。那兩次他表現出一種冰冷的憤怒。但這個故事另一個令人震驚的地方是，在 911 事件發生前六個月，他就想到要做這件事。他會是第一個說他完全沒有以任何形式預測到 911 事件的人，但他現在所做的是，之前就有過恐怖攻擊。那裡確實有大量的保險風險集中，而且世界通常不是一個安全的地方。因此，他有這種我從未遇到過的思考風險的方式，我認為這相當了不起。
In the aftermath of 9/11, I ended up becoming kind of an expert on terrorism, and ended up doing a whole bunch of things. Terrorism as it pertains to insurance risks, so I ended up testifying with our Congress and consulting for the CIA and doing all kinds of weird things. And finally, Warren said to me, you have really done everything that you can do as an analyst, and your career is getting larger than that. I said, "You should quit your job in right a book," and I said, "But Warren, what would I write about?"
在 911 事件之後，我意外成為了某種恐怖主義專家，並因此涉足了一系列相關事務。這包括與保險風險相關的恐怖主義議題，所以我最終在國會作證、為中央情報局提供諮詢，還做了各種各樣奇特的事情。最後，華倫對我說：「你已經以分析師的身份做了所有能做的事，你的職業生涯已經超越了這個範疇。」我說：「你應該辭職寫本書。」而我問他：「但是華倫，我該寫些什麼呢？」
He said, "You'll think of something." He had this conversation at least three times, and I just couldn't figure out what he thought I should write about. And then one day it dawned on me after seeing him on television that there really could only be one thing that he would think would be important enough for me to spell it full time writing about. And that would be himself. And so I called him, and I said, "So Warren, when you suggested that I quit my job in right a book, were you thinking that I might write about you?" And he said, "Oh, if you'll do that, you can spend as much time here, and I'll talk to you, and you can have unlimited access to me, and I'll give you all my papers, and I'll have my friends and my family, and I'll have all the interview with you, and I'll have a range of everything for you, and I'll... Okay. And I decided to do it because it was an important book that needed to be written, and he had never given access to any author before. And now he said he chose me because he likes the way I think he likes the way I write. I am also absolutely certain there are two other factors. One is I was not a journalist, and I think that he did not want a journalist that had A and a agenda and B. He thought he could probably have a bit more control with someone who'd never written a biography before.
他說：「你會想到辦法的。」這樣的對話至少發生過三次，而我始終不明白他認為我該寫些什麼。直到某天在電視上看見他後，我突然領悟——對他而言，唯一重要到值得讓我辭職全心書寫的主題，只可能是他自己。於是我打電話問他：「華倫，當初你建議我辭職寫書時，是不是想著讓我寫你的故事？」他回答：「噢，如果你願意寫，你可以隨時來找我，我會和你暢談，讓你無限制地接觸我的一切。我會提供所有文件，安排家人朋友受訪，為你準備各種素材... 好。」我決定接下這個任務，因為這本重要的傳記需要被寫出來，而他從未給予其他作家這樣的權限。他說選擇我是因為欣賞我的思考與文筆，但我確信還有另外兩個關鍵因素。 一是因為我不是記者，而且我認為他並不想要一個帶有 A 和 B 議程的記者。他覺得與一個從未寫過傳記的人合作，或許能讓他擁有更多的掌控權。
The second thing is I was a woman, and Warren loves to hang around with women, flirt with women, and show off in front of women. That's just his personality. And if you haven't read this no ball, I hope you will, because some of the best stories and about Warren's relationships with women, and how funny he is around women. And if he was going to sit on his sofa for a year and a half telling stories of his life, it certainly wasn't going to be too a man. So in June of 2003, I flew out to Omaha and set up camp there in the double tree end, and I began to work with Warren. Now at the time, they had done, they were starting to renovate the office, and his office had been renovated. It was a corner office, always had been, and he had had it redone with new brown carpet, new brown wood furniture with brown upholstery, brown walls, wallpaper on the walls, and Corner windows with wooden brown wooden shutters on them, which he keeps closed all the time to block out the view, because he does not want to be distracted by the sky. So his office feels a little bit like being inside of a kukuk lock. And I would spend the next year and a half most of my time there, and it was a little bit claustrophobic, and to escape, I would go to the file rooms rooms plural. So if you've ever seen a documentary on TV, and he does the tour of the office, he doesn't show the file rooms. He keeps, he claims he does not keep everything, but I think his definition of everything is pretty elastic. He has two enormous file rooms.
第二件事是我是女性，而華倫喜歡與女性相處、調情，並在女性面前炫耀。這就是他的個性。如果你還沒讀過這本《雪球》，我希望你會去讀，因為書中一些最精彩的故事講述了華倫與女性的關係，以及他在女性面前有多麼風趣。如果他打算花一年半時間坐在沙發上講述自己的人生故事，那對象肯定不會是個男性。所以在 2003 年 6 月，我飛往奧馬哈，在雙樹酒店安頓下來，開始與華倫合作。當時他們正在開始翻修辦公室，而他的辦公室已經裝修完成。那是個角落辦公室，一直都是，他重新裝潢了新的棕色地毯、新的棕色木製家具配上棕色軟墊，棕色牆壁貼著壁紙，角落的窗戶裝著棕色的木製百葉窗，這些百葉窗他總是關著以擋住外面的景色，因為他不想被天空分散注意力。所以他的辦公室感覺有點像在咕咕鐘裡面。 而我接下來一年半的時間大多會待在那裡，那裡有點令人窒息，為了逃離這種感覺，我會去檔案室——是複數的檔案室。所以如果你曾在電視上看過紀錄片，他帶大家參觀辦公室時，並沒有展示檔案室。他聲稱自己並沒有保留所有東西，但我認為他對「所有東西」的定義相當有彈性。他有兩間巨大的檔案室。
He has files of every investment he's ever made, every company he's ever studied, and there's an entire semi secret wall of files on people that are, they're not like Jay Edgar Hoover's files exactly, but I found a file on myself the first day there. And he keeps, he likes to write letters, so all the correspondence with people goes there. It's a very logical thing to do, but he also was very, very worried about giving me access to the files, and he, the only thing he said, I couldn't publish that I found was anything he might have written or said that would be critical of someone else. He said you can write anything critical of me, I don't care, but if I've said something unflattering about another person, please don't put it in the book. And I said, well it depends on what it is, but there is one thing, and I'll tell you a story later, where I am keeping the name of secret. So we started, and I sat down on the sofa and the very first question I asked him was, the big one, which is, weren't if you had to really capture the true secret to your success.
他擁有每一筆投資的檔案、每一間研究過的公司，還有一整面半機密的檔案牆，記錄著各種人物——雖然不完全像傑·埃德加·胡佛的檔案那樣，但我在第一天就發現了自己的檔案。他喜歡寫信，所以所有與人的往來信件都收在那裡。這是非常合乎邏輯的做法，但他也非常、非常擔心讓我接觸這些檔案。他唯一的要求是，我不能公開任何他可能寫過或說過、對他人有批評意味的內容。他說，你可以寫任何批評我的話，我不在乎，但如果我說了對他人不敬的話，請不要放進書裡。我說，這要看情況，但有一件事——我稍後會告訴你一個故事——我會保密名字。於是我們開始了，我坐在沙發上，第一個問題就是最重要的那個：如果要真正抓住你成功的關鍵秘訣，會是什麼？
Honestly, dig deep and tell me what it is, and he said, it's only focus. But what he means by focus is not what you and I mean by focus, and it was more than just going through the carpet warehouse and having spent so much focus that he knew that the shaggy green carpet from 20 years ago had to be marked down, because what I came to learn is that if we're in Buffett bought a pizza parlor. Unlike most people, he would not just look at the financial statements of the pizza parlor and ask questions about them. He would study the price of wheat over time. He would learn how much water went into the pizza dog and how much it cost. He would know everything there was to know about pizza sauce and the cost of it. She's all of the toppings, whether there was a way to make pizza with a bit fewer of them. He would know the price of pizza ovens, all the different kinds of pizza ovens, what it cost to run them, what it cost to repair them, how often they had to be replaced. He would know everything about how much you had to pay employees and delivery people and what the kind of turnover of those employees was, how reliable they were. He would know everything about the leasing terms of the pizza store. The level of detail that he would know before he would own a pizza business would start with the price of wheat. And that's what I mean by focus. It was an incredible amount of focus.
老實說，深入挖掘並告訴我那是什麼，他說，那只是專注。但他所說的專注並非你我理解的專注，這不僅僅是走過地毯倉庫時如此專注，以至於他知道 20 年前的毛茸綠色地毯必須降價，因為我後來了解到，如果我們在巴菲特買下一家披薩店。與大多數人不同，他不僅會查看披薩店的財務報表並提出相關問題。他會研究小麥價格隨時間的變化。他會了解披薩麵團用了多少水及其成本。他會掌握有關披薩醬及其成本的一切知識。她指的是所有的配料，是否有辦法用稍微少一點的配料製作披薩。他會知道披薩烤箱的價格，所有不同種類的披薩烤箱，運營它們的成本，維修它們的成本，以及它們需要更換的頻率。他會了解關於支付員工和送貨員的薪資的一切，以及這些員工的流動率如何，他們有多可靠。 他會對披薩店的租賃條款瞭如指掌。在他擁有一家披薩生意之前，他會從了解小麥的價格開始掌握每一個細節。這就是我所說的專注。那是一種令人難以置信的專注程度。
I also learned as I got to know him, the personal side of that focus. One of the people I met fairly early was Ostrdmanks who is now Ostrdbuff at his second wife. They were living together in Omaha. He was still married to Suzy, his first wife who lived in San Francisco. They lived separate lives. And I also met Suzy who lived in San Francisco, but I met her out in San Francisco. But Ostrdm was one of my better sources because she would tell me stories that were really kind of revealing about Warren in a different way, such as this one. You probably have heard that Warren likes to play bridge on the computer.
隨著我對他的了解加深，我也認識到了這種專注背後個人生活的一面。我較早認識的人之一是奧斯特德曼克斯（Ostrdmanks），現在是他的第二任妻子奧斯特德巴夫（Ostrdbuff）。他們當時一起住在奧馬哈。他仍與第一任妻子蘇西（Suzy）保持婚姻關係，蘇西住在舊金山。他們過著分居的生活。我也在舊金山見過蘇西，但那次是在舊金山見的面。不過，奧斯特德（Ostrdm）是我較好的消息來源之一，因為她會告訴我一些故事，這些故事以不同的方式揭示了華倫（Warren）的另一面，比如這個。你可能聽說過華倫喜歡在電腦上玩橋牌。
And he plays three nights a week, typically. In the family room of their house. It's quite a large room. It's the length of this stage in about twice the width. It looks like it was last decorated in the 1970s and probably was. On one wall, let's turn this around. That's the long wall or windows and curtains. And then a TV, an Ostrdm watches TV. And then on this wall is the door and then here's Warren's computer setup, the table.
他通常每週會演奏三個晚上，地點就在他們家的家庭娛樂室裡。那是個相當寬敞的房間，長度約莫這個舞台的兩倍，寬度也差不多。從裝潢風格來看，上次整修應該是 1970 年代的事了。讓我們轉個方向描述：其中一面長牆裝設了整排窗戶和窗帘，對面擺著電視機——奧斯特羅姆常在那看電視。這面牆則有房門，旁邊就是華倫的電腦工作區，擺著一張桌子。
And then he's got a big monitor and that's where he plays bridge. One night a bat got into the house. And the bat started banging off the walls, getting tangled in the curtains, making all kinds of racket, and Ostrdm terrified started screaming. Warren helped. There's a bat in here. Help me. Warren never turned his face away from the computer. Never took his hand off the mouse.
他配備了大尺寸顯示器，就在那裡玩橋牌。有天晚上有隻蝙蝠闖進屋裡，不斷撞擊牆壁、纏繞在窗簾裡製造各種噪音，嚇得奧斯特羅姆尖叫連連。「有蝙蝠！快幫我！」華倫卻始終沒把視線從電腦螢幕移開，握著滑鼠的手也完全沒鬆開。
It just said, "It's not bothering me any." So Ostrdm called the Pets Control people. They came. They removed the bat. It all took about an hour to get it done. And during the entire time, Warren played bridge. Never looked away from the monitor. So that's a different kind of focus. Warren and I started to get to know each other a little bit on a personal level. He did something very unusual, which is he began to ease me out of my marriage. He decided that he did not think my husband was right for me. And he did it in a very subtle way, which was to ask me questions such as, "I wonder if you would treat your husband the way he's treating you, would you?" And I would think, "Hell no. But I never thought of the question that way before." And gently, gently, like the drops of water on a stone, I began to feel empowered that I really needed to get a divorce. Now, in fairness to my own family and my own father, who was also saying some of these things.
它只是說：「這並沒有打擾到我。」於是奧斯特德姆打電話給寵物控制中心的人。他們來了，帶走了蝙蝠。整個過程大約花了一個小時。而在這段時間裡，華倫一直在玩橋牌，眼睛從未離開過螢幕。這就是另一種專注力了。華倫和我開始在個人層面上稍微了解彼此。他做了一件非常不尋常的事，就是開始幫助我脫離婚姻。他認為我的丈夫並不適合我，並以一種非常巧妙的方式來表達這一點，比如問我：「我在想，如果你丈夫那樣對待你，你會那樣對待他嗎？」而我會想：「當然不會。但我以前從未這樣想過這個問題。」慢慢地，就像水滴石穿一樣，我開始覺得自己真的需要離婚。現在，公平地說，我的家人和我的父親也曾經說過類似的話。
This was not entirely Warren. But it was very interesting that he wanted to have that influence. He felt very paternal. He felt that I wasn't married to the right person. And later, when I remarried, he did ask for and get approval rights. [Laughter] He loves my second husband and gave us a fantastic wedding gift and sent a video and it feels like I got the right one this time. But he also feels that he taught me a lot about how to choose the right person, which is actually true. But at that time, I decided that I was going to buy a house as I was getting divorced.
這不完全是華倫的意思。但很有趣的是他想要有這樣的影響力。他感覺非常像個父親。他覺得我嫁錯了人。後來，當我再婚時，他確實要求並獲得了認可權。[笑聲] 他很喜歡我的第二任丈夫，給了我們一份很棒的結婚禮物，還寄了一段影片，感覺這次我真的選對人了。但他也覺得他教會了我很多關於如何選擇對的人，這其實是真的。但當時，我決定在離婚時買一棟房子。
And I told him, for some reason, I had a lot going on in my life obviously. So I went out, look for a house, made an offer, did a contract, and then, usually we talked about Warren. We didn't talk as much about me. So when I told Warren, he was just quiet for a minute and then he said, "Is it too late to get out?" And I said, "Well, I've put down a deposit and signed a contract. So while technically I could get out, I would lose my deposit." This was in 2004.
我告訴他，不知為何，我當時生活中發生了很多事。所以我出去看房子，出了價，簽了合約，然後，通常我們談的都是華倫的事。我們不太談論我自己。所以當我告訴華倫時，他沉默了一會兒，然後他說：「現在退出還來得及嗎？」我說：「嗯，我已經付了訂金也簽了合約。所以理論上我可以退出，但我會損失訂金。」那是在 2004 年。
His response was, "Well, there's going to be a housing crash." But if you can hold on for 10 years, you'll be able to sell it for what you paid for it. And later, after the 2008, he said he didn't foresee the housing crash. And I believe he meant that sincerely that he didn't foresee the magnitude of it. I thought there was a bubble in '04. He didn't really think it was going to get so much worse. But I will tell you that I did sell my house 10 years later, for essentially what I paid for. And between it was ugly.
他的回應是：「嗯，房市將會崩盤。」但如果你能撐過 10 年，你就能以當初購買的價格賣掉它。後來，在 2008 年金融危機後，他說他並未預見到房市崩盤。我相信他是真心這麼認為，他沒預料到崩盤的嚴重程度。我在 2004 年就覺得有泡沫，但他並不認為情況會惡化到如此地步。不過我要告訴你，我確實在 10 年後賣掉了我的房子，價格基本上就是當初買入價。而這段期間真是慘不忍睹。
So he was right and it was spooky. And it took me back to 9/11 and his way of knowing things. And while I did not think there was anything released but supernatural about it, whenever he makes a prediction or says something in public that is like a forecast or suggests that something might happen, and you should be concerned about it. I always take it now as a gospel that is true and will be right. And I've heard a lot of people question and say that he's got some motive or there's some reason why he's saying these things. But I don't think so. Having spent as much time around him as I have. He just is so good at putting dots together.
所以他是對的，這讓人毛骨悚然。這讓我回想起 911 事件和他那種洞悉事物的方式。雖然我並不認為其中有任何超自然的成分，但每當他做出預測或在公開場合發表類似預報的言論，暗示某些事情可能發生、你應該對此保持警惕時，我現在總是將其視為必然成真的真理。我聽過很多人質疑，說他這麼說背後有什麼動機或原因。但我不這麼認為。以我與他相處的時間來看，他就是非常擅長將各種線索串聯起來。
And the interesting thing about this one is that he had absolutely no interest in real estate. He's lived in the same house since 1956. And as I said it, it looked like it hadn't been remodeled since 1976. He does an investment real estate. He doesn't buy read. Investment, it's a whole area of expertise that he's consciously avoided getting any involvement in. And in fact, once I even asked him what color his bedroom walls were and he said he didn't know. And I actually believe that given that his office is all brown and I'm not even sure he knows that it's brown.
關於這一點有趣的是，他對房地產完全沒有興趣。他自 1956 年起就住在同一棟房子裡。正如我所說，那房子看起來自 1976 年後就沒再裝修過。他從事的是投資房地產，但不買住宅。投資房地產是一門專業領域，他刻意避免涉足其中。事實上，有一次我甚至問他臥室牆壁是什麼顏色，他說他不知道。我其實相信這一點，因為他的辦公室全是棕色的，我甚至不確定他是否知道那是棕色。
So. But as you can see he was having an influence on me. And of course I was his biographer and my job was to be objective. And I could see then that this is what happens when you write about a living person. As you do become quite captivated by that person. And I become captivated by the whole family. Warren had early on introduced me to Doris. And he had told me that I reminded him of Doris. In my personality, she had a very lively personality. And in fact, he had told me about Doris's divorces because he thought there was a similarity in the way that.
所以，但你可以看出他對我有影響。當然，我是他的傳記作者，我的工作是保持客觀。那時我就明白，當你寫一個在世的人時會發生什麼。你會變得相當著迷於那個人。而我也被整個家族迷住了。華倫很早之前就把桃樂絲介紹給我認識。他告訴我，我讓他想起桃樂絲。在個性上，她非常活潑。事實上，他還告訴我關於桃樂絲的離婚經歷，因為他認為在那方面我們有相似之處。
The creativity with which she handled her divorces. At one point Doris's second husband was trying to serve her with some papers or something. And she didn't want to be served. And so she got an un-shabit. And she traveled a lot. She liked to travel. And so she went all around the country dressed as a nun to avoid this person. He was trying to serve her with papers. And that the buffet children, Doris Warren and their other sister, Bernie had their IQs tested when they were very young.
她處理離婚事宜的創意方式。有一次，多麗絲的第二任丈夫試圖向她遞送一些文件之類的東西，而她不想被送達。於是，她弄來一套修女服，並經常旅行——她喜歡旅行。就這樣，她打扮成修女在全國各地遊走，以避開這個人。對方一直試圖向她遞送文件。而巴菲特的孩子們，多麗絲·華倫和他們的另一個姐妹伯妮，在很小的時候就接受了智商測試。
Or their parents had it done. And their IQs are all within one point of each other. And they are very, very high. Some day when they're all gone, I'll say what the number is. I don't want to do it now because I don't want them to be pestered. But they are all well, well up into the genius range. And interestingly, they're all essentially the same. So Doris became a very dear friend. I come out and stayed with her at her house in Frederick's work. She's talked about this college to me many times in how much it meant to her, her love of American history, her program with domestic violence victims, with the prisons, teaching history and prisons. I've stayed at her house in Maine. And she's someone that I just consider very special and precious. And she's embossed now with her grandson, Alex, Ruzik. And who is also a fantastic person. But I just wanted to say that tonight because one of the greatest gifts I got from the opportunity to write this book was the opportunity to get to know Doris or Dodo. She's known within the family. And so that was absolutely fantastic. So as you can see, Warren is very, very much someone who influences the people around him. And perhaps the most notable example of when he's done that was with Katherine Graham and the Washington Post. And this is a different kind of focus because he not only bought the postdoc at a time when it was very depressed and the company was in trouble. But he saw an opportunity of a company who had a leader that had inherited the business after her husband committed suicide. She had no business experience. She was personally very insecure despite being a powerful woman in her own way. And he saw that he could make a difference. He could influence through his friendship with her, the success of his own investment. And at the same time, she made his life better.
或是他們的父母讓他們這麼做的。而他們的智商彼此之間都只相差一分。而且都非常、非常高。有一天當他們都不在了，我會說出那個數字。現在我不想這麼做，因為我不希望他們被打擾。但他們都遠高於天才的範圍。有趣的是，他們基本上都一樣。所以桃樂絲成了我非常親密的朋友。我出來並在她位於弗雷德里克工作的家中與她同住。她多次向我談及這所大學對她的意義，她對美國歷史的熱愛，她與家暴受害者及監獄合作的計劃，在監獄中教授歷史。我也曾在她在緬因州的家中住過。她是我認為非常特別且珍貴的人。現在她與她的孫子亞歷克斯·魯茲克一起生活，他也是個很棒的人。但今晚我想說的是，寫這本書給我最大的禮物之一，就是有機會認識桃樂絲或多多——這是家人對她的暱稱。這絕對是太棒了。所以你可以看到，華倫確實深深影響著他周圍的人。 而他這麼做最著名的例子或許就是與凱瑟琳·葛蘭姆和《華盛頓郵報》的合作。這是一種不同類型的關注，因為他不僅在《郵報》極度低迷、公司陷入困境時收購了這家報社。他還看到了一個機會：這家公司的領導者是在丈夫自殺後繼承了事業，她毫無商業經驗，儘管本身是個有能力的女性，卻對自己極度缺乏信心。而他發現自己能夠改變這一切——透過與她的友誼，他能影響自身投資的成功。與此同時，她也讓他的生活更加美好。
When I interviewed her son Don, she had already passed away. He took me and gave me something amazing which was the files of the packages that Warren had sent to him and his mother over the years to teach them about business. Now, Warren and Kay, socialized together a lot. She was here in Washington all the time and she introduced him to the rich and famous of the world and introduced him to the world of politics. But what he gave them and returned, nobody knows. And what it was was a daily package that had articles, newsletters and letters and bulletins that he had gone through and annotated, underlined, written marginal notes in to teach them about how to run a great business. And how the economy works and how to invest.
當我採訪她的兒子唐時，她已經過世了。他帶我看了些令人驚嘆的東西，那是多年來華倫寄給他和母親的包裹文件，用來教導他們商業知識。當時，華倫和凱經常一起社交。她常駐華盛頓，將他介紹給世界上的富豪名流，並引領他進入政治圈。但他給予他們並回報了什麼，無人知曉。這些包裹裡裝的是每日寄送的文件，包含文章、通訊、信件和公告，他會仔細閱讀並加上註解、劃線、在邊緣寫下筆記，以此教導他們如何經營一家卓越的企業，以及經濟如何運作和投資之道。
And this had gone on for years and years and years and years. And Don let me make coffee so most of it. And so I have it now. And whenever I want a refresher on what truly matters in business and the economy, this is like my master class that I got second hand from Warren that he gave to Don and Kay. And he did it once and it was an immense effort and he wasn't ever going to do it again. So that was amazing. And the impact of that was that he was on the board of directors of the post. And some even said that he was the shadow CEO of the post. I think that's not true, but he did obviously have any enormous influence on that company's business decisions and its history and its future. And as a result, that became one of the most valuable investments that perks your half away ever made. Guy Co is another one. I'll give a very quick example in terms of this focus, this unrelenting focus. With Guy Co he encountered it when he was a teenager reading about it in a library. And he went down to Washington again, D.C. because the company is based here. He went to see the company on a snowy Saturday morning and found the president was in the office working. And he went in and spent four hours talking to Laura Mordavits and to learn about the auto insurance business. Just to learn.
這種情況持續了許多年、許多年、許多年。而唐讓我負責煮咖啡，所以大部分時間都是我在做。現在這份筆記歸我所有。每當我需要重溫商業與經濟中真正重要的核心時，這就像是我從華倫那裡二手獲得的頂級課程——當年他親自傳授給唐和凱的內容。他僅此一次傾囊相授，耗費了巨大心力，此後再也沒有重複講授。這實在令人驚嘆。這件事的影響在於：後來他成為《郵報》的董事會成員，甚至有人說他才是《郵報》的影子執行長。我認為這種說法不盡真實，但無可否認他對該公司的商業決策、歷史軌跡與未來發展產生了巨大影響。正因如此，這成為波克夏早期最具價值的投資案例之一。蓋可保險是另一個例子。關於這種專注力——這種毫不鬆懈的聚焦力，我舉個簡短例子：華倫十幾歲時在圖書館讀到蓋可保險的資料後，再次前往華盛頓特區（因為該公司總部設於此處）。某個飄雪的週六早晨，他去公司探訪時發現總裁仍在辦公室工作。 他走進去，花了四個小時與蘿拉·莫達維茨交談，了解汽車保險業務。純粹就是為了學習。
Then he went back and bought the stock and he put 75% of all of them and he had into Guy Co. He wrote an article called at the Security that I like best and published it in the commercial and financial chronicle, which was like the barrens newspaper of its time. And from then on he owned Guy Co stock. But it was 20 years before there was a situation where he had enough money and Guy Co ran into some trouble and was cheap enough that he was able to buy a huge percentage of the company and in effect acquire control and he did that in 1976. During the entire time, throughout he kept up his friendship with Laura Mordavits and he met the other managers. He made regular visits to Guy Co. He got to know everything about their operations and he wanted Guy Co. He craved Guy Co. Then in 1996 he bought the whole company. He bought the rest of it. And so over a 40 year period he followed this company.
然後他回去買了股票，將他所有資金的 75%投入蓋伊公司。他寫了一篇名為《我最喜歡的證券》的文章，發表在《商業與金融紀事報》上，這份報紙在當時就像是《巴倫週刊》那樣的存在。從那時起，他就持有蓋伊公司的股票。但直到 20 年後，當他有了足夠的資金，而蓋伊公司遇到了一些麻煩，股價變得足夠便宜時，他才得以買下公司的大部分股份，實質上取得了控制權，這發生在 1976 年。在這整個過程中，他始終保持著與蘿拉·莫達維茨的友誼，並認識了其他管理層。他定期訪問蓋伊公司，深入了解他們的運營情況，他渴望擁有蓋伊公司。然後在 1996 年，他買下了整個公司，收購了剩餘的股份。就這樣，在 40 年的時間裡，他一直在追蹤這家公司。
He knew everything about it and the more he learned, the more he wanted to own it. And now Guy Co is the second largest auto insurer in the United States. And I believe probably the most profitable. But at the time that he bought it, it was probably right number 20. It was so small compared to a company like all state, which is now larger than that it was just almost being dismissed by those kinds of companies. It's not even important, but we're in saw then what it was going to be. And he spent 40 years getting hold of it. And then that was in 1996.
他對它瞭若指掌，而且了解得越多，就越想擁有它。如今，Guy Co 已成為美國第二大汽車保險公司，我相信它很可能也是最賺錢的。但在他買下它的時候，它可能只排在第 20 名左右。與像 Allstate 這樣的公司相比，它實在太小了，以至於當時這類公司幾乎都不把它放在眼裡。它甚至不重要，但我們當時就看到了它未來的潛力。而他花了 40 年的時間才終於得到它。那是在 1996 年。
So now we're all forward another 22 years. And it's grown enormously since he bought it. And that story to me is absolutely amazing. But with all of this intense focus on business, there was on myopia. And so I had noticed in getting to know we're in there was a lot that he did not see because of your that focused on narrow things. You can look at things right in front of you and just not see them. So by then I had spent two, three years maybe on the writing and I had spent a year and a half either in Omaha or traveling with him. And then I had been to Omaha periodically after that. So maybe a hundred, I don't know how many occasions, I mean days and days and weeks on end where we had seen each other. And I decided that I would play a trick on warrant. So one day I called him on the phone from my house in Connecticut and I said, "Weren't? What color is my hair? Play the Japanese song. ♪ Finally after the longest silence I think I have ever heard from him." He said, "Not black." [laughter] It was a very precise answer. He gave me the full extent of his knowledge.
所以現在我們又往前推進了 22 年。自從他買下它以來，規模已經大幅成長。這個故事對我來說絕對令人驚嘆。但在如此專注於事業的同時，卻也伴隨著視野的狹隘。因此我注意到，在逐漸了解他的過程中，有許多事物因為他過度聚焦於狹隘的目標而未能察覺。你可以直視眼前的東西卻對它們視而不見。那時我已經花了大概兩、三年時間寫作，還有一年半的時間不是待在奧馬哈就是跟著他到處旅行。之後我也曾定期造訪奧馬哈。算起來可能有上百次——具體多少次我也說不清——我是說我們相處的日子累積起來有無數天甚至連續好幾週。於是我決定跟華倫開個小玩笑。有一天我從康乃狄克州的家中打電話給他，問道：「華倫？我的頭髮是什麼顏色？放那首日本歌來聽。」♪ 經過我聽過最漫長的沉默後，他終於開口：「不是黑色。」[笑聲] 這回答非常精確。他把自己所知的全盤托出了。
So by 2006-78 we were starting to dig down into some really deep stuff and talk about the meaning of life and what's it all about. And at that point I asked him the question directly, "What do you think the purpose of life is?" And he said, "To me, the purpose of life is to be loved by as many of the people that you want to have love you." So I had a chew on that a little bit because it's not most people would say the purpose is to be loved by as many people as possible or something like that. But no, he was thinking about how many people do you want to have love you and then you want to get about 1,000 on that. So if you want three people to love you, you want all three.
到了 2006-78 年，我們開始深入探討一些非常深刻的問題，談論生命的意義以及這一切究竟是為了什麼。那時我直接問了他一個問題：「你認為生命的目的是什麼？」他回答說：「對我來說，生命的目的是被盡可能多你想要他們愛你的人所愛。」我稍微咀嚼了一下這句話，因為大多數人會說生命的目的是被盡可能多的人所愛之類的。但他不是這樣想的，他考慮的是你想要多少人愛你，然後你希望這個數字能達到 1,000 左右。所以如果你想要三個人愛你，你會希望這三個人都愛你。
If you want 50, you want all 50. But maybe you don't want 1,000 people to love you. One thing I had learned about Warren is that he really did want to be loved. And it's because if you read this no-ball you'll see that he wasn't loved as a child at all. And so he had learned to crave that love and try to find it in people as an adult. And he told me a story about how important that love is and what it's like to live in the celebrity world, where if you're rich and famous, particularly both, it's very hard to be loved. Because even people who don't know it often have an ulterior motive, they have an agenda and you can get very confused if you're a celebrity, and you're thinking that people like you or they're in your friend, when really it's all just about your money and the position that you have. And so what can end up happening is you get invited to parties, you get invited to dinner at the White House, you get invited to play golf at a costa, you get invited to be on the 40 list of this and the top 10 list of that and you're on the cover of a magazine. And you feel very important, but it can be very deceiving and then we're in told me a story and he said, "You can never tell who this story is about while I'm alive and I promise." But if I do this beach again and you come when he's not alive, I'll tell you who this story is about. Just not yet. He said, "There is this man and if he thinks that he is just a door, buy everyone, but everyone actually knows that he's no one can stand this person and he doesn't know it." And if he were up on a stage giving his speech and he fell off into the audience and had a heart attack, not one person would dial 911. Not his wife, not his kids, not his colleagues, not his so-called friends. They would all just watch while it happened. And he said, "I don't ever want to be.
如果你想要 50 個人的愛，你會想要全部 50 個人的愛。但也許你不會想要 1,000 個人愛你。我對華倫的一個了解是，他真的渴望被愛。原因在於，如果你讀過這本無保留的傳記，你會發現他童年時根本沒有得到愛。因此他學會了渴望那種愛，並試圖在成年後從他人身上尋找。他告訴我一個關於愛有多重要的故事，以及生活在名人世界的感受——在那裡，如果你既富有又出名，尤其是兩者兼具時，要獲得真愛非常困難。因為即使人們不自覺，往往也別有用心，他們懷有目的。作為名人，你可能會感到非常困惑，以為人們喜歡你或把你當朋友，但實際上一切都只是因為你的金錢和地位。最終可能發生的情況是：你被邀請參加派對、受邀到白宮赴宴、獲邀到高爾夫度假村打球、入選某項 40 強名單或某類 10 大排行榜，還登上雜誌封面。 而你會覺得自己非常重要，但這可能非常具有欺騙性，然後我們被告知一個故事，他說：「在我還活著的時候，你永遠無法猜出這個故事講的是誰，我保證。」但如果我再次來到這個海灘，而當他不在人世時你來了，我會告訴你這個故事講的是誰。只是現在還不行。他說：「有這樣一個人，如果他認為自己只是一扇門，買通所有人，但實際上每個人都知道，沒有人能忍受這個人，而他卻不自知。」如果他站在台上發表演講，然後跌入觀眾席並心臟病發作，沒有一個人會撥打 911。不是他的妻子，不是他的孩子，不是他的同事，也不是他所謂的朋友。他們都會眼睜睜地看著這一切發生。他說：「我永遠不想成為那樣的人。」
That is not who I want to be. I want to be somebody that is loved." Well, I could see that in him and at the same time it was very interesting because over the course of several years of writing, I had encountered quite a number of people that he had dealt with in business who felt a little roughly treated. And I had learned that among the circle of people that were in Buffet wanted to be loved by, we're not necessarily everybody he did business with because sometimes money mattered for more. And I had interviewed people that had raised him to be angry with him because they felt he had bested them in one business deal or another. And I knew, and if you read the snowball, you'll read quite a few stories in there about him exacting terms for people that were quite tough.
那不是我想要成為的樣子。我想成為一個被愛的人。」嗯，我在他身上看到了這一點，同時這也很有趣，因為在幾年的寫作過程中，我遇到了不少他在商業上打交道的人，他們覺得自己受到了些許粗暴的對待。我了解到，在巴菲特希望被愛的那個圈子裡的人，並不一定是所有與他有商業往來的人，因為有時候金錢更為重要。我還採訪過一些對他感到憤怒的人，因為他們覺得他在某筆交易中勝過了他們。如果你讀過《雪球》，你會讀到不少關於他對人提出相當苛刻條件的故事。
And being I would call it rithless. And yet, I interviewed these people and even the ones that were still mad on some level love Warren Buffet. Which I found to be quite extraordinary because they just couldn't help it. And they would say things like, "I'm so mad at him for XYZ that he did in 19 whatever, but I just can't help it. I still love the guy." Because he is lovable. One of those people was a woman I mentioned earlier named Rose Blumkin.
我會稱之為無情。然而，當我採訪這些人時，即使是那些在某種程度上仍對華倫·巴菲特感到憤怒的人，也依然愛著他。我發現這相當不尋常，因為他們就是情不自禁。他們會說這樣的話：「我對他 19XX 年做的 XYZ 事情非常生氣，但我就是沒辦法，我還是愛這傢伙。」因為他就是這麼討人喜歡。其中一位就是我之前提到的羅絲·布魯金女士。
And she was the woman who built, created the Nebraska furniture mart, which was the business that I went jogging through, the carpet warehouse at the beginning. I told you about. Rose sold her business to Warren when she was in her 90s and she was still running it. But by age 95, she had had a falling out with her grandsons over how to run the carpet department, which she took a special interest in. And she quit. And she went and bought a warehouse across the street, literally.
她就是創建內布拉斯加家具商城的那位女性，也就是我一開始慢跑穿過地毯倉庫的那家企業。我在前面已經提到過。羅絲在 90 多歲時將她的企業賣給了華倫，當時她仍在經營。但到了 95 歲時，她因為地毯部門的經營方式與孫子們發生了爭執——她對這個部門特別感興趣。於是她辭職了。她真的就在街對面買了一個倉庫。
And started a competing business. And she was within a year of trouncing on a square foot basis in Nebraska furniture mart. And of course, the Omaha World Herald was all over this. Because it just made the juiciest fodder you could imagine for a newspaper to have the Blumkin family feuding with each other with two businesses across the street. One of them run by a 96-year-old woman at the time. So after a little over two years, Warren just cried uncle. And he couldn't take anymore. She was not only winning, but it was causing terrible publicity for the furniture mart. And what he may not have fully understood himself is that Rose was still mad at him.
並開設了一家競爭企業。不到一年時間，她就在每平方英尺銷售額上擊敗了內布拉斯加家具商城。當然，《奧馬哈世界先驅報》對此事大肆報導。因為這簡直是報紙能想像到的最精彩素材——布盧姆金家族成員互相爭鬥，在街對面開了兩家店。其中一家當時還是由一位 96 歲的老婦人經營。所以兩年多後，華倫終於認輸了。他再也受不了了。她不僅贏了，還給家具商城帶來了極其負面的輿論壓力。而他可能自己都沒完全意識到的是，蘿絲依然在生他的氣。
Because when he bought the furniture mart, he had paid a price for it that she later felt cheated. And her family on the record probably will not talk about this, but they told me, several of them, how mad she was with hindsight, that she felt that she had left $30 plus million on the table, which was in the 1980s. That was an incredibly huge amount of money. It still is. But at the time, it was amazing. And she felt a bit taken advantage of because Warren was competing against another better for this business.
因為當初他收購家具商城時，支付的價格讓她事後覺得被騙了。她的家人雖然公開場合可能不會談論此事，但有好幾位曾告訴我，她事後回想起來有多憤怒——她覺得自己少拿了三千多萬美元（那可是 1980 年代）。這在當時是筆難以置信的巨款，即便現在看也依然可觀。她覺得自己有點被佔便宜，因為華倫當時是與另一位出價更高的競購者爭奪這項生意。
And the other better offered a great deal more money, but she turned them down because they were German. And she sold the Warren. So there were some feelings there, and yet, but she still loved Warren, just like everyone else. So after a couple of years of this fight going on, Warren bought two dozen pink roses and went to her house. Now, she only felt comfortable in a furniture store environment. So her daughters had furnished the house with price tags still hanging on all of the furniture. And that was how she felt comfortable.
另一家德國公司開出了更高的價碼，但她因為對方是德國人而拒絕了。她賣掉了華倫。雖然有些情緒，但她依然像其他人一樣深愛著華倫。這場拉鋸戰持續了幾年後，華倫帶著兩打粉紅玫瑰登門拜訪。她只有在傢俱店的環境中才感到自在，所以女兒們把房子布置得每件傢俱都還掛著價格標籤。這就是她感到舒適的方式。
And so Warren went over there and sat down on the sofa with a price tag hanging off it. And there was a lamp with a price tag. And gave her the roses and then flattered her and said, I can't do this without you. I need you back. Please let me buy your new company for $5 million and I will bring you back in. But there was a catch. She was 98 years old at the time, and he made her sign a non-competit agreement. [Laughter]
於是華倫走進屋裡，坐在還掛著價籤的沙發上。旁邊有盞燈也掛著價籤。他獻上玫瑰，奉承地說：沒有妳我做不到，我需要妳回來。請讓我用五百萬美元買下妳的新公司，我會讓妳重新加入。但有個條件——當時她已 98 歲高齡，華倫竟要她簽署競業禁止協議。[笑聲]
Not only that, the non-competit was a five year non-competit and would not start to run until she quit. So if she quit the day after she came back, it would last until she was 103. But if she left at age 100, she would be tied up till 105. Or later. So I knew about this because I found the non-competit in the file room. And nobody had this story had never been told it. And I found the non-competit and I went and I was like, what is this? And she had signed it with an X because she never learned to read or write English.
不僅如此，這份競業禁止協議長達五年，而且必須從她離職後才開始計算。所以如果她回來隔天就辭職，這份協議將持續到她 103 歲。但若她 100 歲離職，就會被綁到 105 歲，甚至更久。我之所以知道這件事，是因為我在檔案室發現了這份協議。從來沒有人報導過這個故事。當我發現這份協議時，我簡直不敢相信——她簽名時只畫了個叉，因為她從未學會用英文讀寫。
And she could do math in her head. She was fantastic at that, but English she just never did get. So Warren told me this story. And I said, listen, why did you think you needed a five year non-competit with a 98-year-old woman? And he said, you know, I thought she might go on forever. [Laughter] And with Rose, I needed five years beyond forever with her. So the interesting thing about that is that Rose Blumkin is the one person that Warren feels competitive with now. Because he wants to run Berkshire Hathaway forever.
但她心算能力驚人，只是始終沒學會英文。華倫告訴我這個故事時，我問他：「你怎麼會覺得需要和 98 歲的老太太簽五年競業條款？」他回答：「你知道嗎？我覺得她可能會永遠工作下去。」（笑聲）「對蘿絲來說，我需要比『永遠』再多五年的保障。」有趣的是，蘿絲·布魯金是現在唯一讓華倫感到競爭壓力的人，因為他想永遠經營波克夏·海瑟威。
And if you go to him in 10 years when he's 98, and if I could, I'd love to go and offer him a 9-compete, he would sign it in a heartbeat. He would love that. He would love to work until he's 103. He would love to be in the situation where he could live five years beyond forever. Nothing would please him more. But just in case that doesn't happen, let's suppose that it was him up here on the stage tonight instead of me. And let's suppose that he fell off the stage, and it was him who had a heart attack.
而如果你在 10 年後去找他，那時他 98 歲，如果我可以，我很樂意去給他一份 9 分滿分的工作合約，他會毫不猶豫地簽下。他會非常喜歡那樣。他會樂意工作到 103 歲。他會喜歡那種能夠比永遠多活五年的處境。沒有什麼比這更能讓他高興了。但以防萬一這種情況沒有發生，讓我們假設今晚站在這舞台上的是他而不是我。再假設他從舞台上摔下來，心臟病發作的是他。
I think that he would have one of the greatest and most fulfilling moments finding that he had gotten his greatest wish in life, because he would hear hundreds of people grabbing their cellphones calling 911, and he would know that he was loved by the people who loved him because that includes all of you. And that's even better than five years bailing forever. Thank you. [Applause] Yeah, ladies, out of town. So we're ready for questions. Can you give us some examples where he showed compassion for other people? It sounds like to me the picture you're painting, people die in the 20 hours, and he's worried about a couple of billion dollars worth of. And he's not worried about the people who've been loved once, etc. He's a strange sort of guy. He is very left-brained. That is for sure. But I have seen him show compassion a number of times. It is with people he knows, generally that he feels that more, for example, he got very worried back in the 2000s before Abamakar about people that he was close to about the possibility that they might become wiped out by catastrophic medical expenses. And these included people who worked for Berkshire Hathaway, people who were retired, people who just knew. And he set up a pool and he chose individuals. He put $20 million into this pool and designated people and said that if any of them had some terrible thing before them, he would say that he would pay for whatever expenses were not covered by their health insurance to make sure they got all the medical care they needed and they would never have to fear being bankrupted by health care costs. And that's the kind of thinking because that was the time when that was happening regularly to people. He is somebody who will, for a friend, land his reputation when it's appropriate, he'll make that phone call, help somebody get the access that they need. He'll do a lot of very kind things and very thoughtful and consider it. I'll tell you when really short story because I know we have other questions but there was a woman named Venita May Brown that he dated when he was young.
我想他會發現自己實現了人生最大的願望，這將是他最偉大且最充實的時刻之一，因為他會聽到數百人拿起手機撥打 911，而他會知道那些愛他的人——包括在座各位——都深愛著他。這甚至比永遠保釋五年還要美好。謝謝。[掌聲] 是的，女士們，從外地來的。那麼我們準備好回答問題了。你能舉幾個例子說明他對他人表現出同情心嗎？聽起來你描繪的畫面是，人們在 20 小時內死去，而他卻在擔心價值數十億美元的事情。他並不擔心那些曾經被愛過的人等等。他是個奇怪的人。他非常左腦思考，這一點是肯定的。但我曾多次見他表現出同情心。通常是對那些他認識的人，他會更感同身受，例如在 2000 年代阿巴馬卡爾事件之前，他就非常擔心那些與他親近的人可能會因災難性的醫療費用而破產。 這些人包括為波克夏·海瑟威工作的人、已退休的人，以及僅僅相識的人。他設立了一個基金池，並挑選了一些人。他投入了 2000 萬美元到這個基金池中，指定了一些人，並表示如果他們中任何人在未來遭遇重大不幸，他會支付那些未被健康保險覆蓋的費用，確保他們能獲得所需的全部醫療照顧，永遠不必擔心因醫療費用而破產。這種想法源自於當時人們經常面臨這樣的情況。對於朋友，他會在適當的時候動用自己的聲譽，打那通電話，幫助他們獲得所需的資源。他會做許多非常友善且深思熟慮的事情。我告訴你一個小故事，因為我知道我們還有其他問題，但有一位名叫維妮塔·梅·布朗的女性，他年輕時曾與她約會。
And I didn't put the story in the book. I talked about how he dated her but she had been missing Nebraska and she was very beautiful but she got married to one of his friends. And she, there was something not right about her mentally. I'm not sure what it was but she got divorced from his friend. They had a crazy, it was an unusual divorce I'll just say that. And then she started writing more in letters and they were 30, 40, 50 page letters of saying horrible things about you're this terrible, horrible, horrible, you know, that's awful. And then six months later there would be a letter that just was like normal like they're wearing. I miss you, how are you doing, whatever.
而我沒有把這個故事寫進書裡。我談到他們如何交往，但她一直想念內布拉斯加州，而且她非常美麗，後來卻嫁給了他的一個朋友。她心理狀態似乎有些問題，我不確定具體是什麼，但後來她與那位朋友離婚了。那場離婚非常瘋狂，我只能說很不尋常。之後她開始寫更多信，那些信長達 30、40、50 頁，內容充滿可怕的指責，說你多麼糟糕、可惡、令人髮指之類的。然後六個月後又會收到一封完全正常的信，就像平常那樣寫著：我想念你，你過得好嗎之類的話。
I think like 99% of us would just cut off a person like that and just say, I, you know, I can't afford to have this person in my life. They're crazy. They're sending me abusive mail, whatever. We're in decided that he was going to help her. He, every crazy bad letter that she sent, he just ignored. And every good one that was like from a normal, not deranged person, he wrote back, lovely replies. And I have the whole file at home. Over the years, she changed and she got fixed somehow.
我想 99%的人遇到這種情況都會選擇斷絕往來，說我無法讓這種人留在生活中，他們瘋了，寄來辱罵信件等等。但他決定要幫助她。她寄來的每一封瘋狂惡毒的信，他都置之不理；而每一封正常的、不像精神失常者寫的信，他都回以溫馨的回覆。我家裡還保存著完整的信件檔案。多年過去，她逐漸改變，不知怎麼地恢復正常了。
And I'm convinced that similar to animal training behavior he extinguished her whatever it was that was causing her to be abusive and writing. She ended up coming out for a high school reunion and meeting all of his friends and being perfectly fine. And that was, that was sheer kindness on his part. He didn't have to do that. And she took a lot of his time to do this. And he was, he guards his time very jealously. I've seen him do. If we had two hours, I could think of 50 more things like that. But he just, you know, yeah, he's very compassionate. And he's a little bit more compassionate.
我深信，就像動物訓練行為一樣，他消除了她那些導致她變得刻薄和寫作攻擊性的因素。她最終參加了高中同學會，見了他所有的朋友，表現得完全正常。這純粹是他的善意之舉。他本不必這麼做。而且這件事佔用了他大量時間——要知道他對時間的把控向來極其嚴格。如果我們有兩小時，我還能舉出 50 個類似事例。但總之，是的，他非常富有同情心，甚至比一般人更甚。
And he's a little bit more compassionate. So that's how did that become about how did he and Bill get together? So it was Katherine Graham who introduced him to Bill before Bill ever even really, really knew Melinda. And right around the time when they were just, I think, just starting today before well before they were married. Katherine Graham had a close friend who had a house on Bane, where Jailanda, Washington. And they went out for a memorial day weekend. And then this friend was friends with Bill Gates's mother who was a grondon in the Seattle area.
他確實比常人更具悲憫之心。那麼他和比爾是怎麼相識的呢？其實是凱瑟琳·格雷厄姆在比爾還未真正認識梅琳達之前引薦的。大約在他們剛開始約會但遠未結婚的時候，凱瑟琳有位密友在華盛頓州班布里奇島有棟房子。他們在陣亡將士紀念日週末去了那裡，而這位朋友恰好與比爾·蓋茲的母親相熟——後者是西雅圖地區的名媛。
Very one of the great social lights of Seattle who's now deceased. And so the Gates is having a party out of their place on the hood canal. And they insisted that they wanted to meet Warren. The Gates is wanted to Warren and Bill to meet each other and K. wanted Warren and Bill to meet each other. Warren and Bill did not want to meet each other. Bill said, why do I want to meet this investor, ancient investor guy from Omaha? And Warren said, I don't care anything about technology. Why do I want to meet this computer guy? But they went.
西雅圖社交界的一位已故大人物。於是蓋茲夫婦在胡德運河邊的住所舉辦了一場派對。他們堅持要見華倫。蓋茲夫婦希望華倫和比爾能見面，K 也希望華倫和比爾能見面。華倫和比爾都不想見對方。比爾說，我為什麼要見這個來自奧馬哈的老派投資人？華倫則說，我對科技一竅不通。我為什麼要見這個搞電腦的傢伙？但他們還是去了。
And Bill said, I'm only going to talk to him for 10 minutes and Warren said, I'm only going to talk to him for 10 minutes and then we're going to leave. And they met and Warren said, can you explain to me why IBM is a good investment or not? Should I buy it or not? And Bill started talking. And one of the things about Bill, he's not the most social-efficient person. But if you ask him a question about something that he's knowledgeable about, he is fascinating to talk to. So he, Warren had asked him probably the best introductory question anybody ever could. And for the next hours and hours they spent, there's a picture in the book of them walking on the beach next to a seaplane. They were inseparable. And people had to go and try to pry them apart to get them to even show any interest in the other people at the party. And then it went from there. And so Warren, as you can it, Bill about investing, Bill, as you can it Warren about technology.
比爾說，我只打算跟他談 10 分鐘，而華倫說，我也只打算談 10 分鐘，然後我們就要離開。他們見面後，華倫問，你能告訴我為什麼 IBM 是一項好的投資嗎？我該不該買？比爾開始解釋。關於比爾的一點是，他並不是最擅長社交的人。但如果你問他一個他精通領域的問題，和他交談會非常引人入勝。所以，華倫問的可能是任何人都能想到的最佳開場問題。接下來的幾個小時裡，他們一直在一起，書中有張照片是他們在海邊一架水上飛機旁散步。他們形影不離。人們不得不去試圖分開他們，才能讓他們對派對上的其他人表現出一點興趣。之後他們的友誼就從那時開始了。於是，華倫向比爾請教投資，比爾則向華倫請教科技。
Warren knows a lot about technology. He never bought technology stocks because he thought that it was too hard to get a sustainable competitive advantage in technology. He thought these companies would be short lived. And he said at the Sherholder meeting last year he was wrong. He did not understand the power that Facebook and Google and Amazon would have and their ability to sustain through the network effect. Their business and achieve profits from it. Now with what's happening with Facebook right now, he might reconsider. But I don't think so. And he said we could have tried harder. We were perfectly capable of understanding it.
華倫對科技了解甚深。他從未投資科技股，因為他認為在科技領域難以取得持久的競爭優勢，這些公司的壽命可能很短暫。然而，他在去年的股東大會上承認自己錯了。他未能預見 Facebook、Google 和 Amazon 所擁有的力量，以及它們透過網絡效應維持業務並從中獲利的能力。現在 Facebook 面臨的風波或許會讓他重新考慮，但我不這麼認為。他說：「我們本該更努力嘗試。我們完全有能力理解這一切。」
And we just didn't because we just didn't. We felt like we were doing fine. And we were doing just as well with the things that we knew and understood. So we just didn't bother. And it was a mistake. And he called it one of his biggest mistakes. So that's the answer. Well, a question back here. The relationship between Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger is intriguing. You indicated early on in your book that at times Mr. Munger and Mr. Buffett would stop talking in their conversations and communicate by mental telepathy.
但我們就是沒有去做，純粹因為我們沒去做。我們覺得現狀已經很好，專注於熟悉且理解的領域同樣表現出色，所以就懶得費心。這確實是個錯誤，他稱之為自己最大的失誤之一。這就是答案。好的，這邊有個問題：華倫·巴菲特與查理·蒙格的關係相當耐人尋味。你在書中曾提到，有時兩位先生在交談中會突然停止言語，改以心靈感應溝通。
Would you expand on that? Yes. So in their early years Warren and Charlie were known for being glued together and obsessively talking for 10 plus hours of a stretch. They know each other so well at this point that they can, and I've seen this happen, they can both predict exactly what the other one will think or say on any given situation. So they tend to not need to talk because they know what the other room will say. And in the case of both of them, they disagree on quite a number of things, particularly philanthropy. They tend to not talk when they know that the other one would say something disapproving of what they're going to do. They don't agree on politics.
你能詳細說明一下嗎？是的。在他們早年，華倫和查理以形影不離、連續談話超過十小時而聞名。到現在，他們對彼此的了解已經深到可以——我親眼見過——在任何情況下都能準確預測對方的想法或說的話。因此，他們往往不需要交談，因為他們知道對方會說什麼。就他們兩人而言，他們在很多事情上意見不一，尤其是慈善事業。當他們知道對方會對他們要做的事情表示不贊同時，他們往往選擇不談論。他們在政治立場上也不一致。
So they go their own way on that. They are still just as good a friends as ever, but they're sort of like a friendship where they can do it by osmosis. One down here in front and then you. Yes. Everyone who plays bridge understand is a very competitive game. How competitive is Warren with bridge and I understand he plays with Bill Gates. Sometimes maybe is partner and also how many master points does Warren have. Okay. So Warren's partner is Sharon Osberg, who is a two-time world champion, and she took his game from being a casual game to being a serious game.
所以他們在這方面各行其是。他們的友誼依然如故，但更像是一種心照不宣的默契。一個在前頭，另一個在後。是的，每個打橋牌的人都明白這是場非常競爭的遊戲。華倫在橋牌上有多好勝？我知道他有時會和比爾·蓋茲一起打牌，或許是搭檔。還有，華倫有多少大師點數？好的，華倫的搭檔是莎朗·奧斯伯格，她是兩屆世界冠軍，她把他的橋牌從休閒遊戲提升到了專業水平。
He's played in the national championships before with our, I don't know the point system and I don't know the point. But Sharon is probably also his closest friend. He doesn't say a lot about that in public because it would annoy some other people who think there is closest room, but she has actually the one who is. She also plays with Bill a lot as his partner and increasingly is playing with Bill more and more internaments. Warren was a better player with Bill than Bill, but now as Bill is devoting more time to it, he's moving up. But I'm afraid I can't tell you numbers because I don't know. Okay. Yes.
他以前曾和我們一起參加過全國錦標賽，我不清楚點數系統，也不知道具體點數。但莎朗可能也是他最親密的朋友。他不太在公開場合談論這件事，因為這可能會讓其他自認為是最親密的人感到不快，但實際上她才是那個人。她也經常和比爾搭檔打牌，而且越來越多地在比賽中與比爾合作。華倫原本是比爾更好的搭檔，但現在比爾投入更多時間後，水平正在提升。不過恐怕我無法告訴你具體數字，因為我也不清楚。好的。是的。
After reading the post, I was fascinated by his relationship with Katherine Graham and how he mentored her. Did he mentor other people and were they all women? Very, did he mentor other people were they all women very few? He's had a few people come in to Berkshire at the way. I've seen this happen twice and he hired them. He gets kind of enthusiastic and infatuated with people. They come in. They think they're going to be mentored and then he gives them a job and he spends half an hour with them and then they never really see him again. He is not a natural one-on-one coach.
讀完這篇文章後，我對他與凱瑟琳·格雷厄姆的關係以及他如何指導她感到著迷。他有指導過其他人嗎？而且他們都是女性嗎？實際上，他指導過其他人嗎？他們是否都是女性？非常少見。有幾個人曾以某種方式進入波克夏。我見過這種情況發生兩次，他雇用了他們。他會對人產生某種熱情和迷戀。他們進來時以為會得到指導，然後他給了他們一份工作，花了半小時與他們相處，之後他們就再也沒真正見過他了。他天生不是一對一的教練。
That's not what he likes to do. He likes to get up in front of an audience and talk with Kay. I really believe that was the only time that he's put in that kind of time and devotion. There's some people in the front. There's a couple people in the front that look like. Wonderful speech. Thank you. I heard a story about his wallpaper and it went like this. One day he went on vacation and his children decided that he needed new wallpaper. It was money.
那不是他喜歡做的事。他喜歡站在觀眾面前與凱交談。我真的相信那是他唯一一次投入那種時間和奉獻。前排有一些人。前排有幾個人看起來像是。精彩的演講。謝謝。我聽說過一個關於他壁紙的故事，故事是這樣的。有一天他去度假，他的孩子們決定他需要新的壁紙。那是錢的問題。
The wallpaper was printed with money. Not real money but it was money. They decided to redo his office and so they took it down. When he returned, it took him a couple of days to figure out what in the world is different. Then he realized it was different wallpaper. He made them go out and buy money-dewall paper and replace it. That is a true story. He has his daughter a lot of this kind of shopping for him. He used to insist that he would shop for his cars and he would make her go to up to 40 dealerships looking for the cheapest car of the same make and model.
壁紙上印滿了鈔票圖案。不是真鈔，但確實是錢的圖樣。他們決定重新裝修他的辦公室，於是將壁紙撕下。當他回來時，花了幾天時間才察覺哪裡不對勁。後來他發現是壁紙不同了，便堅持要人出去買回鈔票圖案的壁紙重新貼上。這是真實故事。他經常讓女兒幫他處理這類採購事務。過去他堅持要親自選購汽車，會讓女兒跑遍多達 40 家經銷商，只為尋找同款車型中最便宜的那輛。
He would find one. He would have been damaged by hell.
他總能找到一輛。這種執著簡直會把人逼瘋。
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