2 Months and counting.....

It’s been almost a year since I last updated my blog. Apologies for that, but I have been very busy enjoying my student life :)

So, what have I been doing these past few months?

Well, for one, I was in London over the summer. Did my internship with a telecom company. Met with some great guys and made a lot of good friends. Have decided to go back to London to work full time :)

Post internship, I spent the fall term at Wharton, Philadelphia. I wanted to go to Philly to check out whether I have missed anything by not doing an MBA at an American B-school (especially since Wharton dinged my application ;) ), and boy was I glad on having chosen IESE :) ..

Don’t get me wrong, Wharton is a great school. They have a great faculty, attract really big names, and have really smart people. Now, the obvious question is, why did I find IESE sexier....

Well... the reasons are...
1. Barcelona - Nothing can beat this place. The food, the weather, the parties, the guapas..... it’s just truly unique
2. The small size - I have made some of the best friends here. Due to its small size, I practically know everyone from my batch. In Philly, I did not know whether the person sitting next to me was a 2nd yr, 1st yr, undergrad, law student or someone else from the university.....it's just too big...
3. The international crowd - European B-schools are truly international. It’s fun studying in an environment where you get to hear from people from all over the world and read cases based on companies worldwide. US B-schools seem to be lacking this.... most of the courses are American centric.... i.e. the examples are all about the American market....as an international student, I had no clue about half the things they were talking about :)

That being said, I truly cherished my 3 months at Philadelphia. Got to travel, make good friends and study in one of the best B-schools in the world.

Am back to IESE now for my last term... can’t believe it’s almost the end of my MBA.....
Trying to make the most of my left over time here before I go back to work life........

More updates later......

Updates

It sure has been a long time since I last posted.
Life has been pretty exciting since then.

The internship search continued till Feb, and finally I made it through a big telecom company. The role sounds extremely exciting and I am eagerly looking forward to it.

The third term has started and by far it is probably the best term till now. Everyone seems to be a lot more relaxed and are having more fun in the class.

In between the second and third term, I managed to travel to Amsterdam, Portugal and Scotland. Sexy trips with tons of fun.
Had a great time in the coffee shops in Amsterdam, driving through the south of Portugal and doing Quad biking in Scotland.

We also had a couple of long weekends in the middle. In the first one, we went over to Cadaques, the house of Dali. Did Kayaking in the open sea. We had a bottle of Rum with us and all of us were pretty drunk by the time we got back to the shore :)


In the next weekend, we went over to Marrakech, Morocco. This visit is probably the best I have had all this term. It reminded me so much of India. The crowd, the dirt, the smell... it was just perfect :). Became really nostalgic in this trip.

We did a bit of shopping (remember, you need to bargain and bring the price down by at least 70%), ate a lot of good food and managed to watch a belly dance performance ;)

Streets of Medina

Spices at Medina

The Central Square

Souks (shopping area north of the square)

Marrakech Museum

Overall, one heck of a term :)

Midterms and Diwali

Well guys.... the mid terms are finally over. Didnt go as bad as I thought they would go, but not good enough either ;)

On the night before Diwali, I was reading up for my accounting midterm. Trust me, accounting is not the perfect way to begin your diwali ;)

On Friday, second yrs had arranged for a diwali celebration. It was a really nice way to relax after the midterms. They had the aarti playin in the backgrnd (downloaded from the net :) ), did some pooja, had amazin Indian food ordered (tons n tons of it) and then started off with alcohol and cards(which is a must on diwali night :D )

I tried my hands at playin cards, but was not that lucky. Decided to back out before I lost all my money in there ;)

Monday, I have my mock interviews as well as a case study discussion on banking. Need to prepare for it as actual interviewers from one of the banks will be coming in to take the interview.

Pooja

The Food

Funday

Today was a really cool day at school.

We had to discuss a case about Sony Eye Toy in our marketting class, and the professor actually got a PS2 along with the eyetoy to show us what its all about. A couple of us did get to play the game on the giant screen in the class. It was really hilarious to watch these people jump/run/crouch around.... :)

ABP was equally good. Our professor was a couple of mins late. So, some of us started goofing around and started imitating certain people :) ...

Really nice way to relax around and get your mind out of the studies....

Updates

Its been a long time since I updated my blog and I apologize to all my blog readers for the delay.
Life has been really hectic these past two months. Cant believe that it has already been more than 2 months since I came over to Barcelona.

Ok, so here are how things stand. I have started with my first term of MBA. Got 5 subjects this term. Accounting, Marketing, Analysis of Business Problems, Decision Analysis and Managing people in Organization. I also have Capital markets, but that's gonna start only after mid Nov.

It was not even 2 weeks into school that I had to visit London as part of the Banking tour. There were almost 80 of us students walking around the streets of London all dressed up in our black suites. It was a sight to see :). Overall, the trip was great as we got to see a lot of banks and meet with a lot of bankers and understand this industry.

Last week, we had our career forum. For 3 days, we had representatives from 50 odd companies coming down to our campus to present themselves and talk about the openings they have for the summer internship program. It was a great although hectic schedule. Got to learn a lot of a lot of companies.

Had an ABP report to submit today. As usual, I left it till the last minute and was working like crazy on it last night. Managed to write something and submit the report on time.

Next week I have my midterms. It really is scary coz this is the first exam that I shall be taking up after 5 yrs of break. I really am not used to studying anymore :( ..
Well, wish me luck. Need to hit the books now... I promise that I shall try to be more active on my blog...

Till later....

Figueres and the twisted mind of Dali

I went over to Figueres this Monday and saw Dali's museum. Thanks a lot to Magada for taking me along.

I am really not an art lover, but somehow Dali's work was kinda very intriguing... He sure is obsessed with himself.. all his art has either him or his wife in it...

Well, I'll just let the pictures do the talking...

The Museum

"Dali-lisa!!!

Dali's Wife

Ab Lincoln

Dali's jewellery

Room in the shape of a ladies face

In Barca

Well folks... have finally arrived in Barcelona...

After an uneventful flight ( was sleeping throughout), I landed in Barcelona on the 15th of Aug. Little did I know that 15th is a holiday and almost all of Barcelona is closed.
When I say closed, I mean closed. There was nothing at all in town that was open. The whole city looked deserted.

I landed at my new apartment in Barcelona. Its a nice cozy place near the college. I will post snaps a bit later on.

So, on the 15th, I went over to IESE. The old building is really small. It looks more like a villa than a college. But it somehow looks really cute as well :)
I have heard that the new building is much better and that you get a really amazin view of the city from there. Will check that out tomorrow.

The water in Barcelona sucks... it has a weird taste, and after drinkin a glass of it (I was desperate as there was no water at home ), I had an upset stomach.
Have decided to survive on mineral water for the rest of my stay here...

Today, I went over to IESE again. I applied for my resident permit and hopefully something should materialize in the next month or two. I also opened a bank account in La Caxia (had to do it to apply for the resident permit). Then, I got myself a new cell connection. Got a free phone as a part of the deal :). Feels good to get a free phone (something that still needs to happen in India)

Tomorrow, I plan on finishing off with my IESE resident permit work, and then I shall leave for the beach... will click some snaps tomorrow and post them here..

Till then... adios