Where do we go? Where do we go now? Where do we go, ay ay ay aiii.

Not exactly “Sweet Child of Mine” by GnR, but the question is the upcoming MBA exchange. I would well stay in Barcelona for the 4^th term, but besides being here over six months already; what kind of fun would that be?

So what exciting places are there to go and see? Well for starters, let’s get the usual dishes out of the way. You have schools all over Europe, from France, to the UK, the Netherlands, Finland - Boring. Well, Finland could be interesting but that’s all I’m saying on that subject. Then you have the wonderfully wonderful US of A. Same here, East Coast / West Coast schools, some in the south, some up north, all of them the usual suspects (you know those schools that people can’t stop talking about on MBA forums) – and after spending 19 years of my life in the States, something is just not pulling me back there, and although I love and sometimes even miss NYC, for an exchange, bleh. I’ll come back when I have well over a couple of mill € in equity (maybe). Oh… and good luck getting a visa if you’re not from Western Europe. Viva la Patriot Act.

Then we come to the interesting ones kiddies. Nr. 1 on my Choice list. UCT GSB. Huh? University of Cape Town GSB (yes like in Kellogg). Why? Well… because I want to work in energy and during the embargo S.A. converted coal to liquid, they’ve done gas to liquid, and they’re an entry point into all the other Sub-Saharan African nations out there. They’re also the leading economy in Sub-Saharan Africa, and the fastest developing, and building a network there, and learning the lay of the land so to say, will only bring advantage to me when I’m building refineries off the coast of Angola (while investing in Angolan education, infrastructure, etc... because I believe the way Europe and the U.S. have done business on this continent in the past is flawed and morally wrong).

Then there’s numero dos. Or should I say “número dois” is Fundação Getúlio Vargas, Escola de Administração de Empresas de São Paulo. Why? Well it’s Brazil, and Brazil has, for all those who are not privy to this information an amazing E85 system in place, meaning they run most of their autos on an etanol / petrol mix, and as I want to go into energy (see a process developing here), I believe I could learn a lot. Not to mention pick up Portuguese along the way. You see, eu non fala porgugeis. Or something like that.

Then the last one, is a two week stint in China before Term 4 starts, and the school pays for everything but the airfare, and believe it or not, after looking online the flights to an fro Sino land (that is the People’s Republic of China) are not bad at all 700€ round trip. Totally doable, and given my internship prospects don’t turn out as favourable as I hope, and am not able to land that dream job right afterwards, I can always get right on it here in BCN.

So where do you guys think I should go? Huh? Would love to hear your thoughts. Cheers

Nudziarze – czy to właśnie ta rużnica kultur? Inne sprawy, i coś tam jeszcze.

Pare tyg. temu w czasie rozgrywek futbolu Amerykańskiego spotkałem paru Polaków z tego programu MBA koło nas, i muszę powiedzieć ze oprócz Kasi, takiej jednej z Chicago, to reszta troche nudziarze. W jakim sęsie? Pierwsze wrażenia to poprostu przekazywały ze faceci bez jaj. Założę się że każdy z nich to napewno więcej niż przeciętny pracownik, ale czy facet zrobi dobrego CEO, prezesa, itd... sądze że nie. Na te role jest potrzebna wizja, przewodnictwo, i umiejętnosci ludzkie. I osobiscie uważam ze najbardziej im brakowało własnie tego ostatniego. Mimo, że jestem jedynym Polakiem w ESADE, uważam ze kultura naszej szkoły w poruwnaniu do ichnej jest zupełnie inna, i gdybyśmy tu milei więcej rodaków to ta ruyżnica między nami była by jeszcze bardziej widoczna. Więc składajcie ludy, potrzebujemy większą reprezentację Polska. Mamy trzech Rumunów, Węgra, i to wszystko. A jeżeli chcemy zeby nasze firmy, nasza ekonomia, i nasza przyszłość stała na nogi, potrzebujemy sie nauczyć stosunków biznesu na strefie międzynarodowej, nie tylko Polskiej.

W innych sprawach, to nie ma co gadać. Atrykuł w Perspektywach powinnien być wydany za niedługo. Szukam praktyke na lato i idzie jak krew z nosa, i egzaminy na drugi termin się już szybciutko zbliżają – cholera, szybko ten czas leci.

Lessons hard learned

Starting off, Andorra was fun, I tried snowboarding for the 1st time and should have just stuck with skiing, it was an absolute disaster and I spent most of the first day on my arse. The second day saw a wonderful fun filled day at Caldea (biggest spa in Europe - http://www.caldea.com/) and unlike the pictures on their website, there are no floating lemons.

Moving on, I lost the elections for Social VP. I had 43% of the vote, and only about 36% of the population went out and actually voted – so where did I fail? Not getting my supporters to the poles, I was basically the better candidate, but with people saying “Dude, it’s fine, there’s no competition, you’ll win” and not voting, basically led to Jimena taking the spot from me. Good luck, and good riddance. (Kidding, best of luck to her, and if she needs any help I’m there to help her out)

Finally, yesterday saw two things. One was a quiz in Corp. Finance, which would have went quite well if I had remembered how to use my stupid BAII Plus Financial Calculator, I knew what to do and how to do it, but my periods per year were reset to 12, and should have been 1. Oh stupid stupid…; and then there was my phone interview for one of my top 1st firms. How did it go? I haven’t a clue. Maybe, poorly, maybe well… we’ll find out in 7-10 days; but the interviewer ended it with “I wish you the best of luck in your future career”. So what’s that mean? I got it, or I didn’t. Flarghf… I hate ambiguity.

Wait... am I really this motivated? What happened? These MBA's are amazing!!!

OK, so I passed Spanish and am now in the last module before I terminate my classroom learning of the language, French, German or Russian next. We had our career forum, which went well, but... I'm super swamped. Have a huge presentation in Managing People in Organizations tomorrow, then another huge presentation in Environment, I've taken it upon myself to put together the ESADE football team consisting of 1st years, 2nd years and the Part Time program, and after last weeks more than pathetic showing, we really need some vision, leadership, and a lot of training sessions. This weekend we're also going to Andorra - skiing, well snowboarding for me, and that involves a visit to decathlon (sports store) tomorrow, just don't know when, and I'm still to write my speech for social VP. Freggin A. But for kicks, here's my campaign poster, that - I have to print out tomorrow.



And on a final note... lemme tell you, Barcelona's great, but there is truly something I miss about NYC, and I quote from e-mail. ...

"Party Animals,

With its thousands of shows, aftershows, cocktails, afterparties, afterparties of afterparties, models and fashionatas running all around the city, the Fashion Week will always be a special week in New York.. At least for party animals like us!

We'll start tonight at PM with Phillip Bloch & Nick Cannon's 07 Fall/Winter Party, then we'll have Q Models Fashion Week Party at Room Service with special DJ Guest and Grammy Award Winner Hex Hector, on Friday our favourite Azzurri DJ Massi will be back at Manor for an all night long session, and to finish the week our Class Saturdays at Room Service. Dress to impress, its Fashion Week!

Cheers,
Fabien"

Aaaah, the good 'ol life. Cheers.