Academic mumblings...

I'm so glad that I'm writing this blog together with Angela... in these hectic times, she is the one who keeps the blog alive.

It's amazing how busy one can be, from early morning to very late. Papers, tests, preparation, lectures, and then there are the exams next week. The whole campus looks like a 24h study factory. There are people asleep over their books in cubicles at any time of day or night. Students eat at the strangest hours (in my opinion a strong indication of a complete disconnect with reality.) It looks like our current life revolves completely around the exams, inside the INSEAD bubble. For the best post from our fellow J'08 bloggers about the exam fever, checkout: www.strawberrytints.blogspot.com (I even quoted you in my LP&G paper, Dee!)

I'm just sending a few emails now and updating the blog before I go back to read my Finance notes and handouts. Maybe if I try hard, I will be able to master everything there is to know about the CAPM model, how to best diversify my investment portfolio, how to valuate any company using the right Beta's, and how to do all kinds of perverse calculations way into the future, using my HP12c...

P1 is almost over now. After the exams (and our trip to Barcelona), I will post more about my take on P1; the classes, the professors, and my fantastic classmates.

P2 is going to be great fun. I specificaly look forward to the Strategy and Leading Organisations classes. The following core courses will be taught in P2:

- Corporate Financial Policy
- Foundations of Marketing
- Leading Organisations
- Managerial Accounting
- Process & Operations Mgmt
- Strategy

My plan is to take significant time in P2 to do a lot of reading about companies in industries that I would like to work in, learn about the economies in Asia, network with people from places or organisations that I'm interested in, and start my post-MBA job hunt strategy. I will also tailor my Electives package and of course work hard on the core courses and party occasionally around all that...

It's funny, when I decided to stop working for a year to go to school, many people wondered whether I would enjoy it, or whether I would even be able to sit in class all day. Two months down the road (it feels more like 4 months) I can say that I absolutely enjoy it. Much has to do with the people around me. I can speak of all my classmates in this sense: they are a bunch of hard working, focused, fun loving, amazing characters. In my essays I wrote that this was the best possible choice I could make at this point in time... well, I can say now that it's not only a cheesy line in my application essay, it's also actually true.