Catching Up

If my utter failure at blogging was any indication, my first two terms of business school were busy. They were also amazing, exhausting, exciting, terrifying, fun, frustrating, and a firm confirmation that I made the right decision, both to go back to school and about which school to attend.

It's hard to sum up the experience thus far in one post, but I'm going to attempt it because I want to post more regularly going forward (about current life!). 

Why is it exhausting, terrifying, and frustrating? I know, those aren't positive descriptions, but I think anytime you're attempting something big and that you really want and that isn't particularly easy to achieve, those things will come into play. I've slept less in these past months than I ever did in undergrad or working, but it's because I'm being more productive than I realized I could be, and it's pretty cool to discover that you can exceed the limits you thought you had. It's terrifying, because you realize that you're surrounded by a bunch of people who are just as smart, capable, and accomplished as you are - probably a lot more, in fact! - and you have to make yourself stand out to get a job! But at the same time, these are the people who want to help you get better. And frustrating? Well, life happens sometimes. You study all night for a test and still do badly, you give your love to one company and it rejects you from an interview, you discover a friend isn't who you thought they were. These things happen...but that other stuff, the good stuff, makes up for all of this and more.

Why was it amazing, exciting, fun, and a firm confirmation that my choices were correct? So many reasons, many of which are intangible ones like "the people." To start there - I'm lucky enough now to be surrounded by a group of people who are similar to me in some important ways, including the importance we place on our professional and personal development, as well as the importance we place on relationships and laughing and having fun. All those things I mentioned before, the hard stuff we deal with? In between, there are these amazing people asking if I need help, making me laugh constantly, making sure I don't take myself too seriously, keeping me sane. And while we're similar in a lot of ways, like the core values we share, we're different in some really cool ways that help us make each other better. Like our backgrounds, our experiences, our prior jobs...you name, we have someone who's been there / done it / etc. 

Alright, enough fluff and gushing, right? What really happened in the past four months? Well, we had two terms, six weeks each, which let me tell you is REALLY quick! You're just getting used to the course, and suddenly you're in midterms. And then you turn around again and it's finals and you're on to term two...but they keep you on your toes, that's for sure! I took Econ, Accounting, Management Communication and Forecasting in term 1, and Strategy, Marketing, Management Communication and Finance in term 2. 

Career-wise, we went to endless company events...the networking was non-stop. We worked on our resumes, our cover letters, our STAR stories. We did practice case interviews with each other (not enough!) and dropped our resumes for companies, and then anxiously awaited the closed list (interview list) results from each company. And now, we're continuing to prep for interviews that are coming up in only about a week!

And everything else? Well...we had a good time. The great thing about being in Durham (a bit remote, I'd say...) is that people grow close quickly because we're all each other has, at least in the vicinity. We had Campout in early October (36 hours of craziness - camping out in parking lots and running to endless check-ins for just a chance to win season basketball tickets) which was SO much fun...and SO exhausting! Mid-October brought Fall Break - which was much needed! - and a quick trip to Atlanta to visit consulting firms. November was my birthday and a wonderful joint party with 2 friends, we had a great time celebrating. Then it was Thanksgiving, which I and many friends remained in Durham for. A friend and I cooked all of the Thanksgiving sides (they were actually good!!) and the guys cooked the turkey - with much fanfare - it was both hilarious and delicious. Then suddenly it was December, which brought a case competition that I did with 3 friends who made the endless hours locked in a teamroom bearable, and often even enjoyable. The competition caused both the coolest and the toughest week at school so far - no sleep, so much excitement and nervousness and hard work...but we got 2nd place! One of our teammates - the college athlete, unsurprisingly - had us listen to the "win by inches" speech Pacino gives in the movie "Any Given Sunday" before our final presentation, with our eyes closed in a dark room. It was amazing and motivating, and a reminder of what it is to achieve something bigger than yourself because of the people working alongside you. Listen to that speech...it's pretty cool.

Then finally home for Christmas...it was nice to come back to San Diego for a bit. I'm still in San Diego now, but have been doing a good bit of case interview practice for the interviews starting in just over a week. The work is a little bit of a bummer, but it means I get to Skype with friends who I was used to seeing constantly and I miss over break! - so that's a nice benefit. 

They say the first two terms are the toughest...we'll see. I do know that I can't wait to go back and see friends that I miss after only two weeks and see what else this great experiences has to offer. I can't wait.

And I plan to post weekly. We'll see if that happens, though I set myself an Outlook reminder for it, which tends to get me to do things. If I manage more than once over the next couple of terms, I'll be doing better than the last two terms! :o)

The First Week!

The first week at school included a lot of new roomie bonding (yay Sarah!) and unpacking/furnishing the new place. Rach and Dad and Lynda were enormously helpful the first few days, and we had a great time together exploring Durham and Duke. We unpacked, we visited the Duke Chapel, Cameron, the business school building, and Duke Gardens...despite the fact that it felt like it was about 150 degrees because it was so hot and humid that weekend! My dad built me a bike rack so Cannie (mtn bike) and Speedy (road bike) can stand in the corner of my room - there was no chance that I would be able to make something like this, but he had it whipped up in 20 minutes! 

 
Sarah and I decided to motivate ourselves to get the place furnished and ready, so we planned a housewarming party on Tuesday night 7/27 (we got into town on Thursday 7/22). Here are some photos of my apartment, kitchen and living room, before and during the party! We have concrete floors...I wasn't sure how I would feel about that, but they're kind of fun...and really tough to stain/hurt!

After the housewarming, Sarah headed out of town and I spent the rest of the week unpacking my room (the living room was ready for the party, but my room was still a mess of boxes at that point!) and doing pre-assignments for our pre-term classes. Orientation started at 8am on Sunday 8/1, and it was a whirlwind three days! We had a variety of speakers throughout the day - about programs, classes, career stuff, basically just an introduction to all aspects of the school. We were also grouped into our sections (the class of 450 is split into 6 sections of about 75 people) that we theoretically take core classes with and get to know a little better. I'm section 2 (GO DEUCE - there's a lot of section pride that happens here!!) and it's a great group! 

 

Roomie pic at the housewarming

We had parties each night that kept us out until 2am, and then sessions each day at 9am, so sleeping was minimal for those three days. 

The first night was the Around the World party, which basically meant that we were supposed to dress up like whatever place or thing we identify with...so some people wore sports jerseys for their home teams, some wore traditional clothes for where they're from. My class is 40% international, so there were definitely some cool outfits. I took inspiration from California Gurls (song) and went bikini on top...under a tank top, of course. It was a lot of fun! The next night was the 80's party...that one was a lot of fun. I think blinding is a fairly accurate description of my outfit.

80's party...clearly.

Around the World party...bikini on top!

We would, without fail, walk in to the  auditorium in the morning to the Taio Cruz song "Dynamite" blasting...at the time we kept wondering why they had that song on repeat, but at the end they told us that it's our "class song." It's a lot of fun, anytime we're out and that song comes on, everyone flips out and there is a mad dash for the dance floor. 

That's me in the business suit three-legged race...

Orientation ended with Section Olympics - we competed in things like the business suit 3 legged race, dizzy bat, flip cup (with water), and tug-of-war. It was so much fun! Dizzy bat was possibly one of the funniest things I've ever seen in my life. They had to spin something like 10 times on this bat, then run back and forth across the field. Now, 10 is a lot of times...every person, without fail, would put down the bat, stare straight ahead, and make a beeline to the left into the crowd. We were all gasping for air from laughing by the end of it! Here are a few pics of us there - the red t-shirts are section 2 (go deuce!!). 

We went right into pre-term from there on Wednesday, which meant two classes (Leadership and Ethics in Organizations and Global Institutions) plus an improv class which was actually a lot of fun! I wasn't sure what to expect from that, I had this vision of having to stand up and come up with a routine (which was a terrifying thought) but it turned out to be a lot of fun group exercises that helped us get to know each other and get comfortable with each other (think trust falls).

 

The weekend included another housewarming party and brunch at a yummy place called Watts Grocery. It was a great first week, so busy and lacking in sleep, but a great time. Those first weeks of meeting tons of people and making friends were so much fun!

Made It!

Five years, six applications, a LOT of cross-country trips via plane, one long cross-country trip via car, and endless hours of writing/worrying/dreaming/planning later.....

I'M HERE!!!!

And I love it. Really, really, love it. 

But since I'm a little late with this post, I'll back up again, at least to the beginning of the trip out here!  

Bright and early on Monday (July 19th), Rach and I set off east. We didn't get quite the running start we were hoping for - she missed her alarm because her phone turned off overnight, then I forgot to pick up my bikes at Jeni's on the way out so we had to backtrack...but all in all, we were solidly on the road by about 7:30a, which wasn't bad.

Of all the driving days, I would say the first day was second to worst. The desert can be pretty, but there is also a lot of flat brown nothing on that part of the drive. El Centro and the dilapidated little desert towns (that's probably a generous description) aren't exactly scenic. Some of it was beautiful, though - we took the route up through the mountains and Flagstaff, which was beautiful (see left). 

We did listen to a good book on CD, The Prometheus Deception by Robert Ludlum (he wrote the Bourne series, to give some context).

We cruised into Albuquerque, NM around 7:30p (long day!!) and were starving, so we threw our stuff in our rooms and set out for dinner. Unfortunately, by the time we left it was 9pm, and we were surprised to discover that Albuquerque, at least where we were, shuts down at 9pm. Unless we wanted McDonald's, we were out of luck for dinner. We called the hotel and found that their restaurant stayed open until 10p (rebels!) so we went there. It wasn't bad...after a day of road food, the salads we got tasted awesome. (To the right is more AZ scenery).

Day 2 was bottom of the list, driving-day wise. If you've never driven through Texas and surrounding areas on the 40, you're not missing much...it's flat, green/brown, and there is the occasional cluster of cows. That's about it. It's pretty, don't get me wrong, it's just the same for about 8 hours (to the left is a fairly representative picture of the entirety of the drive on Day 2). Luckily, this was the part of the drive where they liked their Dairy Queens every few miles like clockwork, so Rach and I drowned our boredom with that! Blizzards are YUM!

We listened to a book that day too, Big Love by Sarah Dunn. It was...different than we expected. Decidedly a chick book, and a little odd, but entertaining at least, which is really all we were looking for! We stopped that night in Fort Smith, AK. That was a bit of an adventure in itself...in our family, those hotels where you give some thought to how much of the room you're actually willing to touch are called crunchy carpet hotels (you can imagine why). We definitely stayed in one of those that night. We ran into the same issue with dinner...the whole losing an hour thing threw us off a bit. Fort Smith is not the pinnacle of night life, so most things were closed by 9:30p when we were looking for dinner. There was a Hooters nearby, though, so we decided that it was at least safe and had beer and decent food (wings!) so off we went. The waitress was fascinated by our accents, as were we by hers. 

On the drive from Fort Smith to Nashville...it was pretty!

The next day was a bit shorter; we drove into Nashville. Rach and I love country music, so we thought that would be a fun place to spend a night since neither of us had ever been there. We got lucky and got a great hotel within walking distance of the main downtown area with the fun bars and such, so we walked over for dinner. We started by having a killer BBQ dinner - it really was amazing. I'm looking forward to eating some awesome BBQ over the next couple of years down here! We went afterwards to Wildhorse Saloon and heard a live band, they were good! Next stop was Coyote Ugly, which was fun and included some interesting people watching.

The next morning, we got up for our final day of driving...into North Carolina!! That was a particularly interesting day, beginning with some torrential rain while we were driving through the mountains. The trip through the Smoky Mountains was absolutely beautiful...we have a ton of pictures, but I'll spare everyone and only post a couple.

We drove through Ashville and stopped there for lunch, I can't wait to get back for hiking and mountain biking! We cruised into Durham around 8pm, but unloading the trailer seemed like an insurmountable task at that point, so we went to dinner at a Elmo's (a local diner) and went to bed! The first night was spent on Sarah (new roomie)'s air mattress - surprisingly comfortable! - and so ended my fun, safe, memorable, and hopefully last drive across the country!