The Journey Begins

Sitting here in the Atlanta airport waiting for my flight to South Korea, the clock shows 8:10 and I have two simultaneous thoughts:

1. I have been without sleep for 24 hours now. In my effort to get a head start on the jet-lag (and because I procastinated all my packing till the last minute) I stayed awake all night.

2. I don't know when I'll see the 8:10 cafe again. And I have an IOU of $0.75 pending. Maybe someone who owes me money will clear it for me? I'm sure someone owes me money...

As my sleep deprived brain feels less and less excited, the euphoria of finishing school and the joy of traveling are wearing thin. And what is finally creeping up on me is the feeling that I'm going to miss Owen. All the lovely friends, the awesome things we did together, the silly gossip, the petty politics... everything! I suddenly don't want it to be over anymore. This is probably the last time I'm going to be in school and it is over quickly. Too quickly!

At least I have the China trip to look forward to. There will be friends from Owen again, and this time around I'm going to take my time saying goodbye!

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Job Hunting and Business School

After accepting the job offer from Deloitte, I suddenly feel like a mountain has been lifted off my shoulders. I seem to like my classes a lot more and actually put in some effort into my homeworks. I pay a lot more attention in class, now that I don't think about the cover-letters I would be submitting at the end of the day.

All this makes me wonder, did the uncertainty in the job market destroy some of the value of an MBA? I am guessing that learning and gaining knowledge were one of the top reasons why most of us came to business school. The amount of work that is needed for job search and the sheer fear and uncertainty of being jobless are sure to distract us from our endeavor to learn.

Being in an MBA program felt like paying a glorified hiring consultant first, and a graduate school next.

And this makes me wonder... is there a better way to structure an MBA program? Or is this exactly how it is designed to be?

अँधा बदल - The Blind Cloud

One of the few poems I wrote in Hindi:

अँधा था बादल

जो बाहों में था चाँद,

घुर्राते गरजते

ढुंडा था प्यार.

तोड़ के बंधन

जब निखल आया चाँद,

बादल ने पिगला

बहलाते आसून.

And the translation:

The cloud was blind, though it had the moon in its arms

Storming and thundering and searching for love.

Breaking the bonds, when the moon emerged,

Melted the cloud with tears of rain.