We won in 2006, we won in 2007, and we won again this weekend! London Business School rules European sports! We won the MBAT tournament of the top 15 European business schools for a third time this weekend!
I couldn't go this time, so thanks to Rusgirl for texting me from Paris. She won Rugby and Swimming, so congratulations to all the MBAs and Masters in Finance student who fought for the trophy once again! We are proud of you!!
I had a bad nightmare last night. I had just finished my MBA, and for some reason, I was starting back with McKinsey! I was at a welcome dinner in London, ready to start my associate training, and they told us there were different training locations where we would have to go the next day. The locations were London, New Jersey, and Frankfurt. We each had to draw a card that would tell us where we were bound. The director (who happened to be a serious German guy wearing a grey suit) handed out the cards. I told him I wanted to stay in London, that since I lived in London I saw no reason to fly of to some other place just to do a training. He said these were the rules and I would have to show flexibility as a consultant. I refused and finally managed to force him into giving me a card that gave me the right to stay in London. But he told me that I would regret this, that I had the wrong attitude to be a consultant, that I would have to show flexibility and be delighted being told to fly around. He would take my attitude into account at the next "people's performance committee".
After that, the dinner continued. I was sitting opposite an associate principal who I had actually known during my time there. She told me that she was pregnant and would probably going to stop working for a year when the baby came, because, after all, APs didn't earn that much and it wasn't worth it. Then suddenly I was just myself and told her that that was true, that I was very happy with my decision to become an investment banker, and that taking into account my bonus I would probably earn more than her as an Associate, hehehe.
Then I woke up, the sun was shining, and I was in London. I didn't have to fly away. I just took a long walk through Hyde Park, bought fresh juices at Wholefoods, came back home, read a book about 19th century explorers to Tibet, and then took a nap on my sofa. Life is good.
The MBA is drawing to a close - we will graduate in little more than 5 weeks - and I have saved the best for the end. I have just come back from one of the most amazing experiences of my MBA - a trip to Israel organised by some of my fellow students. There have been many trips organised from students for their classmates - to South Africa, Japan, India etc.. Though I had plans to go on most of them before the MBA, once here I realised there was very little time and also the trips were expensive. So finally I made it to one trip to a country that I had wanted to visit for many years but always felt afraid to visit due to the security situation and the tensions there. I am so glad I was able to go with the school trip because it is just a beautiful and very inspiring place. See for yourselves, here are some of my pictures from the trip:
