This week in school...

Another picture of our camping in Namibia...

Before I get too behind in what I am doing, trying to catch up from my summer break, a little bit on what I am doing now.
It has been really nice to be back and see everyone after summer break. We don't all look so exhausted, and we've had time to go out after class and visit, because we haven't had too much homework.
The week started with crisis management. It was a simulated exercise where we pretended we were working for a chemical factor that had potential leaked chemicals (cyanide) in the river. The program was run by BBC reporters, complete with video cameras and protesters. It was really interesting to find out how reporters work, and even more so to learn how we react on camera.
The rest of the week was negotiation, a workshop run by CMPartners. We learned how to negotiate, using skills we already know, but in a more organised fashion. We also learned how to influence people and their thoughts through rational reasoning. It was a really good 2.5 days. Hopefully this will come in handy not only in work situations, but in salary discussions as well.

Yesterday night the Africans in our class held a party, with Ethiopian food and a West African band.
Today I went to Evian with some friends on the ferry. It is a cute little town, with lots of nice cafes on Lake Geneva (Leman).

That's it for now...

1 week in Namibia

After the South Africa trip I and 6 other friends from school rented Land Rovers and drove up the South African coast into Namibia. On the way up we stayed mainly on dirt roads and drove as close to the beach as possible. It was an amazing trip. The Land Rovers came fully equipped with everything you need for camping, dishes, pots, pans, silverware, sleeping bags, pillows, mini-fridge, utensils... complete with 2 tents on top of each truck. The tents folded out pretty easily and had a ladder that slid down so we could crawl up.
The first day we made it as far as Lambert's Bay from Cape Town. Originally we had planned to stay at a hotel, but when we arrived the one hotel was full, so it became our first night of camping. We found a beautiful spot, it was right above the beach. That night we found a restaurant to eat at, and then made a campfire and drank wine until midnight or so... Jonathan woke up first in the morning and made our first 'camp' meal on the propane stove; toast and instant coffee. There was a bathroom with a shower that came with the site, but it was entirely too cold to shower, so we skipped it for the day.
We left around 11 am and began our way to Namibia. We stopped in Springbok for lunch, were we managed to check our email for the last time that week (little did we know... yes we are a bit addicted to electronic connections to the outside world, we discovered). We also went grocery shopping, because this night we planned on camping out. We made reservations at Ai-Ais, near Fish River Canyon.

Around 6pm, just after sunset, we crossed the border into Namibia with little trouble. We drove into the evening, maybe 10pm... It was an amazing drive, mostly on dirt roads. Every night in Namibia we could see the Milky Way and millions of stars. The drive to the campsite was impressive, we could see little other than the dust kicked up from the 2 trucks. In either direction we could see stars, and the shadow of land that seemed to be desert. As we made are way to the campsite we saw a gate and then beyond the campsite, with what seemed to be a least 200 other camp vehicles... I wasn't surprised because online, it seemed that this was a pretty popular spot, but it was a large congregation of people for the middle of the desert.

We couldn't see too much around us, but settled in to set up camp and make dinner. Jonathan became the chef, while Tom, OJ and I sent up tents. Everyone else helped start dinner. We didn't have too much wood, so Gloria, Jeroen and I went searching for wood.... We managed to find a branch close to the entrance of the camp and were quite proud of it, as we carried it back. The truck came equipped with an axe, and OJ promptly got to work trying to chop it, in his blazer I might add (I of course have a picture of this). He had little success... so Jeroen tried, in his scarf (another good picture). In the end the thing proved un-choppable, we just put it in the fire, it turned a little black, and then tried to gather some smaller things that would burn.

The next morning we woke up to discover the desert. Ai-Ais also has hot mineral springs that also supplied water to the pool. So a few of us went swimming after breakfast. Then we did our laundry, it was a funny sight, with socks hanging off windshield wipers and clothes hanging up everywhere. But everything in the desert dries quickly, even my jeans were dry in less than a half an hour. We took off around 11am. On the way out we managed to see some baboons playing in the mountains. It was about an hour's drive, and maybe 30km to the Fish River Canyon, the second largest canyon in the world.

Fish River Canyon was quite impressive. It is hard to imagine what it is like here when it does rain. The ground throughout Namibia is quite sandy and rocky, so the entire area must flood, but the majority of the time everywhere looks completely parched.

We drove a bit further to go to eat lunch at the Fish River Canyon lodge, and then made our way to Seeheim. I think it was here, were the torturing of random insects began, at lunch that is. A bee was attracted to the soda OJ was drinking and became quite bothersome... Serena is very against the hurting of insects... At this point we weren't too bad, and just shut the bee off in a cup and poured some more coke inside... later on we were a bit meaner (in Keetmanshoop) and mustard was poured on him...

So Seeheim... we arrived in Seeheim in time to watch the sunset, something Tom had been trying to do the entire trip. Seeheim makes the map in Namibia, but it is little more than the hotel we stayed at (5? buildings), and a train station across from the buildings. The hotel was basic but nice, and in the middle of nowhere. While we were waiting for them to make us dinner, we hung out outside, OJ started to teach me how to waltz, and at one point we tried to start a band and make music with the bottles and containers we had... not so nice sounding, but fun none the less. The veggie meal was okay, but the meat has remained unidentified. The hotel had a bar which was decorated with all sorts of animals, mounted of course. There was a zebra, a springbok, and antelope... and a bunch of others. There was a stuffed baboon drinking a bear in the corner. The women said her husband hunted near there and shot all of them. Most interesting was the beer that could be on tap; there were two taps, the outlet for the beer... I am not sure how to say this nicely... were the two hind ends of two antelope... male and female. It was funny.

The next morning we left as usual around 11 and headed towards the red sand dunes. The farm (Farm Namtib) we decided to stay at the edge of the dunes was amazing. It had the nicest bathroom we had seen since we had left Cape Town. The people running it raised sheep and goats, and supplemented their income with the hotel and campsite. The picture is dusk at this farm. We camped out here for the night, and made our best campfire meal. I made a veggie stew, and there were baked potatoes and meat and chicken of course.

Unfortunately as we arrived that evening the brakes went on one of the trucks, so our next day's trip was to Keetmanshoop to get them fixed, instead of going further into the red dunes (so now I have a reason to go back). We got the break line fixed and bled (2x) for 18 euro!!! while we ate lunch. Then we started to head back to toward the South African border.

We made it to the border and camped out about 10km at campsite that night. Gloria had been wanting to sleep in the truck since we started out, so this night she did... She used the alarm on the keys to lock the door... and the alarm went off twice, once for about 5 minutes while she searched for them. The other campers hated us I am sure. So at 6am they blew their horns.

The next day we finished the trip off, driving straight through to Cape Town. We stayed the next 2 nights in a nice little boutique hotel on the water in Camps Bay. Tom spoke to the owner and managed to get us the suite, which had a huge balcony and a jacuzzi outside. Tom, Jeroen and I stayed until Monday, while the others went home on Sunday morning. We went out that night for my birthday dinner, which was really cool. It was nice to spend my 29th birthday in Cape Town. It is one of the most beautiful places I have ever visited.

The next day Tom, Jeroen and I woke up to do so some sightseeing. As it was my birthday Tom said we would do whatever I wanted. So to complete the desert safari, we went to the Cape of Good Hope, and stopped on the way back to see some penguins on the coast. That night we met up with Sophie, Joelle and Mark to here up their road trip through South Africa, and eat dinner at a seafood restaurant by the docks of Cape Town.

Monday morning we woke up at 3:30/4 to get in the taxi for our flight back to Switzerland... we were delayed taking off, as the incoming flight was late, and they tried to fix the entertainment system (which they ended up fixing while we were in the air). Because of the delay however, we stayed the night in Frankfurt, and got home on Tuesday morning.

Wednesday I was in Lausanne. Thursday I left for a week in Bulgaria, with a day in Greece. The following Saturday I went to Egypt (Sharm El Sheik). I will write more of this later...

3.5 weeks in : South Africa

I have wanted to go to Africa for a while now, and finally got my chance this summer! As part of the IMD program, the Discovery Expedition, our class traveled to South Africa. The class, minus 3 members, left on the 22nd of June. 3 members of our class, Stephen's, Stephane's, and Alistair's wives were all scheduled to delivery their babies this week (talk about unplanned coordination!).

The picture is of the Soweto shanty town.

As a quick overview, because I will not be able to write about everything, we visited WITS business school, an AIDS hospice, an investment bank, various local businesses, Soweto, vineyards, local charity organisations, a museum commemorating the 1976 children protests and were visited by various figures of government and players in the transition, a film producer, current business students... The IMD MBA diary describes all events in great detail, if you would like to read more.

In South Africa we were hosted by WITS business and studied the post-Apartheid situation in the country. We visited both Johannesburg and Cape Town and were able to have amazing guest speakers explain their role in the economy, from the leader of the then current worker's strike to a discussion of the Truth and Reconciliation Board we
had view points from many sides of the current economic situation.
Some of the key issues facing the country include a massive skills shortage and poverty. During Apartheid non-whites had a limited and challenging educational situation, which has resulted in the majority of the population, more than 70% with very few skills. The current challenge, in addition to overcoming racism, is to help educate this portion of the population. This combined with the fact nearly 1 in 5 South Africans are HIV positive presents enormous challenges.
South Africa is an absolutely stunningly beautiful place. The contrast however, between rich and poor is striking. In one section of town you may see beautiful buildings, decadent houses, vast amounts of wealth... while in Soweto, or the "Ring of Fire" that surrounds Cape Town, you will see shanty towns that seem to stretch on forever in the distance, reflecting the enormous poverty in the country. This has the unfortunate outcome of rampant crime (it is common for most residents to be robbed at gunpoint at least once a year if not more), and lack of hope, as is the case in many emerging economies.
We were fortunate to meet and speak with Musi Manyamalala, a 21 year old film student who produced a real life documentary on train surfing, a past time of many disadvantaged youth in South Africa. In his film he learns to train surf to be able to film the teenagers who perform this stunt. To train surf is to ride on the roofs of the train cars carefully dancing around the high voltage wires, or hanging beneath the cars. If you have a chance to view this short piece, it is incredibly powerful, but I must warn you, incredibly sad.
We also had the opportunity to visit a children's AIDS hospice, where approximately 70% of the children were infected with the virus.
There is hope and tremendous opportunity in the country however. Many programs are being put in place to help educate the public, both in classical subjects (reading, writing, math, etc) as well as in Health education, to help minimize the spread of AIDS. South Africa has entered into agreements with major drug companies so ARVs (anti-retroviral) drugs are available at discount prices, and is working to make these drugs affordable to all. Companies are putting in place health treatment programs, as well as minority promotion programs. As the cost of labor and living is less than most western countries, South Africa holds great opportunities for investment.
Overall the trip was amazing and informative. It was a huge contrast to life in Switzerland, and shared some of the challenges I had seen while living in Bulgaria.

The trip was a great ending to the intensive 6 months at IMD, and a way to get to know all of our classmates better, outside the pressure environment.
At the end of the trip, myself and 6 other classmates had decided to take a road trip to Namibia in Land Rovers. So my next entry will describe our trip...

Life in Switzerland and a vist to Ukraine,

First, I am sorry I haven't written in so long, apparently since March 17th...
IMD
After that week we had our first round of exams a brief break and then started our second building block. More accounting and finance, some organizational behaviour, political economy, strategy, innovation and product design and a few others.
Admittedly the second semester was more relaxed than the first, but still very busy. We learned a lot in our courses - but we also continued to learn a lot about ourselves and group dynamics. This building block's study groups were way more relaxed. It could have been that we were all really tired, or maybe we learned how to manage group dynamics a bit better - to look beneath the surface and see "what's really going on" as one professor might say. I have to admit sometimes it felt like we were dual majoring in psychology.
The good news is that the entire class passed our exams in the final building block in June.

Ukraine
We had a 4 day Friday to Monday (2nd weekend in April I believe) break in between the two building blocks, and I, a friend from class, Paul, and his friend Sne, decided to visit the Ukraine, and Chernoble. I have a friend from the PC, Sarah, that was living there at that time, so she helped us organise the trip. Kiev was beautiful, lots of beautiful buildings, shops, restaurants and clubs. However overall, the country faces a lot of the same problems Bulgaria is facing now - poverty, lack of infrastructure, corruption, lack of opportunity for youth - outside the capital.
Another friend, Rebecca, from the PC was also visiting Sarah at the same time, so it worked out nicely. All 5 of us took a 3 hour drive to Chernoble Saturday. It was a really powerful and sad place to visit. There are several memorials to the people who died during the explosion and to those who were involved in the clean up. Even eerier was the wall of names commemorating those who died, with space still left for those still there and will die soon. Immediately following the disaster people were paid several 1000 dollars a day to be involved in the clean up effort - a death sentence - but because of the economic situation, people took on and still take on this work - because it will allow their families a chance at a better life. Immediately following the explosion workers generally only lived for a week, now the time is somewhat longer, but people still get sick.
1 of the reactors was still functioning, but due to be shut down soon.
The town were all the workers lived was an upper class city built to be a model city, complete with an indoor swimming pool, is now a ghost town. That evening, all the inhabitants were cleared out, forced to leave everything behind as it was contaminated. The architecture, as in all former communist blok countries, is the same - identical to Bulgaria, which gave me a strange feeling. It could have been any of the towns I had visited previously, only here there were no people.
We were not allowed to walk on the grass, because it was contaminated. All the moss in the area had turned red from exposure.
We passed by a town which had to be buried because of the contimanation level. Everywhere we went, we had a radiation meter, measuring the alpha and gamma levels - so we would know how long we could stay at a particular place.
The disaster occurred in April. In May was to be the town's holiday, as each town in Eastern Europe celebrates a day for the town, and the residents were preparing for this celebration. The reminants of this are still in place - a bumper car area and a a brand new ferris wheel.
The 3 hour drive back to Kiev was pretty quiet, all of us tired, and also contemplating what we had just seen.

That evening we went out - and I had the unfortunate incident of leaving my wallet in the taxi on the way home - loosing all of my documents. So- Sunday was spent in another Eastern European police station. It is almost good I always had to register in Bulgaria, because now I am very familar with how these places work. I also learned that I can understand about 60% of Russian.

This weekend...

I have tons of work and things I should be doing right now - like possibly going to the grocery store because if I miss its narrow operating hours today, I will have no food at home all week. I debate how much this matters sometimes, because I am so rarely there and eat most of my meals here, but I like the whole "shopping" experience.
This week, Thursday, we had a course from an actor from London, about body language, public speaking, etc. He was absolutely amazing. He selected a few students to go to the front of the classroom, and within 5 minutes had them improved 100%. It was truly amazing. For one student, who tended to over use the umms, uhs, the actor set up two chairs about 10 feet apart. As he walked between the two chairs he was to think about what he was going to say - and when he arrived at the chair, he was to say one sentence. After this excercise he regave the speach. It was a complete difference, from the removal of the ums, and uhs, to the tone of voice.
Today was a pit stop meeting with a VC (venture capitalist). IMD organised a meeting with him to review our start-up projects, to make sure we are on the right track, and to get some guidance and input from an expert on how to improve our value offering. It was really interesting, and he had some very good ideas on how we can improve bringing our disposable syringe to the market.
This evening I will be going running. As there is little time to find a gym - as the IMD gym is nice, but doesn't have as much equipment I would like, I have started running everyday. It is actually quite nice, it gives us a break from the inside of the building, and breaks up the day between class and study group. My friend Paul and I go everyday, but more and more people are starting to join us to varying degrees and a few different running groups have started. We generally run along the lake and it is beautiful, especially on clear days; the Alps and Evian are right across from us, and the tops of the mountains are snow covered. Generally, because we go around 6 we also get to watch the sunset as well, which for the past few days has been all sorts of yellow, reds and oranges in a pink and blue sky.
IMD actually took it easy on us this week, with very little homework - but we have a few papers and projects due the next two weeks leading up to exams, so I should really not be thinking of this as 'free' time. Exams start next (two weeks from yesterday) Friday and run all the through the following week. The longest will be Finance - for 5.5 hours!!!! Then it is vacation :)
Well 2 hours until my personal development coach session so I should get going... The personal development is a stream/course/elective that we are offered, with a psychoanalyst to develop ourselves and how we interact with people. I have gone to one session so far, which was interesting, we have a total of 20.
Have a good week :)

I haven't written in a while...

I just got back from a run, and started thinking that I haven't written in a while... apparently 11 Feb... We have been really busy, I am not sure where to start. We have had a ton of cases to read, projects and papers. The first was an economics project about the pharmaceutical industry.
The most, I guess you could say intensive, project was the Integrative Project. The project was assigned on a Thursday afternoon - XFM bicycles. The case was about a Chinese company hoping to convert their bicycle factory into a motor bicycle factory. Our assignment was to prepare and present a marketing strategy for the company, including segmenting the market, financials, everything. We had to be prepared to present our preliminary plan Friday morning and the final on Saturday morning. Every group was assigned times to present between 8am and 12pm - my group was assigned 8am...
So we after reviewing the case about an hour, we started. Over the next 60 hours I think we may have slept a combined total of 5 hours, mostly done on the floor of our study roooms. I actually managed on only 1 can of red bull as well. As tired as we were and as stressful as it could be at times, especially on very little sleep and trying to be rational and think logically - it was a lot of fun. When we finally reached Saturday morning and did our presentation, we were relieved and happy it was over and went out for a group breakfast.
That night we went out to Red Club, but it was a pretty quiet evening, and no one drank too much.
Last week, we had an exam on Friday, and 2 projects (Economics and Marketing) with papers due on Friday as well. So it was a long week... but we managed to get everything done and submitted on time.
This week has been calm, not too much to do, so it has be strange not to function under pressure - for me at least. Now I am lazy, and don't feel like reading - but I have about 50 pages or so for tomorrow. I also have to rewrite the leadership paper from February... new and improved with more metaphors and graphs... somehow I think I will come out short on the metaphors - but I think I can make some graphs for them.
In other news & social life... Sadly there isn't much time for that lately. I spend my walks home at night day dreaming about last year, the long, rattling train and bus rides to Sofia and around Bulgaria... going out almost every weekend and spending long afternoons at cafes. I have found I miss Bulgaria a lot, and that my Bulgarian speaking is starting to get a little worse. My friend Eva was here (from BG, but now living in Paris) this weekend, and she will only speak to me in Bulgarian.
Saturday night we went to dinner at another student's house which was a lot of fun. There were about 7 other students, some of her friends from the Netherlands, and Eva and her boyfriend. Sunday I studied.. but managed to find time to go out to Malaysian food :).
My newest travel news: For Easter I will be going to Kiev! So I will be able to add another country to my list :). We will also visit Chernoble. I will go with 2 friends from class, Brant and Paul, and Paul's friend from NY. It should be fun, and a good break from school and studying.
Well I must get going... I have no time to proofread tonight, so I am sorry if it is disorganised. Hope all is going well with everyone!

Picture Update

I added some more pictures to the yahoo photos page of Lausanne that a friend took. The same website as before http://photos.yahoo.com/jah_8

Sunday night is here - This morning I got up, started my laundry, went running at the gym with my friend Brant, went grocery shopping for the next few days at school, and then sat down for an afternoon of accounting and case studies... I can't believe its after 10. I am going to go home now, start reading my 4 chapters of "Measuring and Managing the Value of Companies" and have a glass of red wine.
This week we have a ton of reading today, and tomorrow we have to dress up, and go to visit city hall at night. Then its more accounting fun. Tuesday have the class all day.
We have started planning our trip to Africa - after the school trip. Right now it is looking like Zanzibar for a little while, maybe Mt Kilimanjaro and then Eastern Europe, Turkey... true we only have a few weeks... but we can try :)
Next week I am helping Carolina and the Brazilians have a party for Carnivale. It should be a lot of fun. We will have Samba dancers and a band... we are going to try to get people to dress up.
Have a good week!