It’s that time again

Time to make snap judgements about all the changes happening at INSEAD in P3.  

The break was nice and way too short.  My parents made the trip over – they’ve come to visit me around my birthday for the last 11 years that I haven’t lived at home.  We spent a relaxing week wandering around an adorable northern European town that had amazing beer, and a cuisine that couldn’t hold a candle to France’s. 

I started P3 in style.  Namely, by smashing in the mirror of an idling taxi while trying to avoid running over a stroller that some [idiot] woman was walking down the street instead of on the sidewalk.  Next I introduced myself to someone who’s been on the Fonty campus for the last two periods.  

Smooth.

The Singaporeans are here, with their beautiful tans, their sun-bleached tresses, and their seafoam colored nametags.  (Ours in FBL are forest green – how appropriate!)  Most of the ones I’ve talked to seem to be in shock over the pace of life in Fontainebleau, the freezing weather (though I thought today was like a nice June day like back home), the fact that there’s so much vast study space on campus, and that the grocery stores (and life in general) shut down at noon on Sundays.  And most shockingly of all, they’re sick of Singapore food and craving Tartes de Citron.  I didn’t think that was possible.  

It’s refreshing to have new faces on campus.  Everyone seems much more open to meeting people again – I’ve even had great conversations with Fonty-siders I’ve never talked to before.  And it’s once again okay to ask and be asked what you want to do with your life.  That conversation got replaced by bitching about the Leading Organizations class, or by gossip about who’s hooking up with whom or who’s trying to hook up with whom.

I’m also interested to know why every period seems to start with professors trying to dominate us.  Sameer did it the first day of POM, but then chilled out and decided to be the cool dude that he is for the rest of the term.  Susan started the course by putting a few folks in their places, but later turned out to be quite lovely.  Stan kept up the abuse for the whole term. (Hernan on the other hand seemed to enjoy getting dominated.) And Pekka was a complete sadist who talked about S&M all term, yet we loved every moment.  

Bright and early on Tuesday morning this week, we got an hour and a half long lecture on being on time for Negotiations and an attempt at a public humiliation of all the people who came in late.  This was followed by an enumerations of all the reasons that class is going to suck and feel like a waste of time.  And then followed by a first lecture which didn’t actually suck, and seemed kind of fun and interesting.  Thought maybe it was only compared to our reduced expectations.  Is that the point?  I’m on to you, whacky professor guy.

On a personal note, my own goals for P3 are

(1) do more work.  I did no homework last term, and feel fully justified not having studied more than 2 hours for a single exam.  This term is different.  I’m taking classes that interest me, classes that are so open ended as to only be rewarding if I put in a good amount of work.

(2) take more trips, now that I don’t have to spend 200 EUR a month on a Eurostar ticket.

(3) have more fun, now that I don’t have to cut every night short to have an awkward Skype conversation with a distant SO.

(4) listen to Writer’s Almanac. It’s a short radio piece I used to listen to on NPR – about 5 minutes every morning right before 9AM. I would always end up staying in my car with the radio on in the parking lot of my firm, finishing up the morning poem read by the soothing voice of Garrison Keillor. At the end, he would always sign off, saying, “be well, do good work, and keep in touch.” It was the perfect way to start a day. (You can podcast this on iTunes.)