Getting Ready for Second Year
August 18th, 2008
Yes, I know, I disappeared for a while. By now my internship is almost over (this week is my last one) - I still need to do my final presentation to the SVP but that’s about it. The summer has been great - I became friends with some of the other interns (even though they weren’t all from HBS :)) and we went on trips exploring Seattle and the area, as well as Seattle’s restaurants and bars (with a strong preference to sushi). Work was good, too.
What they say about Seattle is true - in the summer, it’s one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever lived in. The weather is a perfect sunny 25 degrees almost every day, and within less than 100km from downtown there are lakes, waterfalls, glaciers and mountains (and good sushi restaurants). Too bad it’s like that only for the summer… You can skip to the end of the post to see some pictures.
We start second year at HBS after labor day weekend (first week of September). I’m excited about the second year, it’s supposed to be much better - at least easier - than the first one. Here are some of the differences between them:
Alive & Kicking
July 1st, 2008
My photo gallery is alive again. It suddenly stopped working, and after seeking help in the support forums and regressing to my programming and debugging days, I managed to bring it back to life.
So with that, here’s what I’ve been doing in the last week:
Greetings from the “Emerald City”
June 17th, 2008
For some reason every state, city and public bathroom in the US has a nickname. So the “Emerald City” is, apparently, Seattle - the nickname is a result of a contest (!) held in the 80s and refers to the “lush evergreen trees in the surrounding area” (thanks to Wikipedia for that incredibly useful information).
At any rate, this is where I’m going to be for the summer. Landed two days ago (still ridiculously jetlagged) and going to be here till the end of August for my summer internship in a large technology company that sells stuff online.
The same technology company was also nice enough to set me (and the other interns) up in a great apartment complex right in downtown Seattle: Harbor Steps. I think the location couldn’t have been better - 2 minutes walk from Pike Place Market, Seattle Art Museum across the street, 5 minutes walk from the shopping district and tons of restaurants, coffee shops, art galleries and whatnot literally downstairs. Not to mention the waterfront being 2 minutes away (that’s why it’s called Harbor Steps…). I can almost say it’s better than where I used to live in Tel Aviv…
The apartment I have is a fully-furnished one bedroom, which means that when I got here on Saturday this is what welcomed me:
Spring, School, Stuff
April 17th, 2008
Weather Update
After endlessly complaining in my last post about the foul weather here, we had a few amazing sunny days of more than 15 degrees and the forecast for the rest of the week is sunny, with temperatures well above 10 degrees. The trees finally start to go out of their naked cemetery mode and there are even birds here. And they’re chirping.
Conclusion? complaining works!
On the other hand, it’s Boston, so on the very same sunny day of >20 degrees, at around 4pm there was a crazy thunderstorm, complete with lightning, thunder and rain. However it was one of these lucky days when the storm started exactly 5 minutes after I returned home from walking around and taking photos:
Photopost
February 25th, 2008
The problem with Hell Week isn’t that it is hell (it wasn’t, except for the weather), but that it is not a week. I’m still in the midst of interviews - so I will update once the process is all over. Like I said, for some industries - like consulting or investment banking - the interviews process does last only a week and ends with offers (or not…), but for other industries, technology included, the process is a bit longer. Oh well.
And in the meanwhile, to compensate myself for the East Coast weather, I spent a weekend in California, with prime sun and prime company:
Hell Yeah
February 3rd, 2008
Formal Name: “Dedicated Interview Period”
Real Name: *** Hell Week! *** (muhaha)
What it is: a week and a bit in which we don’t study but instead wear suits and march on to interview for summer internships.
Hell Week got its lovely name because of the fact that for many people this week is indeed a stressful, tense and sometimes depressing experience. I think this is true mainly for people interviewing for consulting jobs - they might have 4 interviews in one day, in different locations in Boston, every day of the week. These interviews aren’t easy - in addition to ‘behavioral questions’ (”tell me about a time when you displayed leadership / teamwork / amazing sense of humor”) the interview also consists of a “Case”. The Case is a short business situation that the interviewee needs to analyze qualitatively and quantitatively, and suggest a possible course of action. My fellow classmates doing consulting interviews have been preparing for them for the past couple of weeks, so for them it’s more like “hell month” rather than just a week.
Californication (or - HBS WesTrek ‘08)
January 21st, 2008
I’m starting to pay my debt to society and write about the things I did over winter break, before coming back to -5 degrees in Boston. So in reverse chronological order, just before returning here I spent a week in the Bay Area, as part of the HBS WesTrek, organized by the HBS TechMedia Club. The trek consisted of company visits to ~50 companies, including technology, CPG (consumer packaged goods), consulting and finance. About 70 HBS students participated, each deciding which meetings to attend, where to sleep and which car to rent. Unlike other treks, this one is very “free form” and each participant kind of does her own thing.
I naturally focused on technology companies. It was really fun to see in real life the companies I only read about, or use their products. It was also interesting to see the differences between large companies like Yahoo! (a multi-building campus with nice printed guest tags), the smaller ones like LinkedIn (free drinks in branded refrigerators) and the tiny crazy ones like Slide (dogs barking at the entrance to the office).
Here are a few funny anecdotes and photos from the meetings:
New Year, New Term and No Snow
January 14th, 2008
So I’m back from my fun transatlantic tour of Israel, California and now Boston. I have a long backlog of posts I plan to write, but since tomorrow I’m starting my second term at HBS I thought it’d be a good idea to write about the courses I’ll be studying this term. Just a quick sentence about the most fascinating thing that I experienced during the 3-weeks break - it happened today, when I came back to Boston and discovered all snow has melted! Hooray!
Unfortunately, it seems like it’s going to be back this week… so long for walking around in flip-flops (kidding).
So, second term courses:
Thanksgiving & Weather
November 25th, 2007
Living in a place with four real seasons (as opposed to Israel…) is definitely a change. Last week we had snow for the first time. It didn’t stay on the ground and was more ice than snow, but my cool weather gadget still had this icon for the very first time:
brrrr
October 30th, 2007
Executive Summary: after a few boring posts about micro finance and technology conferences, I come back with a juicy post about… the weather! and naked turkeys.
So yesterday was a sad day: I turned on the heating in my apartment for the first time and wore a scarf for the first time. However, today I sat outside in the sun again, so it looks like we have a few final days of bearable weather here. After that, I’ll be wearing the crazy sleeping bag coat I bought this weekend, along with my new furry hat… pictures to follow.
On the other hand, fall is indeed a beautiful season here. The trees really turn to orange and red (I used to read about it when I was in Israel, but never bought it), here’s a proof:
