Our time in Oxford

so proud and impressed

2009-02-16T14:36:00.002+01:00

I know, it has been an awful long time without any news and this post is not going to be very long, either. I just wanted to share the following article with you:

Special Delivery

It's about Dhruv's business in India and a must read :-)

Well done Dhruv!

Stuff to sell

2008-09-24T16:39:00.008+02:00

Hello all,

we are leaving Oxford... That's sad - but you can take advantage of the situation and cut a great deal by buying the following at fantastic prices:

Macroeconomics – David Miles and Andrew Scott – Second Edition - £25
Organizational Behavior – Stephen P. Robbins – Tenth Edition - £25
Trading & Exchanges Market Microstructure for Practitioners – Larry Harris – 2003 - £30
Options, Futures, and Other Derivates – John C. Hull – Sixth Edition - £30

Sub Fusc (I'm 1.76m - that's 5 feet 9.29 inch) complete with white bow tie and Mortar board £25

Ladies bike (incl. lock and basket on the carrier and battery lights) not new but in good condition £35

Send me an email - give me a call - whatever you like. Will leave Oxford on Friday morning. So you better be quick...

Best
Sebastian

My Birthday

2008-09-02T15:54:00.001+02:00

I took a day off for my birthday on Monday. I was looking forward to punting with

Sebastian and have a nice picnic somewhere when the rain came and we were forced indoors.

Not so easily dissuaded instead we decided to have the picnic in the living room. In the evening we had some beer with friends at Cape of Good Hope. Sebastian was a bit tipsy after the bottle of champagne that we both had in the afternoon and therefore he was surprised that the barman didn’t react to his order of “One Erdbeer Beer” please. Even when he repeated this twice ;)

7th Anniversary

2008-08-18T18:42:00.004+02:00

Liebe heißt Wärme auszustrahlen, ohne einander zu ersticken.
Liebe heißt Feuer zu sein, ohne einander zu verbrennen.
Liebe heißt einander nahe zu sein, ohne einander zu besitzen.
Liebe heißt viel von einander zu halten, ohne einander festzuhalten.
Liebe ist das große Abenteuer des menschlichen Herzens.
Spüren Menschen das Herz eines Menschen, dann kommen sie zum Leben.
Liebe ist der einzige Weg, auf dem Menschen menschlicher werden.
Allein die Liebe ist das Haus, in dem wir wohnen können.

-Phil Bosmans -

Picnic St James's Park

Back in Europe - Oxford

2008-07-01T10:08:00.004+02:00

Just to let you know that I arrived last Wednesday with a 6 hours delay back home - Just in time to see the second half of the EM half final.

Typhoon

2008-06-25T01:05:00.001+02:00

There is a Chinese phrase saying „If nice and lovely people leave their house the weather will celebrate this with rain and thunder”. If this is true I am an amazing person because Hong Kong welcomed me with a black thunderstorm and says Goodbye with a Typhoon and as I saw 5 minutes ago again with a thunderstorm. I would prefer sunshine for celebration ;) The warning came up yesterday evening so that we had to leave the Uni really abrupt to get home save. From a warning 3 it went rapidly to 8 (the highest one). Since this happened yesterday night time I was sure that it won’t affect my flight this morning – but …..

I took around 1.5 hours to get a taxi to the airport – horrible drive.

Now I am sitting in a café because my flight will be at least 4 hours delayed – you can’t see anything outside. After checking the Hong Kong Observatory website I was shocked by all the signs: Red Thunderstorm warning, Typhoon 8, flooding and additional Thunderstorm sign …. GREAT!

My husband’s answer was: I hope you can make it to the half final ;)

Finished - again

2008-06-24T18:36:00.003+02:00

After Trading and Market Microstructure yesterday afternoon - which was ok but for sure not great... - I sat for my last exam this morning in Derivatives.
I think it was fair and hope that what I wrote makes some sense :-) In Oxford you actually never now up to the point when you finally receive your grade. This is due to the fact, that all exams are "curved" which means that after grading them - something like a normal distribution curve with a mean of 63 is used to adjust the results in a way that the results fit the curve. That makes the personal outcome of an exam dependent on the performance of the rest of the class. We will see ;-)

Now I'm back to the library to work on the last two papers for this term. They are due on Monday but I want to finish them as soon as possible to be able to spend some time with Klaudia. We have barely seen each other this term and I'm really looking forward to having her home again tomorrow.

Therefore I better stop blogging for the moment and go back to my work on Negotiations...

Examinations again

2008-06-23T12:59:00.003+02:00

This morning I sat for my Capital Raising Techniques 2 hours exam.
I think it was fair and the form of the exam (4 compulsory questions in part A (short answers) and 2 out of 7 questions (essay form) in part B) provides the possibility to pick essay topics one is comfortable with.
I'm not sure whether my choice to write about the differences between mezzanine and high yield bonds both from an issuer and arranging bank perspective was clever... I'm afraid I might have mixed some things up and did not elaborate enough on the bank's side. But we will see ;-)

At 2:30 I'll sit for the second but last exam in my course: Trading and Market Microstructure.
But before that I'll have lunch, a quick nap and a bit of last minute revision ;-)

Rebus

2008-06-15T09:02:00.006+02:00

What's this? I took this picture last Thursday in the Kowloon Walled City Park after a rain.

The history of the Walled City (known as Kowloon then) can be traced back to the Song Dynasty (960–1279), where it served as a watchpost defending the area against pirates and managing the production of salt. It was rebuilt as a fort in the mid-1800s on the same site on the Kowloon Peninsula of Hong Kong. After the ceding of Hong Kong Island to Britain in 1842 in accordance to the Treaty of Nanjing, the Qing (Chinese) authorities felt it necessary for them to establish a military/administrative post to rule the area and to check further British influence in the area.

The area where the monolith once stood is now a park located in today's Kowloon City District. Completed in August 1995, the park is known as the Kowloon Walled City Park (九龍寨城公園), preserving the heritage of the fabled Walled City and is part of the adjacent Carpenter Road Park.

BBQ at RAC

2008-06-10T22:00:00.002+02:00

You might not believe it, but we really had nice weather for a couple of days.
Brent was kind enough to take the opportunity arranging a BBQ at Templeton's Rewley Abbey Court where quite a number of our classmates live. He is a great chef and we had chicken, ribs, salad and to top it all apple pie with ice cream.
Given my workload this week and the fact, that I was a little drunk on Monday night after hanging out with some of the Germans I stayed away from the beer and left early to get some work done...

Here are some pictures of the BBQ...

I am still alive

2008-06-10T02:52:00.001+02:00

Le Ho (means Hello) from Hong Kong!

I am still alive and ok. The thunderstorm was here for nearly the whole Saturday and he caused some big damage in some regions from Hong Kong but Kowloon where I am based hasn’t suffered from the rain a lot. Since Sunday we have actually some sunny hours and the rain stopped!

Black Thunderstorm

2008-06-07T03:19:00.002+02:00

After a 13 hours flight I arrived on Thursday in Hong Kong to run a campaign at the City University and train 2 new persons for the HK market. It is raining season at the moment.

Today should have been my first day of training BUT ….

It happens that a training day can’t take place because we do not have enough students or the technique is not working BUT here in Hong Kong we had to cancel at least the morning (we will decide at midday if we can do the training) due to a black thunderstorm warning which means that we are not allowed to leave the secure apartment.

You can’t see anything outside ….

Rainstorm Warning System

The rainy season in Hong Kong is normally between April and September. Rain could be particularly heavy and persistent during May and June, causing severe traffic disruption and on occasions major floods and landslips resulting in casualties.

The rainstorm warning system is designed to alert the public about the occurrence of heavy rain which is likely to bring about major disruptions, and to ensure a state of readiness within the essential services to deal with emergencies. It is independent of other severe weather warnings such as tropical cyclone warning and landslip warning, which will be issued separately where necessary.

There are three levels of warning: AMBER, RED and BLACK.

The AMBER signal gives alert about potential heavy rain that may develop into RED or BLACK signal situations. There will be flooding in some low-lying and poorly drained areas. Key Government departments and major transport and utility operators are put on alert.

The RED and BLACK signals warn the public of heavy rain which is likely to bring about serious road flooding and traffic congestion. They will trigger response actions by Government departments and major transport and utility operators. The public will be given clear advice on the appropriate actions to take.

Once issued, the signals are broadcast over radio and television. For your own safety, listen to radio or television announcements for the latest information.

GUIDE TO THE RAINSTORM SIGNALS

AMBER RAINSTORM SIGNAL

Heavy rain has fallen or is expected to fall generally over Hong Kong, exceeding 30 millimetres in an hour, and is likely to continue.

ACTION

Members of the public should take necessary precautions to reduce their exposure to risk posed by heavy rain, such as flooding.
Parents, students, school authorities and school-bus drivers should listen to radio or television announcements on the weather, road and traffic conditions.
Candidates for public examinations should attend the examination as normal, but should listen to radio or watch television in case the weather deteriorates suddenly.
Farmers and fish pond owners, particularly those in low lying or flood frequented areas, should take the necessary precautions to minimise losses, which include checking and clearing the drainage system within and around the farm/fish ponds to ensure that all the drains are not blocked. Where possible, fish pond operators should reduce the water level of ponds which are likely to be flooded.

RED RAINSTORM SIGNAL

Heavy rain has fallen or is expected to fall generally over Hong Kong, exceeding 50 millimetres in an hour, and is likely to continue.

ACTION

Employees working outdoors in areas exposed to rain should suspend outdoor duties if weather conditions in those areas so warrant.
People who have to travel should carefully consider weather and road conditions.
If the RED signal is issued before working hours, employees should report for duty as usual, provided that transport services are available. Supervisors are encouraged to adopt a flexible attitude in case their staff have genuine difficulties in arriving at work on time.
If the RED signal is issued during office hours, employees working indoors should remain on duty as usual unless it is dangerous to do so. Employees in areas where transport services are about to be suspended can be exceptionally released at the discretion of the supervisor. In exercising their discretion, supervisors should take into account the weather and road conditions.

BLACK RAINSTORM SIGNAL

Very heavy rain has fallen or is expected to fall generally over Hong Kong, exceeding 70 millimetres in an hour, and is likely to continue.

ACTION

Stay indoors or take shelter in a safe place until the heavy rain has passed.
Employees working outdoors in exposed areas should stop work and take shelter.
People having no safe place to go may take temporary refuge in any of the special temporary shelters opened by the Home Affairs Department.
Employers are advised not to require their employees to go to work unless prior agreement on work arrangements during rainstorms has been made.
People who are already at work should stay where they are unless it is dangerous to do so.

SPECIAL ACTIONS TO BE TAKEN FOR RED/BLACK SIGNAL

Students should stay home or, if already at school, should remain there until the end of school hours and conditions are safe for them to return home.

If the RED/BLACK signal is issued when some students have set out for school -

School-bound students should normally proceed to school unless the road or traffic conditions ahead are not safe.
School-bus drivers should listen to radio broadcasts on the latest development of the rainstorm and ensure that students are taken to a safe place, normally the school, unless road or traffic conditions ahead warrant otherwise.
Schools should arrange to be open and appropriately staffed to look after any students arriving until it is safe for them to return home.

Candidates for public examinations should listen to radio or watch television for an announcement to be made by the Hong Kong Examinations Authority.

Drivers should beware that there are likely to be serious road flooding and traffic congestion.

People should avoid going near easily flooded watercourses or passing through flooded areas. People whose home may be seriously flooded should consider evacuating their home until the rain has eased and flood water subsided.

Changing perception of private equity in Germany - finally!

2008-06-05T23:54:00.004+02:00

As you might know I have been an investment manager for small and medium sized companies in the time before the MBA.
The environment for this industry was difficult since Franz Müntefering accused private equity firms in 2005 of being "locusts", chewing up good companies before spitting them out again.
Numerous industry professionals draw the funniest pictures of other animals to prove the opposite (especially that of a honeybee :-)) and were more or less successful in changing the perception.

Now it seems as if the general picture of private equity comes back at least to "neutral" as today's FT.com article implies.

A lot of work

2008-06-05T17:27:00.007+02:00

Before we started with the course someone said: "when you made it through Hillary - everything else is a walk in the park" - unfortunately I can't remember who it was but it is absolutely not true. This term is really hard. I was lucky that it started pretty ok, but right now it is really on the edge to getting difficult to stand.

Without complaining - here is my list of work for this term:

looks pretty busy, doesn't it. :-)

Well, anyhow: I better stop blogging and go back to the Private Equity assignment which is due on Monday.

Just a quick note on what else is going on:

On Saturday we had the Sylvester awards which is something like the Oscar's but for MBAs. There were awards in categories like:

most loved lecturer
best pub crawler (for the person hanging out at pubs most of the time)
schmoozing (best networker)

and many more.

I was nominated for "best all around / nicest person"

but couldn't win against Gareth who obviously is even nicer than me ;-) I think he well deserves the award, so: congratulations!

Dress code was "spicy black tie" and there were so many people with wigs around that I couldn't resist to have a picture of me wearing one of the best ones:

The evening carried on with karaoke in the common room,

dancing at Bar Risa, more dancing at Anuba, kebab on St. Giles (my first one in Oxford) and finally Tequilla Fanta at Brent's place.

Puh, what a night. I came home at six in the morning but managed to be at school for meetings from 12:30. We worked till the school closed at midnight, when I went home to proceed till six. After 90 minutes sleep the alarm rang, I handed in my Private Equity assignment at the examination school and went to school to finish the Derivatives assignment which was due at 5 pm that day. Well deserved I spent the evening doing nothing but eating and watching movies :-)

On Tuesday I was invited for dinner at Katy's, Francois' and Christie's house where Nick cooked a fantastic pasta sauce. It was a very nice evening in great company and I feel really sad when I get remembered that we have only a couple of days to go in this term and only weeks till the program is over.

On anther note: I finally figured out what I'm going to do over the summer. I will do a Summer Consulting Project with a London based Hedge fund. In a team of four we will spend eight weeks in London exploring future business opportunities for the fund. I'm really curious to see how a Hedge fund actually works but at the same time I'm a bit scared by the amount of math that will be involved in the project. I will write more about the project once we figured out how strict the confidentiality is...

Home Sweet Home ... BUT

2008-05-28T13:51:00.003+02:00

Finally I arrived at home yesterday after 5 weeks away. BUT it is only a short visit to see my lovely husband, do the washing and pack again. I am going to leave for Germany tomorrow. There will be a conference in Darmstadt from Friday to Sunday. After a stop over to see my family in Bochum on Monday and Tuesday I will head off for a campaign in Hong Kong on Wednesday for 3 weeks.

Oxbridge

2008-05-26T02:11:00.003+02:00

Another tradition in Oxford is to play all kinds of sports against Cambridge. This happens on every level of the University and so there is a MBA competition as well. Every year one of the two schools hosts a whole day full of sport and party activities for the respective other school.

This year it was Cambridge to host us and they did a great job.

We left early on Saturday morning (5.30am) and sports started at 11.00. I participated in squash and ultimate frisbee. Whilst our victory in squash was by only one point, the triumph in ultimate frisbee was slightly clearer (17:2). The Oxford crew managed to win in more sports over all and was therefore declared the winner of the competition. Sports we won include touch rugby, 100m sprint, punting and basketball whilst we lost in football, table tennis and cricket.

--- part of the successful squash team ---

But sports were not the only important things during the day. Meeting with the people from Judge Business School and making new friends was at least as important as the rest. I found it very interesting to see how comparable and yet different the programs are. Overall I was impressed how friendly the atmosphere during the whole day was. Everyone was full of good sportsmanship and the competition was never too fierce. We were treated as welcome guests and got an amazing insight into some parts of Cambridge’s history as well.

--- fooling around in St. John's courtyard before the squash game ---

I hope our successors will host the Judge crew on the same high standard next year!

Stop Over in Singapore

2008-05-25T04:06:00.001+02:00

With amazing sunshine but a bit sad I had to leav e Melbourne after one month.

With nearly 4 hours delay and after the worst flight I had so far I arrived at 1 am local time on Saturday morning in Singapore where I am going to stay for the next 3 days.

30 degrees and 75% humidity.

A City From Above

2008-05-19T05:04:00.006+02:00

Melbourne weather

2008-05-17T00:44:00.001+02:00

I was really lucky the last week. It was sunny and we had around 25 degrees – amazing weather and I enjoyed it.

Tonight it started with a storm and rain – it is raining cats and dogs – unbelievable. The rain was so loud that I could hardly sleep.

Italy in Melbourne

2008-05-11T14:50:00.004+02:00

I went for a coffee and with a good book to Lygon Street, yesterday after calling, which is only a 5 minute walk from my apartment. Italian feeling in the middle of Melbourne

Lygon Street is one of the great food precincts of Melbourne. It has its origins in the early immigration of Italian migrants to Melbourne and, in particular, to Carlton. It also owes much of its growth and popularity as a eating out destination to the students from Melbourne University, who frequented the street long before it became fashionable with business people.

Lygon Street has the biggest selection of Italian restaurants and cafes of anywhere in Australia, and was the first suburb in Melbourne to promote eating outdoors and tables and chairs on footpaths. Lygon Street is a great place to spend a warm summer's evening with a group of friends, especially if you're sitting in the garden cafe of one of the terraces that line the street. – It is also nice for a “single” person with a book ;)

Melbourne at night

2008-05-10T00:55:00.004+02:00

After a daytrip to a National Park with Bianca and Kim I took the possibility to have a walk through the City of Melbourne at Night.

On the way to Paris

2008-05-08T07:28:00.003+02:00

A group of round 150 of us met this morning at 5:00 to start our journey to Paris. Although it was pretty early and quite a number of us had a heavy workload over the last days to get assignments done before the tournament, it seemed as if everyone made it on the buses.

We are now on our way to Dover where we will enter the ferry. Our expected arrival time in Paris is 4 pm. I keep my fingers crossed we make it without major delays.

The weather in France is expected to be great and while I write this I recognize, that I forgot my sunglasses :-(

During the tournament I will compete in "Cross Country" and "Ultimate Frisbee".
Cross Country is basically a team marathon with teams of six running 7 km each. We have some pretty strong runners on the program and I'm curious what their times will be. I didn't have the chance to practice a lot for running, so I don't expect anything ;-)

Ultimate Frisbee is a teamsport and should be fun. We practiced regularly over the last weeks and I hope we can achieve a good placement in the end for all the hard work to pay off :-)

Maybe I have the chance to blog from France...

Mornington Peninsula and Philipp Island (2nd May)

2008-05-07T07:35:00.003+02:00

I’ll break again a bit the chronology but I think that’s not so crucial.

Last Friday we went with 3 RBA project managers, John our boss and Verena who is our International Marketing Director on a daytrip to Mornington Peninsula and Philipp Island in the South of Melbourne (2h drive). We started with the visit of some wineries and some tastings before we went for lunch to a place called “Ten Minutes by tractor” – lovely food, amazing view and wonderful wine.

We finished our day a bit freezing at the beach of Philipp Island to see the smallest Penguins of the World coming home for the night. They are so cude – only 30 cm and the weight is 1kg. They come out of the sea to form an “army” on the beach before crossing to get to their nest for the night. We were not allowed to take pictures but I can tell you they are sweet.

Visitors from all over the world

2008-05-06T19:41:00.005+02:00

Another thing I have to quickly share with you...

Isn't it amazing from which parts of the world the visitors of our blog come?!

Spring in Oxford

2008-05-06T19:07:00.005+02:00

Given the great weather these days (21°) and the MBAT coming up very fast, I decided to swap future performance in my derivatives exam against enjoying a run in the afternoon sun. I hope Celine will understand that her cute french accent could not keep up with spending some time outside :-)

Sydney 24th – 26th April

2008-05-06T03:08:00.012+02:00

I arrived on the 24th April at around 6.00am local time after a 22 hours flight in Sydney. My friend Dany who moved last August to Sydney picked me up from the airport. It was nice to have a bit of “Home” on the other side of the world. I stayed with Dany and her flat mates Jade and Evan for the next three days in Sydney. Their flat is at a river with an amazing view of the Skyline and Kurt Russel owns a flat on the other side of the road. My journey has begun grey not like you would expect a trip to Australia.

Dany had to work on this Thursday. Although it was in the middle of the night for my body clock I only went to bed for 2 hours to get directly in the correct bio rhythm – and it works. I had no problems with a Jetlag – my colleagues are still suffering from it after one week ;)

I went at around midday to the city to explore Sydney a bit on my own. And it was amazing. The Botanical Garden is in the middle of the city and it seems so unreal to see this in front of the skyline. In the Garden I met the first exotic animals: Spiders, Parrots and Bats (here I first thought these are some kind of fruits).

No Fruits but Bats

First I was a bit disappointed of the Opera house. I approached it from the backside and it looks really small when you have the pictures in your mind that you always can see on the postcards. I saw the Harbour Bridge and people climbing on it – like my father in law told me one day before I left the UK.

Sebastian and I discovered that the best way to start a tour in a new town is to have a sightseeing tour by bus to get a rough overview and then definitely by foot. I tool to bus tours since it was part time raining. One tour which covered the suburbs and beaches and one Inner-City tour. Sydney is a lovely town. And it is true that Australians are laid-back people – Nobody is in a hurry and everybody is friendly – great!

Bondi Beach

The day ended with some Caipirinah at Dany’s place and a Australian pub food.

Friday was Anzac Day in Australia and New Zealand and a bank holiday. Anzac Day is commemorated by Australia and New Zealand on 25 April every year to honour members of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps who fought at Gallipoli in Turkey during World War I. We met at 10 am with Rouki one of Dany’s friends to go to the Blue Mountains National Park. It belongs to Sydney but is around 2 hours away – Nothing is close in Australia. It was a wonderful day and I was surprised how green this continent is. On a bank holiday in Europe and especially in Germany you will find all people travelling to one point and everything would be crowded but not here. At some points we were the only people and could enjoy the peace and harmony of this place.

Three Sisters

My stopover in Sydney ended with a lovely sunny day. Dany and I went to the harbour and the Rocks and enjoyed the sun, the people and the whole atmosphere. And we climbed the Sydney Tower to get an amazing overview of Sydney. At 7 pm my flight head of to Melbourne.

Sydney is a Major City with flair and a special atmosphere.

Following some more pictures – definitely not all ;)

CLICK HERE FOR MORE PICTURES

Melbourne College Boat Race

2008-05-05T03:27:00.004+02:00

Hi Folks

I thought I would have some time to update the block on a regular basis but I discover everyday new possibilities to see and do things ;)

So I break now the chronology and write something about my yesterday’s event. At the weekend the training for the student started and we had some problems because on Sunday was the College boat race. Therefore we moved our training to midday. Everybody was so excited about this event that I was motivated to join in. All students from Trinity College met at 7.00 am at the Bul to go to the Yarra River in the middle of Melbourne city to support their Boat teams. Dressed in Christmas Colors I joined them. It was really exciting and fun.

Because of the fact that I joined the students nobody moaned that they are tired or have a hung over.

The atmosphere and the different College’s names reminded me of the UK.

This people are not from Germany - these are Queens College students

Passed again

2008-05-02T16:17:00.003+02:00

We just got our results for last term's exams.
I passed all classes and was even able to achieve a distinction level mark on Financial Management which is a big positive surprise! The rest of the marks are ok.

Now only the mark for our EP is outstanding :-)

May Day

2008-05-01T11:15:00.005+02:00

While Germany celebrates Labour Day and Ascension Day, the British celebrate May Day and in Oxford especially May Morning.

I thought that the fact that our flat is only one minute away from Magdalen Bridge where everyone meets on Max Morning would give me a big advantage, but it turned out that the bridge was not only closed for cars this morning but for everyone.

The reason for that is, that over the last years quite a number of drunken people jumped from the bridge into the River Cherwell which is so shallow that they got seriously injured.

So I had to wait till the singing was over and the bridge was opened before I could meet some of the other MBAs. Ok, there would have been a way around the bridge but at 5:30 in the morning it was way too early to decide quickly enough to not miss the choir :-)

Update and Adventure “Down Under”

2008-04-29T03:48:00.007+02:00

You haven’t heard from me for a long time – SORRY – but I will try to give you some recent updates.

I have travelled a lot in the past weeks. From the 30^th March to the 16^th of April I run a campaign in Cambridge and had enough time to discover “The Other University Town” a bit and it is lovely (I don’t have the pictures with me but we will update these section to give you some impressions). After a one day stop over in Oxford I went on Friday the 18^th April for the weekend to London to give a training at the University of the Arts London – Lovely located in the heart of London next to the Oxford street – a dream for every shoppoholic. ;)

Then I had another 2 days at home to do some washing and get prepared for my long journey to “the other side of the world”. For all of you that don’t know: I will be away from home for 5 weeks. I got the opportunity to work in Australia for 3 weeks and I took some holiday before the campaign starts to explore Australia and a bit afterwards to see Singapore for three days ;)

It is ok if you take some minutes to be jealous now – I can totally understand *hihihi*.

Back to the story: On Tuesday the 22^nd I took my lfight at 10.15 pm to Sydney via Bangkok. I started my journey with a beautiful sunset in London.

After a 10 hour flight we arrived in Bangkok for a short stop over of 2 hours – I only had the chance to see the airport and I took the opportunity to take pictures of the airplane that I travelled with – it was a huge one over two decks as you can see.

After another 11 hours I arrived at 6am local time (22 hours flight) in Sydney where I stayed for 3 days with my friend Daniela who moved last year to Australia.

I will tell you about my days in Sydney and the first experiences in Melbourne during the next days.

Bachelor Party in Germany

2008-04-27T11:42:00.008+02:00

Partying is always a good reason for a trip home and this weekend there were two occasions.
Saturday morning Rafi invited to his birthday brunch and on the evening we celebrated Marc's "last free day".

We met at six and handed over the bachelor t-shirt which Marc had to wear the whole evening.

Subsequently we entered an old American school bus which is now equipped as a party bus

to drive to Duesseldorf where we spent the rest of the night going from bar to bar :-)

Duesseldorf is always full of bachelor and hen parties which gave Marc the possibility to practice his newly acquired dancing skills and us the chance to take some nice pictures ;-)

At four in the morning the night ended and I was pretty happy to be able to go to bed after being awake for 24 hrs (I had to leave Oxford at five to catch the bus to the airport...).

Love

2008-04-14T13:54:00.002+02:00

Love ist patient,
love is kind,
it does not envy,
it does not boast,
it is not proud.
It is not rude,
it is not self-seeking,
it is not easily angered,
it keeps n o record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil
but rejoices in the truth.
It always protects, always trusts,
always hopes,
always preserves.

1 Corinthians 13 vs 4-7

Dubai trip day one

2008-04-06T22:15:00.007+02:00

Our first day was great so far. Starting with a nice but quick breakfast in our awesome hotel I felt well prepared for the first meeting of the trip. Shell who is a sponsor of our journey invited us to their office to explore their business in the area. I really appreciated that they did not hold a long presentation about what the company is doing but rather split us up in three groups to learn more about the operations in a case study style way. In groups of six and seven we got individual introductions first into the LNG operations. Within twenty minutes we had to make our minds up regarding a business decision for a LNG unloading facility in India. Based on our recommendation we discussed challenges in the operations which was really interesting. My group then moved on to a more strategic issue faced in Oman, where the local government heavily advertised the existing gas resources and now face the challenge that the time they are fully exploited comes up faster than expected. We discussed the global influence of the possible solutions for the issue not only for Shell as a company but even for the worldwide economic environment. At the end of our visit we enjoyed a nice lunch buffet with the possibility to ask questions.

In the afternoon we visited the consultancy Bain which operates a Dubai office only recently. We were introduced into their regional field of activity and had the chance to discuss the company’s expectations for the region.

After coming back to the hotel I did some work on our Entrepreneurial Project. Unfortunately I was not able to finish my part before leaving for Dubai so I will have to spend some time on that during the time here as well – hoping that this does not negatively affect the experience here.

In the evening we went to a Lebanese restaurant for dinner and to “The Irish Village” for a pint later. Dinner was really good and the evening very entertaining. It’s a great and diverse group traveling together and we have a lot of fun ;-)

Tomorrow we are going to visit Abu Dhabi for the whole day. I am really curious meeting the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority...

PS: Shola has his passport back. The crazy guy didn't show up again - so everything is fine in the end...

Trip to Dubai

2008-04-06T01:01:00.009+02:00

Today a group of SBS students left for a networking trip to Dubai. We took the 6:15 am bus to Gatwick to catch our Qatar flight via Doha in Qatar.

I have never been flying that nice. We got video on demand at our seats and the service was so outstandingly friendly.

Here are some pictures of our group of seven who travelled together. Overall we are 20 students on the trip. The rest of us arrive in Dubai from India, Jordan and other home countries where they spent the break so far.

When we arrived in Dubai our Nigerian classmate Shola was stopped by the police because a guy who set next to him on the flight from Doha to Dubai contended Shola hat used some voodoo magic on him during the flight, taking bones out of his neck and stealing him a kidney. Well, even though it sounds funny the local authorities had to pay attention to the complaint which ended in an hour discussion at the police station. Finally we could make our way to the hotel - but Shola has to go back to the airport tomorrow to get his passport back since the crazy man wants to provide x-ray evidence of the voodoo. That was a very interesting start in our networking trip and we spent some time at the hotel bar discussing how voodoo could help us all getting pretty lucrative jobs ;-)

Tomorrow at eight the official part of our trip begins with meeting Shell who generously sponsors our trip. So it's definitely time for some sleep now.

I hope I will be able to post more impressions of the trip soon.

Our trip to Wales

2008-03-27T02:04:00.017+01:00

Starting on God Friday after a two hour EP meeting we left for Wales around two pm and managed to arrive at Little Hill End Barn in Llangennith around half past five. Thanks to modern GPS navigation and the help of Nick who stayed at the same place a couple of weeks ago

we found everything immediately.

After making ourselves comfortable with the place

we left for the first stroll through the neighbourhood which is not more than a couple of houses and a camping ground.

The dunes and the sea are only five minutes away and presented themselves in beautiful light.

Our planes for Saturday included the visit of a traditional farmers market in Grovesend. Since the description on the internet was not very detailed we actually had no idea what to expect. Arriving at the Community Hall in Grovesend we were nevertheless a bit surprised to see the market consisting of not more than ten booths selling stitching, embroidery and other craftwork but barely food. The only meat stand displayed a sign saying that there was no meat today but orders could be left for later delivery. We didn’t even ask whether delivery to Little Hill End Barn was possible. All in all our visit did not take longer than 10 minutes. The disappointment did not last long and after a short shopping stop at a nearby Tesco we continued to Lllanelli for a coffee.

Back at the Barn we decided to walk to Worm’s Head to find out how long it would take us. The small island is only accessible during 2.5 hrs before and after low tide. A trip therefore has to be carefully planned.

We found out that it is only a 45 minute walk either on the beach or at the bottom of the hill. We helped ourselves with some free information material at the National Trust visitor center and stayed for a mocha at a small café overlooking the beach.

On our way back we planned to visit Worm’s Head the next morning after a traditional English breakfast at the small café.

Since the weather didn’t look very good the next morning

we changed our planes and took the car to visit some of the suggested sites on the Gower peninsula. We started with King Arthur’s stone - a somewhat 6,000 years old dolmen, mentioned in documents more than 1,000 years ago.

From there we drove to Oxwich castel were we luckily weathered a strong rain and hailstorm while having a stroll through their small Welsh history museum.

Next stop was Three Cliffs Bay and Pennard Castle. The castle is located in the middle of a golf course. It acts a bit as a symbol to the course – very much like the old pipe on the course I used to play in Oberhausen just from a totally different period of time.
Three Cliffs Bay is a marvellous piece of earth and from the top of cliffs we had a great look.

Finally we made our way to Mumbles to have a scoop of Apple Crumble ice cream at Verdi’s café. Thanks a lot to Hermeet for the great advice. The ice cream and the amount of interesting people in the café were definitely worth the trip.

Weather on Monday morning looked much better. So we made our way to the small café for a full English breakfast which should give us enough energy for a whole day on the Worm’s head. With enough time left to the next high tide we started the climbing tour to the small islands. After a while of balancing over stones and cleft we finally enjoyed a great look over the surrounding.

On Tuesday we went only for a small trip to the small island on the opposite site of the Rhossili Bay. Burry Holmes is not even half as big as Worm’s Head but enables a nice look around as well.

We spent the afternoon sitting in front of the barn up to the point when it got too cold.

On our way back to Oxford we stopped in Cardiff the Welsh capital for a quick city tour. Totally tourist like we took one of the red double decker to see Cardiff’s main spots in round 60 minutes.

After five totally relaxing days we finally got back to Oxford in the early afternoon and prepared our place for the visit of the Kontny girls...

You can see more pictures of our trip to Wales here.

Done - again

2008-03-19T17:19:00.002+01:00

Puh... After a horrible learning evening yesterday with desperate oaths to start learning earlier next term if only this one last exam would turn out well, it's finally over for this term.

I have no idea what to say about the Financial Management exam this morning. I gave answers to all three questions and keep my fingers crossed for a clement bench.

After that we went straight to the Turf Tavern for a pint (or two) and had English breakfast afterwards. Now after a relaxing afternoon I'm on my way to the pub again to meet the rest of the group. Unfortunately our exams didn't end in the whole group given all the electives people had this term. Next term will be even more strange with all courses being electives and no exams in the big group... Anyway, that are things to worry about later.

Almost there...

2008-03-18T14:22:00.005+01:00

After finishing today's Operational Management exam there is only one left.
Ops was ok. The case study we had to analyze was gratifyingly short and the operational problem clearly identifiable. Only the questions were a bit strange since they didn't address the problem as a whole but in parts.

For some readers it might be interesting to see a small overview of this term's coursework overall:

Sun 27.01.
Finance II: payout policy I (400 words powerpoint presentation + excel spreadsheet)

Fri 01.02.
Operations Management: Highstreet exercise (1,000 words)

Sun 03.02.
Marketing: pricing for Virgin mobile (1,000 words)

Mon 04.02.
Macro: problemset with three questions

Sun. 10.02.
Finance II: payout policy II (400 words powerpoint presentation + excel spreadsheet)

Sun 17.02.
Marketing: marketing plan for Cialis (1,000 words)

Mon 18.02.
Macro: problemset with three questions

Fri 22.02.
Operations Management: discovery exercise (1,000 words)

Fri 29.02.
Operations Management: IT for fast fashion (Zara) (1,000 words - individual)

Sun 02.03.
Finance II: real options valuation (400 words powerpoint presentation + excel spreadsheet)

Mon 03.03.
Macro: problemset with two questions

Fri 14.03.
Macro: 10 questions + 2 page essay (individual work)

Mon 31.03.
Financial Management: Analysis of citibank's performance score card (3,500 words)

In addition to that we had / have to do an Entrepreneurial Project (EP) which is basically writing a business plan for a new company. I will spend some words on this project later since it kept us busy during the whole term.

I quick glance on what's next: after exams are over tomorrow I'm going to finish my part for the EP and bring myself up to date in terms of the Private Equity conference we are organizing. On Friday Klaudia and I will leave for a short vacation in Wales before the Kontny girls will visit us from Wednesday next week. On April 5th I'm going to Dubai for a week on a networking trip organized by some of my classmates. Back on Sat. April 12th school starts on the following Monday again with. Some lectures will already take place in week 0 as well as the PE conference (Wed. April 16th). But in the meanwhile I'm trying to relax a bit.

50% done

2008-03-17T19:23:00.004+01:00

Wow - time is flying by.
50% of the exams are already over.

Marketing this morning was ok. The task was to write a marketing plan for the charcoal division of a company. Interesting to see that 86% of the overall charcoal volume is used by heavy / medium users :-)
I hope that my thoughts are not too chaotic since I had some problems finding my way in the writing part.

Finance is difficult to estimate. The exam on the whole followed the kind of questions we were introduced to but I never no how it really was till I get the results.

I'm now back to more studying for Operations Management tomorrow and Financial Management on Wednesday.

Let's get ready to rumble!

2008-03-17T00:42:00.004+01:00

After a busy term exams are lining up again...

Monday March 17th:

09.30 - 12.30 Marketing
14.30 - 16.30 Finance II

Tuesday March 18th:

09:30 - 11:30 Operations Management

Wednesday March 19th:

09:30 - 11:00 Financial Management

Please keep your fingers crossed :-)

Vallendar – Pub Crawl

2008-02-18T07:48:00.001+01:00

The students at the WHU in Vallendar have once a month a „Pub Crawl“ and they decided to invite me to the last one. I know the Oxford Pub Crawls and I was excited although I thought I have seen almost every pub in Vallendar on my way from the Guesthouse to the Uni – and this was only a 2 minutes walk. BUT I love surprises and you never know if Vallendar has some special secret Pubs.

Now I can say that Vallendar has 5 Pubs. 2 of them were already closed at 10 pm and the audience in the others was around 60 years old – if there were persons.

But it was fun! The students really cared about me. Maybe the picture tells you why. …..

20 boys – 3 girls.

Valentines Day in the call room

2008-02-17T17:07:00.004+01:00

Candle light, red wine, romantic music ….. This could be a “normal” Valentines day BUT who wants to have an evening with only one person?

We supervisors have the chance to be in the call room with around 15 students – brilliant.

Strawberry jelly hearts, 3D confetti and cards – that’s the way the day should be.

PASSED

2008-01-29T16:43:00.000+01:00

What a great day - we just got the results for last term's exams and I passed them all!

Haha, funny how my best result was in Decision Science :-) For all of you who know my performance in this topic during my first degree - this will be a big surprise and so it was for me.

Typical british: queuing for the transcripts...

Christmas vacation in Germany

2007-12-20T19:18:00.000+01:00

On Tuesday we hit the road back to Germany.

Using the EuroTunnel it took us only seven something hours for the 610 km from Oxford to Essen which seems to be ok if one considers the flexibility we have during our stay by having our car with us.

We will spend our time here visiting family and friends and most important: relaxing from an exhausting three months period.

Stay tuned for updates :-)

one year ago...

2007-12-19T18:40:00.000+01:00

Last year on Dec. 19th 2007 I got the offer from SAID Business School to be a member of the class of 2008 with this email:

Dear Sebastian

I am delighted to confirm the decision of the MBA Committee to offer you a place on the 2007 – 2008 programme. Dr Blackmon was very impressed when she spoke to you for your interview and the MBA Committee has agreed that you meet the very high standard expected of an Oxford Student.

We hope very much that you will accept the Committee’s offer and join the 2007-2008 class. We aim to welcome another class of around 220 to the next MBA, allowing each student to benefit from close supportive and constructive relationships with Faculty.

We look forward to watching over the next few months how the profile of our incoming class develops. To give you an idea of the profile structure, the current class is made up of 214 students from over 40 countries, confirming the School’s reputation as a truly international centre of learning.

You will shortly receive your official offer letter >from Colin Mayer, Dean of the Said Business School, and Stephan Chambers, MBA Director. These, along with your offer pack, will be sent in the post by DHL Connect to the address on your application form; if you prefer for your pack to be sent to another address please let me know as soon as possible.

The offer pack will contain details of your log on to our Class of 2007 - 2008 website, and discussion forum. The website is designed to help you with the practicalities of coming to Oxford. This has information from the next steps of securing your place onto the programme to traveling to Oxford. You will also find details of what is happening at the School and hopefully you will get a sense of what an exciting year is ahead of you. The discussion forum is a chance for you to get to know your new class mates straight away and chat to some of the students on the current programme.

We very much hope you will become a member of the 2007 – 2008 Oxford MBA class and look forward to welcoming you to Oxford and the course.

Please feel free to contact me directly by email or phone should you have any queries or questions.

I look forward to talking to you soon.

Sally

Sally Webb

MBA Admissions Coordinator

Wow, I remember the feelings: pride, fear, gratefulness, excitement, confusion, eagerness...

Now, one year later and after the first term gratefulness is the prevailing feeling. Gratefulness especially that Klaudia is such a strong and encouraging wife, supporting me from the very first second of the MBA idea and for sure the big reason I finally made it into the program.

Thank you so much for being the pillar of strength for me, for keeping me committed, working, learning, for having an open ear and a good advise and for joining me on this trip.

Let us be grateful to people who make us happy: They are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.
** Marcel Proust (1871 - 1922) **

In addition to that a big thank you to our families and friends who are interested in what we are doing and who support us in completely different ways. I feels good to know there is someone who really cares!

Furthermore I am grateful for all the great experiences I had so far: with great lecturers, prominent speakers and classmates from more than 40 nations, some of them with the potential of becoming good friends.

DONE!!!

2007-12-13T19:27:00.001+01:00

Wow, what a week! Six exams in four days but now: finished for this term.

The one hour finance was though today. The trip to the exam and back to the city in a pink stretch limo hilarious.

And the post exam drinks at the turf (students do that for 800 years now) legendary.

We had Champagne and Bloody Marry instead of breakfast and are now on our way for the evening part of the celebration.

Great weather in Oxford these days... cold but sunny.

Only one more

2007-12-12T17:00:00.000+01:00

After another study session yesterday evening with the big aim of getting all the DEM models in my head and the three hours exam this morning there is only one evening of studying and one exam left in this term.

Yesterday's evening was fun. We did an experiment to find out if the consumption of polish vodka can increase learning aptitude ...

The results are not yet released - we will see :-)

Another snapshot of my learning mates Katy and Nick:

The exam today was difficult for me. From the total three hours we had one hour of reading time for a case study and then got our three questions with another two hours to answer them. The case was nearly twenty pages long which definitely is a lot for people not native in English. We will see how it was in February...

This afternoon and evening is reserved for the final studies for Finance tomorrow...
The whole group is crazy about finishing the term and starting the celebrations. So am I :-)

2/3 completed

2007-12-11T18:29:00.000+01:00

Puh, Decision Science was another hard one. Really good, that we spent so much time on the preparation. It is unbelievable how fast 90 minutes can pass by when you maltreat your head and your calculator with standard deviations, standard errors, p-values, autocorrelation and all that stuff... Nearly got caught in a trap on question 5 by overseeing that it has way more than letter a) i-iii ... Lucky me, that I realized it early enough...

Attention: Funny evening with preparation for tomorrow (developing effective managers) and Thursday (finance) approaching...

50% done

2007-12-11T13:12:00.000+01:00

With finishing the Strategy exam only a couple of minutes ago I'm done with 50% of this term's exams... Yippee!

Strategy seemed to be fair. We had to analyze Lego's competitive position and I found that having been an avid Lego user as a child did unfortunately not really help answering the questions.
Hard to predict results for this one but when it positively correlated with the pain in my writing hand after 75 minutes of shorthand it could be at least a pass ... Keeping fingers crossed.

Will do a bit of Decision Science practice now, take a nap and then head to the Examination hall again for number four :-)

Strategy revision

2007-12-11T00:39:00.000+01:00

After five hours of strategy revision I'm not sure whether I will be able to remember all that stuff Prof. Strategy tried to drum into my head tonight...
I'll know in less than 12 hours... :-)

Prof. Strategy's reaction to me repeating the "Four degrees of diversification"

(first) Katy with what always helps: coffee
(second) crowded study place...

Exams Part II

2007-12-10T18:31:00.000+01:00

Yeah! Two done - four to come...
Financial Reporting was harder than what we had seen in the sample exams but manageable in the end. Hopefully not too many stupid mistakes :-)

Will spend the evening studying for tomorrow's Strategy and Decision Science and for Wednesday's Developing effective managers. And when there is time left tonight I may even do another Finance Exam in preparation for Thursday! Yippee! :-)

Exams

2007-12-10T12:52:00.000+01:00

Wow, how fast can one hour pass by?
We took our first exam in Managerial Economic this morning. One hour with "price discrimination", "Nash Equilibrium" and "Monopoly" :-)
The exams seemed to be fair. We will see what I think when results are published (not before February...)

By the way: Did you ever take an exam in a black suite, white shirt, white bow tie and the funny gown? Feels a bit strange but is fun ;-)

At 2.30 pm we will take Financial Reporting... Keep tuned for updates :-)

running again

2007-12-08T12:18:00.000+01:00

Seeing the last two posts one might think I don't have other things to do than running. With exams next week much closer than I'd like them to be this is obviously not true. But running has the big advantage of being an exercise one can do nearly everywhere and at every time. Therefore it can be easily fit into a learning schedule (if one has one...). Furthermore it helps relaxing, taking a break from all the academic stuff we are dealing with these days...

For this reason and with the European MBA Olympics (MBAT) in next year’s spring we planned to have a first run with the SAID Business School’s running team. Heavy studying, rain and the early time are hopefully the only reasons why only three avid runners turned up...

We did a nice run of 1:15h (here is the route we took) and even managed to take a picture at the University Parks Sports Grounds in front of a sign remembering Roger Bannister running a mile in less than 4 minutes ever.

Daniel who took the picture is unfortunately not on the photo...

So... Enough for the moment... Back to Managerial Economic, Financial Reporting and all my other good friends. There is still lots of work to do...

Running in Oxford

2007-11-29T19:01:00.000+01:00

Today was my day off and beside starting with the revision for the exams I managed to go for a run. (Have a look at my route...)
We have great weather these days and since I took my camera with me you can enjoy some great impressions of the river Isis ...

and me ;-)

Boathouse of a rich college:

and not so rich college (3 sharing...):

Christ Church College:

more pictures HERE...

Just a quick note

2007-11-21T19:23:00.001+01:00

Since times on Oxford are really busy at the moment, here comes only a very short posting to show that I'm still around...

We are in week 7 already which means that it is only one more week of lectures (!). In week nine we have "revision week" to prepare for the exams which will take place in week 10.
The schedule for the exams was released a couple of days ago:

Monday Dec. 10

Managerial Economics (1h)
Financial Reporting (1.5h)

Tuesday Dec. 11

Strategy (2.75h)
Decision Science (1.5h)

Wednesday Dec. 12

Developing effective managers (3h)

Thursday Dec. 13

Finance (1h)

This week is "assignment" week. We have 4 papers due within 8 days including the two heavyweights Financial Reporting (3,500 words) and Managerial Economice (3,000 words). The other two are Decision Science (excel based exercise on scenario / sensitivity analysis) and Finance (project evaluation with NPV, APV and tax adjusted WACC)

Here is a picture taken during our Decision Science workshop on Monday where we were expected to do most of our assignment work...

thinking - dreaming - posing

Well...

Enough for the moment. There is a lot more work to do today... Getting the assignment for Decision Science finalized, writing a first draft on eBay's business model in the UK in terms of products and services offered and making the Finance spreadsheet so beautiful that we get a distinction this time...

In one of the following postings we will cover: Dinner with friends at our place, visit of my parents, dinner with friends at Gino's, Silicon valley at Oxford and so forth... :-)

Bright side of the rain

2007-11-21T00:37:00.000+01:00

Yesterday afternoon!

Halloween in the call room

2007-11-11T11:36:00.000+01:00

My students and I had to work on Halloween day. So I decided to decorate the room a little bit and we had a best costumes contest. It was really fun!

3/5 of week 4 done…

2007-10-31T23:12:00.001+01:00

I take some time on this Wednedsday evening to catch up a bit with my blog entries.

Things I haven’t told you so far include matriculation, formal dinner at my college, SBS photo shooting and dinner with 3i’s CEO Philip Yea.

Trying to keep the chronological order I start with my first formal dinner at St. Hugh’s College. The dinner is called formal since everyone is supposed to wear appropriate clothes. This can be a challenging expression in Oxford, as different occasions demand different “appropriate clothes”. As a graduate student our formal dress for all University related events is the so called sub fusc. It consists of black suit with black shoes and black socks, white shirt with white bow tie in combination with a gown and mortarboard. Have a look at Wikipedia for more information.

Fortunately the dress code for our dinner was just formal which means suit for the boys and evening dress for the girls. Here are some pictures from the drinks reception before the dinner.

Although St. Hugh’s is said to be a poor College we have our own wine J

Curiously I was placed at the high table were normally only fellows and their guests sit. The high table is another funny Oxford tradition, being a table that is really separated from the normal dining-hall by being located of a podium overlooking the hall. Unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures at the high table. In the middle of the high table sits the Principal who officially opens the dinner with some Latin words. Before he has finished no one is allowed to sit... 800 years of tradition :-)

We had a really nice evening over a three course meal and finished the evening with a beer in the College bar.

On Friday Oct. 12^th we had our first happy hour. Every Friday from 5:30 to 7:30 pm our common room serves fair priced bear and wine and the dining hall offers take away food. Following a good start at the common room we went to the Turf Tavern to celebrate the first real week of studying. More pictures here...

Saturday morning we then had to meet at our Colleges for matriculation, which means in the broadest sense registration with the University. After a group picture in full sub fusc we went to the Sheldonian Theatre under the guidance of a senior member of the college. Since all Colleges have their matriculation on the same day, the city was full of perfectly dressed students. The ceremony itself took only several minutes but is for sure another nice tradition. More pictures...

Here is a small video I recorded...

Since our time slot for the ceremony was early in the morning some of the St. Hugh’s MBAs had decided to have breakfast together. This turned out to be a bit difficult since most of the pubs down town don’t serve breakfast and a lot of the cafes were already crowded when we arrived. Finally we ended in a place some minutes outside the city centre and I had my first full English breakfast consisting of eggs, sausage, mushrooms, grilled tomato, bacon, and black pudding which turned out to be “Blutwurst”. This interesting and obviously healthy, fat free and low calories dish is served with buttered toast and tasted really good :-)

On Wednesday Philip Yea, CEO of Private Equity and Venture Capital investor 3i gave a talk at the business school. He spoke about current challenges in the private equity market and how established companies deal with that. Following his speech and the common drinks reception I was invited to participate in a formal dinner with Philip, our dean and a number of interesting people thereunder a McKinsey Partner, the principal of Brasenose College, a representative of Rolls Royce and a small number of MBA students. I had a really good time although cooking is not one of the British’s strength :-)

Here are some more pictures from last week’s happy hour. More pictures...

And from the photoshooting for the SBS class picture... More pictures...

Sunday 21st October

2007-10-29T11:36:00.001+01:00

Sebastian and I managed to have some minutes together and we started this beautiful autumn day with a lovely walk through the University Park – every Sunday should start like this!

Animal Welcome

2007-10-23T22:11:00.001+02:00

This Morning I got a warm „Welcome“of a special kind. The cows were today a little bit late for there morning relocation – maybe because of the really freeze morning – therefore they crossed my way very closely. I was happy that our car isn’t red-coloured.

First days in school

2007-10-21T22:08:00.000+02:00

It’s been a while since my last post and quite a lot happend.

This post shall try to resume the last weeks and give you a quick overview of my student live :-)

The time in Oxford started with a number of nice socializing evenings with my new class mates. The city is said to have more than 300 pubs which made us try to visit a new place every night. From evening to evening the group got bigger and got really difficult to remember all the different names. But since most of us face the same problem, nobody is really angry if he is accosted with the wrong name.

The weather in the first days was not bad which prompted Mariah to invite the whole new MBA group to her place for a garden party.

On the same evening (Sept. 28) the school hosted the first company presentation of the year 2007 / 2008. By these presentations we have the possibility to learn more about the big players of the industries: banking, consulting and other industries. The events start with a presentation, followed by some time for questions and answers before all participants head for the common room, the lobby or the reception room for a glass of wine, some finger food and an informal chat with the company’s representatives.

On Saturday before the start of the term we were invited by the school for the oxford pursuit, a big Schnitzeljagd through the whole city. We were put into groups of six by lot and had to answer dodgy questions about the city and its history. The questions were asked in a way that simple internet search would not help but only running through the whole city.

Since our group was really fast in answering the questions we had enough time to stop at the Jam Factory for a quick bear

before all groups met again in the school’s common room for a cold buffet and free drinks.

After the award ceremony the whole crowd went to the Oxford Retreat where some of us had reserved an area and arranged special prices for the incoming class. Over a lot of beer we talked about our pre-MBA live, or fears of the year and what we would like to do afterwards. Remembering names was a bit easier during this evening since most of us wore the nametags we had got in the morning.

On Sunday all new students were invited with their families to visit the school and get to know the other students and family members. That was a nice and relaxed start in the formal student live.

On Monday Oct. 1st school began. But during the first week we didn’t have any classes. We spent two days of more or less administrative things, with nearly a whole day for short presentations of not more than one minute from every class mate. The school recorded these session on video and I will share my stammering with you as soon as it is available.

The rest of the week was reserved for College related things. We our formal introduction by all of the College’s officials and spend the rest of the week with preliminary reading and pub explorations.

Our first real week started on Oct. 8th and we realized that the first assignment was due only fifteen days later. My study group consists of six people from all over the world. I will introduce them to you later. Here are some pictures from our workshops.

By now we have already finished two assignments of 1,000 words each. Not many words one might say but imagine six people trying to discuss really complex problems in only 1,000 words... The case study’s topics were fun so far. The first one dealt with the impact of personality to organisations and the second one analysed the structure of the global wine industry. Thank god I understand at least the basics of winegrowing / wine production.

I will come up with a report about my first formal dinner, matriculation and my first full English breakfast later. Now I have to stop to prepare tomorrows classes and our next study group meeting on Tuesday.

The first frost

2007-10-20T12:30:00.000+02:00

One of the meadows at our office.

Friday was the first day that I had to scratch ice on my car. We had only about 1 degree Celsius in the morning but it was again a lovely day with sunshine. It is like a picture-book autumn.

Out of our flat we look on this meadow. At 8.00 am it seems to be magical.

This is my view from the office car park.

Our daily milk

Training at the Kent University

2007-10-18T21:41:00.000+02:00

Last weekend I stayed for three days in Canterbury (southeast England) to present our Training at the Kent University. My first campaigns were in Marlborough and Oxford therefore the buildings that the training and the seminars took place were really lovely and nice to look on. At Kent I felt a little bit like visiting the Ruhr Universität Bochum because the buildings were like there build in the 70^th and look like boxes.

The university is situated on a hill so that you have a really fantastic few on the city and the cathedral.

I stayed for this weekend in a nice B&B which was only a 10 minutes walk from the centre so that I had the chance to have a little walk through this tiny town on Saturday.

Weather

2007-10-17T21:17:00.000+02:00

Yesterday it was raining cats and dogs and today it was an awesome day with blue sky and sun.

My way to the office was again tremendous – but because of the rain “my cows” had to move place. The meadow was a little river . . .

They promised the weather will stay like this for the weekend – cold but sunny.

Keep fingers crossed that Sebastian will have a little more time at least on Sunday.

It's raining cats & dogs

2007-10-16T22:33:00.000+02:00

It is awful!

Today is the first day with permanent rain.

We hope that this isn’t the beginning of a longer period.

The way to the office

2007-10-12T22:00:00.000+02:00

Our office is based in Chipping Norton which is around 20 miles north of Oxford.

My journey to the office is fantastic not only because driving against the current – in the morning there is a traffic jam towards Oxford and in the evening all are leaving Oxford – but because of the lovely countryside.

I go through the historic town of Woodstock and many fields. The last 2,5 km are through a small path where I come across cows, pheasants, squirrels and other beautiful creatures – I gave some of them names. :)

These last 5 minutes make me feel happy every day and show me that life is wonderful and there are so many things that want to be explored.

Emmy - our office dog

2007-10-12T10:33:00.000+02:00

Pete’s dog Emmy is our office dog and she is really cute.

Sometimes you have the feeling that she isn’t in the office because she is so quite and good and in the next moment she jumps up with a bottle in her mouth and wants to play – great.

She likes lying in the sun or like here in front of the heater.

Everyone loves Emmy!

Discount Shopping Tour

2007-10-09T19:45:00.000+02:00

Shopping at LiDL which is 15 km away and ALDI which took us nearly 1 hour because it is 50 km away. But our car was full!

My first campaign or SMILE WITH YOUR VOICE

2007-10-08T16:37:00.000+02:00

After joining Vikki for one week at Marlborough and Claire at Trinity I got my own campaign to run over two weeks in Oxford. John did the training at the first two days and then I managed the rest of the two weeks. I was a little bit nervous at the beginning but I think that´s normal. I decided not to think about all the possible barriers but to use my common sense and my experiences. It worked well: The results of the campaign are fantastic, the students liked me (Although they were sometimes a little bit surprised at my procedure and games – e.g. we all collected frameworks and rules and at the end I invited them to sign these on the poster, another time I showed them a stick under which everybody should put a finger to hold it in the high of my nose. The aim was to bring this pole in 5 minutes down to the floor without losing contact. They looked at me and smiled but it took them two trials to hit the target.) and I feel good in the things that I do – That’s the way life should be.

I am now in the office since one week and will stay here for 3 more.

BBQ with my colleagues

2007-09-27T10:44:00.000+02:00

I am now for 5 weeks with RBA but in the first 4 weeks I only know a handful of my colleagues.

My first days I spent in Edinburgh, then I went with Vikki to Marlborough, afterwards I had a campaign in Oxford with Claire at Trinity College and then I run a campaign on my own in Oxford with Lincoln College. Since my first day I was only for a few hours in the office.

So it was a great opportunity that John made one of his legendary BBQ at his house and most of my colleagues joint this event. It was a fantastic funky BBQ where I got to know nearly everyone and I can say: It’s going to be a great time with these guys.

What happened in the meanwhile…

2007-09-26T20:39:00.000+02:00

Time is running so fast for us at the moment. It’s been more than a week that I’m in Oxford now and there are lots of things to write:

After moving our things to Oxford as mentioned in the last post I drove back to Germany with Rafi to visit my grandfather on his 80th birthday. My Swiss uncle and I made a surprise visit and had a good time with parts of the family. As you can see having only little hair is a rampant thing in our family.

This is my uncle with his uncle and me during the birthday dinner.

Following the birthday party I’ve been in Essen for two days before visiting Rafi in Liederbach for a two day farewell trip. Sorry, now pictures…

Finally I attended Heike’s and Flo’s wedding on Saturday which was a really great party starting with the “civil marriage” in Mülheim and a big evening event in Essen. Since I didn’t manage to buy a new camera yet there is only one picture:

Me with Luisa, Mirja’s and Jörg’s cute daughter.

On Sunday I finally moved to the island with a fully stuffed car and a weird feeling in my stomach. But it was like coming home in a way. Klaudia has been kind enough to clean up our flat and make it a real home!

Since then I’m having a great time. Although there are loads of things to do (open bank account, register for all the student stuff, buy books, get student id, meet new classmates, buy sub fusc, get preliminary reading done and so on) it’s really exciting.

It feels like the city is bursting from all the energy in the forefront of the new academic year. That is really cool!

Have a look at the impressions of the last days here...

Home Sweet Home

2007-09-09T20:39:00.000+02:00

On Friday 7^th we moved to our “new home” in Oxford.

Since we knew how complex our move in Essen was we were a little bit afraid: Would all of our boxes fit in the van and into the new flat?

Yes it did. With the cooperation of our friend Rafi and the time-frame that the van had to be back on sunday, the move was done inside two day. The van was packed on Thursday, Sebastian and Rafi picked me up in Marlborough on Friday at 6.00 am, we went to Oxford

and then the motto was “Cleaning and unpacking”.

All was done by 9 pm so that we had the first Thai-Dinner in our flat and afterwards we fall asleep very fast.

Thanks to Rafi

It is great to “Come Home now”.

Last days in Germany and first week working in UK

2007-09-02T11:27:00.000+02:00

Since I have been on the national juniors’ camp held by the Marketing Club Essen and organized by myself in a leading role, there wasn’t much time to think about the upcoming changes. The camp was a great success with a fantastic team working together very well, great weather, a beautiful location and a lot of fun.

I left the event earlier than it ended on Saturday to have enough time for preparing my luggage, arranging the last things and finally visiting my family again. Saying good bye to them was quite hard since we are very close. But on the other hand I’m really curious to what’s coming up during the next days and weeks.

The farewell on Monday was bittersweet for the same reason. On my way to Dortmund airport we stopped by at the cemetery where my grandfather as well as my grand grandmother lies for a quick good bye.

From Dortmund I flew to Edinburgh where I participated in the CASE Europe, a big fare related to fundraising. I was there as a delegate of Rux Burton Associates my new employer and met a handful of my new colleagues who are very nice and gave me a warm welcome. I’m very pleased that I was given the great opportunity of attending the fare. It was a fantastic start into a new topic leaving me with a lot of new things learned and exciting things seen. The four days passed by very quickly and were exhausting since being flooded with new impressions in a foreign language seems not to be the easiest thing :-)

One big challenge had to be taken during the CASE. I was asked to tell the audience a little bit about the German fundraising market. Speaking in front of a group is not a problem for me, normally but having to explain issues I’m not completely in to yet and in a language which is not my mother tongue made me a little bit nervous. In the end it turned out to be quite good I think, so that I’m a little more relaxed on what might comes...

Our journey from Edinburgh back to the south of Britain was hell. It took us 12 hours to get to Swindon where we stopped for a night to go the remaining 20 km on the next morning.

In Swindon I met Sebastian who came over for the weekend not only to sing our rental agreement in Oxford on Monday but to celebrate my 30th birthday with me. It was probably the strangest and calmest birthday I’ve ever celebrated with only one guest (but probably the most welcome) and no thinking of the event beforehand. I had my first day on a campaign in Marlborough on my birthday with a lot of interesting insights on how people at Rux Burton do their job. Finishing around five p.m Sebastian and I had plenty of time to take a walk through the tiny streets of Marlborough ending up at an Indian restaurant for an early dinner. After a delicious meal we took another walk before we headed for the hotel the Marlborough College was kind enough to book for us.

Summing up my first week in Britain I can say that I’m experiencing a great start in a new period. People are very friendly and it seems as if I could really like the issue of fundraising. On the other hand with six different places of accommodation within one week (will move to college accommodation tomorrow...) living out of a suitcase is getting on my nerves. I’m therefore looking forward to moving into our flat in Oxford next week’s Friday to set up something like home in the UK.

My last days with NRW.BANK

2007-08-31T23:55:00.000+02:00

What a strange moment: Leaving the place where you have worked for the last three years...

It’s been five months now since I formally quit my job as an Investment Manager with NRW.BANK’s participations department. A long time to prepare the leave one might think but in the end it all went quite fast... Up to the last afternoon I haven’t had the feeling of really leaving the company and my colleagues. Don’t know where that came from...

A possible explanation might be that I spent the last two days of my NRW.BANK time on a strategy meeting with the whole team on Schloss Krickenbeck an old water castle owned by WestLB and set up as a high standard Seminar hotel.

These strategy meetings are held by the participations department once a year and I was very happy being invited to this year’s event. As usual the two days weren’t too serious but well balanced between discussing new market opportunities or improvements in existing products and on the other hand team building and heavy socializing.

In the afternoon of our first day we had a painting class in which we designed collages of the letters forming our company’s name NRW.BANK. We did this in groups of three formed by coincidence by picking notes and had a really good time with great results.

The evenings at Krickenbeck are traditionally spent in the bar "Tenne" and are vital part of the socializing side of such events. We had a very funny evening with good talks and a very nice speak of my boss saying that I did a good job during my time with the bank and that I will be welcomed warmly when I will come back. In addition to the plane shaped kite with flight vouchers I got during the breakfast I arranged as a farewell meal some days ago, I got a little book with pictures and nice words and wishes from my colleagues now. This is a really nice thing to remind me of the last three years and the nice persons I have been working with. Thank you very much for it!

Another tradition linked to the bar is turning to Ramazotti at a certain moment during the evening and finally ending up drinking Bessen Genever. The evenings usually finish with bamby eyes bagging for a last and final round of drinks and staff only reacting to this reluctantly.

In the morning after too many drinks having a swim in the hotel's pool is always a great idea and good basis for the rest of the strategy meeting. I did so with my very close work mates Mirja and Marko taking the opportunity to wrap up things and to discuss the last evening.

The two days ended with a warm farewell from my colleagues and me heading to airport Weeze catching the plane to visit Klaudia in Marlborough.

Cleaning up the mess

2007-08-19T15:00:00.000+02:00

We normally try to get the big mess cleaned up directly after a party.

Our farewell party was an exception since we weren’t able to do so which left us with quite a bit of work on Sunday morning. With the dismantling of our sold kitchen scheduled for 3 p.m. we didn’t have that much time for getting things in order. Since Klaudia had been up early and started tidying up immediately we finished everything on time and even had the leisure to have a coffee with Steffi and Horny who stopped by on their Sunday walk with their daughter Maja.

On Sunday evening we moved to my parent`s flat. Staying in our one would have been quite uncomfortable without a kitchen :-)

Our farewell party

2007-08-18T23:55:00.000+02:00

After a week of hard work with packing boxes and getting administrative things done we gave our farewell party on our sixth wedding anniversary. Thanks to the help of my mother, mother in law, sister in law (who made a really fantastic cake),

Aunt Anna and Joey’s Pizza, we didn’t have to prepare more than the drinks and therefore could spend the day quite relaxed.
With having no furniture in the living room except the dining table we set up bar tables in order to make the party more comfortable for our 30 guests.

It was a great pleasure for us to have so many good friends around especially since even those with small children or having been invited to other parties managed to come for at least a short while.

Supported by a good amount of Zitronella and other spirits we had a great party which only ended in the early morning hours.
Many thanks to our guests for a really nice night, all the good wishes and the nice presents!

Please find some of the party pictures here.

Housewarming at Stumpf’s place

2007-08-17T23:56:00.000+02:00

The night before our farewell party we were invited to Yvonne and Stumpfi’s place, where they not only gave a small housewarming party but also presented the picture CD Stumpfi produced from our weekend trip to the Netherlands in April 2007. He did a great job on that, bringing the fantastic time in the CenterParcs back to our memory. It was a very funny evening.

The move becomes concrete

2007-08-12T22:37:00.000+02:00

The last week was very stressful and busy. Our days were dominated by packing boxes. You can´t imagine how many things we collected over the years and had to through away now. We had to drive to the recycling court several times to get rid of all that stuff we don’t need any more. This is even crazier since we gave away so many things to friends and family before…

After recognizing how many bottles of Campari we have, we decided to serve the red Italian alcohol at our farewell-party next week. To offer different variations of Campari we tried various cocktails during the last nights – it was great fun as you can see ;)

On Saturday we brought the bulk of our furniture and the boxes to my parent’s garage – a big THANK YOU to all the hard-working helpers that handled this removal with ease.

After all things had been stored in the garage another task waited for all the helping hands: Wallpaper had to be removed. In a good mood and with energetic help even from the smallest three rooms were cleaned in less than two hours. Wow, fantastic job!

Now we are staying in a nearly empty flat and packing the last boxes. There are only two weeks left till Klaudia will leave Germany for Edinburgh.

See more pictures of our last week here...

move:elevator weekend

2007-08-09T09:14:00.000+02:00

I promised to tell you something about the company outing last weekend.
This trip was definitely a reminder to why I so enjoyed working with Hans, Markus and the whole team. The weekend was great. We came back on Sunday and I had to say Goodbye. This was the first farewell and there are going to come some more ;(

But know look and see and try to get an impression how cool this outing was!

A little “Holiday” with my best friend Sonja

2007-08-06T17:17:00.001+02:00

On Wednesday was my first day of. I will leave Germany on the 27^th of August and till then we have to organize many things so that I´ll have the next 3 weeks off to manage all these things.

My best friend Sonja called me on Tuesday and ask if I would like to go to a lake for Wednesday to relax a little bit. She is a nurse and has now three days off. I was doubleminded. On the one hand I enjoy time with Sonja and relaxing is also good but on the other hand there was my bad conscience.

But I am glad that she convinced me – Look an see!

My last day at move:elevator

2007-08-02T17:50:00.001+02:00

On Tuesday was my last day with my current colleagues. It was a strange feeling and I can´t, even two days later, really realize that I left the agency. I am very enthusiastic about my new job but I will miss the old one.

I will use this place to thank my managers Hans and Markus for a great time with move:elevator. I am sure we will see each other again ;)

On Tuesday evening Caroline, a colleague who is going to stay in Finnland for a term, and I celebrated our farewell party on the sun deck above Oberhausen. It was bittersweet.

BUT it was only a GOODBYE for a short time. The team is going on a company outing from Friday till Sunday. Carolin and I will join the group. We don´t know where we are going to but we are sure that we will PARTY the whole weekend. I will inform you next week.

Another short update from our weekend

2007-07-29T21:16:00.001+02:00

Today is my birthday :-) and I had a great two-piece party. Yesterday evening my best friend Rafi stopped by for a beer, some Citronella (I will explain this in a post later on) some games on his Playstation and some chitchat. I don’t know how well known the game Singstar is, but anyway, we tock a toll on our neighbors’ nerves with our karaoke performance…

After I got a hearty serenade in Polish (Klaudia’s and Rafi’s families are from there) and really nice presents, we continued the evening in the Essence Club in Essen.

Today we celebrated with our families. Klaudia had won a “Party special” from a small brewery (Dampfbierbrauerei) in our neighborhood which she donated. We had homemade beer, fried sausages, sauerkraut, roast potatoes, cordial and lard sandwiches. This typical German food was good as usual and we had a very pleasant afternoon with nice chats. On our way home we stopped at a fun-fair so that our niece Emily had a ride on the carousel.

This was a really nice birthday. Hopefully we will be able to celebrate my next one with all the family members, again. This all the more since we will be at least one person more: We came to know today that my sister Mareike and her husband Thomas are expecting her second child! All the best to you!

New techniques or two worlds collide

2007-07-29T21:03:00.000+02:00

It isn’t easy for our families that we are going abroad. They are very proud of us and are of the opinion that it was a good decision and we are doing the right thing. We made our parents the present of a webcam to give them and us the possibility to communicate for free and to see each other regularly via the web.

Our fathers use the computer regularly and Sebastian’s mother is used to word-processing as well, but for my mother this item seems to be somewhat a closed book. By all means it is great to see how everyone is willing and enthusiastic to use this new technology.

My parents moved over from Poland to Germany 30 years ago. When they wanted to talk to their families abroad they had to apply for a telephone slot and arrange this call in the village because there was only one telephone for the settlement. And nowadays you switch on the computer and you can communicate with people all over the world quite easily.

For our parents this is strange but for our grandparents it is like two worlds are colliding.

Nevertheless we hope that the new way of information technology will help us to stay in close contact and make the short distance to Oxford even smaller! We’ll keep you posted ;-)

It's going on...

2007-07-28T10:56:00.000+02:00

Our preparations for moving to Oxford proceed.

On Wednesday Klaudia's parents were kind enough helping us to relieve parts of the wall system in the living room.

Furthermore they painted parts of the bathroom since we had to "rebuild" a blue bordure Klaudia had applied to the walls.
There are a lot of things to do these days. Klaudia is preparing for her last day on work, which will be on Tuesday.
We plan to move most of our furniture from our flat to my parent's garage in two weeks, so everything has to be prepared by then. My plan for this morning is to get some of this chaos structured…

By the way: It's not our dog. Picco belongs to Klaudia's parents :-)

It is our choice.......we can decide ahead of time

2007-07-24T09:51:00.000+02:00

Please allow me to share with you a heart warming story to brighten your week ...

A 92-year-old, petite, well-poised and proud man, who is fully dressed each morning by eight o'clock, with his hair fashionably coifed and shaved perfectly, even though he is legally blind, moved to a nursing home today. His wife of 70 years recently passed away, making the move necessary. After many hours of waiting patiently in the lobby of the nursing home, he smiled sweetly when told his room was ready. As he maneuvered his walker to the elevator, I provided a visual description of his tiny room, including the eyelet sheets that had been hung on his window. "I love it," he stated with the enthusiasm of an eight-year-old having just been presented with a new puppy. "Mr. Jones, you haven't seen the room; just wait." " That doesn't have anything to do with it," he replied. "Happiness is something you decide on ahead of time. Whether I like my room or not doesn't depend on how the furniture is arranged .. it's how I arrange my mind. I already decided to love it. "It's a decision I make every morning when I wake up. I have a choice; I can spend the day in bed recounting the difficulty I have with the parts of my body that no longer work, or get out of bed and be thankful for the ones that do. Each day is a gift, and as long as my eyes open, I'll focus on the new day and all the happy memories I've stored away. Just for this time in my life. Old age is like a bank account. You withdraw from what you've put in. So, my advice to you would be to deposit a lot of happiness in the bank account of memories! Thank you for your part in filling my Memory bank. I am still depositing."