Thursday, March 30, 2006
The beginning of the end
I only have 34 classes left this semester. That’s just amazing to me, I’m not sure where the last two years have gone.
China was a blast. We flew into Beijing, spent 1.5 days in Xian, and then spent the rest of the time in Shanghai. In Xian we used Hyatt points (thank you consulting firms!) to get a queen room, but we got lucky and were upgraded to a King Suite instead. It was a really nice room and on the same level as the Regency Club, which is Hyatt’s little perk room where you can get free breakfast and cocktails. We assumed we were upgraded to Regency Club since it was on our floor so we partook in a free breakfast before realizing that evening that we weren’t. Ah well, the breakfast was nice for the first morning.
Shanghai was a whirlwind trip involving numerous lunches and dinners with Jie’s family. The food was fantastic and it was great to reconnect with all the people that I last saw three years ago. There were two new kids to play with this time, which is always a lot of fun for me. Aside from eating, I got to ride my first Chinese train this trip, which was an interesting experience. We also went to pay respects at the grave’s of Jie’s three deceased grandparents, which was a personally and culturally significant experience. My China galleries are available on smugmug, just follow the smugmug link to the left and look for the featured galleries. They’re also listed under Travel.
Now that I’m back for the final run in school Jie and I have turned our attention to summer plans and the number and timing of trips to Chicago to look for a place. I suppose I’ve also got to figure out what to do with this blog. I think I’ll keep blogging in one form or another, but I have a feeling that the best thing for this blog is to end at graduation and live on to provide a somewhat encapsulated recording of the HBS experience. Any other thoughts?
Oh yeah, special thanks to Ben who loaned me a copy of The Face of Battle by John Keegan. The book was great and I recommend it to anyone looking to read a little history.
China was a blast. We flew into Beijing, spent 1.5 days in Xian, and then spent the rest of the time in Shanghai. In Xian we used Hyatt points (thank you consulting firms!) to get a queen room, but we got lucky and were upgraded to a King Suite instead. It was a really nice room and on the same level as the Regency Club, which is Hyatt’s little perk room where you can get free breakfast and cocktails. We assumed we were upgraded to Regency Club since it was on our floor so we partook in a free breakfast before realizing that evening that we weren’t. Ah well, the breakfast was nice for the first morning.
Shanghai was a whirlwind trip involving numerous lunches and dinners with Jie’s family. The food was fantastic and it was great to reconnect with all the people that I last saw three years ago. There were two new kids to play with this time, which is always a lot of fun for me. Aside from eating, I got to ride my first Chinese train this trip, which was an interesting experience. We also went to pay respects at the grave’s of Jie’s three deceased grandparents, which was a personally and culturally significant experience. My China galleries are available on smugmug, just follow the smugmug link to the left and look for the featured galleries. They’re also listed under Travel.
Now that I’m back for the final run in school Jie and I have turned our attention to summer plans and the number and timing of trips to Chicago to look for a place. I suppose I’ve also got to figure out what to do with this blog. I think I’ll keep blogging in one form or another, but I have a feeling that the best thing for this blog is to end at graduation and live on to provide a somewhat encapsulated recording of the HBS experience. Any other thoughts?
Oh yeah, special thanks to Ben who loaned me a copy of The Face of Battle by John Keegan. The book was great and I recommend it to anyone looking to read a little history.
