1st impressons

I'm back! yes, again. awake from slumber & already trembling with fear. Fear? why? Well lets see, I've landed in France & school starts tomorrow. Stage fright was always a problem & the roll call hasn't even started yet.
So a quick round up of 1st impressions-

Dont understand a word of French after 2 months of classes & too embarrassed to try, so mostly I'm backing off from the language exam this week. dont want to start the year feeling more miserable than I already am

Fontainebleau is pretty & quaint but tres cher

House is sweet & almost exactly like how it was described. Though have to admit we have got lucky. Word of caution - when the agent says its a 5 min walk pls remember he/she is a state level athlete & can cover huge distance in record time that mere mortals will not be able to. For simplifying life just multiply by 3 & you'll be fine.

This is v exciting, we live in a venture capitalists backyard & he has 'good relations' with INSEAD professors when asked if he comes to campus for recruiting! hmmm, have to be friendlier to his dogs now

As expected, there is a party or get together every day noon & night. Been for 1 dinner, 1 party, a couple of meet ups, 1 lunch,1 excursion to Paris & its only been 4 days. Yes, my networking skills suck, seem to missing as many as I'm attending

Repeated by almost everyone from the Business foundation group - its tough, too much work, no sleep & goes way too fast. I have no business background, too broke to sign up for the rich kids express learning tour & too lazy to have gone the self taught route. This is dangerous & definetly not recommended. Have to rely on charm only from now on but in this 'charming' little town thats not a quality in short supply, sigh...at least i know enough economics to realize I'm in the merde.


Again repeated by every BFP attendee - the professor specifically stated that networking is far more important here than learning. great can they start grading us on how many parties we attended, how many invitations we garnered & how many inane conversations we could squeeze into an hour?

Reflection on above point - I'm not good at 'networking', at all the meets people finally ended mixing as per gender & nationality. Not as per recommendation right? Some seem genuinely great at it & very enthusiastic towards one & all. Somehow I'm already feeling like I'm not making the cut into the 'cool peoples group, damn I actually said no to a party, i don't have a future, this is going to haunt me all my life....oh god i better pause for breath

2nd reflection of same point - if its only about networking, wouldnt 70,000Euros be a great kitty to start my own party hearty club? So are we here to become a fully paid up member of the club?

So whats going to be my USP, seems a bit unlikely I'm breaking into the deans list, and if I'm not the networking energizer bunny, where do i stand? Is the middle ground gonna be good enough?

There are so many of us, when they say diversity they mean it. Already met marine engineer, consultant,economist, lawywer, PR agent, every engineer under the sun( they all somehow blur into this single unit for me)

The sections just got announced & now I know my group mates. Having refused the car ride to the party I am now the loser sitting in my pj's & checking the stats out - we are 311 of us here in Fonty.

My group has 5 members & 5 nationalities, 3 continents & 4 careers. Between us we speak 7 languages. great!
More such v random thoughts running thru my head & we are now under 12 hours to registration.