waitlist at chicago

yup there it is..waitlisted at chicago booth :) so i think my decisions are more or less made.. i like the clarity of knowing where you're going.. duke fuqua it is. 

looking forward to my vacation now starting in just 2 days. woooohooo can't wait. one of the best parts is the movies you get to see on the long emirates flights :)

viva la ghana!

V for vacation and W for waitlist..

So the W part first.. i got waitlisted from Cornell Johnson. no biggie though as I feel Duke Fuqua is more my type compared to Johnson. What I did find a bit strange / impersonal was that there was no email notification of your status. Nothing. You had to remember the notification date (yourself) and log into the system and check your status. Really, after the application fees and all the effort, I would have appreciated it on email at least!

and now for the V:
Vacation time! With 1 admit and hopefully (if all goes well) financing and other issues resolved, I feel it's time to vacation.. okay so there's still a lot of stuff going on, but i decided to take an early vacation.. and so I'm heading over to Accra, Ghana in a few weeks.

Am very excited, as it's the first time I'm heading over to Africa. Any suggestions / feedback from fellow bloggers who have been to Accra are much welcome! Any must-sees that are recommended?

Cornell Johnson Interview..

So get this.. Johnson's results are announced on March 18th (i think), and they are apparently interviewing up til March 17th! wow! anyway so I was just notified last week of an interview invite, and I scheduled it.. here's a re-cap:

I had my Johnson (Cornell) interview last night, which lasted for 40 minutes. It was on the phone with an ad-com representative, and was a blind interview. The questions were pretty routine:

-Why MBA, why now, what are your post-MBA plans

- Discussion on your career to date, what roles you have had, skills learned etc

- example of a time when you had a conflict in team and how you reacted to it

- example of a leadership situation - where you had to convince a colleague or team about something they disagreed with

- Why Cornell.. this I feel is the most important aspect for Johnson. They really want to see how motivated you are to attend Johnson, whether you'll be a good fit, and whether you actually have an idea of what they prize themselves on

- What 3 adjectives would I use to describe you to the Admissions committee 

-What student clubs are you interested in

- What Immersion Program will you join

- Any questions for me

Basically, I spoke to a few friends who are current MBA students / alums before my interview, and also got a feel from them regarding the community, culture, opportunities, Cornell's strengths etc. Made sure to mention this in the interview, and the ad-com person was quite happy to hear that I actually knew people studying there.. I think they really want you to know as much about the school as you can at this stage.. 

A few points I think any Cornell prospective should consider discussing are:

-it's extremely collegial, small, collaborative community. average class size is roughly 260 only, so you know everyone on campus. you don't feel lost.

- Strength of immersion programs

- Cornell connections - you benefit from overall Cornell University's resources, curriculum, activities etc.

- Brand name

- Strong alumni network

:) Good luck to other prospectives!

Accepted at Fuqua!!!

So remember my Duke result was (much) awaited.. well I finally got it, and here it is: ACCEPTED!!!! woohooo! am really happy now that it's finally sunk in!

The tension before was almost unbearable, got a weird nervousness, butterflies in stomach and all that... the Businessweek forum suddenly became quite a happening place as all of us in the same boat, tried to pass time and bet on when exactly the result would come out :P lols..

anyway so yeah , somewhere around 12.00 noon ET (night time where I live) I got an email from Fuqua telling me to check my status .. in the email was another link, and finally I clicked to see a nice-looking admissions letter open!! :)

Went a little numb initially so it took time for the words to get absorbed in the mind :) many congrats to fellow-Fuqua admittees, and best of luck to all others... here's to the 1st woo-hoo of this MBA process..

Time after some Time...

I used to love that song.. 'Time after time' by Cyndi Lauper, when I was a kid. .. somehow the 80s songs are just so unique, don't you guys think so? And that ever-favorite classic 'girls just wanna have fun'.. anyway, so i saw another great program yesterday on the travel channel. its called planet food, and it basically links great scenery, great places with great(looking) food. yum. my kind of program!

anyway so yesterday they focused on greece, and particularly 'cretan food' which is supposed to be one of the healthiest diets in the world, due to the reliance on olive oil and fresh veggies. pretty interesting.

in other news, i just realised yesterday that i have been more-or-less dinged by Johnson (Cornell), as their final decision is released on march 18th, and all admitted people have prior interviews. Considering the fact that i still haven't been called for an interview, i think it's time to put the missing pieces together :) anyway thats okay. there's really no way of figuring out what clicks for x school vs x school. I guess they do have some kind of deciding factor, although i believe that to a certain extent, it all comes down to luck. fate, or kismet.

As you all know, the d-day for duke-dom is approaching. 1 day away as i speak. yeahh :) finally the wait will be over, and i can either cross another one off the list or make a nice :) next to it. hehe.

I've lined up a 2 week vacation in end March. Phew!

Fellow bloggers, would love if you can predict which continent & country i am going for on a vacation :) HINT: its not easy! but still, bring on the comments and guessing!!!!!!

Post-application stress reliever

So I have nothing much new to report (since my last post was just a few days ago), yet I still felt the urge to write. The recent sporting fiasco vis a vis sub-continent cricket has put me in a bit of a downer-mood and that's having an impact on my thought process :P I guess I am trying to mentally prepare myself for the 'ding' (or was it ring?) awaiting me in a few days... sheesh, I wish this tension would just go away! 

Tried watching ' Doubt' and man is that one slow movie. So here's to a stress-free tomorrow. 

And then there were eight...

I had a flashback of that murder mystery today.. 'And then there were none' by Agatha Christie.. funny, huh, how counting the days till March 10 (D-Day for my Duke Fuqua app) reminded me of that book... so yea, here it is. 8 days to go till I get my 1st 'decision'.

It's been a long walk though. Still remember the Duke deadline and how I was so relieved when I submitted the application. phew. that kind of relief is just phenomenal. i guess what follows stress is often relief. who can forget the stressful days of thinking of what to write in applications, mulling over how to write it, how to make it look /sound good, and how to edit it...oh man, am i so glad that's over!

anyway so despite this anxious sounding blog, i guess it's okay. if i've waited 54 days already (jan 7th onwards), then i guess 8 more really can't hurt. 

in other news, I had a fun-filled weekend.. meeting old friends, gym-ing, snoozing, movie-watching, organizing a surprise party and yea, relishing some yum desserts!