Thanks to my lovely flat mate here in Singapore, I had the opportunity to go to Shanghai last week and experience the life of a local (almost). For the first time in my life, I felt like a complete alien not knowing the language and having to explain everything using hand gestures (which btw in a lot of cases didn’t seem to work either). Two pieces of advise to whoever wants to visit China-know how to speak chinese (dialect depends on the region you are going to) and have a local with you. For first timers in asia, the experience can be very overwhelming when surrounded by billions of people speaking gibberish.

For the limited time I had, I was able to check out some of the best clubs, bars and cloth markets. I highly recommend MINT, Bar Rouge, Barbossa, and Cloud 9 for drinks/partying. For food, surprisingly I had a wide variety of cuisines from Moroccan to Italian, Chinese to French, Mexican to the american favorite McDonalds. While in Shanghai, take advantage of the big expat life in China to explore all the different cuisines. Most of these restaurants are very highly rated and award wining.

While in Shanghai, a trip to the Jinmao towers is a must, the view is breath-taking and the bar on the 87th floor adds to the charm of having the bird’s eye view of Shanghai. During the day, the french concession is a great place to explore with numerous art galleries displaying great photography as well as painting skills. For all the shopaholics, check out the local cloth markets and don’t forget to bargain. There is an amazing fake market on Nanjing road which is worth while and offers a wide range of goodies.

To sum it all up, Shanghai is like New York in China. It is definitely not reflective of China and if you want to see the culture and experience the real China then Beijing (or another chinese city) is a better option. The night life, the clubs and bars, the shopping are just a few things that make the experience that Shanghai offers. Shanghai seems to be a clear winner for expats who want all the luxuries, and offerings for a fraction of the price.

Before class: “we get the quiz back today, I think I did well on it. I did study for this one “
Quiz in hand: “what happened here? Looks like studying has a negetive autocorrelation to grades “
If anyone has a better way of turning this relation around, we need to talk… Before the finals…..

Now I know exactly what the INSEADers mean when they say “these would be the quickest 10 months of your life”. I have been wanting to update my blog and I just cant find the time. As I write this post, in the back of my head there is this noise asking me to start studying for the finals (yes we do study at INSEAD). Ignoring that noise and moving on, let’s catchup.

Following Bintan, I made a trip to Bali (for my birthday weekend) and Bangkok last weekend. I hate to say this but Bali was rather disappointing in a lot of ways. It is one place where tourism is being over-exercised and everything is over-rated because locals know tourists will fall for any sort of crap. My highlight for the Bali trip was surfing. My first ever surfing lesson – I brilliantly bruise myself on my already bruised knee – crash into another learner – and manage to stand on the board for a full 3 seconds I have admit that the red flags all over the beach displaying skulls did not make it any easier mentally. But if you are in Bali, I highly highly recommend that you take one of these surfing lessons and hit the waves (mostly high-tides and very strong). Another place that I highly recommend is Kudeta which is right by the beach and has an amazing DJ and open space serving delicious food. Trying out some of the local restaurants is definitely a unique experience and so are the rice terraces. Overall, I think Bali is way over-rated and I would much rather go some place more untouched.

Moving on to Bangkok – in one word, F@$#*%^ AWSOME. Ok that’s two words. Bangkok deserves a post all for itself so I going to leave out details about that one in this post.

In terms of INSEAD, life is good. This is really as good as it gets. Partying, traveling, great people. great food, great apartments with amazing pools, and lots of fun stories. Its been 2 months since I landed in Singapore and this place never fails to amaze me. There has not been a single day when I went to bed and didn’t think “hmm… that was an interesting day, definitely a first”. 2 weeks ago was the first time I saw the library so packed with students, of course the midterms were around the corner but I had almost forgotten that there was a studying aspect to me being here. It’s amazing how everyone found it difficult to go back to studying after being complete party animals for the most part of P1. I must say that the midterms were a good kick in the @$$ reminding me to study harder. I started INSEAD “wanting” to be on the dean’s list but now that I think of it, I don’t even want to consider being on it. There are way too many people who can easily breeze through the courses and land on that list, while I struggle to study day and night. The dean’s list is essentially the top 5-6 people in every section and I know that I don’t stand a chance in my section so why bother and torture myself. Plus I love my social life too much

Last week’s highlight was campus bidding. My-oh-my. Disastrous. Enough said!

The trips have begun, the plans are taking shape, the travelers are all geared up, and there is no time to waste.

Last weekend marked my first INSEAD trip and my first trip to Indonesia. As part of the birthday celebrations for two of my peers, the destination was aptly chosen. In short, the trip was an hour long ferry ride (watch out if you have motion sickness), quick shuttle through the forests to the beach resort followed by lots of entertaining events (details not to be disclosed), followed by the same events in reverse order.

There is not a lot to do in Bintan since it is a fairly small island but what was amazing to see was the white sand beaches with horizontal coconut trees (think windows screensaver), the blue sea accompanied by corals and sea weed (corals not being my favorite part since it gave me a blue bruise on the knee), and an impressive above-expectations resort.

This is a great place for a relaxing weekend get-away. A small tip for first time travelers – get your massages at a village/shopping area close by instead of the hotel. The price difference is huge and the service is great. The food didn’t impress me much, however I am hoping to find something better in Bali next weekend. All in all, if you want a quite weekend away from the city – Bintan can be your destination very close to Singapore.

I have been planning to write this post for the past 1 week and here I am finally, putting my thoughts on paper .. ummm ..welll on my blog. There has been tons going on and lots of simultaneous action all around this place. I can only try to put everything down here, sadly what the readers can’t measure is the adrenaline and the anxiety. To top it all, this is ONLY the start of P1.

Orientation Week was an experience in itself- crazy parties, awsome people, too many welcome events (some with slightly boring speeches), tons of new faces (some really cute faces ), and events invites coming in left right and center. All in all, I’d come to INSEAD just for the Orientation Week. It totally rocks!!! Lots of insights into INSEAD traditions and the way things are done here. It is spell-bounding to see the spirit that each individual carries, on campus or off campus. The welcome week was full of drama and suspense and definitely a lot of action (all sorts of action, let your imagination wild – literally).

Weel 1 also meant OB – Outward Bound which is the group building activity that everyone goes through with their assigned groups at INSEAD. It was super except for the totally uncalled for “commit and jump” game. More on that in a bit. OB is a great way to get to know your peers and group mates, especially when you will be spending most of your time with them doing cases/presentations. Whoever came up with the idea of Outward Bound @ INSEAD is pure genius. Not having met two of my group mates before (out of the 5 that we are) and unable to get the worst case scenario out of my head [in case the "faceless" guy never showed up] was an interesting start to this experience. Luckily, everyone in my group has a face and I now know them all. well sorta.

People who know me well know this for a fact that I won’t bungee jump even if someone puts a gun to my head. Well, guess what our last activity as a team was? “Commit and JUMP” @#%#$@$#%@$@#$@$#@  you have got to me kidding me …. the idea was to commit to your group (whatever you wanted) and then make the “leap of faith” …. buhh …. and it’s not so bad until you are standing on a plank that I can only define as 1/100th of a surf board and looking 3 stories down preparing to jump while you try to catch/hold on to the trapeze hanging in front of you in mid-air …. what the @#%$   Since everyone around me did it, I was forced to go up there and pretend like I am strong enough for such challenges while the truth remains far from it. Anyways, the only reason I jumped was because I didn’t know how else to get down while a black king (not even queen) bee chased me. So yea, that was some experience … ughhhh!!!! While all the other groups got to do fun stuff like rock climbing, I was stuck in midair with a trapeze and bee. brilliant, ain’t it ….

While I try to manage my time between socializing (which is a biggg part of the INSEAD experience) and studying, I simply can’t ignore how quickly each day is passing by me. You really have to experience it to understand it and trust me, this is a feeling like no other. I had heard a the INSEAD community talk about this but until now I didn’t quite understand what the fuss was all about. Well now I know and I am one of those people who will comply to these facts. If you are considering coming to INSEAD, I can assure you from my 3 weeks here, that you will never look back. On that note, I shall leave you – my readers – to live each day to the fullest and enjoy every moment so when you look back, you will see an ocean of memories and faces that will stay with you for a lifetime.

P.S. I realized this afternoon that an Accounting Class post-lunch is a very very very bad idea …. talk about the urgent need of a double espresso shot… it was fun to see that I wasn’t the only one feeling this way. lol ….

I am finally in Singapore and tomorrow marks the first day of my official MBA (Business Foundation) program. The past one week in Singapore has been crazy: from cleaning a super messy apartment to getting to know some of my future classmates; from staying up until 3 in the morning to sight-seeing with obnoxious tour guides; from partying to doing groceries – this past week’s been just the beginning to a roller-coaster ride ahead.

My initial reaction, right out of the airport, was … WOW .. the highways (called expressways here) have so many trees. I have never in my life seen a greener highway. And ofcourse, every single person here has a different accent. My cleaning lady is impossible to understand and I have only met one person so far with an American accent. Amusingly, I have an italian guy in my class whose accent reminds me of Joey from Friends My roommate speaks Spanish and Mandarin, so half the time when she is conversing with a local or a spaniard, I am totally lost.  Not to mention that all the cab drivers in this city appear the same to me. But what did not catch me by surprise was the cleanliness in this city. They don’t sell gum here, there are huge fines for littering; no wonder this place is so freaking clean. Well, except for the ants that appear in truck loads at the drop of a food particle and the crazy amount of cleaning and ant gadgets it takes to then get rid of them. Pretty much qualify for a nightmare.

One thing is for sure, my year at INSEAD is going to be a hell lot of fun. Having met a couple of my classmates, I must admit that they are each unique and very interesting .. not to mention they all love to partayyyy!!! Some are geekier than others but in the end I think the majority of the class will be sticking together when it comes to complaining about the work load… or atleast I hope I have company in that department.

I, finally, got my new iPhone 3G to work with a network in India. Bought from Canada, the iPhone was locked with the Canadian network and ofcourse refused to co-operate with me *sigh* BUT I finally got it unlocked with some help …

Here is the link that gives you details on how to unlock an iPhone 3G 3.0

http://www.blogsdna.com/3778/how-to-unlock-iphone-3g-30-os-firmware-with-ultrasn0w-06.htm

And this is the link to unlocking an iPhone 3G 3.0 with Baseband 04.26.08 (this is the one I had to use, so this one is tested on my iPhone and this works .. yayy!!!)

http://www.blogsdna.com/3694/ultrasn0w-to-unlock-iphone-3g-30-jailbreak-tool-demo-video.htm

Hope this helps.

This is for all the twilight fans out there who are eagerly waiting for the next movie of the twilight series – ‘the twilight saga new moon’ which comes out on November 20th 2009.  

Check out these latest teasers out in theaters. 

Personally, I love the first teaser a lot more than the second one. Taylor Lautner (JAKE) looks absolutely gorgeous. He really has worked hard to get into shape for this movie and I am so glad that he continues to play the character of Jacob Black. 

GO TEAM JAKE !!!

With the purchase of my new Mac book came the access baggage of a steep learning curve. On numerous occasions I had to go online and google a whole bunch of shortcuts and how-tos …  Here are a couple common ones that almost every second person uses Hope this helps the newbies like me out there …

• How to switch between multiple windows of the same application? 

command + ` (tild key)

• How to switch between multiple windows of different applications?

command + tab

• How to get the functionality of backspace (like in windows) ?

Backspace key in windows = Delete key in MAC

Delete key in windows = fn + Delete key in MAC

At the end of Breaking Dawn, the happily ever after still left me yearning for more happiness … The book was – yet again- a good read but I guess I had really high expectations of it especially after numerous people told me that it is the best one in the series. For me, it wasn’t the best one in the series but yes it kept me engaged and involved in the story. 

The story had some great twists and turns. The one that really caught me was Jacob imprinting on Reneesme. But that was a very smart turn to the story and one that kept me from feeling sorry for Jake. I loved the chapter “Jacob”, it was good to read from another character’s perspective apart from Bella’s.

All in all –  the wedding, the change, the new vampires, the rise against the Volturi, the ‘happy’ ending – the book was definitely a  sure way to close the book while keeping doors open for more sequels. And if Stephenie Meyer decides to go for more sequels then I certainly hope that she writes from Jake’s perspective.