After The MBA

Post-MBA Important Deadlines

In addition to finding employment, there are also many other important dates that every recent MBA grad should be aware of in the months following graduation:

 

Harry Potter And The Half-Assed Plot

I saw the latest Harry Potter movie and I feel cheated. I will admit that I have never read the books but that shouldn't excuse a movie for being bad right? Time and time again, I get tricked into watching an average movie at best, hoping it will be better than the previous ones but I always fail.

Not only are the movies generic but Harry Potter's character is so annoying. He is supposed to be the Chosen One? Why does he always get his butt kicked and make terrible decisions? In my opinion, he is more like the Kwame Brown of Wizardry than Lebron James.

 

Seriously though, every Harry Potter movie follows the same freakin' template except everyone is slightly older than the previous movie.

The Quest For Housing Continues

Sometimes I wonder if I am applying for shared housing or for an investment banking job.

Take this reply for example:

This is a pretty hardcore example but this is what I have to deal with when trying to find shared housing. It ain't easy, especially without a Vault guide to prep me for the interviews!

24 Hour Fitness Membership Is Dirt Cheap

So I didn't have any houses to look at today and I decided it was time to join a gym because I have been getting pudgy. I'm not sure yet where I will end up living in San Francisco so I figured the safest bet was to join 24 Hour Fitness because they have multiple locations throughout the city.

I went onto their website and found an awesome deal: 3 Year All-Club Sport membership with three, 50-minute Personal Training sessions $549.99.I know 24 Hour Fitness isn't Equinox or anything fancy but it is an adequate gym and in NYC, you wouldn't even be able to find any gym for $550 for 1 year, let alone 3 years so to me, this was an amazing steal.

I randomly went to the location in the Castro district (the gayborhood) for my first workout and surprisingly there was a decent amount of women there (some kinda cute too). Although their free weight selection is lacking, the fact that 90% of the guys there are gay means that the law of supply and demand plays into my favor and it also makes it easier to initiate conversation with the female patrons because they assume you are gay so their defenses are down. On the flipside, all the guys in the gym check out my ass but it always feels nice to be appreciated I guess.

How To Surprise Your Parents

As I mentioned in a previous post, I never told my parents that I was moving to San Francisco from Ithaca, NY. In fact, they were drooling at the prospect of me being forced to move back into their house while I continued the job search.

I however, had other plans.

So how does one finally break the news to their parents that they are 4,000 miles away from where they expected them to be? A nicely crafted email of course!

This is how it all went down:

--------------------------------------------------------------------

From: Alex
Sent: Monday, July 13, 2009 10:48 PM
To: Parents
Cc: Sister
Subject: Hello

Dear Mom & Dad,

Love,
Alex

Road Trip Day 6 & 7: Nevada & California

One thing I noticed is that Nevada does not have any lights along Highway 80. No lights at all. This makes the drive extremely dark, especially when you are the only car on the road (like me). I wonder why Nevada is so cheap that they can’t afford to put lights anywhere along a national highway. I mean, they get plenty of tax money from gaming right?

Winnamucca – Winnamucca is a little casino town along the way to Reno and I decided to stop there for the night because Reno was another 2 hours away. I have never seen such a sad casino strip in my life. I stayed in the Winnamucca Inn and Casino, which supposedly had the best hotel in town. The casino in the hotel did not have any dealers and everything was electronic/machines. I went down the street to the supposed “best” casino in town and the two dealer tables were closed for the night (it was only 1AM!). I guess I will have to wait another day to play a few hands of blackjack.

Sacramento – I really wasn’t going to write anything about Sacramento because it was relatively uneventful but I had quite possibly the best French toast that I have ever had in my life at Tower Cafe. If you are ever in Sacramento, you have to stop by this place for brunch and order their famous French toast!  Tower Cafe, 1518 Broadway , Sacramento, CA 95818

Tomorrow I finally make it to San Francisco and sadly, my trans-American road trip comes to an end.

Road Trip Day 4-5: Colorado & Utah

Instead of staying on Highway 80 and passing through southern Wyoming, which according to my buddy Jae is boring and uneventful, I decided to take Highway 76 and then 36 through Colorado and the Rocky Mountain National Park. The 3-hour detour was well worth it because I finally saw the mountains, canyons and forests that I was expecting to see on this road trip.

Rocky Mountain National Park – Highway 36 took me through here as I headed west towards California. The park itself was pretty amazing to drive through and I would say it is arguably worth the $20 entrance fee to drive through. Make sure you go in with at least half a tank of gas because you are going to be driving through mountains for awhile with no gas stations until you exit the park. Driving at 11,000 feet above sea level is pretty darn cool and there are plenty of elk and moose walking around that you can see from the road. I can’t say enough good things about this park except that once the sun sets, you have to be very cautious driving because all those wild animals that you saw during the day now like to hang out in the road. On the other side of the park, there is a cute little mountain town called Grand Lake that is worth checking out before hitting the road.

 

Salt Lake City – I decided to visit my buddy Sam along the way to SF. Similar to Cleveland, Salt Lake City is a lot smaller than expected. The downtown area is quite small and most of the city is residential-type buildings. Sam took me to Crown Burger, a local burger joint that supposedly had these legendary burgers topped with hot pastrami. The hot pastrami-topped burgers were pretty good but I think Sam definitely worshipped the burgers more than I did. On the plus side, I didn’t need to eat for the rest of the week.

Road Trip Day 3-4: Iowa & Nebraska

This leg of my trip was a huge disappointment. There isn’t really anything neat to look at around here. I was expecting to see some mountains and forests but all you see is GRASS, endless plains of freaking grass.  I know that this is the Great Plains region but damn, can’t there be the random mountain or canyon along the way? The next time I drive across the country, I am going to go around Iowa and Nebraska. 

Des Moines – There is actually a pretty large Asian population here, which I did not know beforehand. I was definitely not expecting to see Asian grocery stores and Vietnamese restaurants in the middle of Iowa. Des Moines is kind of spread out but quite small in terms of its downtown area. The highlight of this city is that I found an Asian-themed (tastefully done) pizza place called Fong’s Pizza. The pizza was pretty good and the story is that before the pizza place was in business, the space was occupied by the first Chinese restaurant in the state of Iowa and the next business owners wanted to keep the Asian tradition going.  

North Platte – When I asked the hotel check-in girl, “What cool things are there to see in town?” and she replied with “nothing”, I probably should have moved on with my road trip. Well, I figure I didn’t drive out here to not see anything in Nebraska so I drove around town and eventually found Union Pacific’s Bailey Yard, the largest railroad classification yard in the world. For $6 I had the chance to ride up in an elevator six flights and look at the rail yard. It wasn’t very good value for time or money but then again, what else are you going to do in Nebraska?

My buddy Jae, who also took Highway 80 from New York to California, informed me that southern Wyoming is also full of grass and just as boring as Iowa and Nebraska.  So I will be changing my route and taking a detour through northern Colorado.

Road Trip Day 1-2: Ohio & Illinois

So I started my road trip way behind schedule. Instead of leaving Ithaca at 12 noon, I departed around 12 midnight instead. Packing and moving ALWAYS takes longer than expected. I will admit that I probably dragged my feet a little because I was sad to leave Ithaca but once I had hit the road, I was pretty excited to start my latest chapter. Probably, the funniest thing about this whole road trip and everything is that I haven't told my parents about moving to California yet. I plan on surprising them once I get to Cali so hopefully no one has told them about my blog yet!

Cleveland – I arrived in Cleveland at sunrise around 6AM and drove around the city. Cleveland wasn’t as dirty and ghetto as I had expected it to be but it certainly is a lot smaller than I had imagined. Shaquille O’Neal is going to be bored as hell on his off days.

Chicago – I took Route 41 up along the west side of Lake Michigan to get into the city. I do NOT recommend taking this route because you go through some pretty sketchy neighborhoods. The Sears Tower does not look that tall or impressive even though it is still one of the tallest buildings in the world. And the lines to get to the top are a lot slower than the Empire State Building.  However, it does have the new glass balconies that jut out like 4-5 feet from the edge of the building so that makes the trip a lot more worthwhile.

One cool feature about Chicago is that it has nice beaches along the east side of the city where you can swim in Lake Michigan or lie out in the sand. Who would have expected to find beaches in Chicago? (Certainly not me) 

I also tried the famous Chicago-style pizza at some famous place called Giordano's. I prefer New York-style pizza better because in my opinion the crust is the worst part of the pie so why would you want more of it?  

NYC Thin Crust Pizza > Chicago Deep Dish Pizza

 Tomorrow I head out for Iowa, home of the Iowa caucuses!

The Best & Worst Buildings at Cornell University

After conducting an intensive study of all the buildings on campus, the best and worst buildings on campus have been identified by a blue-ribbon panel consisting of me. What does the “best” ranking mean you ask? Well basically it means that it is worth your time to check out the building while you are in Ithaca. On the flipside, the “worst” building ranking means that it is ugly and boring and that it would be a pity to have lectures in that dumpy place.

*Note*: The ILR building and the Biotechnology building were not included in this study due to conflicts related to accessibility.

Worst Building

Ward Center For Nuclear Sciences - I had high expectations for this place. I mean, anything related to nuclear science has to be pretty cool right? WRONG! Maybe if this building was named the Ward Center for Ugly, then I would not have been as harsh. This place is tiny and hidden within the Engineering Quad. Unfortunately, I managed to find it and had the unpleasant experience of exploring an abandoned building that looks and smells like it hasn’t changed a bit since it's glory days with the Manhattan Project.

Worst Building Runner-Up

Baker Laboratory – This building is huge and sits on top of the hill right before you cross the main bridge heading towards north campus. From the outside, it looks like a grand structure sitting on its throne, looking down in contempt at its ghetto neighbor, Rand Hall, which ironically houses the top architecture program in the country. However, once you enter the front doors you will be greeted with a dark lobby filled with brown tables and chairs, reminiscent of a Bingo Night at your local senior citizens center. Besides the lackluster entrance way, the lecture halls are filled with algae-green chairs and they didn't even bother to finish laying down the linoleum tiles in front of the library.

Best Building

Uris  Library – Nestled at the foot of the McGraw clock tower, this building is epic in scale and grandeur. There are many parts to this library, but the timeless A.D. White Reading Room with its crisscrossing catwalks is the most impressive room to visit. And if you ever wondered what was inside that panoramic window overlooking the slope, well it is the cocktail lounge in the basement of Uris. Walking and exploring Uris Library will take at least 10-15 minutes and as the "best" building at Cornell University, it is definitely worth a visit if you haven’t checked it out already.

Best Building Runner-Up

Mann Library – I guess the libraries at Cornell have to be well-designed and adorned because everyone studies so hard. Mann Library is like Uris’ newer and shinier brother but lacks the charm and class of its counterpart. Nonetheless, Mann Library, which is located in the Ag Quad, is a pleasant surprise amongst the old and drab buildings that surround it (*ahem* Warren Hall) and is also worth a look around. The 2^nd and 3^rd floors also contain additional study areas to check out.