Winter Internships - A Blind Date

Hi
I begin with an apology (the worst way to begin anything). I have been extremely busy in the last one week. Due to which I have not been able to blog. Last week was also a lot of fun. Working with a bunch of consultants, I was exposed to tons of jargons - "technocommercial" "a 20000 feet thought" "sales clawback period" "biz pulse" "YTD" ... Anyway this week looks a little more sane and so I'm back.

After the final exams, we had a month's break. Too long a break if you ask me. Specially for a shortened 18 month program. Most of us opted to/had to go back home. There were quite a lot who tried for a winter internship. Unfortunately, only a few succeeded. I don't know the exact numbers. Because as the term went on, the internship search became a 'Sherlock Holmes' mystery. People didn't want to tell others whether they were applying, where they were applying to and what their status was.

The bottomline is that the winter internship is like a 'Blind Date'. You always have a shot at success. But the chances of things working out are remote. By my estimate, around 10 in the batch got a winter internship. Companies varied from KPMG, RBS, TATA and a few other small boys.

As for me, initially I applied to a few companies. Nothing worked out. And my parents wanted to come down to Singapore during December. So, I gave up the ghost. My parents, sister and uncle came down to Singapore. We went to Malaysia, Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai and Macau. It was a fun trip and a great learning experience. But this trip had nothing to do with NUS. And this blog is positioned as my experience @ NUS MBA. So, I shall not delve much into the trip.

My exchange program at MBS was to start on Feb 4th. But NUS opened a couple of weeks earlier. So, it was an extended holiday for me. Whenever I went to college, people kept asking me, "What are you doing here?" And to be honest, I asked the same question "What am I doing here?". Just the after-effects of an overly long vacation.

Cheers,
Suraj