This is how we roll

Yesterday was one of those days when you know that you have done something good in your life. The kind of day when you realise how much good people you know. The kind of day what you will look back years from now and think "wow, that was a great day" with a smile on your face.

One of my dear classmates had a birthday yesterday, so we arranged a surprise for her: we had booked a limo. Not just a limo, but it was a cool purple one :) (Unfortunately I don't have a picture of it now, but I will definitely upload when I get one) So, after school many of us, something like 14 persons went to the limo which was waiting nearby the school. Few others "had to do group work" with the birthday girl for a while so that we can get in to the car and get everything ready. Then, they made an excuse of some kind to go somewhere else and brought the bd-girl to the limo. The expression on her face... well, happy :)

We drove around in St.Pete for about 3 hours before jumping off and went to eat to this place called Liverpool. While cruising the birthday girl got congratulated in 10 or 11 different languages :D Tells something about the group in which we rolled. With a great group of people we had so much fun in the limo as well as in the restaurant/pub. Later on we went to this club called Mod with a smaller group which also was quite fun. Overall, a night to remember, definitely!

In Liverpool I ate the best burger I've ever eaten! I guess this quote is pretty close to the feeling I got when I sunk my teeth in that delicious piece of cuisine:

That first bite-oh, what heaven that first bite is. The bun, like a sesame freckled breast of an angel, resting gently on the ketchup and mustard below, flavors mingling in a seductive pas de deux. And then… a pickle! The most playful little pickle! Then a slice of tomato, a leaf of lettuce and a-a patty of ground beef so exquisite, swirling in your mouth, breaking apart, and combining again in a fugue of sweets and savor so delightful. This is no mere sandwich of grilled meat and toasted bread. This is God, speaking to us in food.

- Marshall Erikssen, from the tv-show "How I met your mother"

Sunday studying

After really fun few days it was time to get back to business today. At least on some level. So, today I was studying some Russian, writing report for Corporate social responsibility class and also finished my part on the first part of Knowledge management group work (midterm report). Not that big things but I am still quite pleased that I have been able to do some studying today. Tomorrow is going to be quite an intense day, school from 9 am to 6 pm. After that, the usual homework stuff and working on group projects.

I feel I have to study a lot for Russian class since I have not studied that much during the last few weeks. Other courses have gotten priority over Russian classes, but I will definitely put more effort on learning the language on next few weeks.

Actually, yesterday I tried to get my very first black taxi by myself. I managed to stop something like 10 cars and asked how much does it cost to go from Nevskiy to Marinskiy theater were I was supposed to meet some friends. Well, the attempts failed miserably in a way - I was prepared to pay 100 rubles for the trip because I knew it wasn't that far away. The cheapest price I heard was 200 rubles... Of course they noticed that I am not Russian so probably the drivers were just trying to get some easy money. Hah. As if I would pay them. Since I knew where I was heading, I just walked to meet my friends. The trip took only something like 15 minutes by foot. Quite a boring story actually :D But yeah, now I can say that I've tried getting a "taxi" also. Lets hope that soon I am actually able to ride in one to correct place :)

Management of intellectual capital

Again a new course started: Management of intellectual capital. The first lessons were really interesting and the teacher seems to know his business. Also, he seems to be able to get the attention of students and involve them heavily in the classroom. His style is a bit similar to the one that our Technology management teacher has, but the difference is that this guy seems to make sense. Also, he is definitely nearly as confusing has the TM teacher. But lets see how the next few lessons are like before giving a final verdict. One thing is for sure though - he expects us to read a lot of articles for the classes, something like 3-4 for each class. Combined to the work (and readload) of other classes it seems that we really need to study hard and the days will be long.

Lots of reading

Since I skipped the last part of the qualitative research course today I went to the library to read some articles for Knowledge management course. We actually have pretty much to read for the classes every week. On todays agenda was 3 articles and one case for tomorrow. I really like this class and the readings! They are really interesting for the most part and the text is understandable. Also, I think that I can use this information after graduation. Which is nice.

Business research

Again a new course started, this time the course is called Qualitative methods of business research. The class is as interesting as it sounds... The teacher wasn't able to catch my attention during the classes today and the whole class seemed to be more or less non-sense. Well, maybe not nonsense, but the time was used on things that didn't require that much attention. So, when we had the break in the middle of the 3 hour session, I did the same as a lot of other students - left the classroom without any intention to return there after the break.

My problem with this kind of courses is that I don't understand what is the added value for me. I am pretty sure, that I wont learn how to execute proper qualitative research in this class, at least not in business environment. Also, the course doesn't seem to be targeted for doing scientific research - the kind that you might need when doing your thesis. Se where does it fit in the big picture? I don't know.

CSR, thesis stuff and World bank

Well, I haven't updated my blog for a while it seems. School life has been quite normal. On Thursday we had this research seminar for our thesis's where every MITIM-student had to present their topic for their thesis. Which was basically total waste of time, because basically no one knows at the moment what is their topic, do they write it as an assignment to some company etc. But well... I guess this has something to do with the Russian educational system and the fact that all master students are expected to start their thesis process in the beginning on master program. Luckily, it doesn't have that much weight on anything - just something that needs to be done. My topic was "Internalization challenges and strategies for SME IT-company". The idea would be to first identify the challenges for expansion to foreign markets and then create a strategy with the company on how to execute the expansion. Quite an interesting topic I think, but it requires whether or not I would be able to find a partner company or companies. Let's see.

I spend a couple of days with my parents here in St.Pete. They came here on Thursday and left on Sunday. It was nice to see them, it had been almost two months since the last meeting.

Today we had our second lecture on Corporate social responsibility (CSR). It's quite an interesting topic, but for whatever reason I've had really big problems on concentrating on those classes. We learned about ethical decision making. Also, all the students made a quick 10 minute test to determine our levels of ethics. It seems that I am "ethically challenged" :D Oh well.

After CSR lecture was a quest lecture from World Bank. It was quite interesting overall. Basically, they presented the idea of 3 D's (Distance, Division and Density) that explain to extent the economic growth. The idea is that these big clusters (usually in big cities) help the developing countries to grow and gain some international stature in the business world. Mobility of the workforce and removing artificial barriers are in key role in here. The speaker demonstrated many examples so it was easy to understand what she meant. It just made it more clear that world is really coming more and more urban and that people living in rural areas likely have to relocate if they want to be part of the growth and get the benefits from it. Which kind of makes the Finnish areal development seem futile.. And to be honest, it pretty much is fighting against the windmills - I don't like the way it is going, but sometimes you just have to accept the facts and adapt.

Knowledge management

Today we had the second class of Knowledge management as a theory and practice -course. Last week we had an introduction to knowledge management - what it is etc. Today, we learned about knowledge creation, knowledge sharing and the barriers for those activities. Being a knowledge management major from previous studies, there was not that much new information for me. Nevertheless, it was ok to revise the things. The only thing was that we had 6 hours of classes today. It was definitely too much! Anyway, I like the subject and enjoy the classes for most part.

I don't understand how I have been able to study in intensive (6-9 hours straight) classes before. Maybe I haven't :)

Wow, almost done

Today we had the second to last class of Technology management that SZ "teaches". It is quite a relief for us, because those classes have been quite exhausting. Usually, we have a test every class. 4-6 exercises, 15-20 minutes to complete it. Usually we have had to draw few pictures like fishbone diagram (Ishikawa), mind map (out of some poem....) etc. Also the classes are more or less like the TV show wheel of fortune where we have to gues what word/term the teacher is thinking. Seriously, we spend something like 15 minutes every class trying to guess the word. Hence the nickname "The Riddler" to our teacher...

Hopefully the lectures tought by the Finnish professor from LUT are better. From what I know about his research and interests they will be so much more interesting. Fingers crossed. At least I am quite sure he wont be showing us UML, XML, SQL and that kind of stuff in his classes....

Sports update

Today I bought a gym membership from a nearby fitness center for 3 months. The membership wasn't cheap, 7740 rubles (~172 euros), but I guess it is still better to so some sports than do nothing. I have been feeling a bit sluggish lately, hopefully exercising will help me to get my energy levels higher.

Random pictures

Crossing the road Russian style: running.

Petrovskiy stadium, the home of Zenit St.Petersburg

View from the balcony.
Our dormitory.
Peterhof.

Apostilles, nostrification and a huge mess.

Hah, why I am not surprised? Last week we had to pay 10000 rubles for nostrification of our documents to Master's office at the university. This week, quite many of my co-students have gotten some part of that money back so I went to get my money too. But there was a problem, of course. The lady in the office first said that I haven't given her all the necessary apostilles during the previous weeks. Which I of course did. After a few minutes of discussion and "no you didn't - yes I did"-play she checked her bookcase and voila, there they were. Because of my "missing" apostilles she was not able to deliver my documents for nostrification process which just makes it longer for me.

Also, my apostilles are not good enough they say. The apostilles I gave her are originals and they include copies of my diplomas, which were notarized by Finnish lawyers. So really legal stuff. Many of my student colleagues have exactly the same kind of copies and they are okay. This situation does not make any sense, but let's see how this develops in the future. Oh, and the 10000 rubles I paid for the nostrification is not enough for them because my diploma + supplements have so many pages... Kjeh. I also had to give them my original diplomas earlier, just like all the rest of foreign MITIM students. I wonder whether I will even get my diplomas back and if so, when I will get them. I bet in the year 2011.

Интернет работает в oбщежитие!!!!

For you who does not understand basic Russian: Internet now works also at the dormitory! Finally, it took only about 6 weeks. The problems were:

• No connection in Shevchenko dormitory. Okay, I lived there only for 3 days so not that bad.
• After moving to Karabli, my computer was still registered to Shevchenko. I went to the office and informed them that we had moved. They changed our address to Karabli.
• In Karabli, my computer was registered to wrong room so it didn't work on my room. Also, it didn't work on the room where it was supposed to work either (reason below)
• The socket in the wall where the cable is connected was broken. We had to wait for a couple of weeks until someone came to fix that.
• After changing the socket, everything was okay for my roommates, but not for me. The reason was, that when they first took my MAC-address in the office during the first week in St.Pete they took the wrong one. That address was for WLAN and not for cable which resulted that I could not use my computer.
• Yesterday I went to the office once again (I guess it was something like 4th time in that office, I've also been in other offices at least 2 times each). I showed them my MAC-address, they changed it and now it works at the dormitory.

Basically everything was went wrong with this Internet-thing: the addresses, the physical equipment and incompetence. Well, now it works at least *knocks on wood*. There is still one problem what we have to address - there is 3 persons in our room and only one place for cable (logical, huh?). So today, after school we have to go and buy a router so we can all be online at the same time. Hopefully.

Russian language studies

I am starting to sound like Shot, but I don't like the way Russian language (and other language) studies are organized here in GSOM. I have no complaints about the level of teacher, who I think is good. My problem is with the fact that we have classes only once a week. 4 lessons in a row, which means 3 actual hours with a 15 minute break in the middle. Is there a person in this school that can cope with that? I don't think so.

It's not that hard to concentrate on learning stuff about economics or organizational behaviour for 4 lessons in a row, but languages are a different case in my opinion. Grammar, vocabulary, pronunciation, etc.. It takes time to ingest all that information. Like today, all of the students were already loaded with new information by the break and the second part of the class was quite painful for us. Luckily our teacher notices these things and won't push as that far during the second half.

Actually it is pretty cool how long we have come during one month from level 0. Now we can(?) describe our friends,family and surroundings, the weather, ask for directions etc. Maybe in a couple of months time we are actually able to have some discussions in Russian :) At the moment it's still pretty much impossible, aside asking typical 'how are you' and so on.

Hooray for hot water

Good news, we have hot water again at the dormitory. No more cold showers in the morning. At least for now....

Managerial economics

Today we had the first lectures of Managerial economics. The first surprise came when we entered the room - the professor is really, really young. Very likely 27 or so. I was a bit sceptical about her, but quickly I realized that I was prejudiced for no good reason. She really seems to know what she is teaching us. Okay, that was only the first lesson but still I was quite pleased with her. Her teaching style was pretty "normal" which is okay and she used a lot of chalkboard to draw some pictures, which made it easier to understand the concepts that she had put on the slides. Let's see how this course developes in the upcoming lectures.