What happened to ME????

Why havent i wrote a blog for such a long time??? The short ans is "I was kinda busy" and the long one is.......

My life has changed, changed a lot since i started my MBA preparation. It all started in May(when I last posted in this blog!). Here's what happened between this blog and the previous one!

mid-May '06 - July 24th '06 - GMAT prep
The books that i wanted to go thro were GMAT OG 11, OG quants, OG verbal, 6 Manhattan books, Kaplan 800, Kaplan Verbal, Princeton GMAT review and a few other materials on the verbal section that were downloaded from the net
My initial plan was to prepare for GMAT 2 hrs in the morn and 2 hrs in the even during weekdays and spend the whole weekend infront of the GMAT books... thou i hardly stuck to my plan, i was able to finish all the books by taking a week's holiday.
On July 24th, i was sure that i would score 700 and above.

July 25th - GMAT Exam
The day of the exam. I took a Fruit n Nut to have it between sessions. The stayed cool during the exam. Then came the moment... time for my score card... my score... 740! I was really elated ....not cos i scored 740 buy cos i scored more in the verbal sec than quants... courtesy my hard work

Aug - Sep
Researched on the colleges to apply and started working on the essays. It was during this period that i realized that GMAT was the easiest part of apping for an MBA! Had to do a lot of introspection. Some of the benifits of writing a essays to b-schools were: I learnt a lot about myself, obtained SOME clarity in my goals(atleast that i decided that finance was my true calling) and my writing skills improved.

Oct
Submitted my application for Cornell (my personal favourite) and Darden. Wanted to apply to Chicago and UCLA. But i decided to save them for the 2nd round.

Nov
Sumitted app for Simon, McCombs and McDonough. Initiated an interview with McDonough. Got a ding from Cornell (It was really disappointing to say the least).

Dec
Interview invites from Darden, Simon and McCombs. McDonough was my first interview xp since my interview with HCL in June'03!. I screwed up big time. Then I flew to Mumbai to attend the McCombs interview. The interview went on well. My day in Mumbai wasnt very eventful - returned to chennai the same nite. The telephonic interview with Simon went on well. My Darden interivew got postponed to Jan'07. In the meantime, worked on essays for Wharton, Kellogg and UCLA.

Jan'07
3rd - Submitted UCLA app
4th - Submitted Wharton app
5th - Submitted Kellogg app
6th - Decided to apply to Chicago.
10th - Applied to Chicago
11th - Applied to Oxford (MFE program)
12th - Telephonic interview with Darden
Now.... that was quiet a schedule i guess!!!!

Then started the long wait for the admission results. Got an admit with 35% scholarship from Simon on the 15th of Jan. I was really really happy that i got an admit. But at the same time i was getting anxious about the other schools' results. Finally. got a waitlist from McDonough and an interview invite from Chicago on the 29th.

Feb
Got an interview invite from Oxford. Interviewed with an alum at Park Sheraton for Chicago. The interviewer said that he was really impressed with my profile and that he would surely recommend me for an admit. I was really happy with my interview. My only qualm was that i should have given more time for my Chicago essays.
My Oxford interview was the worst interview xp in my life time. Most of the Qs were on differential calculus!!!!!!!! Not the kind of interview i expected. Actually i should take the blame for performing bad in the interview. My preparations for the interivew was more MBA-ish! I never realized that it was a technical pgm to which i was gona interview.... atleast until the interview really began :(
Then heard from Darden and McCombs. Both waitlists. A ding from Wharton and Kellogg followed. Not the kind of news I wanted to hear from all these schools. But then, thats MBA admissions for you!
In the mean time, I spoke to a few current students at Simon. I started looking at Simon as a possible or rather a practial MBA destination for me.

March
Back to normal. Back to writing my blog.
I am happy with Simon. My current focus is to prepare myself so that i can get the best out of my MBA program. As a first step, I read the book 'Ahead of the curve'. I found the book to be really informative. Let's see how life unfolds from now on!