In the Business School on a Sunday.

Yes, reviewing our CVs in group. And I don't care, it is actually fun. Should I be worried??

Morphine

Rules!



If I could go back in time...

Productive Saturday

Yes, I am happy with my day. It was a good day. I did wake up at 7:30, bought tickets for 5 concerts at the Arts Centre, registered for the Health Centre, bought my Meal Card and found out that the laundry near the Rootes Building is also closed.
By chance I found the main Mail Room and asked for the box with the contents of my second suitcase I was expecting from Germany. And, against many odds, it had arrived and was there! So I am well equiped now.
After some salad with risotto I went to Coventry to buy a push scooter (patinete), without luck. But I did buy other small things and had the opportunity to see a bit of the city. Next time I'll get a map.
I got back in time to meet with other 3 colleagues and go back to Coventry to buy some traditional fish & chips we ate back at Cristiano's place, it was very pleasant. But I don't want to see crisps or chips for a long time now.
Now some more minutes to wind down and go to sleep. Will wake up early tomorrow again, I guess this is a good habit to keep.

From 070929 Univer...

From 070929 Coventry

Two new albums for you if you click on the pics above.

Adapter plugs

There are eletric adapter plugs available at Costcutter for those of us who have electrical appliances from overseas. There are 2 types:

• For shaver only, maximum load of 1 Ampère
• Universal adapters, maximum load of 13 Ampères (I think)
  

Be sure to buy the universal adapter. Around 3 pounds at Costcutter, near the Rootes Building.
If you buy the "shavers only", use it for shavers only or for small appliances. In Britain, plugs have a protection fuse which will, surprisingly enough, go bust if you try to use appliances which need more power than the nominal power of the adapter.
You have also to be careful when using more than one appliance on a multisocket adapter. If they add up to a lot of power, the fuse may go bust again.


View Larger Map

The crisps are gone...

Well, the meeting was great, we had about 40 people there, and it went on until about 10:30 p.m. Good way to end the week, good way to talk to the colleagues outside the BizzS. But I'll leave you with the first picture of the album and with a picture with more people on it.

From 070928 Mannhe...

Mannheim Crisps Party

Mannheim Crisps Party
Come get some crisps at the Graduate Bar with us
Host: Mannheim Exchange Students

Friday, September 28, 2007
Time: 6:20pm - 8:20pm

Location:
Graduate Bar, Students' Union Building
Coventry

Boring session

So, not all is a 100% anywhere, of course. I had the first boring session today, about diversity, different nationalities. The topic is, certainly, very relevant and interesting, but I didn't have the patience today.



But I did like the slide above, which does give a good overview on how people work and act differently around the globe, and how one can position oneself in this behaviour field. Of course, this is a useful generalisation, and, as such, should be used with care.

Day 4 and group photos

A view from the entrance of the Lakeside Residence, where I live, yesterday evening, before the alumni meeting in Leamington Spa.

Today we had a workshop with Nicholas Bate. Chris has written more about that and one of the exercises.

The other activity of the day was the group photo. I asked Karen to take some quick pics while we were preparing for the real photograph. So enjoy the preview, but wait for the oficial picture.

A bit of fun inbetween

Cristiano took this video on a whim during the coffee break. We also try to have some fun from time to time.



I usually don't drink coffee during the coffee breaks. But am happy to attack the fruit basket and drink water.

The second day of the term.

Well, I am a bit behind schedule in many things, but want to post daily here during this week. I imagine that this week will be one of the busiest of the term, with the biggest amount of new information and experiences in a very short time.



We had a very interesting presentation on team management by Nick Arding on Monday. Or was it Tuesday? It is really easy to get mixed up, so much has happened in such a short time. But it was on Monday. And it was really a great presentation, obviously very refined by countless repetitions and presentations in different events.
Learned not only about organizing a climbing expedition of Royal Navy Marines to the summit of Mount Everest, but also how to use photos and music effectively, though I am a bit suspicious of music with PowerPoint, still.

Yesterday we had the day to get to know our syndicate groups. I am part of what has called itself the Young Stars group (I am no fan of the name, and they know it. But at least we are not called Oceans 11, like 3 other groups.). We are 11 people and, according to a very interesting exercise with coloured cards, we are quite varied in our personalities, but complement each other quite well. The whole day was used to build a simple gliding plane.
Some conflicts in the morning and a bit more focused work in the afternoon, after a review session. But I was glad to see how the team worked. I put myself in front of the team for most of the time due to the nature of the task. It was a good learning experience, but it is not something I want to do too often, I know I can act like a bulldozer sometimes. And I've gotten honest and direct feedback, which I appreciated.



But it is already too late again, almost 1 a.m., and I should be sleeping. So I will not write about the C.V. writing sessions with the fast speaking people of Penhella, or about the first accounting exercise which took ages of my lunch to be completed, or the Alumni meeting some 5 of us attended in Leamington Spa tonight. But I'll put one photo here and, if the upload has finished, the link to another album of photos.

http://picasaweb.google.de/ferbress/070925WarwickTeamBuilding

070925 Warwick Team Building

First day at Warwick Business School - Photos

Well, here are the first photos of the 2007 Full Time MBA class at Warwick Business School.

070924 Warwick first day

This week will probably be one of the busiest overall, I'll try to post other pictures during the weekend.
At least I have been to the supermarket today (thanks, Darren!) and have piled up some emergency food in my room.

First day at Warwick

Well, we had some introduction speeches (not boring!) and one class today already and some time to get to know some of our colleagues. So far, so good. Lots of new experiences to make and I intend on writing some of the important ones here, for future reference.
But know, after lunch, some shopping and a short break, it's back to class.

Rootes Building

Well, just arrived at Warwick University, am leaving the Rootes Building to the residence to get to my room now. I am happy to be here!

Glasgow

After over 9 hours of travel by coach I arrived safely in Glasgow yesterday. My friend Donald Black was at the coach station to pick me up and, after an excellent dinner prepared by his charming wife Lorna we met another friend, Donnie, and went to two pubs in Stirling.
Today the three of us went for a drive in country side, which is really beautiful. We had excellent weather and it has been a good day so far.
In the evening we are visiting a pub where people meet to play Scottish music. I am looking forward to it.
And tomorrow I will spend many hours in a coach again, on my way to Coventry. I hope it doesn't rain and that I don't have problems getting from the coach station in Birmingham to the university. The next update I'll post from my residence room.

Tuesday Jam at the Adelaide

And later on I went to the Adelaide to a very cool jam session. Very nice room, friendly atmosphere, well organized, not too loud and fun.
I recommend it greatly. There I met other 4 harmonica players. Mano from Brazil (we have several friends in common, as he also comes from São Paulo), Dave, Phil and Huwey (not sure of the spelling).
And the bus stopping at the door brought me practically home, so it was a great evening.


No plans for tonight or tomorrow, so, if any of you have any suggestions, I'll be glad to read them. I might go to the 55 tomorrow, but am actually looking for something different.

View Larger Map

Information:
The Adelaide
143 Adelaide Road, London, NW3 3NL
(Swiss Cottage or Chalk Farm tubes)
The Niall Kelly Band began hosting a weekly jam here 10 April 2007. Feedback and comments welcome.
E-mail: jamattheadelaide@gmail.com
Web: http://www.myspace.com/jamattheadelaide

First Warwick BS 07 Full Time get together

Well, we met at a Starbucks on Villiers St. in downtown London for about 2 hours today. We were maybe 10 people in total, and it was fun getting to know some of my future colleagues already. Let's see if I will be able to remember all the names.
Each of us had it's caricature drawn by Simon, and this was not only fun, but also impressive. But I have to admit that it is strange to see how others see you and which characteristics stand out and are exagerated in the drawing. I know know that I should have shaved this morning, but I am intentionally letting my beard grow, so...
Here three pictures I took hastily before the group disbanded.

070919 WBS Coffee meeting

Colleagues

Some of the Full Time 2008 Mannheim Business School participants.


Photo courtesy of Sekou, from the Ivory Coast.

Harmonica bit of the day

Well, I was on my way on Exhibition Road to the Imperial College's library, looked left and saw a familiar face. It was the yound and already very successful chromatic harmonica player Philip Achile. I had met him briefly during the World Harmonica Festival 2005, where he ended up being champion.
Philip had a saxophone case with him. It turns out that he is studying sax at the Imperial College, but wants to try playing harmonica there too. Well, he has made it to the Royal Albert Hall already, I guess that says a lot!

Thames Festival

070915 01 Thames Festival

The weather was great, lots of people outside, some interesting booths and, at the end, good music. The Thames Festival was my main activity yesterday in the afternoon.

Queen's in Forbes MBA Rankings

Forbes Magazine has come out with their 2007 MBA rankings.The business schools ranked by Forbes for the best one-year non-US MBA programmes were: IMD (Switzerland), INSEAD (France), Cambridge (Judge, UK), Instituto de Empresa (Spain), Cranfield (UK), SDA Bocconi (Italy), Oxford (Said, UK), Lancaster (UK), City (Cass, UK), Queen's (Canada) and HEC-Montreal (Canada).

Click here for the details

I got this info from a fellow MBA blogger from Queen's School of Business, Indian Blogger.

London, first photos

Well, a first note on travelling to London. Those cheap flight to Stanstead are really temping. But take into consideration that you will spend at least an extra 25 pounds (almost €40,00) to get to Central London, between the train, the tube and change comission. The best bet is London City airport.


At Stanstead


The day after, taking a bus trip from Hammersmith Hospital to Piccadilly Circus. Why Piccadilly? Because. It was as good a destination as any other. I chose the bus over the tube so that I could see the sights too, sitting in the top front left spot. This inverted traffic system is really scary.


Then a stop at Apple's store on Regent Street. I liked the stairs a lot. Made of glas. It is interesting, though, to watch how things work there. It has characteristics of a church, school, social center. You really don't go there just to buy things. You can spend hours testing everything, learning from the instructors, watching product presentations and workshops.

From 070912-13 London

Good thing I am not a Mac fan, or I would have come out of the shop a lot poorer. But the new iPod Nano is nice. And I have friends who enjoy this, so I put the photos online.

And later I was walking towards Piccadilly Circus I heard the distinctive sound of live music. And, sure enough, great funk music with tight horn lines was flowing out of a big fancy shop. I got in, spent some minutes, drank a nice glass of berry juice, shot this short video and continued on my way.


More photos here.

An Irish weekend

And it seems that, this time, it will be Irish. First I found the following:

Irish Music Sessions: Community Corner:

The second Friday of the month.

At Hammersmith Irish Cultural Centre, London
From 7:30pm
Price: Free

And then, by chance, I saw that Brendan Power, harmonica extraordinaire, and old acquaintance, will be playing the same venue on Saturday:

Saturday, 15 September 2007
Brendan Power
At Hammersmith Irish Cultural Centre, London
From 8:15pm (Doors 7:30pm)

On Monday I'll probably go to the blues jam at the "Ain't nothin' but..." with two or three harmonicas in the pockets. Let's see.

What I'll be doing on Sunday

It is a pitty, but the Spitz is closing now in September. I've been there on my first trip to London with Nix, a big fan of punk blues and we saw the Urban Vodoo Machine one and a half years ago.
NIX, I'll drink a vodka screwdriver in your name!

Blogger Mobile Post: made it square!

The wording came out a bit funny, I thought. :-)

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: postgateway@blogger.com
Date: Sep 12, 2007 7:05 PM
Subject: Blogger Mobile Post
To: fer@gmail


Success! Your Made it! post made it to Blogger (Your mobile blog is bresslau.blogspot.com)

Well, it should have!

Made it!

Just in time, with 10 min to go.
London, here I come!

First British party

And I won't be able to attend, being hundreds of quilometers away :-)

---------------------------- Original Message ----------------------------
Subject: Warwick Postgrads
From: "University of Warwick SU"
Date: Tue, September 11, 2007 6:37 pm
To: bresslau@warw
--------------------------------------------------------------------------


Hello from Warwick SU [that's Student Union]
Postgrad Party
There is a party for all Postgrads tomorrow (Wednesday 12th September)
8pm till late in The Graduate Bar and Club
Carlsberg 1.50 a pint
The Grad will be serving basket meals till late.

FREE ENTRY ALL POSTGRADS WELCOME!
We would also like to invite you to our Postgraduate Welcome Evening on Friday 12th October (Week 2 of term). More details can be found on the Postgrad section of the SU website including details of the Postgrad forums and how to join the Postgraduate Society.

We hope you have a great year whether you are just about to start or just about to finish your studies at Warwick.

Warwick SU

First Canadian party for me

And I won't be able to attend, being thousands of quilometers away. But I guess this just shows how my stay at the co-op house will be. The social aspect of it was surely one of the reasons to decide to stay at the Science '44 Co-op, in Kingston, Ontario, for my stay at the Queen's School of Business.

From: MSC
Date: Sep 10, 2007 9:52 PM
Subject: First Co-op Party of the Year!
To: science44co-op.com

Hello All,

Just a quick e-mail to announce that 31 Garrett Street will be hosting the first Co-op party of the year. See the poster in the dining hall and please post the poster I've put in your house mailbox outside my office door.

Where: 31 Garrett Street
When: Saturday September 15th 8pm
Theme: Back 2 Skool "Uniform Required" (I'm guessing you are supposed to dress preppy or in a faux school uniform...I'm sure this is open to stylistic interpretation!)
BYOB
Non-co-opers are welcome!

Have a great week,

Member Services Coordinator
Science'44 Co-op

Eating in Mannheim

Well, one of the aims of this MBA blog is to record some practical information which might be useful for future MBA candidates. So I'll start in Mannheim, after having spent a week there.
It is of course important to have an idea of the costs for food and beverages. And these costs are difficult to find on the internet.
The first meal I took at the EO, which is the smaller cafeteria in the castle, very trendy and well thought of. There you also have WLAN access, so people go there to study and work while drinking a coffee. But it is a bit noisy during lunch hours.
If you go there and pay cash, you'll pay the normal price. If you get an eccum card and load it with credit, you get the discounted price, 20% off. Since I didn't have my card on Tuesday, I payed the normal price.
I spent about €9,50 for this first meal. It was a good meal with salad, pasta and meat. Additionally, I drank a Bionade, which is a German soft drink I recommend. Well, it is not cheap, but it isn't expensive either. My aim is to spend less than that in the future, but it was OK on Tuesday, since it is very conveniently located, a good place to go if you don't have much time.
I also bought sandwiches there on Friday, at about €2,50 each. The sandwiches were excellent, I have to say.
Another option in Mannheim is the main cafeteria, or Mensa. There you have 4 different menus, including vegetarian. I don't know the prices exactly, but I guess you can eat for less than €5,00 without beverage.
We went once to eat at an Indian fast food. I paid around €5,00 with beverage (or Getränk), which was a good price. The restaurant is located about 3 blocks from the Villa, and I ordered the small dish, which was more than enough for me, and quite tasty.
Well, that's it for now. I hope this blog develops well and the info is useful.

Day 5

Well, it has been a great week until now, I guess that the most important thing was to get to know all the other students before we are all scattered around the world. I was impressed to see how we could establish realtively strong connections in such a short time, but I think that this has a lot to do with how the team was assembled. People just seem to naturally fit in.
If all goes well, I will take the ICE to Utrecht at about 3 p.m., coming back tomorrow for the Hohner party in Trossingen.
On Monday I guess that I will be able to catch up with e-mails and post some pictures and othere thoughts on this week.
I have the last class in 13 minutes and haven't eaten lunch yet, have to go!

Day 1

Well, let's start this in English then. But it will be short, I am late for the second day, almost.
The first day was great, I got a good feeling of the whole thing and I think I will develop mysel well in that group. And it was fun.
See you later!

Primeiro dia da era pós-Trossingen

Bem, resolvi ir com calma hoje. Dormi um bocado, mas não exageradamente. Acho que ainda precisarei da noite de hoje para me recuperar dos últimos 3 dias de Trossingen.
Um efeito muito positivo que eu não tenho certeza se resultou do estresse da última semana é que eu perdi uns 2 a 3 quilos do meu peso. A barriga voltou a ficar muito mais apresentável e as bochechas acho que estão um pouco menos pronunciadas. Difícil de dizer, pois a barba cheia muda um pouco o rosto.
Depois de organizada a roupa da mala e telefonado com os pais, saí para resolver algumas coisas em Heidelberg, aproveitando as lojas abertas. Na verdade, a única coisa que precisava resolver de verdade era comprar um transformador para o modem que, obviamente, está funcionando neste exato momento. Outras coisas resolvidas foram o passe semanal para Mannheim, uma maleta/mochila para o lap top, adaptadores de tomada para a Inglaterra e Canadá, uma caneta tinteiro com um sistema de recarga muito interessante e comida para a semana.


O almoço foi, como a janta de ontem, num fast food oriental do outro lado da rua do apartamento. Simples mas gostoso e barato. Os pratos pequenos saem por menos de 3 euros e são mais do que suficientes. Amanhã acho que prepararei o brócoli com gorgonzola, veremos.
Agora à noite foi a vez de usar a internet de novo e preparar o calendário para a semana que vem, verificando horários de bondes, ônibus e trens, além de ler uns artigos legais da Businessweek.
Estranhamente, o sono não vem e eu estou pensando seriamente em assistir ao filme do mundo da Amélia, que tanta gente fala que é bom e eu não tenho a mínima idéia do que se trata. Quase que comprei a décima temporada de Friends por 9,50 EUR, mas desisti. Já devo ter visto vários dos episódios e não sou tão fã assim para gastar tanto tempo essa semana. Algo me diz que tempo é algo que não terei.
A foto de hoje eu tirei da última vez que vim à Heidelberg, depois da viagem à Bélgica com o Rômulo.

No trem para Heidelberg: tchau Trossingen!

Mais um capítulo escrito. [esse seria o título original do artigo, mas acho que não se desenvolveu de acordo]

Quero ver se acho um texto que rascunhei sobre a minha estadia em Trossingen. Não está terminado, nem sei se terminarei, mas quero ver se publico aqui. Era para ser um e-mailzão geral como aquele que enviei em final de julho. Mas, quando fui ver, já tinha escrito três páginas em Times New Roman 12 no Word e não tinha nem chegado ainda ao anúncio de que iria sair da firma. Resultado: fiz um outro e-mail mais suscinto às pressas, principalmente voltado para meus amigo gaitistas, a quem talvez a informação do estado da minha relação de trabalho com a Hohner fosse mais importante. Ou não.
De qualquer forma, abri o lap top no trem para contar das peripécias do dia de hoje, que começou ontem às oito e meia da manhã e ainda não terminou. Pois é, pela primeira vez estou me exibindo de computador numa mesinha do ICE só para mim e as minhas bagunças. Mas, pelo que estou vendo, não vou durar muito. Como vocês talvez perceberam na terceira oração desse parágrafo (e meus leitores são todos (os três) muito perspicazes e com certeza perceberam a indireta), varei a noite. E agora, depois de um dia de muita adrenalina, o sono tá voltando. De modo que eu acho que contarei as peripécias uma outra hora, senão isso aqui não vai dar certo. Até. 15:16