Jill Yellock

Graduated!

Hello All, I thought that I would now submit a post as an alumnus of Tepper School of Business.  I received my diploma on May 19th, and have begun the search of a home in New York City where I will be working with the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

Since I've had the pleasure of traveling to China, Germany, Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Belgium as a student, I have decided to begin my new job in June.  It's been VERY stressful.  I've just returned from a trip in NYC looking for an apartment.  I found a great 2 bedroom apartment in Park Slope Brooklyn.  I'll have a 30-40 minute commute to work everyday.  My roommate's commute will be 1 hour.  Well, at least we can read the paper on the subway!  AND, we've saved LOTS of money by picking the area in which we will live.

I begin working in a few weeks.  Next week the movers are coming to pack and load my stuff.  Then, I will go home to 'Bama to visit my family, and to meet my new neice Kaylin Elizabeth who was born last Wednesday. 

I'm so excited, so many changes occuring in life so fast.  Going to Tepper School of Business was worth the opportunity cost of 2 years of salary.  This is a wonderful school with great people--the students, faculty, and staff.  AWESOME.

Hotel Kyjev

Hotel Kyjev is the lap of luxury in Bratislava. It is a hotel built during the communistic era in Slovakia. In less than one year, this hotel will no longer exist—they are tearing it down. And, all that most of us can say is “Good riddance!”

The walls are carpeted, and the wall in my room is falling down. The housekeepers don't change your dirty glasses. Fortunately, they do change your towels. Remote control for the television is a random occurrence, and as the front desk told me--not all rooms do. One classmate can't get CNN which is the only English speaking channel on television. The bathtubs are peeling, and there are no shower curtains. There are stains all over the carpet. The walls are paper thin, and the rooms smell funny. Each room I’ve been into has its own distinct stinky smell.

The hotel is so awful that the morning after our first night, the professor from Germany asked me what I thought of the hotel. Even though I knew that he wanted me to say that I hate it because he's a well-off man walking around in his completely upscale name brand wardrobe, I told him, “It’s okay.” Fortunately, all of the Tepper MBAs were politically correct as well. See if you can find this hotel online.

It's a relic of communistic rule, which makes it pretty cool to be staying here, and the main reason why our host school picked it for us.

12-hour bus ride to Bratislava

Well, it took a 12-hour bus ride to get here, but Bratislava, Slovakia is GREAT!  We prepared well for our long journey.  Rachel Duncan (another Blogger) and I stocked the bus full of "refreshments"--primarily the fantastic German beers and wine we "sampled" while in Germany.  We also bought a deck of cards for the journey.

On the bus there were only 4 out of the 7 students riding (3 ladies + 1 guy) and one of our professors.  Our bus left our hotel at 8:15 in the morning.  We slept for most of the morning until we stopped at a "Truck Stop" restaurant in the region of Germany from which our professor was reared.

After lunch....we drank ALL of the beers and a bottle of wine in short order.  Of course, those drinks rocked us to sleep.  In Vienna, we picked up our other 3 classmates who used the 1 1/2 day break to travel to Munich, Germany and then to Vienna, Austria.  Fortunately for them, they only had to spend 1-hour on the bus.  It was actaully a lot of fun.

This week is our final week of study in Europe...I'll update soon on how the final project went.

AFTER the Castle dinner

We realized we have not put serious effort into our final project which is a consumer marketing plan for goods or a service to launched in the Euro Zone.  It’s a 8-10 page SINGLE SPACED report along with at 20 minute final presentation that is due on our last day of study in Bratislava.  In addition, we also realized that we had not studied for our midterm examination, which would cover all of the material and company experiences we had while in Germany on the next day.

We didn’t worry about it too much because we were all too intoxicated to do any work that night.  So, we all crammed for our midterm exam during the 3-hour break we had in between lunch and the time of exam.  I think in the end we all passed.  (At least we haven't received any complaints from our professors.

The exam was an essay exam, and was just a general assessment of our understanding of the Euro zone i.e. operations, economics, accounting, R&D, patent analysis and marketing in the region.  It was good that we had to review the material because all of this will be important and needs to be covered in our final project which is due on our final day of study in Bratislava.

Dinner at the Castle

Our farewell dinner in Koblenz was at a beautiful castle.  Our host is the current owner of the castle.  She personally gave us a tour and told us stories about the castle including one about an apparition of a girl that appeared surrounded by a green light to one of her guest.  The suspicion according to the owner is that her daughter’s soul had left her body for the night.  Uh…there’s a story that you can ask one of us travelers about when we return.

It was also very beautiful at the castle.  People regularly use the castle for weddings as well as corporate meetings.  It is decorated with antique furniture and books. SHe actually allows guest to utilize EVERYTHING in the castle (because you can spend the night there).  It was great.