The world works funny

Lately I’ve been searching through the LBS booklets I have at home. In one of them I found a letter (“thank you for you interest in…”) which I received about two years ago. The “Ref. Number” on it seemed strangely familiar. I’ve checked it with my acceptance letter… and it turned out that that is my current student number! (Wow! Who could have imagined that all the history is stored?)

Another funny story is about my application for Chevening Scholarship. I applied for it in two subsequent years. First year I got my rejection straight in November, with original of my diploma. This year I didn’t have a straight feedback. As time went by and all deadlines passed, I understood that this year application was not successful either. So I wrote a number of e-mails to British Council officer asking to send me the rejection letter, which I will need as a proof for future scholarship applications.

In beginning of April I phoned the lady and begged her to send me the letter.

I got it yesterday (exactly when I no longer needed it), but the letter itself was quite interesting. It contained my diploma and some other docs from my application which meant that they haven’t sent me this letter earlier and it hasn’t been lost in the depth of Russian post office which I always blame (ah, this reminds me of an anecdote I will post as a footnote). But the letter – the letter said: “Thank you for your interview for Chevening scholarship. However, we are sorry to inform you…”

I haven’t received an interview invitation, neither attended one. And it makes me wonder – who were they interviewing and why this person did so badly and haven’t won me a scholarship? :)

--- anecdote ---

A week before Christmas a post office received a letter addressed to “Santa Claus”. Since there was no address, the officers opened it and read:

‘Dear Santa Claus,

I leeve in orphanage and now winter came and I have no worm clothz. It is very, very cold now and I can not play with my frends outsaid. Pleaze, can you brin me a Christmas prezent a coat, a hat, glovz and boots? Thank you, thank you, thank you…’

The officers were so touched that they chipped in for the present from their low wages and were able to buy a coat, a hat and boots for the boy. They send that as a present from Santa Claus and a week later another letter came from that very boy. They all gathered to read it out loud:

‘Dear Santa Claus,

Thank you very mush for you prezent. I am warm now I got yor coat and boots and hat. I have not got glovz, but this is sure becoz bad guyz at the post ofis stole them…’

Made it to the Top10 Best of Blogging Applicants!

My blog is named 6th in the Best of Blogging competition! Many-many thanks for everyone who voted for me and to ClearAdmit for organizing the competition!
It was a great opportunity to vote for the blogs I love, and I am glad that my voice counted.
Congratulations to Angel Angie and Rungee!!! You both got the well deserved awards for great blogs and effort you put in them!
Angie, thanks a lot for offering the Room Of Inspiration! I appreciate that ;)

Loan, accommodation and other things

Instead of having a week holiday during which I planned to complete my loan application, I spent two weeks in bed with quinsy. Speaking of the bright side – this reminded me that most of the pills and medicine in London can only be bought with a doctor prescription. Thus I compiled a list of my favorite medicines to take with me. Mental note: I will also need to think of a list of all other things I will bring to UK and squeeze it to the minimum (postpone until July).

I haven’t submitted the loan application yet, but I hope to send it next week. It turned out that the account statement couldn’t be notarized if the officer who signed it didn’t write her post. So I had to take the already translated document back to the bank (in another city), find the lady who signed it and ask her to put a stamp with her post on the paper. And then take it back to the notary and wait for another couple of days…

I have also thought about accommodation.

As one of the first year students pointed out, LBS offers 33 places in London University accommodation. The biggest minus is lack of cooking facilities in most of the rooms (I prefer not to eat in a dining room – been there, tasted that, didn’t like it).

Since I have no more than 10% chances of getting the university accommodation, a backup is needed. Flathunter’s Pub Crawl will help – and I have joined the group of volunteers who will organize it!

There are a lot of things going on the LBS Portal. The most interesting one is the topic called “Getting to know you!” where my fellow classmates give a short presentation about themselves. Judging from it I will study with a group of very interesting and diverse people!

Looking ahead there are three things I have to start thinking about: short term accommodation, flight and visa.

I can book accommodation right now. London University International Hall offers rooms for 18 pounds a day. But if I postpone this until later, I can only count on other universities and the price will be 30 pounds a day. Or maybe I will be able to have a sublet room from one of the fellow students? (Any offers for 13-26 of August? ;))

I can fly with Aeroflot or British Airways. Aeroflot flies at a convenient time (arrival on 1 p.m.), but only allows 20kg of free baggage. BA flies at inconvenient time (arrival on 6 a.m. or 11 p.m.), but allows 32kg of free baggage. As far as I understand I won’t have student discounts yet since ISIC will be valid from September 2007.

I will apply for the visa as soon as my passport is ready. I have confirmed with fellow students that I do not need to show the consulate the money for the whole course (fee + living expenses). This means I do not need the outcome of the loan and scholarship applications.

Speaking of scholarships I really need to start writing the essays. There’s only one month before deadline left (OMG!). But I use every opportunity to procrastinate (like writing this post!)

New Order Business School (by Seth Godin)

Check out the following article NoBS, the end of the MBA by Seth Godin. It is Seth's thought exercise that might be useful to:

• MBA-haters ("aha, Seth too says that MBA is dead!")
• MBA-aspirers ("if I get an MBA from *** it will be my silver bullet")
• MBA-about-thinkers ("what other options have I got? What will I get from the degree?")
• MBA-admits ("find out what it all about")

And it is also an interesting read!