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| Great seats to "Rent" on tour last night for $20!
I just answered this Featured Question; you can answer it too! | | |
| Jack: Greg, how come you don't like cats?
Greg: I don't not like cats I just, I just prefer dogs. I mean I'm just more of a dog kind of, you know - come home, they're wagging their little tails, happy to see you.
Jack: So you need that assurance do you? You prefer an emotionally shallow animal? You see Greg, when you yell at a dog, his tail will go between his legs and cover his genitals, his ears will go down. A dog is very easy to break, but cats make you work for their affection, they don't sell out the way dogs do.
I just answered this Featured Question; you can answer it too! | | |
| I'm done with my last day in Vienna. I went back to bed after I posted last and met Stef and Andrea for lunch at an Italian restaurant. I took another nap after lunch and started packing when I woke up. We all met to exchange pictures at about 4pm. I'll have thousands of pictures to sort through tomorrow during my flight, so that should be fun!
I finally had the opportunity to go to the Schweizerhaus for dinner. This is one of the biggest beer gardens in Vienna that seats about 2,000 people, and I've wanted to go to it since day one, and it became a running joke that people I happened to not hang out with on a particular day would end up there for dinner and drinks. Tonight, I finally had my chance, and despite my high expectations, it was just as wonderful as I thought it would be!
The entire operation is in a "garden" area, and it's able to seat so many people because there are cafeteria-style tables where they just cram people in. Servers walk around to give beer to anyone who looks like they need one (and don't seem to be serving any specific table), AND they have an awesome food menu. I was there with the only people left in Vienna - Adam, Rob, Ilya, Melissa and Stef - and we all loved it. I wish we had something like that in the cities.
Tomorrow, Rob, Adam and I are leaving for the airport mid-morning. We'll meet up at the airport with Kate and Eric from Chicago, who are also on our flight to Atlanta. I hope my flights back are better than the ones here, and I can't wait to see everyone soon!
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| I passed my classes! I can't believe this amazing experience is finally over. I'm so sad to have to say goodbye to everyone and to come back to reality. I'm not going to lie - not having to go to work was awesome.
Thursday's class was miserably long. I didn't do much after class because it was a gross, rainy day and was tired from the day before. I ate a fast lunch and met with Eric and Serge back at the dorm to finish our presentation. I took a break to have a short nap and then did some souvenir shopping. I ended up buying as much chocolate as I could carry. Those weren't souvenirs, though - those are for me. :)
That evening everyone just hung out and studied for the exam the next day, and some people came up to our room to play cards and watch the Olympics for a while.
The last day of class was a total disaster. My group presented first, and when we were done, the prof made us stay up there for 45 minutes while she "critiqued" our content and basically re-did our presentation. It was unreal. We thought it was just us, but she gave the same treatment to every other group. Clearly, this woman had been doing these cases for several years, and she had an exact idea of what she was looking for in the analysis. She yelled at Clarissa in front of everyone for using notes, she told Rob and Brenda's group that they "obviously struggled with this case." Later, Rob was like, "well, I actually didn't know we struggled, but thanks for telling me." Since she did this with each of the seven groups, our class went 45 minutes over, which pushed back our oral interview schedule. The WU administrators were on her back at the end of the class period to get through the interviews so they could put the grades in by 4pm. She did NOT like to be told what to do. I actually see where she's coming from; how do you grade an entire class in 3 hours after the last session? Anyway, she got really pissed and started dropping the f-bomb. Yikes! The oral was fine, but some people ended up waiting in the hall until 5pm, so it was basically a wasted day for them.
I was one of the first people to go, so when I was done, I went to the Naschmarkt, which is an open air market that's open every day in downtown Vienna. You can buy cheeses, sturm wine, fruits and vegetables, meat, spices, and a variety of cheap trinkets. I would have loved to know about this place earlier, but knowing that I'd be leaving soon, I settled for a pastry and ate it for dinner.
There was a formal closing ceremony at the school that was like a graduation. There were some speeches, and then we all walked up to collect our certificates of completion and our grades. I think everyone got Goods (B to A-). The only exceptions were Adam, who was the only one who got an Excellent (A+) in Securitizations, and Vijay, who got a Pass (C) in Securitizations. Getting our grades was a huge relief, and the ceremony was a fun celebration for everyone. After the ceremony, we made reservations at the restaurant on the corner we always go to for dinner and drinks. Everyone was there, and it was a last hurrah for those who were leaving on trains or flights that night.
Clarissa knew about a strip of clubs and bars along the river that were going to be busy that night because Friday is a holiday, so we made our way to the island to have some appetizers and drinks at one place, and then we found a dance club that was built on the edge of a pier. Everyone had a really great time drinking and dancing, and the group thinned out over the course of the night (the Aussies had to pack, Clarissa had an early train this morning, Andrea and Melissa were tired, Hiro's flight left early this morning, Kevin and Stef probably wanted to sleep together one last time -haha?), but the last of us walked home at around 3:30.
I finally went to sleep at around 4am and woke up only 3 hours later and have been up since then. I have not been sleeping well over the last week. It's so freaking hot, I just wake up all sweaty and can't breathe. Opening the window doesn't help because there isn't a huge amount of air flow in the courtyard side of the building, and it's also really loud with the windows open. Ugh. Brenda and Logan left last night, so at least tonight I'll get to use the fan they bought at the beginning of the trip.
As of now, I'm not really sure what I'm going to do today. Like I said before, since today is a national holiday, everything is closed. Thankfully it's nice outside, so I can at least walk around or something. Also, I'll actually have people to hang out with. A big group of people were planning on going to Bratislava for the day, but I think almost everyone got too drunk last night to want to get up early, so that worked out well for me. Hopefully I'll find time to squeeze in a nap. Tonight I definitely want to go to this massive beer garden that everyone keeps talking about that I haven't had a chance to go to yet. I hope it's open.
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