Allen in BCN

We've moved to Houston

2008-05-28T10:55:00.000-07:00

You're in the wrong place. I'll no longer be posting to this blog. Go to Gregory Allen Edwards instead.

New Apartment

2008-05-13T10:44:00.001-07:00

I'm moving to midtown. I just closed on the new apartment during lunch.

Blogging from My Phone

2008-05-12T20:59:00.001-07:00

As if Twitter wasn't enough. Yea.

____________________________________________________________________________________
Be a better friend, newshound, and
know-it-all with Yahoo! Mobile. Try it now.

http://mobile.yahoo.com/;_ylt=Ahu06i62sR8HDtDypao8Wcj9tAcJ

A Certain Beauty

2008-04-07T18:15:00.000-07:00

Total Safety

2008-03-17T17:41:00.000-07:00

Total Safety Video at Youtube

Cutest Niece in the World

2008-03-17T17:38:00.000-07:00

The Breakup

2008-02-22T21:27:00.000-08:00

As most of you who bother reading this thing anymore already know, Lisa and I broke up this week. It hasn't been easy. Most of my friends here are either consultants who travel or are in a different place in their lives. On top of this work has been crazy this month (one of the reasons for the break up).

At the same time I've moved into a new apartment. The whole thing is a very major life change: new job, new apartment, no relationship. In some ways it's liberating and I try to keep telling myself that, but there are also a lot of days where I get up, work, and sleep. It's going to be like that this weekend and next week at best. No idea what happens after that.

Recession or Inflation?

2008-01-18T16:46:00.000-08:00

This is the only politician I've heard of who isn't promising kittens and ponies for the economy but is instead concerned about the long-term effects of inflation:

From the NewsHour:

Concerns over inflation
JEFFREY BROWN: Now, Mr. Ryan, is there also a potential fear on the inflation side?

REP. PAUL RYAN: There is. That is my...

JEFFREY BROWN: Explain that. Because now that's kind of a balancing act for the Fed, right?

REP. PAUL RYAN: That was the line of questioning I pursued with the chairman today. I am very concerned that they're courting inflation, because the Fed is claiming pursuant of this dual mandate, which in this instance is sort of conflicting with one another, employment mandate and a price stability mandate.

Given that the Federal Reserve has sole power over monetary policy and price stability, it's my opinion that they're primary responsibility ought to be price stability.

However, they're not doing that. They're going with more easing, more interest rate cuts, and that at a time when gold is at an all-time high, that at a time when the CPI is up 4 percent, that at a time when all of these indicators of inflation are screaming
inflation.

Paul Ryan's website (R-WI).

Brother Had a Baby

2007-11-04T19:41:00.000-08:00

Sydney Edwards. Born today. She's a healthy little girl. To see the newest soldier in the Edwards army check out my the link to my brother's blog on the left or his family web page here.

Buried Lead Department -- 2nd Earth Found

2007-11-02T17:03:00.000-07:00

A second earth has been found 20 light years away. Why haven't I heard about this on the news?

Link

September 29, 2010, an update: Link

Could be the real thing after all.

Also interesting:

Another advantage for potential life on Gliese 581g is that its star is “effectively immortal,” Butler said. “Our sun will go 10 billion years before it goes nova, and life here ceases to exist. But M dwarfs live for tens, hundreds of billions of years, many times the current age of the universe. So life has a long time to get a toehold.”

And then:

“The fact that we found one so close and so early on in the search suggests there’s a lot of these things,” Butler says. Only about 100 other stars are as close to Earth as Gliese 581, and only 9 of them have been closely examined for planets. Odds are good that 10 to 20 percent of stars in the Milky Way have habitable planets, Vogt says.

ESADE Info

2007-10-21T21:31:00.000-07:00

A reader writes in and I respond at the >>:

>>Hi, thanks for writing. I'll try to answer your questions below:

Allen:

Hey, I just read some of your blog while researching MBA programs.
Actually, the I'd really like to do that exactly what you did, the Double Degree with McCombs and ESADE. It would be great if I could pick your brain a bit about it if you don't mind.

Can you get into the double degree program via McCombs easily? Was it competitive or can anyone go if they fit some qualifications like minimum GPA etc.?

>> You need a minimum 3.0 GPA. I think there was also a GMAT requirement. On top of that you have to basically apply to the ESADE program as if you were attending there without the McCombs GPA. It isn't competitive so much as exclusive. If you really want to go, McCombs will help you get in there.

[..Personal info removed...]

I noticed that you had trouble finding a job in Spain and didn't like the offers. I even considering going right to ESADE because of there international focus, but am afraid that in the event that I return to the US it will not carry over well. Would you recommend going to ESADE for the full program as an American?

>>Probably the best idea for finding a job is to attend ESADE and then do an exchange program your second year at UT or NYU or Duke. They all have great career services and can help you get a job. I was a little upset that a friend of mine at ESADE got a great consulting job at UT that I probably would have been able to get if I hadn't left. If you do the UT-ESADE Double Degree, I would recommend that you continue using the career services website at UT event though UT career services tells you not to do so. The worst case scenario is that you would fly back to Texas for a couple of grand for the interview. I probably spent over $5k during the three months it took me to look for a job when I came back from Spain. It would have been much cheaper to fly back to the US for interviews before I graduated.

Also, did you have to take classes at McCombs over the summer before the ESADE program? What do you think about that? I was a little concerned that it may take away from the MBA experience as a whole without doing an internship.

>>I took Spanish during the summer before I went to ESADE. It wasn't necessary, but it helped. Also, I was forced to take summer classes at UT before I went to ESADE, but this was do to an administrative problem at UT. If you let the folks at UT know that you are interested in ESADE before you apply, they will help you take the right classes so that you don't have to worry about not having a normal internship.

I was glad to see your blog and get to read about your experiences.
McCombs is a great school and ESADE is too so I'd be lucky to get into either one. You must have had a really cool experience at both places.
Thanks for your time and I hope it was all you hoped it would be.

>>It was tough all around, but very rewarding. The only reason I got the
>>great job I currently have is because of my diverse experience from
>>the two programs. The other day I acted as an interpreter between our
>>accounting departments in Mexico DF and Houston. I wouldn't have felt
>>comfortable doing that if I hadn't spent the year in Spain.

>>Allen

Job Info & What About Allen In Houston?

2007-09-14T21:39:00.000-07:00

So, first some information about the job. I'll be working for a company that does consulting in the oil business, both upstream and downstream. It mainly focuses on things like improving worker safety and reducing the risk of contamination. I found the company through the McCombs alumni job board but not directly through the Career Services web site which is down for the summer. Either way, thank you Red McCombs.

My job will be business process improvement internally for the company, meaning that I'll be focusing on improving metrics to help the C-level folks run the company. The company is growing quickly which is one of the reasons they hired me. The pay is competitive with other MBA graduates, so I'm quite happy about the mix of working for a socially responsible company that is growing and has (what MBAs consider) cool work.

I'm moving to Houston tomorrow morning. I haven't got an apartment or a car yet (I sold mine when I went to Barcelona) but I shouldn't have any problem with that. The housing market in Houston is fantastic for buyers. The average home price is $150k.

As far as future blog updates, I'm probably not going to create an AllenInHouston. The reason is that 1) I'll have less time, 2) most of what I would have to say in the future would be proprietary, and 3) my life isn't going to be as interesting as it was a year ago (at least not to outsiders who don't enjoy fishing data out of a company's IS system). From time to time I may post new things here. This also means that I won't have to update my iTunes podcast link which is a pain.

Job

2007-09-08T00:55:00.000-07:00

I received a job offer as of Saturday and I'm moving to Houston. More about that later.

Summer of 2007

2007-09-07T21:52:00.000-07:00

I know what I did last summer.

MP4
Windows Media

VirtualBox Ethernet Bridge

2007-09-07T07:01:00.000-07:00

As a backburner task I've been playing around with VirtualBox. VirtualBox allows you to run a different OS in the background of the OS you are using. I play around with Linux a lot, but the problem is that the driver support isn't there and I also get tired of completely wiping the hard drive of a computer every time I want to check out a distribution. Also, Linux is much friendly at being a server and I play around with different web based software installations. So, VirtualBox is cool.

The problem I was having was that I could install a Linux VirtualBox guest on an XP host system, but I couldn't get the outside world or even the host box to see the Apache (html) server on the guest. VirtualBox is a little opaque about how to get this running, but I eventually figured it out.

I'm putting this here because I know that this blog gets crawled and linked from a number of different places, so hopefully if there is someone else out there trying to figure out how to let the outside world see your VirtualBox, they will find it here.

I was running Fedora 7 inside XP. I had installed Fedora with all the default options including the networking then realized the outside world couldn't see it. First I shut down the Fedora guest system and from the VirtualBox gui running in XP I selected the Fedora "Box". Then I clicked on settings. Next, I chose networking and created a new interface (the name doesn't matter), and this creates a new interface in your Windows Network Connections. After that, I chose Host Interface Networking in VirtualBox for my Fedora guest and saved everything.

The next thing I had to do was go into Windows Network Connections and select both my ethernet interface and the new Host Interface, right-clicked, and chose "Bridge Connections". This kicked me off the network and then it came back on again.

I started up my Fedora guest, but the outside world still couldn't see the Fedora guest from my original local IP. What I hadn't realized is that when I created the bridge, it created two separate local IPs for my XP and Fedora. I ran ipconfig on the XP and /sbin/ifconfig on Fedora to figure out what the two new local IPs were. Now I could connect to the Fedora Apache server using its unique local IP (192.168.1.x) from any computer on the network. If I wanted to actually server to the outside world the next step would have been to open up port 80 on the firewall on my router.

As a quick follow up, I had some trouble getting the shared drives to work between the host and the guest. This is because I didn't install guest additions. It is in a drop down under devices when you run your guest. Also, when you run a guest it seems to destory cutting and pasting in both the host and the guest (I'm running an XP in an XP on 1.5.0). Clipboard sharing can be turned off in the virtualbox gui manager under the advanced tab in the general category for the device manager for a guest setup.

--4/19/2009 It looks like with VirtualBox 2.2.0 that after setting up a network bridge you may need to download and repair VirtualBox in order for it to recognize your bridge in the bridged networking adapter.

Earthquake

2007-07-20T04:46:00.000-07:00

I'm in San Fran on business, and being the earthquake magnet I am we just had a 4.2. Ever since Northridge I get a little freaked out. The idea of everyone upstairs coming crashing through the ceiling.

The thing that worries me about the little ones is that we had a couple of minor shakes before Northridge. You never know. I guess I'm up early this morning.

Progressing...

2007-06-27T16:43:00.001-07:00

The reason I haven't been posting is because I've been doing a lot of interviewing. No offers in hand yet, but it feels like this whole thing may be moving towards the endgame.

Job Search

2007-05-20T10:38:00.000-07:00

I just came back from graduation ceremonies at UT Austin, embarrassed that I had returned from Spain without a job. It turns out that about 40% of my class is in the same boat, and those that had jobs aren't all happy about it. I should add that there were some people with fantastic i-banking and consulting jobs and will no doubt go on to rule the universe. The rest of us are mere hopefuls, but it was nice to be around the other alumni and realize that not having a job at graduation isn't the end of the world.

I've all but given up on job boards. I still hit them, but I only send a generic cover letter now. From everyone I've talked to, it is a waste of time. Recently the job search has turned to alumni and friends. That actually lead to a couple of interviews, but so far no joy. I'm also using the alumni web sites for both schools to try to worm my way in. There are a few alumni chapter receptions in cities around the US that I'm going to go check out. It will be over $1k in travel money I don't have to spend, but I've got to give it a try.

Career Services at UT has also paid for "career consultants" for those of us who don't have jobs, so hopefully they will be worth the money.

What about a job?

2007-05-01T11:42:00.000-07:00

A couple of people have written to ask about the whole job process. When I was over there companies (even consulting companies) would lose interest when I told them I didn't have a work permit. I started mentioning in my cover letter that I didn't have work authorization, and after that all interviews halted. That, accompanied by the fact that the pay in Europe and especially Spain is miserable made me lose interest and I started looking for jobs back in the States.

So, how do U.S. students at ESADE find a job? From what I can gather there are two routes: 1) get a long-term internship in Spain starting over the summer and use that to begin your authorization process, or 2) go back to a U.S. school on exchange during the first semester of your second year and use that to get a job. Option 2 seems to be the most common.

I came back to the U.S. right after my program ended with the intention of grabbing the last of McComb's Career Service offers. Unfortunately, about two weeks before I left all the new offers completely stopped. In the last three weeks there has been absolutely nothing.

Surprisingly, the outlook is still good though. I've got access to two alumni groups, and so far people have been very helpful. I've had one office interview and several hopeful over-the-phone interviews with more scheduled. 63% of my class at UT already has a job at this point, so I am feeling the pressure. Hopefully, something will come along soon.

Family in Las Vegas

2007-04-09T09:25:00.000-07:00

My dad and brother came to Vegas with step-mom and sister-in-law in tow. I'm too lazy to put up the whole video thing, so pictures. We had a great time. Now back to the reality of looking for a job.

Heading Back...

2007-03-23T04:17:00.000-07:00

I'm going back to Vegas tomorrow morning. I just spent 2 hours plus 2 hours travel dealing with the folks at US Airways.

I'll be glad to get back. The US isn't perfect, but customer service still means customer service, not something you try to avoid doing while talking to your girlfriend. For that matter, it will be nice to have stores that are open from the morning until night, unlike here where even the Burger King has its "we're randomly closed time" from the hours of "try to guess" and "you'll never remember".

Mayor Sol

2007-03-22T11:00:00.000-07:00

I stopped by Plaza Mayor. Had tapas near Plaza del Sol. Same stuff as 6 years ago. I don't really feel like sightseeing.

Out of BCN

2007-03-22T01:15:00.000-07:00

...for good, and on to Madrid. I've got to do battle with US Airways to try to find a way home in time for an interview.

MBA Done

2007-03-19T07:50:00.000-07:00

Last exam was today.

MBA done.

Now, to find a way to pay for it...

Soviet Cartoons

2007-02-24T16:30:00.000-08:00

Veoh.com has some interesting cartoons from the Soviet era here. Among them are the Ну, погоди! (nu, pogodi) series here and here. Wikipedia article here.

Marrakech

2007-02-09T01:57:00.000-08:00

After the career forums I had a few days where Spanish was my only class, so I skipped a couple and went to Africa. Three days in a 5 star resort in Marrakech. I only paid about $60 per night and most of my food was cheap.

iPod
Mp4
WMV

Gaucho's

2007-01-30T13:37:00.000-08:00

Meat at last, meat at last, thank God almighty there's meat at last!

Through chance I found an Argentinian steak place close to the house. For $24 US you get two filet's that are of decent American quality. You can get it cooked a punto (a little rare) or hecho which is medium. I had two a punto with no regrets. Best meat in the city. I actually thought about ordering another round.

I also got to check out my Vodafone card and was able to keep a Skype conversation with Lisa's home phone as I walked around the city. Not a bad day for a geek with a protein deficit.

Click On the Ads!

2007-01-26T02:00:00.000-08:00

You've seen the ads. Why haven't you clicked on them? I need bank!

Saying Goodbye to the Ambassador

2007-01-23T11:50:00.000-08:00

Today was our last day of Geopolitics. We said goodbye to our professor, Ambassador Soonu Kochar, who was a former Indian Ambassador to a number of countries.

Find the Drag Queen

2007-01-22T14:40:00.000-08:00

Each of the posts below has exactly 1 drag queen. Can you find the drag queen?

How Is Career Services for Americans?

2007-01-19T02:17:00.000-08:00

A reader writes in:

I am 08 McCombs MBA student. I am planning to go to ESADE this fall to pursue my double degree. [Someone at UT] gave me your contact details on my request. I hope its okay with you, as I just wanted to know how your overall experience has been so far in Barcelona. My special concern are employment opportunities after ESADE and the effectiveness of career services office there. Anything you can write to shed light on these issues will be much appreciated.

PS: I have lived in Spain for seven years and speak fluent Spanish. So I guess we dont have to worry about culture shock :)

And my reply:

The first thing I would encourage you to do is to make sure you have or will be taking two extra credits before the end of the semester. Then, you should be able to do an individual study over the summer and do a full internship. I wasn't aware that I could do it this way and had to take a shortened internship.

If you have a work permit for Europe already you should be set. If not, you are going to discover that people coming from the outside trying to work as an MBA in Europe can be challenging. I don't know of any other American who has got a job in Europe while attending ESADE. Most American students at ESADE who have jobs got those jobs by going back to the states on Exchange [and those jobs are in the US].

Career services here is good at bringing in a group of iBanks and consulting companies once a semester. The career services job offers on their website are mostly in Spain and usually don't pay more than 45k EURO [and are mostly meant for Spanish students]. One of my friends from Germany went through the entire recruitment process for what she thought was a great job in Spain. At the end of all the interview rounds they told her that they were prepared to offer her 29k EURO a year. [...I]n general companies in Spain (other than consultants) don't seem to understand or care about the value of a top-tier MBA.

Putting that aside for a moment, I would encourage you to pursue the Double Degree. It has been a great experience not only for the people and the environment, but also because I think that the hard skills you pick up at UT are complemented by the soft skills that ESADE focuses on. For example, we are constantly in group meetings and presentations here. I'm about to give one right now, and I have another one on Monday and another on Tuesday. Beyond that, I think that the long-term advantages of having a truly international pedigree will go a long way in the business world.

Residencia Pt. III: The End

2007-01-15T06:51:00.000-08:00

I just completed my epic quest to secure my NIE. The last face-to-face contact I had with the attorney handling my case was October 24, 2006. We met in the police station at Gracia at around 8am. It took about 30 minutes to get in and another hour to go through the process.

As you can see from the line, if you don't use an attorney, you will stand in line from 5am and might not get out until 9am. If you come later than that, you can stand in line all day and never get in, since they shoo everyone away around noon.

After I got out, I was given a small piece of paper that I was told by the attorney that I would need to bring with me to Mallorca, 213 a month later. I waited 45 days, which is what was mentioned on the paper and since I didn't hear back from the attorney I called several times and left an email. We traded phone messages and faxes until just today and I finally got him to agree to meet me at Mallorca. Standing in line here took another hour.

I now have my NIE. It is a small driver's license looking card. You use it along with your passport to get back into the country if you leave. The important thing here is that if I had planned to go home for Christmas, I might not have been able to get back into Spain. Fortunately, I never bought a plane ticket home, and so didn't have this problem.

Revolution Void

2007-01-14T07:53:00.000-08:00

A while ago I got tired of buying music from iTunes and be disappointed with my purchase. I have also moved completely away from stealing intellectual property. I think back in the 90's we were just excited that all this stuff was out there available in digital form, but now that I'm older I really don't like the idea of taking what someone else is selling, whether the damages are tangible or intangible.

Instead, I've found that I really like what is out there under Creative Commons. This stuff is copyleft, which means not only can you listen to it for free, but you can also use it for your own purposes as long as you aren't using it commercially and as long as you attribute the author. I get most of my music from Jamendo.com which mainly appeals to French and Spanish musicians.

Lately, I've been listening to Revolution Void's "Increase the Dosage" which despite obvious the counterculture reference is more of a traditional cross-over of jazz and house. You can download the entire album here for free or go visit their website.

So, how do these people make money? Well, partly they get people like me to give them free publicity. Also, the model centers more around the pull you get for merchandise and concert tickets once people like the music (what musicians get paid for anyway under the studio model). Basically, they cut out the middle man.

Admittedly, if you wade through Jamendo, there is a lot of stuff out there that just isn't good, but all you have to do is click the next track button. Once a group you like comes up a couple of times, you can decide to download it for free. Admittedly it requires some work. Or, you could just stay tuned and download what I'm downloading. The thing I like about Jamendo and similar sites is that it reminds me of music in the 80's when I was a kid and both rap and alternative were just starting up. It was very experimental, but it was also very original. I think that traditional distribution channels have lost a lot of that ingenuity and I find what's going on in the copyleft world with a lot of fusion of different genres reminds me of what I used to love about music when I was a kid.

Unlock PDFs

2007-01-11T08:24:00.000-08:00

I had a PDF for one of my classes that was locked, meaning that I couldn't underline anything or add notes. This was obviously a pain, but I happened to find an online solution for it.

The Good:
You upload your PDF file to this site and it creates an unlocked version of the PDF which it opens and you can save to your desktop.

The Bad:
1) You are sending this PDF across the internet to someone you don't know.
2) There has recently been news that Acrobat 7 and below can have executable code attached to it. So, this would be a great way to add a virus or trojan to your system.

URL.

Dia de los Reyes

2007-01-06T14:34:00.000-08:00

Today is the Three King's Day. Basically, it is the day the kids open their Christmas presents from the three kings. They have Santa Claus out here, but I'm not sure when or if he brings product.

The Wikipedia entry.

Turkish Star Wars

2007-01-04T13:28:00.000-08:00

Turkish movie from 19982 that ripped off footage of Star Wars and added in their own goofy plot and costumes.

The actual movie can be seen here: video.

The imdb entry.
A funny review.
Another review.

I don't recommend watching the whole thing (I didn't), but the first five minutes give you the idea.

The Wikipedia entry on it is also pretty good. The Foleyvision mentioned in the article is the same one from Austin's Alamo movie theaters.

Vamos a la Playa

2007-01-03T06:19:00.000-08:00

Italian group from the 80's singing New Wave music in Spanish.

Obviously not big in the US. Apparently they were popular in Europe. I saw this on one of those video dialup shows where you pay 2 EURO to SMS the code for a video you want. Someone actually wanted to pay to see this.

The highlight for me is the communication wrist watches they habitually sing in to each other and the close-up on the pink socks.

Video 1.
Video2.

Here was their follow up "No Tengo Dinero". I imagine they sing this one a lot these days.

Skyping Veeru

2007-01-03T04:22:00.000-08:00

I had a chance to chat with Veeru today over Skype. He is seen here and below with his devil progeny Aaron. It is hard to believe that Veeru is still out there in the world let alone that he is multiplying. He says they have another one on the way as well. Without the miracles of modern technology, I probably never would have heard from him again.

He still has a band. Here is a test version of a website they are working on along with pictures.

Lisa the Mermaid

2007-01-01T11:54:00.000-08:00

Lisa took an aerial gig for New Year's where they dressed her up like a mermaid. All went well.

Bad News Daily

2006-12-29T04:33:00.000-08:00

A friend of mine has a new website you should check out. It is called Bad News Daily. Please take a look.

Website.

This is Dave Pass from back in the Trimark days. I'm sure it will be great.

Mom Sends a Tree

2006-12-27T06:07:00.000-08:00

Mom sent a Christmas tree. It actually got here on the 22nd, but the receptionist in our building didn't work until this morning, so I just got it.

If you are having trouble seeing the windows videos, try right-clicking on the URL and choosing "Save as..." and save it to your desktop.

Christmas with Lisa: the Last Week

2006-12-25T13:03:00.000-08:00

From finals week where I'm still writing my paper, to when the heat goes out, to a circus, to Montjuic and Tibidabo. Just about everything that is left in Spain, we did.

iPod
MP4
WMV

Christmas with Lisa Days 5 and 6

2006-12-18T18:25:00.000-08:00

Day 5 was a recovery day from day 4. We had lunch with Gonzalo and his girlfriend, Maria Jose.

Day 6 was Pedrera, Ba Ba Reeba, Batllo, Torre Agbar, and a trip back to Floridablanca to see the Illusionist.

iPod
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Windows

Christmas with Lisa Days 3 and 4

2006-12-16T04:24:00.000-08:00

Some errands around Gracia. We also go to see Borat.

The next day the heat breaks down, so we open presents and head off to the Cram. We also trip around Placa Catalunya into the Born and at 3am end up at Red in Barceloneta along the water on the pier.

iPod
MP4
Windows

Christmas with Lisa Days 1 and 2

2006-12-14T05:02:00.000-08:00

Lisa arrives in BCN. Day 1 we go to Placa Catalunya for some shopping then end up eating tapas at Cerverceria Catalana while I study for Spanish.

Day 2 she comes to ESADE and hangs out while I take my exam. That night we go to Rosa Negra and meet the ESADE folks at Danzatoria.

iPod
MP4
WMV

Start-up generates random numbers from space

2006-12-12T09:15:00.000-08:00

This company Yuzoz is selling its algorithm for generating random numbers which is based on celestial events. This is how they chose their name:

Yuzoz was a random name--we used our product to create our name. We turned the system on New Year's Day, gave it some rules and created 6,000 names. Seven or eight names jumped out as being cool. Six already had the domains registered, but Yuzoz was unique.

So, out of all the randomness in God's creation, they were able to find one domain name that hadn't been registered. It sounds like a better way to generate true randomness is just to see what's being registered next at domains.com.

Article

As an update to this post, you'll see that someone from Yuzoz left a comment. Since they took the time to write in, I figured the least I could do was link to them. There is not much on their website, but I am interested in seeing how they implement the calculation and delivery of their random numbers.

Website

ESADE vs. IESE vs. the US

2006-12-07T03:31:00.000-08:00

A reader writes in:

I have enjoyed your blog about ESADE and I would like to ask a few question if you have time. I am in the process of deciding which school should I go to and I have two options in Spain., ESADE and IE.

I know ESADE has a better reputation, but how do you feel about it now that you are studying at ESADE?
How do you see you job opportunities after graduation? Do you think it has a good return of you investment? What advice do you have for financial aid for US Citizens?

I appreciate any information you can give.

And I respond:

I’m assuming that by IE you are talking about IESE. If you are talking about another school, then this comparison may not be useful to you.
Although the business rankings put ESADE ahead of IESE, the question of which has a better reputation is more open to question. ESADE is more of an up and comer and certainly my roommates who made the decision to attend IESE over ESADE were surprised to learn that ESADE had moved significantly ahead of IESE in the rankings.

Part of this reason is that ESADE has done a better job of attending to international recruiters’ needs. ESADE has more of an influence on soft skills (marketing, languages, etc) which is why it has done so well in the rankings. As a Double Degree student I feel that ESADE’s soft skills have served as a nice complement to the hard skills of UT Austin’s hard skills.

In terms of jobs, you should realize that whether you go to IESE or ESADE almost all the job offers you are going to get from these schools will come from inside Spain and that these jobs will top out at about 30k EURO in pay, which is not enough to help you pay off your school debt and live in Barcelona. The exception to this is in investment banking and consulting where the pay is competitive. One of the advantages of going to ESADE is that they don’t release your grades. I’ve known some people here that got banking internships who never would have had the opportunity at an American school.

So, the question of return on investment for a Spanish MBA program comes down to what you want. If you want to go into investment banking or consulting and if you speak fluent Spanish and can come here to learn German or French, you will probably find it to be a great return on your investment. Likewise if you are aware of what kind of job you want in Europe, if you already have a European passport, and if you have a reasonable expectation that you can land that job on your own, then it would be a good investment. If you only speak English, have no work permit, don’t have a background that will get you into investment banking or consulting, it is going to be very difficult to get a job over here.

My purpose in coming out here was to get international experience and has been more of a concern for my future than my first job out of school. The career services at ESADE is very helpful especially if you are interested in investment banking or consulting. Outside of those areas my impression so far is that you need to go out and find a job on your own. At UT Austin I felt that at times the career services was even adversarial and I didn’t have an opportunity to speak to an advisor until after my first few months there. On the other hand, Austin brings in a constant stream of recruiters to the school, and if you are willing to work in the southwest, especially Texas, I think it would be almost impossible not to find a job at graduation.

The good news is that the financial aid is easy. They will point you to Sallie Mae and getting the loan is as easy as pressing a few buttons on the website.

Thanks Spain!

2006-12-06T03:20:00.000-08:00

It was time for a 5-day weekend.

Finals are coming up though and this means term-papers for second-years. I've got several. I'm hoping to be done by the end of next week so that I can start Christmas vacation on time.

Christmas in BCN

2006-11-30T01:56:00.000-08:00

Lights and such around Barcelona and Gracia. I've stopped putting up quicktime. If you have quicktime you should be able to open the iPod or Mp4 versions. Let me know if that is not the case.

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Spanish Classes

2006-11-27T03:36:00.000-08:00

When I originally came here I was under the impression that I wouldn't have to take any Spanish classes. I knew that some of the classes were in Spanish and that I wouldn't take them. In truth, there are very few elective classes in Spanish that I am interested in, so that hasn't been a problem.

When I first got here, they told me that in fact that I would have to take one Spanish course my first semester. I started to get suspicious that I was being confused with an exchange student, so over the past few weeks I've been doing some more digging to make sure that 1) I needed to take Spanish, and 2) that I was taking enough Spanish to graduate.

I stirred up a hornet's nest there, because all of a sudden I was told that in order to graduate I would need to speak fluent business Spanish. This came as a great surprise because right now I am somewhere in the upper intermediate range. It seems we have come to a compromise that I will only have to take one more Spanish class and then I will be done with the whole thing.

If you're considering thd Double Degree next year, just be warned that you may need to be fluent by the time you graduate.

Design Management

2006-11-25T12:08:00.000-08:00

This is the video for the presentation in my Design Management class. I spent the better part of Saturday working on it which is why I'm posting a backup of it here. While it is great to work on soft skills and all, I really have to say that I think that all this focus on powerpoint and presentations is not making me a better businessman. As much as I complained about the course load at McCombs, at least I felt like every time I finished a project there I was moving the ball forward. There are many days here where I feel like I am just killing time until it is time to go back into the real world. Admittedly, the real world will probably more full of powerpoint presentations than it will of discounted cash flow analysis.

Windows media only because that is the only format the PCs at school play.

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Team Meetings

2006-11-21T15:03:00.000-08:00

It's about all I do these days. The first set is Sunday at Omm. They have free wifi and a great place to hang out while you work. The second is a trip to Barcelona Activa on Monday to learn allabout how Barcelona incubates startups.

What's On in Barcelona

2006-11-18T13:52:00.000-08:00

A bunch of clips from Barcelona TV.
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Another Late Post

2006-11-18T10:41:00.000-08:00

A smattering of pictures from October that I haven't put up yet.

These are some pictures from the far east side of Gracia. A little rough.

At the MBASA club meeting. I played bartender.

Down the stairwell at our apartment.

Consulting Interview

2006-11-17T03:12:00.000-08:00

I had a consulting interview today. They had concerns about my Spanish but mainly they said they weren't hiring Americans. I'm not sure why they had me come all the way down to see them. Maybe it was a nice way of telling me how bad my Spanish was.

The case interview part was relatively easy, but by then my American-ness had been exposed and I think they were just phoning in their part. It was actually fun. Much easier than sitting through two hours of behavioral interviews explaining why I am qualified for a position that I was just told they weren't willing to hire me for.

Spain has failed me

2006-11-15T06:34:00.000-08:00

I was just looking at the schedule for November. We don't have another holiday for almost a month. Back home, you guys are going to have Thanksgiving before we get another national holiday. Unthinkable.

Halloween at ESADE

2006-11-09T11:58:00.000-08:00

It has been a while since Halloween. A mix of busy and lazy I guess. Here it is anyway.

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Blogger Monks

2006-11-05T03:09:00.000-08:00

Out of the Mustache Business

2006-11-03T10:38:00.000-08:00

After only two days I've shaved the mustache. I got yet another call for an interview this month and I decided that I couldn't risk a couple of interviews for this. Feel free to support the charity at the links below. For the record, i was going for a Morgan Spurlock. Morgan Spurlock.

The Allen Shirt -- You Want One

2006-11-03T10:33:00.000-08:00

Movember

2006-10-30T14:43:00.000-08:00

During Movember (the month formerly known as November) I’ll be growing a moustache. That’s right I’m bringing the Mo back because I’m passionate about changing the state of men’s health.

Male health is a major issue, did you know:

Men are far less healthy than women. The average life expectancy of males is 6 years less than females.
Every year in Australia and New Zealand 3,300 men die with prostate cancer – about the same number of women who die from breast cancer
Males in the UK are three times more likely to take their own lives than women

Help me change the face of men’s health by sponsoring my mo.

Please go to the Movember website, enter my Rego number which is 11711 and your credit card details. You also should be able to get to my donation page directly by clicking here.

The money raised by Movember will be used to change the face of men’s health by creating awareness and funding research into prostate cancer and male depression.

Movember culminates at the end of the month at the London Gala Partè. If you want to be part of this great night you’ll have to purchase a London Gala Parte ticket for $100 (roughly £40).

So, all that was ripped from the email they sent me. Keep in mind that I'll be doing this during prime interview time. So for just the price of a cup of coffee or an Italian sports car you can insure that I walk into my interviews looking like a 70's porn star. Sign up now, won't you?

This information will also be replicated on alleninbcn.blogspot.com. I'll also be keeping updates on the 'stache up there and I'm even going to have a go at time lapsed photography.

Cheers

Allen

More info is available at www.movember.com.au

Movember is proudly grown by Motorola, Polaroid, Remington and VB.

Movember is proud partners with the Prostate Cancer Foundations of Australia and New Zealand and the Samaritans.

Lisa Week Ends with a Bang

2006-10-27T19:48:00.000-07:00

So, Lisa lost her job on Thursday because Prince bought out Club Rio and got rid of all the Go-Gos. Lisa walked into an audition for another club on Saturday and out of a huge pool of dancers (all the people laid off from Ice, Rio, Buck Wild...blah, blah, blah) she got the job. So, she rocks.

Lisa Silks

2006-10-27T10:40:00.000-07:00

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Lisa Lyra

2006-10-24T06:07:00.000-07:00

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Lisa Week

2006-10-23T13:07:00.000-07:00

We're going to be posting some of Lisa's aerial footage so that employers can get to it, so that means that this is going to be Lisa Week.

If anyone has an iPod and is subscribed, please let me know if these videos are showing up on your iPod.

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I am iTunes

2006-10-20T06:46:00.000-07:00

That is right, this blog can now be subscribed to via iTunes. Click on the iTunes link in the upper-right hand corner and you should get all the latest video delivered automatically. You can also go to iTunes and under podcasts search for "Gregory Edwards", "Allen Edwards", "BCN", or "ESADE" and you will find me (as of the time of this post).

Lisa's Halloween Party

2006-10-15T04:50:00.000-07:00

Lisa went to a Halloween party at Scotty's house. I turned the pictures into a microsoft Photo Story video. Since everyone I know is using iTunes, and since syndication is very short-term, I'm going to try switching this to an iTunes vidcast. If all goes well there should be an iTunes link to this video podcast (vlog) in the upper right hand corner of this page very soon. I'll continue putting up other versions of the video files as well.

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Another 3-day Weekend

2006-10-12T04:08:00.000-07:00

Actually a 4 day. It has been an entire week without a holiday and I wasn't sure if I was going to make it. Most of the stuff I need to do requires the attention of either ESADE administration or local officials, so all this time off is actually more of an inconvenience. I got out of class on Wednesday at 6pm and don't have to go back until Monday at noon. I thought about flying down to Africa just to say I put my feet on the continent, but I didn't have time to put it together.

Sarria, ESADE, Parc Guell

2006-10-08T14:50:00.000-07:00

An excellent Lebanese restaurant in Placa del Sol called Amir de Nit.
A chinese restaurant in Verdi with a panda on the front window. Hopefully, it is the mascot, not the menu.
Parc Guell. Gaudi's creation.

That night we had dinner at Ba Ba Ree Ba again. The pizza there is very good, which I wouldn't have expected. It's getting cool in Barcelona. For the first time I felt like I needed to wear a jacket out at night.

Girona

2006-10-07T13:19:00.000-07:00

We went out to Girona.

The Roman wall.

The Cathedral.

We learned about Tissana (cava sangria/Spanish mimosas).

Dinner on Las Ramblas in Barcelona.

Montserrat

2006-10-06T13:14:00.000-07:00

Gothic Quarter and Environs

2006-10-05T01:35:00.000-07:00

My parents started off at Montjuic.

I met my parents at the Gothic quarter.

Sagrada Familia

2006-10-02T06:30:00.000-07:00

La Terrazza at Poble Espanyol

2006-10-02T01:34:00.000-07:00

A Summary of ESADE

2006-09-28T01:44:00.000-07:00

In my corporate Social Responsibility class we were asked as a class to come up with ESADE's values. We were asked to place these values in four quadrants: values that were aspired to (formulated) and practiced, values that were formulated but not practiced, values that were practiced but not formulated, and values that were not formulated or practiced (room for improvement).

Some of this appears negative. Keep in mind that the tool is designed to point out faults. Also, there is only 1 quadrant that outlines "successes" whereas there are 3 that outline problems. Finally, I think that you would get a much more positive view from a group of first years as opposed to a room full of jaded second years who have built up 9 months of disappointments.

Formulated and Practiced

Ethics: ESADE and its students don't cheat and are concerned about ethics and CSR in the workplace
Team Work/Collaboration: ESADE students are not competitive within teams and are good at working in groups. The organization encourages this behavior
Prestige/Ambition
Informal atmosphere: students and professors are able to speak with each other quite easily. From my time here, it seems that ESADE students are much more laid back than IESE students. Paradoxically, IESE seems to be more "social" than ESADE. Some of the students put this in the "room for improvement" category and felt that ESADE and its students should do more to encourage a competitive atmosphere in order to force students to excel.
Diversity: you will see this listed below as well, but it was agreed by everyone that the student body and the scope of the program is very diverse and international.

Formulated but Not Practiced

Collaboration: Administration doesn't like to hear about problems. This was also defined by some students as a lack of honesty, in that the administration appears to be open to criticism, but responds very negatively to it.
Diversity: there is diversity in the student body, but the school is not diverse. The faculty and administration are all from Spain.
Academic Rigor: you are told that you have to work very hard but none of the students feel that this is true. On the same issue, there is no real understanding by the student body what their grades mean. There is no way to compare themselves to other students. The consensus is that grades tend to be in the range of 65-85 with anything above 85 being rare even among the outstanding students. The grading system seems to be designed to obscure performance.

Practiced but Not Formulated

Frugality: it is hard to get the administration to put out money for students. Complaints were about the food and its commitment to other student services
Marketing of the Program: there were concerns that the school touts itself as an international program, but most of the jobs are in Spain and the professors are largely Spanish.
Loyalty/Feeling of "Family": because of the small scope of the program, students are very dedicated to it and to each other by virtue of their affiliation with ESADE

Not Formulated and Not Practiced

Organization: it was universally observed that the administration is extremely disorganized, from responding to student concerns to making sure that materials are delivered on time for classes. There was also concern that materials often had incorrect information or spelling errors that were never corrected. Another issue was that the administration and faculty had no concern for urgency, from replying to issues to returning grades.
Community Building: ESADE does very little organically or inorganically to get the students to build a community and network with each other.
Health: with little access to workout facilities and healthy food it is hard for students to stay healthy.
Professionalism/Punctuality: ESADE students are on "Latin American time". They show up late for all scheduled events, including class. There have been some complaints that professors have also failed to attend classes.

All of this sound like a lot of griping on the part of the students, although I think the high points were listed. One of the things that I would like to add that the students may not be fully aware of is that from my limited perspective the professors here are deserving of their #1 ranking. I believe that this exercise shows that the method and environment defined by the professor in this class did an excellent job of outlining what kind of school ESADE is.

The other thing I've found is that ESADE seems to focus much more on building business-related soft skills than the hard skills taught at McCombs. As an anecdotal example, in the two weeks I've been here I've been involved in almost as many presentations at ESADE as I was during my entire year at McCombs. Working out interpersonal issues in groups becomes a highly polished practice. It seems like McCombs attempts to use soft skills as a way to present data arrived at through the use of hard skills. At ESADE, it seems more like the hard skills are introduced as a way to focus on building soft skills.

Another interesting fact was that after this exercise was done, the professor wrote all the words used to describe our values up on the board. We each put a star (up to five) next to the words we felt ESADE should keep and encourage.

The final list was:

Professionalism
Team Work
Diversity
Integrity
Excellence

What I think was interesting is that these are most likely the kind of things that the administration focuses on in order to keep us the #1 international business school. Some of the facts on the ground may annoy the students, but I don't think any of us would trade our ranking for the small changes that might make our lives a little easier.

ESADE Ch. 2: The Pool of Tears

2006-09-27T11:37:00.001-07:00

My advisor at UT asked me how I was doing. I realized that for all the kicking and screaming I did to get out here, being out here is a lot of trouble. I think I accurately summarize it in my letter to her:

Things are good. I took a class called Business Simulation that was fantastic. The career services are also very helpful.

The big problem is with all the hoops you have to jump through to get your tarjeta de estancias estudios. You either have to wait in line for at least four hours with all the right papers or you can use their attorney. If you use their attorney you have to have more documents including a letter from your Spanish bank (I didn’t have a Spanish bank account). Transferring money from my American account turned out to be a nightmare. For some reason they shut off my bank account in the US and I haven’t been able to get money for food or rent. I’m about to go see if my 4 hour international phone call accomplished anything to fix it.

ESADE has had a lot of problems getting me into their system. I finally got a mailbox today which has been prohibiting me from getting some of the required reading for my classes. They also put me in a Spanish section for my latest class which means that even though I am sitting in on the English section while we work this out, all of my books are in Spanish.

Regarding that, my Spanish has improved remarkably. I even considered staying in the Spanish section of my class, but I didn’t want to risk my grades. The idea that you can come to ESADE and not speak Spanish is crazy. People in Spain speak Catalan as a second language, not English. All of the job offers are in Spanish on the career services website, and all official documents are in Spanish or Catalan. My comprehension is very good, but I have a real problem speaking Spanish.

The orientation has been piecemeal. Meaning, I have to figure out that I’m missing something important and then I have to go find the person who should have known I needed it and who might be able to help. One of the examples is Spanish. They still don’t know if I am required to take it or at what level. The latest word is that I need to take a class for credit but I don’t need to graduate with any specific proficiency.

Emails here largely go unnoticed. Sometimes people will do something about a problem but not send a return email. The only thing you can do is track that person down and ask them to do it.

Between dealing with administrative problems and looking for a job, I fit in classes. There is absolutely no room to do anything else. Which isn’t that big of a problem because most of the ESADE students are already bonded and there is no official “Think n Drink” to meet my classmates. Mainly I am friends with the first years and other exchange students. Unfortunately those students don’t have a lot of inside knowledge about the ESADE experience.

All that said, I’m having a great time. The food is great. I’m enjoying picking up my Spanish again. The classes so far have lived up to ESADE’s reputation. It was really exciting to see that ESADE was rated #1 by the Wall Street journal the other day. My roommates are IESE so it was nice to rub in the fact that we are ahead of them in the Journal and in Business Week ranking. There are a lot more cultural issues in teams than there were at UT Austin. I don’t know why that is. It may be that foreign students at Austin are more Americanized.

I’m hoping that most of the problems I’m dealing with are startup costs and a month from now everything will be settled. As long as I can find a decent job for myself, it looks like the whole ESADE experience will be a great memory. I wouldn’t recommend it for people who think they are going to have fun and sun. If you are serious about the international experience, I think the Austin-ESADE double degree is a great way to show range and diversity on your resume.

Like I said in the letter, I am glad I am out here. I had no idea that there would be so many problems getting started up and settled over here. There is a constant stream of things that you need to get done. It doesn't seem to end.

As she said these words her foot slipped, and in another moment, splash! she was up to her chin in salt water. He first idea was that she had somehow fallen into the sea, `and in that case I can go back by railway,' she said to herself. (Alice had been to the seaside once in her life, and had come to the general conclusion, that wherever you go to on the English coast you find a number of bathing machines in the sea, some children digging in the sand with wooden spades, then a row of lodging houses, and behind them a railway station.) However, she soon made out that she was in the pool of tears which she had wept when she was nine feet high.
`I wish I hadn't cried so much!' said Alice, as she swam about, trying to find her way out. `I shall be punished for it now, I suppose, by being drowned in my own tears! That will be a queer thing, to be sure! However, everything is queer to-day.'

Turn an Office into a Bedroom

2006-09-26T10:35:00.000-07:00

A company that sells a whole lot of fold-up furniture. Link

TMB Map

2006-09-26T06:58:00.000-07:00

A map of the ferrocarrils and metro. Here is a link to the PDF.

Parents in Town

2006-09-24T05:42:00.000-07:00

Dad and Charlotte were in town today. They stayed at the Cram hotel. Dad started out all right as you can see here.

A shot from the top of level 4.
We went down to Passeig de Gracia next to Las Ramblas to see the Gaudi building.

We went to get tapas and he didn't quite make it. This is their hotel. Very nice. It is called the Cram on the corner of Aribau and Arago. It reminds me of the Standard in LA.

That night we ate across the street at an Italian place called Frico. Aribau 47, +34934525495. Great food at a reasonable price. The next day we had lunch near Placa Catalunya at Celler Tapas. We spent the rest of the day on the 7th floor of the Cram by the pool. That night we ate at Mexi y Cal. Mexican food in Spain. Very good. Aribau 50, +34933234316.

An unrelated shot of Sarria I took yesterday near school.

Strategic Business Simulation

2006-09-22T23:57:00.000-07:00

I just finished a class called "Strategic Business Simulation" with Prof. Jorge Brunat-Campamany. The class is underpublicized in the curriculum and was a fantastic experience. I recommend it to anyone attending ESADE in the future.

The class uses the INT OP simulation model. It pits 8 different teams against each other. All teams are given the same starting advantages, or disadvantages actually. You are given -4M retained earnings and you have to dig yourself out of a hole. The class is an intensive, one-week course where you do nothing besides manage the company. It was a lot of fun and a great learning experience.

This was the team I worked with. Going around the table closest to the camera were: Charlotte Lewis (US), Cesar Souza (Brazil), Tim Malonn (Germany), Lluis Ripoll-Girat (Spain), and Malysa Martin (France).

ESADE is the #1 International Business School

2006-09-20T03:31:00.000-07:00

The rankings are shown in the Wall Street Journal. Link

The glory of ESADE.

And for dinner, an octopus...

Residencia Pt. II: The Abogado

2006-09-19T22:19:00.000-07:00

So, I had the choice of either going to the police station and waiting in line myself last week, or trying to get the school's attorney to do it for me. After class, I raced down to his office and met with his assistant. It turns out that it was a good thing that I didn't try to wait in line on my own because I was missing a few things. By the way, the thing in question is called the Tarjeta de Estancia para Estudios.

1. My passport photos were the wrong size. I have American size passport photos. They want smaller versions. At metro stops, they have these little booths where you can get foto carnet. You sit there, press the button and out pop your Spanish passport photos.
2. You are required to have a letter from a Spanish bank stating that you have at least 1000 EURO, but maybe between 4000-11000 EURO available. It also needs your passport number and bank account number. I didn't have either of these.

Fortunately, I was surprised to find that there is a Caja Madrid located inside ESADE. I'm going there today. I'll end up faxing a copy of my carta del banco to the attorney, but when he goes in to talk with the police, I'll have to bring the original passport, new photos, and the letter.

Some Pictures Some Notes

2006-09-17T01:33:00.000-07:00

Pictures from my terrace.

Down on Passeig de Gracia. We have a restaurant with the same name in Vegas.

A random shot near Fontana.

I met the ESADE folks for the first time last night. There was a gathering at a bar near my house. I also met Jacek for the first time in person. It was a good time, nothing crazy. As usual with MBA folks, everyone talked about school, myself included. I suppose you can't get away from that. I think at the very end of McCombs the friends I had started to get to know each other well enough that school wasn't the main focus of everything we talked about, but by then I was leaving. It will be the same here.

Buy Some Coffee

2006-09-17T01:00:00.000-07:00

Seriously. You want this coffee.

Phone Compass

2006-09-17T00:38:00.000-07:00

I think this partly appeals to me because of my sailing days. It takes a real masochist to think that using a sextant is interesting when GPS are much more reliable and useful. But I've also found myself in recent days popping up in metro stations and having no idea which way to go to get to my destination. This is a java tool for your phone that uses the time and your position to map the location of the sun or moon. Once you compare the position of the sun or moon to the phone image, Bob's your uncle. URL.

Residencia Pt. I: El Padron

2006-09-14T00:58:00.000-07:00

60 days after showing up in Spain you have to get your Residencia if you are going to be here for longer than 3 months. For this, you need a student residency form, proof of registration or proof of payment from your school, orignal and copy of your passport, original and copy of your visa, 3 passport sized photographs, and the certificado de empadronamiento.

For this last one, you have to find an OCB (no idea what it stand for) and wait in line with a copy of your lease agreement. I am subletting, so ultimately I needed a form from the OCB for my roommate with the name on the lease to fill out, a copy of his passport picture page, and a copy of his passport page with his signature. My school had issued an official document saying that they were aware that I lived at my present address, but this didn't work.

FYI

Career Services

2006-09-13T11:20:00.000-07:00

I had my first meeting with Career Services at ESADE today. I was really struck by the service model they've implemented there and impressed by the organization. At McCombs, we had a student bad mouth the program which supposedly resulted in our dropping out of the top twenty Wall Street Journal rankings. The result was that Career Services instituted a number of policies to insure our professionalism.

What this meant was that we were given a large number of rules that could result in us being dropped from Career Services and most of our meetings with Career Services were a reminder of those rules. So far, ESADE seems more geared towards serving the students. My resume was hand checked and improved by one of the Career Services advisors. I was able to sit down with a Career Services person on day 1 (Smeralda) and talk about my needs and goals. For the first three months at McCombs, my only contact with Career Services was through an appointed 2nd year student who acted as an intermediary between myself and the organization.

I'm guessing that much of this has to do with the difference in size of the two schools. There is of course a caveat, which is that ESADE has not yet helped me to land a job. Ask me three months from now what I think of ESADE's Career Services.

ESADE

2006-09-12T08:35:00.000-07:00

I had a meeting today at ESADE. Mirroring my experiences with the Spanish consulate, I was stood up. Three hours shot. I've had similar experiences on the subway. People move in front of you and stop. Shopkeepers tend to hold whatever hours they feel like that day. Its like the entire culture is trying to tell you slow down. Don't worry about it. If nothing gets done, that's fine.

The Apartment

2006-09-12T00:01:00.000-07:00

The Diada

2006-09-11T06:27:00.000-07:00

The entire province of Catalunya is closed today. Thanks for coming. Please stop by tomorrow.

This is the Placa of Rius and Taulet...Tapas!

Quick Update

2006-09-10T05:34:00.000-07:00

I got in on the morning of the 6th. I unpacked and slept most of the day. That night I went out with my roommates to Placa del Sol next to my apartment for tapas. We had dinner with about 10 other IESE students.

On the Thursday the 7th I spent most of the day at ESADE working out administrative issues. On Friday I got a lot of the move in stuff out of the way like obtaining a cell phone and finding a place to workout.

Yesterday I did some tourist stuff. There is a farmer's market behind my apartment. These are their fish.

I also spent a lot of time at Placa Catalunya. It is ground zero for the metro and shopping, so I was here several times yesterday.

Saturday night we went out to 7 Ports in Barceloneta for dinner. Great paella. That is Mellisa (USA), Rwan (Jordan), Sam (Philly), Vivek (India), Amon (India, not pictured), and Margaret (USA).

Finally in BCN

2006-09-06T12:08:00.000-07:00

I arrived. At the apartment. It is 26 degrees Celsius and muggy. No air conditioning in the new place.

Spy Day

2006-08-30T15:20:00.000-07:00

Skydiving out of a helicopter leads to a high speed car chase and indiscriminate machine gun fire.

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Experiments in 640

2006-08-18T12:31:00.000-07:00

Lisa took off work for three days and we had an extra day on Sunday. We did nothing but have fun for four days.

This is my first try at putting up 640 x 480 video. Please leave a comment below to let me know if the files are too big to download or stream, or if they could be bigger with a commensurate increase in quality.

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VMWare

2006-08-18T12:21:00.000-07:00

A couple of days ago I got a pop-up from a website. I clicked on the close or cancel button, but about a minute later my anti-virus software quarantined a file on my computer.

I started looking around for a more secure way to browse the web. One option is VMWare. First download the player and then download the browser appliance. You can run the browser inside the virtual player. Basically, the browser is in a self-contained box that is destroyed and created everytime you run the player. It is much slower to run and the browser takes up 1GB because it is running a virutal Ubuntu (Linux) OS, but obviously very safe.

Looking Good...

2006-08-16T10:49:00.000-07:00

My tickets are here, my apartment seems to be ready, my scholarship money is in the bank, and I just received my visa. Looks like I'm ready to go.

Fear of Sleep

2006-08-06T19:50:00.000-07:00

I sold my phone, so this is the last video from the tricorder. In it you'll see my last shots of the city, Mom and Randy stop by a final time, and I confess to being twice shy about the whole earthquake thing.

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By the way, if you need to get in touch with me, email me with your phone number and I'll skype you.

Light earthquake hits Bay Area

2006-08-03T14:46:00.000-07:00

A magnitude 4.4 earthquake shook the Bay Area Wednesday night...The temblor struck just after 8 p.m. about three miles west of Glen Ellen in Sonoma County and 42 miles northwest of San Francisco near the Rodgers Creek Fault, the U.S. Geological Survey said. It was followed by a magnitude 2.0 aftershock about an hour later.

The earthquake was widely felt as far north as Cloverdale and more than 80 miles to the south in San Jose, according to the USGS.

Steve Walter, a USGS seismologist in Menlo Park, said it was fortunate the quake did not actually occur on the Rodgers Creek Fault, the northern extension of the dangerous Hayward Fault, which many say is due for a major rupture.

I felt this and immediately recalled the Northridge quake which occured 13 years ago about two days after I moved to California. There were a few smaller quakes before the big one, so right now I keep wondering when the other shoe is going to drop.

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Fourth Week

2006-07-30T18:37:00.000-07:00

The Oakland A's, the East Bay, and some bars in the Mission.

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World Map of Happiness

2006-07-29T18:14:00.000-07:00

Redder means happier.

More from the website here.