Life progress up to 06.26.2006

It's been a very long time since my last posting. I owe an apology to all those people who have come back to check on my blog and got disappointed day after day. You might think that I lost passion to blog about my journey to an MBA. Well, the passion is still there but the past one and half months have been so messy in terms of life changes and decision making that I wasn't in a mood to sit down and write in a sensible manner. But somehow today I feel the muse has returned to me so here I am writing again to my dear readers.

To make a story short, here is a quick update of the things I've done/encountered during my absence.

Work wise

- Job interviews: 4 face-to-face interviews; 1 telephone interview
- Coffee/lunch with former employer: 3 times
- Loss of sleep over career shift: Quite a lot
- Meaningful business meetings: 5 (believe me, they are rare)
- Meaningful teleconference: 1 (almost 3 hours non-stop)
- Boring business meetings: Numerous
- Trips to cities outside of Taipei: 2
- New Business plan produced: 1 (8 pages, on Japan)
- Previous business plan being approved: 1
- B2C event organized & held: 1
- Advertorial produced: 1
- Web banners produced: 3
- Probation period passed: 1

MBA wise

- New language learned: Spanish level 1
- Savings plan for seed money: entering the 3rd month
- Visit to GMAT prep school: Once
- Association that I now work voluntarily for: ORBIS
- B-school thoroughly surveyed: at least 10

Personal wise

- Magazine invited to contribute article to: 1
- Relocation/Moving to a new apartment: Once
- Partying/excessive drinking: Once
- Football matches watched: 6 matches
- Verbal conflicts with family: Twice
- Sincere apology to family after fights: Once
- Reunion/Happy dinner with an old friend: Once
- Stalker I got rid of: 1 (Hey you, don't ever call me again!)
- Boring dates went: Once (Just happened yesterday, and I'm still recovering from that... uh :s)
- Boring lunch/movie declined: 2

After so many turbulences in a short time, I finally am able to tell myself that my decision to shift career from a PR agency to a marketing role was not a mistake. Although the pasture that I occupy at the moment is not super green, it does enable me to do things that were luxurious to me when all of my time was tied up in a PR agency. I still feel quite passionate about PR though, especially regarding the health care and pharmaceutical practice. And when the timing is right, I hope to get back to that again.

Meanwhile, after quite a lot of thinking and extensive research online I've re-arranged the list of b-schools that I want to get in. Most of the schools on my wish list now are European ones as I realize that's the area of the world which interests me the most...

Well, that's it for now. I will write about my progress made in July soon.

PS. David Beckham finally scored a goal last night with a brilliant free kick! I am keeping my fingers crossed for the England team.