It was pouring rain when I arrived, and for some reason, it took US Airways over an hour to get the luggage out. I then booked an airport shuttle to University City with 5 other Penn students. They informed me about the stereotypes of each school, such as Engineering being nerds and Whartonites being pretentious.
The van pulled up to my new home: a large, plain concrete building labelled “International House”. I was showed to my room, which looks like what I imagine is a juvenile detention center, except that I have the key and can go in and out as I please. The furniture is old, and to quote Ben, my German roommate in Singapore who also lives at IH, the building smells like East Germany before reunification. However, IH is located about 3 minutes away from Wharton, so the location is ideal. I have to share 2 showers and two toilets between 10 people. It hasn’t been a problem so far. The heating doesn’t work in my room, and it got quite cold a couple of nights this week, and I woke up totally frozen. I actually had to wear my “toque” to sleep for these entire two nights. I’ve been to busy and lazy to ask maintenance to come fix it, but hopefully spring will come and I won’t have to shiver much more.
The Penn campus is urban and it’s beautiful as long as you stay within its boundaries. It’s the oldest secular university in the US, and has been founded by the venerable Benjamin Franklin. It has the old campus feel that we sometimes see in American college movies. Penn is located in West Philly, an extremely rough neighbourhood. If you stray a few streets North or West, you fall into threatening ghetto territory. They recommend that you never go past 40th street, but I walked over to 48th in the afternoon without any apparent threat or problems. I suspect that the situation would be extremely different at night. I am told that female Asian student was shot at 7/11 about 100 metres from where I live a couple of weeks ago for no apparent reason. Penn has reacted by putting security guards on bikes on almost every single street around campus. Otherwise, there are many restaurants and pub within walking distance. If you can make it there and back, you have a great time on the Penn campus!
The people at Wharton are pretty different from INSEAD. My first impression is that people don’t mix very much. Indians mostly hang out and work with Indians, Asians with Asians and Caucasians with Caucasians. It is pretty difficult to integrate with them because they have been studying for 18 months together already, and cliques of friends have been formed. The INSEAD students have been chiefly staying together since the beginning, and we definitely need to make more efforts to join the mainstream crowd. A very pleasant change about INSEAD is that Wharton has about 40% women, which is more than twice the ratio at INSEAD.
Something else that sucks about Wharton is the fact that you have to pay for your course kits, which added up to close to $200! I guess they are factored into tuition at INSEAD, so you don’t see the direct cost of the printing and royalties.
I have been mostly eating American food so far, like truck food Philly Cheesesteak, Fajitas, pizza etc. I felt so guilty that I signed up for the fancy gym located right between IH and Wharton. They only have 4-month packages, so I had to pay $135 for 4 months even though I’m only here for 2. I’ve already spent 4 hours there over 2 sessions, so I am making the most out of my investment. They have everything you could dream of, including a climbing wall, a pool, a ton of treadmills with TVs, a huge weight room etc.
On Tuesday night, I went out for dinner with my assigned buddy, a charming Romanian girl who has lived in Toronto for the past few years. She also completed her undergrad at Wharton, so she is well informed on how things work around campus.
Thursday nights are normally “pub nights” at Wharton, where you pay about $15 for all-you-can-eat pizza and all-you-can-drink imported beers. However, I did not participate because the INSEAD students had a cocktail with a major consulting firm at a trendy bar. 3 INSEAD, 2 Wharton students and I then went out for dinner to a “bring your own wine” French restaurant, where I ate delicious but cold duck. It was a pleasant evening, but I definitely intend to go to pub next week.
On Friday, I had an informational interview with a top-tier consulting firm in Montreal, and learned quite a bit about this company who is not recruiting at INSEAD. I intend to present my candidacy with them in the next few days. On Friday night, after a hard workout, 6 INSEAD guys went out for dinner at the Japanese-Korean restaurant just down the street from IH. They make very nice bibimbap, BBQ and sushi. After dinner, we went to celebrate St-Patrick’s at a “Center City” (downtown in Philly) Irish pub called “The Black Sheep”. The main level was so crowded that it was impossible to walk around or raise your glass to cheer and drink. We went upstairs and shared a few Guinness. We then walked over to another pub, and closed the bar down at 2am. I had not been kicked out of a bar in quite a while, as there is no bar curfew in Singapore.
On Saturday, I took care of a lot of outstanding issues, such as buying binders, finishing unpacking, visiting the liquor store and the dollar store, doing laundry etc. Now that I’m settled and getting used to it, my room is no so bad. I spent the entire evening up until right now (2am) working on my cover letters for two top consulting firms due tomorrow. I have been refining them for hours and hours. It’s very hard work!
Next Wednesday, I am going to a 76ers NBA basketball game. I’ve never been to a professional basketball game before, so it will add to my American experience.
I will try to take a few pictures of the campus and the surroundings. In the meantime, enjoy these pictures of my luxury flat.
Thanks for checking in!
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