Oh yeah, I graduated

This post is coming a bit late, we MITIM's graduated from LUT on 30.June and from GSOM on 2.July. It was one busy weekend, but definitely one that will stay in the top 5 best memories.  

There was all together 110 graduating from LUT (including the Ph.D & engineer students), so the ceremony took a while, as we all one by one went up there to pick our diplomas. When I finally got that funny light blue hard-covered book in my hand and a glass of sparkling wine, I just couldn't stop smiling. 

MITIM'11

The after party was in the summer cottage close to the Uni, where we have been few other times too, BBQ & sauna. It was really nice, warm evening again. 

Next morning a group of us took a minibus to St.Pete, where we arrived after a loong wait (the bus was 2 hours late) and a long drive. But other than the delay, it was good. I was in a hurry to go to St.Pete, since my parents were waiting for me there. They had arrived to Russia already on Thursday but of course they wanted to see the city from my point of view. Well, unfortunately we didn't have so much time, but fortunately we got a good Russian dinner with some rossiskoje shampanskoje. :) 

Dad & Mom in St.Pete

The graduation party was a bit different in St.Pete, we had the whole Harry Potter -look and overall the ceremony with all the speeches was more festive than in LUT. In the evening we had the after party in Malevich bar with the MIB students. 

Before the ceremony in the main building of the St.Pete State University

The second night I stayed at the Nevsky Grand Hotel, which was really nice (well, I payed 124 euros for one night, so it should be). On Sunday before taking the marshrutka back to Helsinki, I sat in the park behind Ruskii Muzei, went for a boat trip and did some shopping in Galleria. 

Oh, St.Pete, I will miss you...

View from Neva

Oh yeah, a thing that made my graduation even more exciting was that on Thursday morning I got a job offer from Kesko Food (IT department). Obviously I accepted it, as the position matches exactly what I have been studying & looking and wishing for. I will start 15.8. 

So now, it's a holiday!! :D Enjoy!

thinking positive..

Yes, I still want to go abroad, but I started to think after my last posting that why not try to enjoy the time here. After all, there are nice things in Lappeenranta and the university if compared to the other universities I've studied in other countries. 

We have student healthcare (including dental services) which is a lot cheaper but good quality (for example teeth cleaning costs 4,5 euros), the lunch at the restaurant (there's at least 3 of them to choose from in the campus area) costs from 1,05-4,50. I usually pay for a soup and salad 2,50 and it includes bread and drinks. The food is usually good too. There's a free gym, well it's quite small and students can use it only on a certain times, but still, it will do it for me. And there is a big sports hall, where you can play badminton, basketball, etc. It's free too. And the beautiful nature around the city is perfect for jogging, cross-country skiing, skating etc.

The student accommodation, organized by LOAS is cheap and really good if I compare my other experiences..   I pay 354 euros for my studio which is about 30 square meters with a big balcony. That amount includes electricity, internet, water, heating... 

Lappeenranta is close by St.Petersburg, 2,5 hours away from the capital city Helsinki and the trains go there several times a day (it's around 20 euros one way with the student card. So with that you get -50% off the price). But thanks to the Russian tourists who come to Lappeenranta for shopping, there are quite many nice shops here that wouldn't otherwise exist in a small city like this... 

So yeah, enough with complaining and now more positive attitude. :)

First lecture

The spring semester started for MITIM students on Monday with orientation day followed by Finnish sauna evening. Also Tuesday we had more orientation, mainly about the schedule and the electronic systems, such as Noppa, WebOodi and Blackboard.

Today I had first Russian lesson. Most of the group started already 11th of January, so we have some catching up. At least the vocabulary is different and a bit wider than what we have been learning, but we probably went ahead with the grammatic. The book is (of course) different than the one we used in GSOM, but it looked quite ok. For me the best thing is that it´s in Finnish. Probably for foreign students it´s not that nice..

After Russian we had Strategic Management of Growth lecture. Shot said that it was very Finnish. Maybe she was referring to the professors Finnish way of speaking English, the humor and loose boundaries (it´s not as scary serious as in Russia, the deadlines are up to us, participation is not so required,etc.) and the examples of Finnish companies, such as Fiskars... But I liked the lecture, it was interesting.

Inspired by the lecture, I will go Saturday to buy or loan few books by Sun Tzu and Machiavelli. I don´t know if I can agree that the best way of learning strategy for business is to learn how to fight wars, but that´s what everyone else is doing. So I guess it´s compulsory to understand what everyone else is thinking in the business field. I just hope that I would work for more advantaged company in the future.

(I know, I sound too naive and idealistic sometimes. Today I "had a little bit of sugar and milk in my coffee")