Archive for Travel
May 12, 2005 at 9:22 pm · Filed under Climbing, Daily unimportant sh*t, GMAT, Travel
Today, next to my mathematics (which I begin to grasp but I am still to sloppy) I went to my climbing intro course. Way cool, but, why is it that every time I hang on a wall at about 5 meters grasping for a foothold which is just not made for Dutch feet, I think “So, tell me again: why did you like this?” When I am standing with my two feet on the ground, I know: because it is cool to overwin yourself. The rest of the evening I boulder: another thing I am not good at but hé, if I can learn math, why not bouldering? Then reality kicks in and the answer as well: You’re a smart guy, not a flexible guy, thats why!
May 10, 2005 at 9:19 pm · Filed under Daily unimportant sh*t, GMAT, Travel
Study alone day. A bit boring all by yourself in the Motel6 room. Around 4 I went to StarBucks where they have, next to great coffee, a WIFI internet connection where I can video conference with Guénola. We chatted quite a while and it is silly to experience that you can talk and see but you can’t touch. At least, not without making the lens of your webcam very dirty.
After that, I went to Notre dame de Namur University to buy a sweater and a present for my love. Then I biked around to find a fitness center. In the end, I found a great place called Planet Granite, where you can do fitness and rock climb for “just” $80 a month. I think a see a pattern: everything that is “stuff” is cheap, everything that is service is “extremely expensive”. To top of a relaxed day I ate Thai food and bought some salad for tomorrow’s lunch at Safeway (opened 24 hrs a day: what a invention)
May 9, 2005 at 9:17 pm · Filed under Daily unimportant sh*t, GMAT, Travel
Again loaded with assignments from SB. Most grammar which I don’t resent like a lot of people do and, because I don’t resent it, I’m good at it: I’m such a simple guy!
After the meeting with SB at 17.00 I went to a lovely Indian Restaurant where I was the only customer. I loved these guys and the food was terrific. I will surely come back here
May 7, 2005 at 9:09 pm · Filed under Daily unimportant sh*t, GMAT, Travel
Today I have to study on my own in the hotel and i start at 0900 after a small breakfast at Hobees: lovely place, lovely people but a kind of expensive to do on a daily basis. So I decide to get some breakfast shit in the afternoon. Complaining to my favourite gay-friend helps and he suggest driving me to a car rental. I said that since I’m Dutch I would be better of with a bike and he said he would loooooooove to drive to Taaaaaaarget or something. At Target I buy a mountain bike for a mere 70$ and I’m outside before I know it.
Biking back was not so easy since I didn’t have a map and Americans seems to know their country only when one can relate to a major highway…. Sir, I’m on a bike… O, well, then I don’t know, sorry.
2 hours laters, 15 miles of serious uphill (no fun) and downhill (load of fun and a shot of adrenaline) I arrive at my hotel: to study again. Today is also the first time I should take a full GMAT test. Since I lost track of the time it’s not really representative but I score a 660 (out of 800) which is about the same as I did before in The Netherlands.
After doing a full fletched GMAT I go back to the town center of Belmont (The town center of Belmont is more a collection of parking lots with some buildings around it next to train station). I look for something to eat, but I don’t want to bike in the dark without knowing the place very well, so I land at Togo’s: a friendly sandwich shop. I order a sandwich and the guy asks me if I want French of Dutch bread. “How the heck looks does Dutch bread look like then” I ask. He shows me the bread, but I am sure we don’t have that in Holland. I tell this to the guy behind the counter and he sighs ”It is just a name sir, just a name”. So, I guess I am degraded to something that is just a name. That’s cool: I feel like a cool space being or something….just a name… ET phone hoooooome.
May 6, 2005 at 8:06 pm · Filed under Daily unimportant sh*t, Travel
I arrive at San Francisco International airport and feel ok: a bit tired, but ok. San Francisco time is about 2 o’clock but in Holland it is 23.00 (in the evening); my body thinks its time to go to bed. I catch a bus and a lovely femail fat Afro-American bus driver welcomes me to the USA “Hi bud how are youououo doinnnnnnnnn, get your thing on bus”. Great to meet a happy person on the job. She keeps me from falling asleep and missing my stop. She doesn’t mind I don’t have any quarters yet and lets me of the bus at Ralston, Belmont. “So, where the fuck is my motel” I think. Since nobody I ask knows, so I settle down at Peets café. A couple of minutes later somebody tells me where my hotel is and after finishing my lovely Cafe Latte I head for my hotel. “Are you walking” ask the counter girl at Peets. “yes” “Well have good walk then”. After half an hour walking and struggling with my suitcase I begin to realize what they meant: I arrive at a daunting set of crossroads: no lights, only speeding cars and not the faintest clue about how long I should walk from here. Then in the distance, I spot my motel: Motel6… lovely set between a freeway and the Oracle headquarters: fun.
At the reception I run into a happy face which belonged to a guy whose gaydom one could spot from a fair distance…. “Hi there, hoooooow can IIIIIIIIIIIIIIII help you my friend” Happy having a friend so fast, although it a gay one, I gave him my details and he checks me in and consequently robs me of a dear 1400 bucks.
I go to my room and try to stay awake by not looking at and surely not sitting on my queen-sized bed: if I hit it, I’m surely gone and I want to adjust my body to the new time zone. A walk back to town seems to be the best option and I spend the afternoon drinkin’ café latte and eating some sandwiches. Then at about 20.00 I allow my body to walk back and crash in my queen-sized bed: I can’t remember hitting the mattress
May 5, 2005 at 9:03 pm · Filed under Daily unimportant sh*t, GMAT, Travel
Packin’, and being a bit negative about leaving my love for so long. Accepting it as a fact helps and after a lovely evening I fall asleep, dreaming about whats coming. I don’t have to wait long: at 04.00 the buzzer wakes me up. At 06.00 I am at the airport checking in which leaves 3 hours to go to work, do some stuff and return for boarding. So where am I going? Well I am going to San Francisco because it seems that one of the greatest GMAT teachers live there and I just need a higher score on the test.
G-what? Well the GMAT is a standardized test Business Schools (MBA’s) use to compare candidates on Quantative and Verbal skills. In a 4.5 hour test you have to write 2 essays, 3 verbal tests (Critical Reasoning, Sentence Correction, Reading Comprehension) and 3 mathematics tests (2* Problem solving and 1 Data Sufficiency test). Well so far so good, I did the test and I scored a 640 (in a range of 200 to 800) which is not bad (85th percentile) but for top schools you just need to do better, and ambitious as I am, I want to go to a top-school (INSEAD, ranked 1st in Europe, 7th in the world), hence I have to do something to improve.
In Belmont, CA, lives the only person in the world who scored twice a perfect 800 on this test and next to being brainy he seems to be a good teacher as well. I respect his unique way of approaching things so I decide to go for it: A 4-week long immersion in Verbal and Quantative skills in order to improve 60 points. I aim at scoring a 700 which is about 10% higher then I did score previously. Previously I half-heartedly prepared with an online Princeton Review course. This obviously did not do it for me (too many distractions in daily life) so I resort to this course.
So, off we go, SFO here I come!
