Getting Settled In

The first two days of my stay in Lausanne required adminstrative tasks.  I had to go to the local commune to get registered (announcing to the local authorities that I would be living in their Canton for a year) and open a Swiss bank account.  I was amazed at the personal attention I was given when opening the account, from the one-on-one hour-long meeting in a private conference room to the espresso served on a silver platter. 

Jetlag and sleeplessness hit me hard this trip, and I was continually exhausted and could tell I was fighting getting sick.  I didn't feel very hungry the first couple of days, but I accounted that to the fact that my body's mealtimes were totally confused.

Lausanne was very cold and very snowy, and the weather reminded me of New York City, except that this year I was no longer seasoned to the cold, as I had spent the first two months of winter in balmy Oklahoma.  It took me 3 days to find the energy to even hang up my clothes, even though I only had a grand total of 4 pairs of pants and a dozen shirts.

I stopped by IMD both days to use the internet and met some fellow students in the process.  The administrative employees for the MBA program were all really nice and helpful, and on the second day I even got a fantastic recommendation for a last-minute hairdresser who gave me a full highlighting and haircut same day, just in time for the formal pictures we had to take on the first day of school.

The night before the first day I hunted down a gym close to my apartment and convinced them to give me a one-day guest pass to try it out before deciding if I wanted to sign up.  Swiss strictness showed in full plumage.  First I was chided for wearing my running shoes into the gym.  I was supposed to have carried my gym shoes with me, worn my street shoes in, and put on blue hospital shoe covers immediately upon entering in order to walk to the dressing room without contaminating the floor with germs from outside.  I went along with it while being both amazed and amused.  I got on a treadmill and began jogging, and within five minutes the attendant hurried over and chided me again, this time for not clipping the safety string to my clothes - ("This is very important for you!" he said).  It took me a while to realize that the speed and distance meters on the treadmill were in kilometers (which explained why my speed of "6" per hour felt so slow - 6km/h = 3.7m/h).

Six of the seven people who interviewed for IMD on the same day as me back in April 2009 were accepted and decided to come to IMD, so I already have some "friends", who in reality are not much more than familiar faces.  Luckily, one of them lives in my building and two of them live in the building next door, so I already have a network springing into place.  After the gym I went next door to Vamshi's apartment (she's from India) because she can pick up a wireless signal, and Roberto came over (he's from Peru) and we shared a bottle of wine, cheered to the coming year, and discussed what we expected on the first day of grad school.

I feel like I'm living in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

This is what my walk to school looks like.

It finally stopped snowing long enough to see the mountains and the lake!  This is the view looking south from my apartment balcony.  The mountains just on the other side of the lake are France.

And the view looking north from my balcony.

I recognized the trees across the street as willows, because they look just like the womping willow from Harry Potter. (what an embarrasing cultural reference)

When I set up my bank account I got my own private conference room.

And was served espresso on a silver platter.

I'm not quite sure what makes this a "Tiger Woods" mini pizza.

The school lunch served an Epiphany pastry that had a hidden figurine inside - whoever got the piece with the figurine was queen/king for the day.  Guess who got lucky . . .