Today, I'm feeling a strong sense of nostalgia and sadness. I attended my last MSc class and said farewell to a lot of my classmates who I'd now only be likely to run into over the summer when we work on our dissertations. Over the last nine months, so many of us have turned from strangers into best of friends… and it's unimaginable to think that in a few months, the program will officially come to an end.
The last month has been breakneck academically. We've had multiple group meetings that begin as soon as the AMBS building opens up at 8am that run until it closes at 8pm… yes, we do break for a pizza in the middle :) Working in groups with different classmates on different projects is so beneficial - it gives you insights into working with people from different backgrounds and nationalities and also shows you a different side to people you think you know. It was brilliant getting to know so many of my classmates quite intimately over the last month by default - being stuck in a room with all of them for hours on end!
We also had Poster Day towards the end of March - where we presented our dissertation proposals on a poster and faculty members came around and shared their two cents with us about how it can improve - a very productive session indeed.
I finished my last major group assignment in the beginning of April - giving all of us some time to enjoy a very well-deserved Easter break.
My classes and professors have all been excellent this semester - I'm proud to say that Alex Gunz's consumer behaviour, Magda Hassan's international marketing, and Pedro Sampaio's digital business classes were insightful and taught me a range of different marketing concepts. While I do wish we had a chance to take more electives, I'm very happy with the three that I selected, and would highly recommend each of these courses to anyone next semester.
It's so important to keep yourself going with something else, aside from academics, especially when things start getting busier. For me, it was cricket. We're getting closer to the start of the university cricket season, and the team has been training hard to get into a good position to win the league. I'm looking forward to representing the University of Manchester in May - and you'll know how we've done depending on whether I post about it :)
March brought funny weather to Manchester, we had a string of sunny days, where we brought out our sunglasses and pretended like it was warm…and then a succession of gloomy, cloudy days. But then again, that's Manchester for you. I do hope it gets warmer after Easter though; I am a warm-weather boy deep down!
I wish all of you a pleasant Easter break - enjoy your vacation; I know I will!
