all the best!

Martin

So with our last few weeks before moving, we decided to take a quick holiday to Japan, stopping at Tokyo, Hakone, Kyoto, Osaka & Hiroshima among others..

Loads more amazing photos on Silvia's flickr 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/squeakandsleep/sets/72157622642796863/

We spent a lot of great time at Sushi counters in our two week stay, from breakfast at the food market (above), to an amazing place in Kyoto (below), to even some farewell pieces with some morning sake at Tokyo Narita before our flight!

Some last thoughts before I leave Italy for work, although I’ll be back often to see Silvia’s family, overall it will be a real shame to leave but sadly the work opportunities are limited for me despite the Bocconi experience.  I hope to be able to return to live here again in the next few years but what I've learned in my year below about the country is condensed below.

What I love about Italy
•    The country – beautiful of course
•    The food – nuff said
•    The wine - nuff said - also helps my italian
•    The lifestyle – summer on the beach, winter in the mountains or round the table, stylish clothes - amazing
•    The people – funny, welcoming and great to spend time with

What is hard about Italy
•    Public administration, Timekeeping and getting anything done quickly
•    Everything is subject to change, and nothing even the law is fixed
•    Queuing doesn't exist
•    Parking (a Milano)

Well its the end of my course, after over 1 year in total around 14 months including a brief 3 months working in Berlin.  This was my 'year off' present after 8 years at Yahoo! and for me a chance to get back to Europe, learn more about it and live outside of the UK in Italy for the first time. 

However the MBA was a big investment financially and physically and I've had many people approach me about it with questions so I wanted to note down a few things they might find useful.

1. Good 1 yr program overall - Overall looking back I think the MBA as a program is interesting, its given me a grounding in traditional business which I hadn't had before and forced me to learn 'the basics' of business in addition to working on some things I've wanted to do for ages, namely Entrepreneurship and writing and pitching a business plan and learning about a new part of the industry - in my case the mobile and mobile services business.  Plus it was a pretty quick year program including 3 months of work/internship, for those at the usual 2 year classes in US schools I don't know how you do (did) it!
   
2. Out of date? - However in particular at SDA Bocconi the program is in need of serious modernization, arriving in Milan from San Francisco last year was also a bit like a step back in time. Bocconi is known for finance and to a lesser extent marking and strategy, and finance was excellently taught. However there is a knowing wariness to technology - this was not all due to the 'old country', in my belief institutions that are teaching the leaders of tomorrow (their words not mine) need to understand that technology is going to play more of a role not less in all their lives, yet the focus was far away from any modern technology for much of the program.  Technology was still seen as the same as IT and even the careers service at the school struggled to understand the opportunity for placing graduates and roles and find opportunities for those interested in the tech industry, despite it being a major recruiter for MBA grads in the US over 14%, its less than 1% at SDA Bocconi.
3. Job hunting for me spoiled the program - it made the focus on the next job rather than on finding out what you want to do and exploring other careers.  For most of the 1 year course students, (Jan - May) then Sept onwards students were interviewing either for internship or full time vacancies, and I think this did a bit more harm than good. It meant working on group projects harder and therefore the quality of the work suffered throughout. Due to the crisis the amount of vacancies were reduced then meant tough time for students, as many companies could be more choosy, and many incredibly even interviewed up to 30 people for 1 internship position.  Surely a complete waste of time for both parties.  Also at time of writing the majority of students out of 110 total leaving the program had not secured a permanent job.
   
4. Social Aspects - Also while I took value from the course, the social aspect is probably the most appealing aspect for some people, and I think younger people got more from the course for that reason.  I were to recommend it I would suggest it for slightly younger people,  25-28 ish max and single, a few people my age or older said they would be interested but maybe an exec program is more suitable or look at IMD or similar would be my advice.
5. Timing is crucial, while taking the year out after the US was perfect for me, I wasn't expecting a huge financial crisis and neither were my classmates; this affected the classes, the mood and the opportunities after graduation. However on the flip side, classes became much more interesting as we could see around us what was happening and get detailed explanations as to why and what it meant.  It would've been a much different experience 2 years earlier, or indeed 2 years after.
6. Workload - At times was very intense particularly in the first term, but was manageable in a 1 year full time program and is achievable easily in 8-9 months.  The tough trick I think is to give yourself more time to study the things you want to on top of the things you have to..I can imagine it being tough in a 2 yr part time course on top of a full time job, a friend who had did this called this 'the worst two years of his life..'.
   

Managed to fit in a great weekend in Florence, a beautiful city  and fantastic food – principally the Fiorentina!  Also since Silvia was working closely with TIM and there 3 days a week for work, managed to get back to Rome again.  Managed to fit in a good days sight seeing with the pup that involved just the two of us, the vatican, and a 4 course lunch so good we even took Silvia the next day....

Great to return ‘home’ after Berlin to Milan to return to the great parking and the beautiful people after their summer on the beach.  September we had great weather in Milan, an average of 28 degrees and sunny each day.  With a smaller work load at SDA Bocconi each day I had a bit more time to walk the dog and spend some time enjoying myself which was much appreciated!

So despite spending most of the summer in slightly wet and cold but very cool Berlin, I did get back to Italy for the Italian summer break for a few days for Ferragosto.

I got down to a very packed beach for the final few days and big fish dinner on the beach and fireworks on the Saturday night.

There were people everywhere taking advantage of most Italian businesses being closed at least a couple of weeks and was very impressed by the quantity of people and degree of tans everyone was proudly showing off.

It was very nice being among all the Italian extended families though and being part of the dinner and the summer celebration and recommend anyone who has the chance to try and be with an italian family at this time, really a festival of summer and the good life!

More info

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferragosto

In order to complete my mission of a 1 year blog of the MBA and Italy, just wrapping a few half-finished entries from over the summer I forgot to upload. Overall had a fun summer in Berlin in Kreuzberg and with the project and the team at Nokia services in Berlin,  some highlights below

1. Berlin International Beer Festival (see above) featuring 2km of beers and food stalls - such a shame I'll miss Oktoberfest!
   
2. Berlin Music Festival in the airport - featuring an awesome show stealing display of German language skills by Mr Jarvis Cocker (see below pic and http://www.berlinfestival.de/)
   
3. Lots of very nice visits by people, honorable mentions but not limited to Silvia and the Pupster, Mum and Jen, Morena, Glenn and Danielle, SDA Bocconi chums and many more.....

There were loads around for the world cup, but even more this year I've noticed so far in Berlin loads of beach bars, all along the spree, often with cocktails, music plus sand and palm trees!

I've even found a beach bar on a roof of a car park where the latest Toytown expat drinks party was held!  Complete with minimalist techno soundtrack and v.strong mojito's.

So as JFK said I am now a local or sommat in Berlin for the summer from now until end of August.  I'm working with one of Nokia's many teams working on 'Social Locations or SO LO' which should be interesting once I can work out what it is all about. So the year in Italy has added in a few months in Germany and I'll add slowly some random observations on the city as I explore them.  First of which is that where I'm leaving in Kreuzburg today really reminds me of Camden, bit dirty, known as being cool, with great pubs!

Apartment was called Casa Lory and was great spacious rooms and considering the area not too bad for the price.

http://www.tripadvisor.it/Hotel_Review-g187834-d1380607-Reviews-Casa_Lory_Crotto_Bellagio-Bellagio_Lake_Como_Lombardy.html

Excellent local trattoria which actually had great value excellent pasta as well as Barcetta in the main town which was really good but watch out for the pasta sauce with fish eggs that jumps on your shirt!

http://travel.nytimes.com/travel/guides/europe/italy/lake-como/42630/ristorante-barchetta/restaurant-detail.html

http://www.ristorantemella.it/english/index2.htm

Great event this weekend in Milan we attended which was incredibly popular was an event around the Salone del Mobile international furniture design festival, and it highlighted the design area around via tortona.

We attended a number of events in the Zona Tortona area where a huge number of streets were crowded with people to see cool new furniture design setup in galleries close to porta genova.

It was really interesting to see the streets packed out to see new industrial design but very cool to see also, with a lot of it very affordable - such as the cool recyclable umbrella's above.

Some links with more info http://www.zonatortona.net/index.html

http://www.blackbookmag.com/article/milans-salone-del-mobile-zona-tortona/7307

We had a very relaxing break for Easter & my birthday staying in a small quiet rented apartment near San Gimignano in Toscana or "Chiantishire" as its known....and driving around eating, wine tasting and visiting the picturesque villages around.

To be honest, while the area is undoubtedly lovely, so far in Italy I've rarely seen so many tourists and signs, menu's & everything in english.  While obviously very handy it did detract from the experience a bit, and many other people we talked to found it a bit much.

We ate at two fantastic restaurants alongside all the other simply very good ones - Castello Banfi and Taverna Banfi http://www.banfi.it/ & the excellent Osteria del Vicario http://www.osteriadelvicario.it/2007/index.html on the 10th for a giant 800g Bistecca alla Fiorentina and a fantastic bottle of Brunello di Montalcino.  Truly recommended if your ever in the this neck of the woods....

We are staying not far from the Chianti area, and hope to try some Brunello di Montalcino amongst other wines.  Hope its a nice as La Morra (below) and the Barolo area we managed to spend a day in earlier this year...however weather forecast is rain....so we'll see....

However our pup who is friendly with everyone in the world... is not that friendly when confronted with a hairdryer - see below