German style BBQ to celebrate end of Trimester

By Bui Vinh Nguyen (William), Vietnamese, Nanyang MBA Participant, Intake 2011

With Trimester 2 exams completed, it signaled that we were half way through our MBA journey at Nanyang. To celebrate this, we gathered at Tanglin View Condo, a centrally located, beautiful condominium near town area. Our gracious hosts were our classmates from Germany who prepared German style BBQ (we had Korean last time). It was an event too, to share stories, laughter and our plans in the near future after our MBA.

Our German hosts for the night - (Left to right) Justus, Florian, and Simon — Our German hosts for the night – (Left to right) Justus, Florian, and Simon

It was a fun and relaxing gathering, especially after one stressful week, capped by a very intensive exam in ADMC or Accounting for Decision Making Control. ADMC is a managerial accounting course with a lot of group work, case studies and presentations. Our Norwegian professor, Hanno Roberts, is friendly and accommodating but, mind you, he is also very demanding when it comes to students’ workload. Despite the challenges we encountered during the course, we also recognized that ADMC is an important course for aspiring managers like us to apply in real management activities. Our peer from Japan, Harutaka-san or Haru, a senior manager from Suntory, a leading Japanese beverage firm, finds that ADMC is extremely helpful for his job as an executive in cutting cost and increasing the cost effectiveness at Suntory,

Preparaing for the German BBQ — Harutaka, 4th from left, always sponsors his company (Suntory) drinks for events at NANYANG MBA. He is seen here with classmates (from left to right) Chinese Zhou Dan, Indian Kabeer, a guest from overseas of one of our classmates, and Filipino Eric.

During the BBQ, we also discussed our travel plans. A number of us were busy preparing to travel around South East Asia. Justus Kaiser, from Germany, is a world traveler. He enjoyed his time doing The NANYANG MBA – he frequently travels on his own or with his family, discovering many beautiful destinations in South East Asia. This time, Justus together with Singaporean Charles and Haru planned to challenge Mount Kinabalu, the highest peak in Borneo’s Crocker Range and the highest mountain in the Malay Archipelago. Mount Kinabalu is found in Kota Kinabalu in Malaysia, a popular short get-away destination, a little over 2 hours plane ride from Singapore, for food, city-activities and a number of outdoor activities including the popular ones like mountain climbing and white water rafting. This is one of the many perks of studying in Singapore – we can hop on a plane and fly to many Asian destinations within 6 hours flight time (and flight tickets are inexpensive, too!). Singapore is, indeed, a travel hub of Asia.

Sharing a good laugh over food (from left to right) - Charles’ wife Bobo, Singaporean Charles, and Japanese Harutaka-san

We also shared our recent experiences on job hunting and internships. We were also brushing up our resumes at this time with the hope of getting our ‘foot in the door.’ Thanks to the dynamic efforts of the Career Development Office, we had chance to meet many companies visiting us on campus, such as: Roland Berger, Solution Providers, Talent Plus, Dream Incubator, SAP, OCBC, and DBS, among many others. The number of internship requirements made available, so far, exceeds the number of MBAs looking for internship. My good friends Filipino Eric and Myanmarese Nyan, started their internships at Adidas

The evening was about enjoying German food (sausages, beer, etc,) and German hospitality, in Singapore’s tropical weather. I never had so much German food in one night. I wonder what is the country of origin of the next BBQ will be.