Reporter : K2
It was very hard time in my life. Even though I spent a lot of time in overseas up to now, studying at Stanford GSB put me in very difficult circumstances - studying in native English, devating with incredible students from over 20 different countries, coping with hectic academic life, expanding networking even in busy life, overcoming culture shock..... I noticed such things would happen before leaving Japan for USA; however, the burden on my shoulder was much more than expected. I can say it was a good experience to have harsh burden; however, only people who experienced those things knows how hard it was.
Sometime I felt loneliness especially when I strongly felt burden from the above hard situation. When I need comfort from my family, they were not around me as I left them in Japan. However, what I found here at Stanford and what is now my precious fortune is my frineds here. All students at Stanford GSB was selected from a lot of candidates, thus their career background and academic record are great. What makes me feel "they are my fortune and part of my family" is their integrity and being humble. All people here is very coorperative and never be competitive nor selfish.... This experience opened my eyes what is important in our life and this experience will surely enrich my private and business life following this program. They give me comfort and make me more humble guy with pure integrity. Everybody is eager to contribute to class thus class becomes more enjoyable and comfortable place for all of us.
We finished yesterday our autumn term and had a Sloan Holiday Party at Schwab Residentical Center (located on Stanford Campus). It lasted for almost 5 hours. However, I felt time passed so quickly.... I learned before that if people really enjoying something, she/he feels time passes so quickly. In the meantime, if people should feel a difficulty in killing time, he/she feels time passes so slowly.
I do not know who made this idea; however, we sung a song, which we sung during our west coast trip in November. We can say that this song becomes a theme song of Sloan 2008! The title of song is " My Way". Yes, this song is famous - a song with lyrics written by Paul Anka and popularized by Frank Sinatra.
We spent 4 months together and will spend another 6 months from now. We will have hard time and pleasant time. We can share those time so that impact from hard time becomes less and pleasant time will be more great time. Each student will capture the things in different way and it will become each persson's root to grow up their tree further. They will find their own way for further career and private life. I wish we can repsect ways of others and can sing the song "My Way" again before graduating from Stanford and even after the graduation somewhere in the world. This is really a fun for our classmates and big fortune in our life.