Orientation began Thursday, August 13th and went on for a week and a half of fun. There's so much to say, I'm going to divide my Orientation review into 3 blog posts.

We kicked off Day 1 with a super-energized talk by Debra Fine on the Art of Small Talk, a great way to kick things off in my opinion, because I could see her tips in action during orientation -- people employing them to break the ice with our new classmates and making meaningful conversations. We also had talk on Lessons in Leadership by professor Jim LoPresti, who really is an absolute delight.

Social gatherings on almost all days of orientation gave us lots of time to get to know our classmates, apart from getting free food and drinks =) On the first day, we had a family barbeque at the business field, which was right after the partners/significant others' orientation. **Interesting trivia: One of our classmates, Rick Rampton's wife Emily, who was with us at the barbeque, was due with their first baby that very day! Amazingly, she was a picture of calm and they became proud parents to baby Adelaide 4 days later. Congratulations guys!**

Now, Day 2 was super fun. We had been assigned team building activities at an outdoor location. To be honest, I was a little skeptical about the whole thing since I'm not exactly what you would call an 'outdoors person' (that should change soon though). So we went up to Joder Ranch and headed out separately in 10 groups of around 12 people each. The activities seemed a bit odd when we started out, but then at the end of each activity we were made to introspect and relate that experience to something we will face during the course of our MBA and beyond.

It was a very unconventional experience, but I kid you not, the insight was fantastic! I really wish we get a chance to do this again in between semesters so that we can understand how we used what we learned there and what we can do to improve. A truly wonderful experience!

*Look out for Part 2 of my MBA orientation review later this week!

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This post can also be found on the official Leeds MBA Experience Blog at http://www.cuboulderblogs.com/mba.