Scribbles

It finally dawned on me today that I’m a full time student again. Today was registration day and I picked up my welcome packet, replete with information and tasks. I ran around like a headless chicken throughout the various buildings today to complete those tasks, things like buying health insurance (734 euros!), getting my badge, setting up IT account, verifying completion of my language requirements, locker, signatures, and picking up a ridiculously large bag full of course material (and we still have to buy books). Class begins on Thursday and we already have reading assignments. Overall just a hectic day and a lot less organized that expected. I expected to sit down in an lecture hall and have someone hand-hold us to over what we needed instead of independently reading a ton of instructions and running around on a scavenger hunt. Regardless, it’s mostly done. The one other big nagging thing in the back of my mind is the carte de sejour application, which will require more paperwork and a trip to Paris for a physical. It would’ve helped tremendously if they could have a few doctors here perform the necessary examinations for the couple hundred non-EU students in our international program. Alas, French bureaucracy, what can you do?

I did find out who’s in my group. There are only 4 people as opposed to most groups with 5. Luckily one of my group members is a chateau mate but unluckily, we’re all men. I hear that the groups with women typically have two women, so it’s feast or famine given the ratio of approximately 4 to 1. Word is that they changed the 1 woman per group to 2 because the single woman felt alienated or uncomfortable in past male dominated situations. I don’t know if there’s any truth to that, but I know the women in our chateau can more than hold their own.

Going over my class schedule, I realized that the two month periods (the term used at INSEAD to denote the duration of classes) really resemble summer school classes, with a ton of material crammed into a short time period. The only difference is we have to juggle 5 classes (6 if you have a language course) and the necessary social stuff. I don’t feel mentally prepped for class just yet, but I better soon before it becomes insane.