Marquis' Weblog

"I'm going back to Cali...Cali...Cali..."

It looks like my time on the East Coast for this summer has come to an end. In a few minutes, I'm going to be leaving for the airport for that long flight back out to Cali and will be starting classes again in a few weeks. I can't believe that the summer is coming to a close already...it feels like I was just landing at Dulles Airport yesterday after my Spring quarter finals. I've already mentioned how much I learned during my internship, so I won't go into that again. Instead, I'll just say that it was all of the non-internship experiences that have made this a great summer so far.

As I look toward making another trip from VA to Stanford to start a school year, I can't help but think about how different I am from the kid who loaded up his car and drove cross country last August. I left here knowing nothing about the business game and now my overall business acumen has grown by leaps and bounds. More importantly, my strategic and analytical skills have gotten hecka sharp. A few days ago, my man Rashad (GSB 2006) hit me up to help him figure out a supplier cost problem for a GMIX project he's doing in China and I naturally broke it down like a consulting case interview question. Then, earlier today, one of my former coworkers who now works for a professional sports league asked me for help with developing a yield management strategy for ticket sales and I was surprised at how quickly my mind broke the problem down and came up with ideas. My business game is getting SO crucial and, if I can ever get the overall polish that my peoples say I need, I might do some damage one day. Bump Donald Trump...I might need to start making plans to bring him on as my apprentice... ;-)

Before I hit the road, I'll give out one more set of shout-outs:
- a "I'll be back soon" shout out to my mother. I know she'd rather have me stay around for linger since I spent most of the summer up north, but she knows that I'm trying to do it up real big and build her a church one day. By the way, Mom, if you're reading this, congrats again on your rcent ordination *hug*
- a "hurry up and have that baby" shout out to my sister Monica. I thought she'd be having my neice before I left, but she didn't, so now I'm just going to have to plan to come back here in 4-5 weeks to be able to see the little one.
- a "Congratulations" shout out goes to my man Travis, who just finished a hellish clerkship with a Circuit Court judge in LA. I swear that judge was trying to kill my boy with all that work, but he survived and now he's getting some quality time in with his GF. Travis, if you're reading this, biggups to you, blackman. *dap*
- a "you're a cool cat" shout out goes to my girl Nina, who has to be one of the illest females on the planet. I met her about 2 weeks ago through my girl "Yoda" (GSB 2007) and was surprised to see that there was a girl out there who was into hip hop as much as me and, even wilder, she's the most "gangsta acting" Indian girl in the world. We've hung out a lot and, since she has been reading this blog, I figured that she was "shout out"-worthy.
- a "Thank you" shout out goes to all of my other family, friends, and coworkers that made this a good summer for The Kid. I'll have a lot of things to remember and smile about while I'm struggling through Corporate Finance in the Fall.