Travel and Personal

Goodbye Geneva

By Dweep Chanana ⋅ October 30, 2005 ⋅  Email this post ⋅ Post a comment

September 1, 2004, late evening. Arrival.
October 30, 2005. 7:45am. Departure.
Time to move on.

More than a year earlier I landed into the most intense, enjoyable, and memorable year of my life. Now, I’m moving on - on to Nairobi, Kenya. My return ticket says 4 months, but you never know…

Why was I here? To do the International Organizations MBA at the University of Geneva.

What did I learn in this year? That Geneva is a cold, grey city that everyone complains about and nobody likes. That I adore Geneva, because it is neither cold nor grey if you can make it into the most glorious summer. Because I can speak any language under the sun and meet people from any country - recognized or not. Because once you are used to biking, a 10 minute commute seems too long. Most of all, because Geneva is the crossroads of the world - two kinds of people come here. Those that come here to retire - they join the United Nations. And those that come here to figure out where to go next. If you stay in one place long enough, you may see the next Pope walk by.

This year was about more than Geneva, though. It was an expensive exercise in self-discovery and relationship management. What I didn’t learn myself, my classmates formed me to learn. For my money, I learnt several interesting academic theories and about the UN. The IOMBA will certainly make you an expert on the UN and international system. But that is a separate topic.

For now, I leave for Nairobi, my internship with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) funded by the IOMBA for 3 months. Like many of my classmates, I don’t know what next. Living a day, a month at a time is not everyone’s thing. It isn’t mine either, but I like the certainty that comes with the uncertainty - the certainty that wherever I’ll be, it will be a new experience, in a new country, surrounded by new people, doing wonderful new things. Solving the problems that plague the world - maybe not? But chipping away at them, at least…