“If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?”
- Steve Jobs, delivered as the commencement at Stanford University, June 12, 2005

As you may know the remarkable speech made by one of the most successful business persons in this decade, it must be the feeling all of my fellow classmates shared today. Through the induction events in the 1st week of our life-changing year, we came to recognize that everyday counts (psychologically AND physically), not just because it is a one-year MBA programme, but also because we will have an unimaginable number of notes in our datebook.

So, what took me here? Being born and having spent all years in Japan, a beautiful island country, I bought a one-way ticket to overseas, the first one in my life. By then, I had come to believe that Oxford MBA is my destined course for many reasons: it has truly global and matured student body; it maximizes students’ experiences through the University brand and academic rigor, it pursues excellent business education from holistic perspectives, paying special attention to social goodness.

These beliefs were naturally proved through the induction week. We were told that the class of 2009-2010 consists of 240 students from 48 countries, 29+ years old on average. We were taught how to leverage the incomparable Oxford brand and academic challenges. We were thrilled by a director’s welcome speech, mentioning a number “30,000”, which is obviously not the amount of salary increase that we expect at the exit of MBA, but the number of children’s death per day caused by hunger and disease.

Now, here we are. The gate is opening and it is time to take off. I know that the 1st week functioned well enough to raise the expectations at the highest spree. Even so, I am still comfortable in saying that this year’s experience will meet them.