Microfinance for Lead Foundation

Right now I should be reading and creating slides for the competition I’m in, but I can’t focus at all. It’s hard to focus on something that you just don’t understand, especially when you have very limited time to study and try to learn it.

I entered myself into the Women’s World Banking Microfinance Competition. Why? Well, it sounded like a good idea at the time. I’m on a team of six JPMorgan employees (mainly from the Investment Bank) and we’re trying to “optimize the capital structure” for a NGO-Microfinance Institution in Cairo, Egypt (Lead Foundation). I don’t even know what this means, so don’t feel too confused. This makes it even more difficult for me to create the slides (this part is my job) for our presentation.

We started with only a month left before the competition. We have to understand the financial structure of the NGO-MFI, the client base and products offered, the legal structure of Egypt and then try and recommend ways in which to make more money, while reducing costs. Every week we get on a call with the president of the Foundation to ask questions. He’s really helpful, but I have such a hard time understanding anything he says. The accent is difficult and it doesn’t help that I’m clueless to all the acronyms associated with microfinance.

Like I said, most of the people in my group work in the IB. They have created a model, which includes the Foundation’s balance sheet information. They can tweak the assumptions in the model and it will spit back different scenarios to us. How they know how to do all of this is so amazing to me. One of the girls is only 2 years older than me, yet she’s helping to build this model with the more senior people on the team. I give them a lot of credit for putting together the information. It’s quite amazing.

But now it’s my turn to do something for the group…the slides. I told them I was good at powerpoint (which I am) and they were all very happy about that because they never use powerpoint. The only problem is that they are expecting me to understand what they are giving me and then just create some amazing slides for the group. Um…easier said than done.

I’ve been here at work on a Saturday now for about two hours and I’m still sitting here staring at a blank powerpoint slide. So frustrating. I have a very large stack of papers that I need to read for this presentation, but I’m just not sure where to start.

When it’s all said and done, I’ll be happy that I participated because I know I’ll learn something from this experience, but right now I’m really regretting signing myself up for this. I’d rather be at home right now taking a nap.

Here is the website to the Foundation. http://www.lead.org.eg/default.html

My To Do List...what's yours?

I just finished watching MTV's "The Buried Life" and it really got me thinking, what would I like to do before I die?

It's a hard question to answer actually. If someone made you answer the top 10 things you'd like to do before you die, what would you say? There are so many places I want to travel to and so many things I'd really like to see in life. It's tough, but here is my initial list, which could probably change tomorrow when I think of a few more...

10) Run a marathon (...okay, so maybe just a half marathon)
9) Swim with a Dolphin (I'm hoping the Dolphin takes my mind off of my fear of water)
8) Learn French and actually use it by moving to France or Geneva
7) Zip line through the jungle
6) Work on a vineyard in Europe for a month
5) Humanitarian work in Africa or South America
4) Figure out my family tree and share it with my family (whether they like it or not)
3) Braid my little girl's pig-tails
2) Climb to the top of a really large mountain or volcano and scream
1) Knock on my biological father's front door

In need of a vacation...

I haven’t been on a real vacation since my trip with Mike to Paris and the Burgundy Wine region. This was my first time in Europe and the first time I truly left the country (not so sure Canada and Bahamas counts that much). It was a really amazing trip. I’m French, so it was even more special for me than Mike (Italian).

Well, it’s his turn to really feel special. We’re now planning and hopefully booking out next big trip to Europe. This is a doosey of a list too: Palermo, Taormina, Rome, Dublin, Llanfairfechan, and then London.

Sicily
We’re going to Sicily first (I think) for 4 days to continue our “wine tour around the world theme”. Mike’s family is from Palermo and his last name is Taormina, so it makes sense for us to go. Only problem for me is that he’s already been! I’d rather our trips be new and fresh to the both of us, but he’s already been to the places we’re about to go. I think this sucks, he thinks it’ll be fine. Ehh, whatever, at least he’ll know where he’s going. He tells me there is a big volcano in Taormina…we’re definitely climbing to the top of this bad boy.

Rome
Lisa, Mike’s sister, is studying in Rome right now and will be finishing up her semester by the time we show up. Mike’s already been here too but I cannot wait to see the Sistine Chapel and Colosseum! I don’t care if he’s already seen them.

Dublin
We through this part of the trip in last second, just because. Mike says I’ll actually like Guinness from Dublin…we’ll see, but I’ll probably still think it tastes like hot dogs (?!). We’re taking a ferry from Dublin over to Wales next.

Llanfairfechan, Wales
You’re probably thinking “wtf?!” because I certainly was at first too. Mike’s friend, Ian, is turning 30 and he’s putting on a pretty fabulous birthday bash. He has rented a castle in Llanfairfechan, Wales for a bunch of his friends. He is renting out places to stay at bed and breakfasts’ around town and isn’t charging a thing for people that have traveled to come to this. Pretty crazy! I’ve been trying to find things to do in Llanfairfechan, but it doesn’t look like much. The party's theme is the Roaring 20s. I’ll definitely need some pretty amazing 20s inspired costumes for this though. Hopefully everyone else dresses up. Check out his website below (yes, he even made a website for this). http://www.iancurry.com/30main.htm

London
Our stop in London will be really quick but will be the end of our 2 week long trip of traveling to random places. Mike studied at LSE for a year, so he’s pretty familiar with London, but I’ve always wanted to see it. Hopefully he was too poor while in school there and wasn’t able to do the touristy things that I want to check out.

Then it’s back home and back to work. Ugh, I’m already dreading this part.