Favorite Restaurant: Sapori Trattoria

This is the first time I checked out this restaurant in Lincoln Park and I am utterly shocked I have not been before. This is by far my favorite Italian in the city as the linguini was homemade and my dish was fresh and absolutely delicious. The price was right too with entrees at about $15-35.

I am still dreaming about it.

Also, the chef, because we had to wait fifteen minutes for our table when we had a reservation, ended up giving us some bruschetta to apologize for our wait. Don't worry Alessandra, I pronounced it correctly and with your accent too. I am really excited for the next time I get to eat here. Below are some photos of our Saturday date! The editor on blogspot won't work, but the first photo is of Kelly and her Porchini mushroom risotto and the other is my meal, which was a special linguini and red sauce with clams, oysters, salmon, scallops and shrimp. See the website here as well

Favorite Moment: Meeting with Father Hesburgh

Last week, despite finals, my MBAA board and I had a meeting with Father Hesburgh. It took about a month of trying to schedule a meeting as his assistant was out on Christmas break, but my team and I finally got our 45 minutes with him!

Father Hesburgh's office is up on the 13th floor of the Hesburgh library (shocking name I know) and he has quite the office compiled of a seating room, a hallway full of awards and a huge office with a bowl full of MnMs and cigars. 

Below are some of the questions we asked and the answers that he gave us..of course not verbatim, but what I remember from our long conversation!

Favorite President he's met: Eisenhower (yea..eisenhower..i was expecting maybe a president from the past 30 years but no biggie) Favorite City: Rome from when he was studying to be a priest 

Favorite location on ND's campus: the Grotto and the Basilica 

Most Inspiring Person He Has Met: MLK Jr. 

Political stance: Independent (he repeated this a couple times during our conversation..."I am not a Republican. I am not a Democrat. I am an independent.") 

Where he gets his inspiration? Our Lady (every day when he looks out of his office

Greatest accomplishment: Civil rights. He repeated over and over again his enthusiasm for how many Hispanics the ND community has attracted and how proud he was when in 1947, ND had its first black graduate. He also is proud of his work with the blacks and about three time repeated that we had a black president and that it was because of what they did back in the 70s that made it possible.

..and on a fun note: Favorite Sports Moment: When Notre Dame wins the NCAA tournament this year or the BCS championship next year!

The Congressional Medal of Freedom

The MBAA Team with Father Hesburgh

The hallway of medals and honors

Rob, Chris and I outside Father Hesburgh's library

Favorite Forward: Women

Could this be why we only have 27 women in our class at school? Just kidding, but I personally LOVE the map of going to GAP. Check out below:

Favorite Friday: Jeff Hollender

Fridays are a day of rest for the MBA clan at Notre Dame. We are able to catch up on all the work we have been delaying, attend speaker series, practice interviewing...or play video games and watch movies (might as well give a realistic touch to things here.)

Today, I decided to be productive and studied for most of the day, but as I am a member of Net Impact, I also attended a speech and Q&A session with Jeff Hollender. Jeff is the founder of Seventh Generation and is the ex-CEO prior to getting fired this past October (yes, he was fired from the company he founded). Jeff started the company in 1988, his third entrepreneurial enterprise, and led it until this past year. Seventh Generation's motto is to ensure that each decision the company makes has considered the impact on the next seven generations; thus, its name. It makes non-toxic products for the household such as baby wipes, detergent, toilet paper and other cleaners and is located in many stores from Target to Walmart so you may have seen the products.

Jeff is a true idealist at heart. He believes that he can change how America is run and has worked on countless councils and boards speaking about sustainability and activism. When my turn came up for a question though, instead of asking the typical questions about greenwashing, sustainability and entrepreneurial "best practices," I was curious about how he positioned himself in reaction to the past several months. He discussed repurposing and repositioning himself. He mentioned not trusting anyone in business and in a matter of words, how when one founds a company, to never let go of the majority stakeholder. He doesn't know where his next move is, but I am sure it won't be a quiet one. It was interesting to see just one more person who has been deceived by shareholders, big business and corporate egos.

Anyways, to see the speech, go to the following website. It isn't up yet, but should be soon. Note that this isn't the talk I went to, but one he gave in the morning to the auditorium.

http://business.nd.edu/news_and_events/speaker_series/ten_years_hence/