I arrived in Cambridge this afternoon and was given the keys to my college bedroom, my home for the next year. The room is great – modern, en-suite and a view of Fenner's cricket pitch!

After unloading my boxes from the car, I went down to The Mill pub where some of my cohort had arranged a pre-term get together. Over the following 5 hours, I met around 40 of my future classmates. At some point we moved on to a Thai restaurant and finally the Eagle pub.

A good social start to the programme.

The University of Cambridge has probably given more to mankind that any other institution in the world. It’s rare for an academic to become a household name but many Cambridge academics have done exactly that… Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin and Maynard Keynes all conducted their research at Cambridge, as does Stephen Hawkins today. This is the institution that invented football, discovered the electron and DNA and which invented the jet engine. The university has (so far) produced 81 Nobel Laureates, more than any other university in the world. It goes without saying that this is an inspiring place to study.

Today was my first day at the Judge Business School. Our MBA comprises 107 students from 37 countries. Surprisingly, the largest contingent is not from the UK… The 5 largest national groupings are Indians (13), Chinese (12), Brits (9), Japanese (9) and Americans (9).

I have been assigned to a study group, who I will be working with on various group assignments. My group consists of me (British), Leslie (Canadian / Hong Kong), Roshanthi (Sri Lankan), Kenichiro (Japanese) and Amit (Indian). Having only worked with Europeans and Americans in the past, this culture exposure should prove to be a very positive experience.

The official part of matriculation involves signing two matriculation forms, one for the college and one for the university, during college registration, between meeting the college president’s secretary and picking up your room key.

The fun part, which is optional, is the dinner. Along with the PGCE students, who matriculated at the same time as us, we attended a pre-dinner drinks reception on the college lawn with the university’s vice-chancellor before heading over to the dining hall for a superb dinner, with copious quantities of wine and port. Once the formal part of the evening ended, we headed down to the college bar, which had one of its more profitable evenings.

I’m still not quite sure of the point of matriculation but it was good fun.