Why Kuala Lumpur

I went looking for the most serious on-ramp I could find to Southeast Asia.

I found it in Kuala Lumpur.

In August, I’m moving to KL for a year to earn my MBA at the Asia School of Business, co-founded by MIT Sloan and Bank Negara Malaysia, Malaysia’s central bank.

The program combines a global cohort with MIT’s action learning model, applied through placements with companies across Asia and beyond.

Not just in a classroom. In the field.

That is how I learn best: applying new knowledge to real problems, testing ideas against real constraints, and observing how people in other places view the world.

Kuala Lumpur also makes practical sense. It sits near the geographic center of ASEAN. It is metropolitan, multicultural, English-speaking, and connected to the rest of the region.

For the first time, I’m resisting the urge to have a complete plan.

This leap is about learning. I trust that what comes next will emerge along the way.

Someone who knows the region well recently told me, “It takes immersion to figure out where the opportunities are.”