The TimePass of India

When I was a kid, the only night I got to stay up till 12 in the night was the NEW year's eve. Then after I joined Engineering, usually I stayed out till 2 in the night. In MDI, the parties would go on till 4. But the ultimate were always the parties that you read about on Page 3 of News-dailies.

Now its not the same party that most guys have on a Saturday night back home. These parties in Berlin are a trip to crazy and back. Some parties just leave you at crazy and forget to take you back - Beware of such parties. Such parties are suitable only for Michael Jackson (R.I.P mate) and his friends (the ones over 18 years of age).

So I went to this party or should I call them parties coz they are in plural, and it was like crazy. Now I dont want you to think that I havent been to/have been invited for any parties. As you might have guessed, I am like, super popular here in Berlin too... And everyone wants a piece of Arshat coolcucumber... Now being a nice guy, I do like to appease people and go to every party that get invited to, which is Every party btw.

But of course I have my own constraints... I am not a party machine now, am I? Wait... maybe I am!

So this pretty blonde girl asked me out... I kid-you-not, she really did...!! So maybe she called like a group of 8 people to go out, but my friends in India and my son are gonna hear a different story! :P

If I have learnt anything from German TV, it would be never to turn down a blondie.

Now my regular readers (all 3 of you) know that I am a quiet guys who usually keeps to himself unless he really likes you after which he showers you with a mix of funny anecdotes and knowledge tit-bits. If you have noticed that I am like that with you, go buy yourself a chocolate medal. Others, keep trying :P

So as a quiet guy, I never really attended many parties. My engineering background and my straight A's made sure I spent Saturday nights cuddling with my books. Okay, go ahead make fun of me... But now, I can talk bout cars till dawn and you can not! And some of that talk does turn on some hot girls in the class, so there! In your face!.... Okay, I am kidding. My little 3rd and 4th cousins read this blog and I would like to tell you guys, car talk aint hot... Cuddling with books takes you nowhere! Maybe it takes you to IIT or better SPCE, but we have a girl:boy ratio of 1:147, that's where you want to end up? haan? haan? :)

The night started with quiet drinks. And it ended with quiet drinks... But inbetween lay the crazy. I wont explain the crazy as a timeline... It just started randomly, like it used to happen in class back in the 6th grade when the teacher was not around. One notorious guy with the name Chetan or Karan used to throw a chalk at someone and then would start the chalk fight of the century. The fight would end with one of the chalk pieces hitting the teacher between the eyes.. wait.. does this story sound like David and Goliath to any of you?

The evening had started at around 8 and all of a sudden it was 3 in the night! The night had just begun... Imagine that! The night began at 3!

Now in Mumbai/Delhi, the pubs have a realistic feel to them. They spend money for it to look swanky and stuff. There is a huge dance floor depending on whether you are Delhi or Mumbai. Its smaller if you are in Mumbai, coz, well, lack of space. Btw, did you know that in 1997, Mumbai real estate was costlier than Manhattan?! without the PPP! So anyway, there is a DJ playing songs with the words - Mainu, tainu, Ahun Ahun, balle, shava if you are in a Delhi pub and English songs if you in Mumbai. The number of English songs played depends on how further south Mumbai are you ready to go! There are 3-4 big bouncers in pubs in Mumbai to control the crowds. In Delhi the number of bouncers and their body-size doubles to control drunk Sardarjis, most of whom are as big as the bouncers themselves.

The bar occupies double the area and have more people crowding it than Mumbai. The bartenders are themselves drunk and go like-

"Mainu nahi karna pyaar.. ahun ahun ahun" when asked for a drink...

The point is, it looks regular... In the pub we went to in Berlin, well, it was like the inside of a Submarine... It was all red and green and blue and bare brick walls. It has all these pipes running through the pub. And there was this huge pipe with sofas inside and stuff!! How cool...

Now there werent any Bouncers in this club or maybe they must have hid themselves after they saw me coming. I tell you, the tales of my bravery are spread far and wide. But the bartenders were scary. I am so used to ahun..ahun..ahun... when asked for a beer. And they werent drunk at all!

I went -"Ein Bier bitte?" (One beer please, I hope it means that)

"Diese? oder Diese?"(This or this one?)

She could make out there were two different types of beer in the fridge!! She wasnt drunk even by a bit! Disappointing I tell ya! :P

The songs played were without any lyrics - they went - dhumchuk dhumchuk twing twing twing... And people - i-kid-you-not - the people had the beat memorized!!!! So after dhumchuk dhumchuk, they went in chorus - twing twing twing... It was in one word - Awesome!

So I was just soaking in the twing twing twing in me and trying to synchronise my dance steps, giving the Germans the complex of their lifetimes, just then a girl comes to me and says -

"What?" I shouted.

"You Indian?" she shouted. It was difficult to hear her over the dhumchuk dhumchuk

"Yes, also Kathak is from India" I shouted proudly.

So after getting my ego thrashed from a girl whose only sense of dancing was to sway her curls from left side to the right, I went and sat in one of those Submarine sofas. And there I saw a boy and girl... well... since my cousins are reading it - I saw a boy and a girl "make notes". Now its cool in Germany to "make notes" in the train, airport, taxi, Brandenburger Tor, but these two were making like notes real hard... Like they had an exam coming up. The girl was also reciting the notes they were making. I am no prude. Well I am a lil. I made sure I made the notes makers a little conscious. hehe. What? Daddy's gotta have some fun too!

I hid behind the bar to see if the curly haired girl who had crushed my dancing ego had left. She was there dancing, thankfully here hair covered her face and eyes and she couldnt see me dancing in the corner. I was doing the best moves Berlin had seen since the last time Michael Jackson was here and I was giving them what they wanted. Obviously, the pretty blonde girl I had come there noticed me and invited me to dance with her.

Now I was dancing my heart out when I froze. My lower jaw fell down, forming a huge gap, formerly known as the pie-hole. The girl stopped dancing and shouted-

"Isnt dancing your thing?"

Of course dancing is my thing! I just showed Berlin the dance moves!

I came back and sat on a bench made of pipes and bricks. I now disclose, for the first time on this blog, what I actually saw that made me stop in between my jig -

I saw.. ahem... two girls "make notes" Oh yeah... I saw what most of Mechanical Engineers with, usually just 1 girl in their class dream of! Everytime there are two girls - standing, talking or the best - fighting, they think something will happen that would make them start taking notes! But it never does happen!!

Today, I became the first in my class of SPCE Mechanical Engineering, class of 2007, to witness it. If any of you have already done it, I have a blog and i have written it down... So I am officially the first, suck it up!

So anyway, after having so much of crazy, I hate to admit, I was tired. And I was the only one of my group who was tired. For the rest, the party had just started! They did some pub hopping, which essentially means, go from one pub to another till all the pubs in the city close down post noon.

I came out of the dark interiors of the pub into the soft light of the morning Sun. The slight chill of the German Summer was in the air. We sat in the taxi and they dropped me at the station. I got into the train. Swaying slightly as the train rocked the rails. It was 7 in the morning. I had partied for the last 11 hours!

I remembered the Page 3 headlines announcing that the party went on till the wee hours of the morning. Wee hours meaning 5 am. Here I was, wondering about how MDI parties lasted till 4 in morning and that seemed a big deal. I remembered how as a kid, staying awake till 12 at New years eve seemed like a big deal. And now, here I was wide awake at 7 am, with a night of dhumchuk dhumchuk, making notes and pub hopping behind me. I looked out of the window to see my station approach. I got out of the train, did a little jig and twing twing twing.....

I started blogging on a winter day on Jan 19 2007. Or was it Jan 17 2007? It doesnt really matter much.. If you parents came and told you that you were born 3 days before the date you thought you were, would it matter? Birthdays, CGPAs, salaries, no. of girl who find you hot, is just a number... You should never let it go to your head. This is the kinda speech I would give to my son if I forgot his bday. Yeah, got it all figured out.

That reminds me, I love kids. Especially the blonde ones. Blonde babies are the super subset of cuteness. They are so blonde.. and so pink! Sometimes I am hungry, and I see a blonde baby, I want to eat it up.. they are that cute! (and tasty!)

Talking about about blondies, I know how you horny bastards have arrived on this blog. You searched for hot blondes and google directed you to this blog. Guess what? There are no pictures of hot blondies here... Well, just so that you dont feel cheated I ll throw in one.. But just one! This one-

Coming back tot he super interesting topic of blondies, well, I went to this place in Berlin called Brandenburger Tor. I would have posted the pic, but its essentially a gate, and I know that most of you dont want to look at a huge gate after looking at the blondie pic. Most of you have stopped reading already.

So this place, its surrounded by a sea of Blonde German girls. Now I have seen French girls, and I am not arguing about their beauty. They are amongst the prettiest women in the world. But German girls are real pretty too. Different from French girls. But pretty. I dont know how to describe their prettiness without being vulgar.

So anyway, I am surrounded by a sea of pretty girls, but it gets better. (Special request to my engineering friends : Dont execute your fantasies, nothing of that sort happened). You see, Germany is cold. Winter lasts for like 6 months here. So every time the Sun shines, people storm out like Indians do on the 26 Jan sale at Big Bazar. And the girls see the Sun as a special invite to show their legs.

So there are legs all around me. Amongst the best legs I have seen ever.

A note to the girls who read my blog (all three of you), you wont really understand what a guy's fixation with legs is. It's difficult to explain. But to give you an idea what good legs look like, following are a few pointers

The point is, they were pretty girls with short clothes and long legs. Now even in Mumbai, when you see a pretty girl with like nice legs, you are bound to give her a customary glance.

A glance has to be limited between 3 sec (for it to be a legally valid glance) to 7 secs (for it not to label you as a bloody tharki by your friends.)

Its easy to give a glance in Mumbai, there arent that many girls who wear short skirts all at the same time. You see, unlike Germany, Sun makes more appearances than Paris Hilton's naked videos do. So in Mumbai, out on the streets, if there is a group of girls going out for a party or dinner or something, there's only one girl who wears a short skirt. It's like a pact between Indian women. Only one of them can look superhot on a particular day. They have divided days according to it - Wednesdays for Preeti, Thursdays for Ragini, Fridays for Priya.. you get the drift... Btw, the names are random, I dont know any girls by these names. The order of hot looking days is also random. Or is it? ;)

So, in Mumbai, you give a customary glance to a girl's legs. I dont think there are any thoughts going on in the guys mind. It's just a way of appreciating something that's a gift from God or Talwalkar's gym. I bet even Abhishek Bacchan, married to one of the world' s most beautiful women, still glances at let's say, Rimi Sen. (did I just break AB's marriage?)

So the thing is, while you can glance legally in Mumbai, you cant do the same in Germany because of the unlimited resources! They are all around. You spend around 5 minutes checking out, trying to decide on which pair deserves a glance. You see, all of them deserve more than a glance, but now that you have choice, very much like in capitalist countries, you are confused.

So I spent 5 mins, still confused on where I should stop and give that much deserved glance.

I sat on a bench to contemplate, like they do in the movies. In that sea of pretty women legs walking from in and out the Brandenburger Gate, I could think of only one pair. The worst part is, she wasnt even here. The best pair of legs belonged to a girl who I had left back home. And even when presented with so many choices, I couldnt think of anyone else but her.

This phenomena, while pretty confusing for the guy who experiences it, causes awe to the readers. Most of them are already posting this on the Infy BB, while others are forwarding it to their friends, girlfriends, some are also forwarding it to their boyfriends, to show that they have been such dumbasses while I take the award for the coolest guy in the universe. Just a couple of pointers ladies, one-yes, I am supercool and stuff... and two-when you mail this post to your boyfriend, do remember to remove the blondie pic from the post.

About the confusion bit, I have always followed the 'Hardwire' rule which was discovered by Arshat Chaudhary in the lazy summer holidays of 2006.

Just to enlighten you mortals, the hardwire rules goes as follows:

There! Simplified funda of life. You are welcome.

But you should be in control enough not to gawk at a female in presence of another girl.

So I followed the hardwired rule. But the rules get damned sometimes, dont they? Sometimes, you the jump the Queue when you shouldnt... Sometimes you travel without a ticket, when you thought you never should.... Sometimes the self-imposed rules go for a walk. It might seem like we break those rules for no reason, but there's always a sub-conscious reason... Maybe you travelled ticketless coz you were late for a football match on a lovely rainy day and you didnt wanna waste 3 mins printing a ticket. Maybe you jumped the queue, coz you lost that match and wanted to divert your mind from the loss...

I am just saying, there's always a reason for the way we behave in. Sometimes you are just lucky to know what those reasons are. Some other times, you sit confused on a bench, in a foreign country, staring blankly at a humongous gate....

German Sir: I dont know the name of that metal... its called Wolfram in German...

Out of deep slumber woke our hero, our uber cool guy (UCG)...

UCG: Its Tungsten...

Sir: Tung.. what?

UCG: Tungsten...

Sir: How... what.. How do you know that? (true exclamation)

UCG: I dont know... I am just plain awesome...

So now that I have established my utter supremacy over you mere mortals, let me continue with all the mundane stuff...

So, Its pretty awesome here in Berlin... The city is super systematic... Its kinda cold here, I expected better weather this time of the year... Everything is mostly on time. Even the buses have a time table to follow.

There are no traffic jams here. And potholes on the road are a matter of National crisis for the Germans.

I like my classmates. They come from like 20 nationalities. Most of them are pretty curious about India. There is this one guy who sings sanskrit mantras and stuff... Freaks me out I tell you.. sometimes I feel he knows more about my country than I do...

Then there guys who come to me and ask...

Curious foreign guy: Hey Aaarrrshat, how do you say 'Fuck' in Indian...

Uber cool Indian guy (me) : There is no language called - Indian...

The nice guy that I am, I almost always enlighten them... its fun I tell ya..

The best part is our calculation abilities... We solve calculations before you can say - Ich liebe Berlin...

There was this question, very simple question, and the professor was like, Have you brought your calculators, and I solved it in like 3 seconds... Between surprised chuckles and awe and respect, yours truly was surrounded...

Okay, now that I have made myself sound good (which is the whole point of this post and in greater sense, this blog) let me talk some (more) meaningful talks..

Germany and cool and everything, but the thought of staying here somehow doesnt come into my mind. Sometimes I dream about India, mostly about Mumbai, the warm humid weather, my friends and family, sometimes even Gurgaon and the college. I feel like I have left some part of me behind. Somehow, 100% Arshat isnt here.

They say - Home is where the Heart is...

They god damn right...

I wanna stay in Mumbai for most of my life... I have decided that... Cant stay anywhere but there. There is something bout the city I will never understand. You see it in the movies, you read about it, but you dont really know what is about that place that doesnt let you leave ever.

Or maybe everyone feels like that about their homeland. Maybe all of them leave behind a certain part of themselves which is so important that you always wanna come back to it... Ich liebe Berlin... But home is where the heart is...

Chalo, bahut senti maar liya... happens when you miss home...

Miss all you people back home (you know who you are)...

Will come back soon.. Till then..

Auf Weidersehen...

It was difficult to answer her. How was it coming along?

It all started with an ad which I saw when I was in the 7th standard.

The difference is- German Engineering. Opel.

Opel didnt work. But the ad did. That line somewhere stayed in my mind. The respect for Germany grew as I came to know more about them. The Engineering dream realised and I set my heart on doing my masters in Mechanical Engineering in Germany.

I got disillusioned during my engineering. 4 hours of travelling, overload of assignments, stupidity all over didnt help my case. The German dream died and I set my eyes on an MBA. In between happened Siemens, the respect for Germany increased and the dream was reborn.

I left Siemens, prepared for CAT to get into MDI's International Management course. One leg of the course was to be completed in ESCP, Berlin. The German dream kept coming back to me. It was destined or something.

This monday, I landed in Germany. It was not easy. Not at all. First the German Embassy acted like they didnt want us to come here. Then Deutsche Bank did their best to keep us out. German efficiency was thrown out of the window for inefficiency and stupidity. It was our luck that we finally got our Visas one day before leaving.

What followed next was a journey of a life time. I took the Air India flight from Mumbai to Frankfurt in the night at 2. I was so damn tired with all the running around, meeting friends and stuff. The flight was overbooked and I probably got the worst seats. Couldnt sleep a wink on the flight. I had an Air Berlin flight from Frankfurt to Berlin in the evening. That gave me around 12 hours to go around Frankfurt.

I landed at Fraport, was overwhelmed by the size of the airport. It was freaking cold outside. If Delhi cold was a bitch, Frankfurt cold was son of a bitch (does that make it worse or not?). Fraport is lovely, though I still feel mumbai airport is not too behind when it comes to management. (You can take me out of Mumbai, but u cant take Mumbai outta me.)

I had like 4 bags, one out of which was cabin baggage. I wanted to go around Frankfurt, so I deposited the bags at the Air Berlin counter for my flight in the evening. I had more baggage than the alloted 20 kgs. The girl at the counter (who I thought was spanish) however turned in 4 kgs more than alloted, which I thought was kinda sweet. I thanked her profusely, to which she said - You are Indian, I am Indian...

I felt so damn proud. No one every did anything special for me just coz I was Indian.

I went around the city. German Engineering everywhere. Footpaths which sloped at the edges so that you might not have a problem to get down and cross the road. Zebra crossings everywhere. Cars stopping for you even if there was no red signal. Grey skies. Biting cold. Costly food. But that didnt stop me from going on a 50 min cruise on the river Main.

In the evening I returned back to the airport or Fraport as they call it. I waited for the evening flight. After running around the Airport, I realised that the flight had been delayed. I waited. The flight was cancelled. I was stranded on the Airport. I contacted Air Berlin. German rules suggest that you stand in the line and wait for your turn, which incidentally took me around 1 hour. It was 9 in the night local time (1.30 night India) It was 40 hours since I had slept. Standing in line sucked.

"We will arrange your stay in a hotel and also arrange for pick up and drop" said the lady at the task.

They arranged for the hotel, but forgot the pick-up. Good for me though, I got to take a taxi (which means my dream of travelling my a Merc was fulfilled.) I was amazed to see my Hotel room (an Executive room at The Kongress Sheraton). One word - Awesome! I slept for 5 hours. The next flight was in the morning.

At the airport, I confirmed if my baggage was on the flight (since the last flight was cancelled.)

On reaching the Berlin airport after a rough flight which was more like a roller coaster than anything else, I found that one of my bags was missing. In spite of my confirming at Fraport that they were loaded on the very same flight that I was travelling by... How do you misplace baggage ON the Way? All my clothes were in that bag, and I was already late for the first class. Which meant I was gonna skip class. Not much of a problem that. With the jet lag, I might have slept in the class anyway.

It was damn difficult to find the place where the hostel was. It was 4 degrees outside, and if you know me, I hate cold. I come from a land of Warm sunny beaches, anything colder than 16 degrees is clearly unacceptable. This is one of the reasons Delhi is no longer a contender for me working there.

I reached the hostel with great difficulty and finally dropped dead on the bed. I dreamt.

I had a dream, the German dream... It took long to realize it. It was difficult. What a journey! I didnt wanna meet the President of the US or stuff like SRK wanted in "My name is Khan", but this journey was pretty difficult too.

For the record: My name is Chaudhary...

My work there is done. I have the MDI degree. Quite frankly, I didnt think I would be able to. I would be lying if I say that I didnt think about running off from Delhi into the cosy, humid confines of Mumbai everytime MDI pushed me into a corner and boxed the daylights out of me. It is BY FAR the TOUGHEST MBA course in the country. We read these posts about IIM guys trying to justify how tough their life is, and end up laughing... If this course had gone for another 8 months, (along with some basic physical training) we would have been ready to take down the entire Al Quaeda Army or something.

I remember what all I had planned before I cam here. Some plans:

-Will watch one movie everyday.

-Will watch lots of sitcoms

-Will learn to play tennis

-Will go running around the campus every morning (I later changed it to evening, who ll get up in the morning yaar?)

-Will try to learn, rather than score marks

-Will get to know more about the culture of Delhi

-Will learn more about people in Delhi

-Will be a better friend

-Will be the coolest guy I know (I have always been that)

-Will try out new things

-Will try local cuisine

Now lets see if the plans materialized or not. Some effects:

-Watch one movie everyday??! I would consider myself lucky if I could see one in a week. The schedule is killing. Sleep doesnt come easy even to someone like me who values it a lot!

-Well, I did manage to watch a few seasons of a couple of sitcoms.

Fell in love with 'That 70s show' and 'Seinfeld'. Saw a bit of Scrubs too.

- Learn to play tennis? Just got enough time for a game. Nailed a German friend of mine in that game. Okay, thats a lie. I am awesome, but not Rajnikanth.

-Hmm.. I did run around the campus, but to submit reports, assignments etc.

-I did a better job of learning than what I did in engineering. Infact, I am kinda proud of myself :)

-Got to know the culture of Delhi... loved it..

-Got to know the people, loved them even more.

-I think this time I was better friend than what I normally have. I will leave this one for the friends at MDI.

-I AM the coolest guy I know, so no surprises there.

-Tried out a lot of new things... lots..

-fell in love with the local cusine - rajma chawal, kadhi chawal, paneer kulcha, tandoori parathe, steamed sweet potates, veg momos, wai-wai, chole bature etc etc

So, some of my plans have been realized, others not. The ones requiring time, have been difficult to realize.

What is the point of this post? Abbe? Har time story hi chahiye kya? Sometimes hamari bhi sun liya karo!

Anyway, time for my flight.

Take care. Have fun.