The TimePass of India

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.

There were way too many spam comments coming.. Which means I am damn popular... Not that you didnt know about it already...

So now that I have blown my own trumpet and played a jingle on the banjo... I need to work on this Branding project..

Just want you guys to know that commenting on this blog will require you guys to fill a captcha from now on... I am so sure comments on this blog are gonna reduce.. esp Hiren's and Aroop's comments... Lazyasses, I tell u..

Enjoy...

Hello to all the dudes. And love to all the girls who have been visiting this page everyday for the past 1 month. Well all your wishes have come true. I am here.

After almost an age and a half, I slept for 10 straight hours. I woke up to a huge breakfast. Slept again. Took a bath, more than a record 25 minutes. Slept again. Woke up for a heavy lunch. And now I am here. Sitting outside my room facing the terrace, enjoying the warmth of the Sun and the chill of the evening air, and thanking God for inventing Wi-Fi.

The funny thing about this post is that I was supposed to write it last month, when my last exams got over. But I slept then, because I was sleep deprived. Once the weekend after the exams gets over, you never get time to do anything. Now this may seem to be a usual MBA cliche. But in this case, its not.

Heard MBA guys whine about scarcity of time and lack of sleep? Well, those guys have 14 lectures a week... We at International Management(IM) at MDI, have 26 lectures a week! More lectures also mean more assignments, more quizzes and more exams! And that is why we have exams every 4 weeks, but they get a good month and a half before every exam. Compared to my life, the normal life that MBA students live around the country live is Disneyland. And this crib is in line with my philosophy - What I do is more difficult than what you do! :P

So all those guys who are mad at me for not being able to comment on their blogposts, I rest my case.

But this isnt a crib post, this post is a feel good post... feel good for YOU that is! But seriously, MDI isnt all about hard work... umm.. it is actually.. But its majorly IM who has it so bad, but then they get to study and work abroad, proving Timberlake's age-old line of thought- "what goes around comes back around" :P

I have a stack of unread Economic times on my table that I plan to read. I have been collecting them since a week now. Last week, I didnt really get the time.

Today, after my bath, I cut my nails. It took me only 10 minutes. Believe me you, I had been planning when to cut them all week. After I was done, I wondered, why was I actually planning a thing this trivial?! Then I realised, its all about priorities.. Its always a tradeoff...

What do I do? Should I read that article I had been planning to or should I shave my 3 day old stubble? Should I sleep for another 20 minutes or research on that assignment. Should I read the newspaper or work on that ppt slide? Should I study over the weekend or join the folks over for a trip to Kasauli? Everything, you see, is a tradeoff..

But its not always bad. Sometimes I choose a trip to Kasauli(a hill station near Shimla) over studying. And its great fun... Come to think of it, even reading and studying and working on projects isnt too bad. Actually its kinda fun. You have to be creative and different from your peers. There isnt anything thats right or wrong, there are just different ways of doing it.

Now for example, this is something that I plan to work on - "The ratio in which the fairer sex checks itself out in the mirror, compared to the male, when presented with an opportunity"

You will be amazed by how nerdy I am gonna sound for the next para or so. I can already see the girls who used to hide behind trees to have a glimpse of me turning their laptops off. But dont. Listen to this.

The other day, in the 15 minute break that we get between serial lectures, I was having coffee, resting my already tired body, tired beacuse of attending 4 lectures on the trot, against the wall facing the door of the building. For the MDI guys who are reading this post, the building I am talking about is 'Lakshya', the building where all the International Management guys attend their lectures. This is a centrally AC building. It has reflective glass doors. The ones that allow the people inside the building to see the ones who are outside, but not vice-versa.

So I was standing opposite to the door. One door was open, the other was closed. As people entered the building I noted that they looked at the close door. Some just look, some touch their hair. But something was peculiar about this. The girls did this more. I was confused for like a minute. But then the coffee kicked in. I realised they are looking at their own reflection in the glass door.

I got half the class to stand with me and predicted who will look to the left(the girls) and who wont(the guys). Well, needless to say, it was a rage. I declared that only girls look at the mirror when presented an opportunity. Foreign girls go out of their way to look at their image. Some of them actually stop and pose and stuff! Well guys dont look at themsleves. But this notion was ruined by the French and the Italian guys who entered the building and not only looked at themselves but also fixed their hair. I am in the International relations committee of MDI and know these guys by their first names and nationalities. My next aim to find which part of what country they belong to. Btw, some Indian guys also looked at themselves as they entered. We now exercise caution against them. :P

Taking this research forward(yes, I am taking this very seriously) I conducted the same research in the break after the morning lecture. It turns out that lesser people looked at their reflection. So now I am very interested.

I want to conduct a full fledged research on this. Any corporate house interested in sponsoring this research(inclusive of the coffee bills) can contact me.

What good is this research gonna bring to the society you ask?

Well, due to the varied sample size - we can understand the impact of different cultural attributes on the behaviour of the masses of different regions of the world and the different ways in which this impact manifests itself.

I have learnt in my 4 months of MBA training that your answers to stupid questions must be more than 3 lines in length and equally stupid.

Anyway, I have solved the purpose of this post, which was to clean the webs hanging off its ceiling and treating you guys to some quality(?) blogging. Now that I saved the day, I should go off to my 3rd short nap of the day(I am making some kinda record here).

Thanks & Regards,(something I learnt here)

Arshat.