Monday, September 14, 2009

First mails from Germany Part - 2

Hi people,

My stint with the university is going on well. Had dinner (noodles) last

night and crashed around 2100hrs, Got up today only at 0830! Thankfully

my feet were no longer swollen. Had a lot of things to do in the

university, some registration with the stuttgart city council,

insurance, etc. Right opposite the stittgart city council is a huge

supermarket called Schwaben Gallery, Where you have some supermarkets

for food, clothing, fashion and then a place called Media Markt, where

they have everything electronic! Everything except the Grundig World

Band radio i was looking for. And one more thing! i wonder who got this

concept of importing things from abroad saying it's cheap. I certainly

didnt't find anything cheap here! the Sony 7600G World band radio which

i was following in india, it costs 199Eur here and it was around 7K in

india! Apple iPod touch is 219Eur, and 14K in india. A swiss army knife,

which i bought costs 63Eur here but back when i bought it, it was around

3K. Oh well, the stuff like bus ticket and stuff is explainable, a

4-stop bus ride costs 1Eur 95Cent for one direction. A map of stuttgart

costs 7Eur. A Veggie Delight Sub at Subway with 0.5Ltr coke and a cookie

costs 4Eur 99Cent. I'm like "just take it and go!" to the people at the

billing counter! One thing though, nobody ever complaing about change!

every place, every bus and every train station has change, in abundance!

And things are kinda over-organized, like say if a vending machine has

something for 50Cent, you can either put in 50Cent, or 20+20+10 or if

you put in 1Eur, it gives back the change! Crazy i tell you!


Everything is German, I get damn scared whenever someone asks me to sign

at the bottom of some printed paper, scared, that i'll end up signing

the ownership of my own life. But then the thought occurs to me, my life

is nothing important to them, why would they take the trouble of

printing a two sheet document just to own my life :P when they can do it

by flashing a knife!


Eating habits are still not optimal, Had Noodles last night, breakfast

cereal this morning, 0.5Kg of fresh grapes in the afternoon, Sub + Coke

+ cookie in the evening. Not sure what to do at night. But i bought some

bread, jam, some more breakfast cereal, soups, ketchup, milk, yoghurt,

buttermilk, sugar, salt...... everything pure veg and edible! yippie!


Got a sim card this evening, darn thing still ain't working! it seems

T-Mobile is experiencing some problems! if it doesn't work by tomorrow

then i guess i'll have to spend 4Eur to go back to the T-Mobile store

and get it sorted. Thinking of buying a better phone, a blackberry

perhaps, my eyes took a good glance at it and made my body fall in love

with it! so don't blame me! I know I know, i'm a student, blah blah! but

dast ist Zuper, Zehr Gut!"


By the way, i did the shopping and the sim card and the Subway stint all

alone, taking a bus to the city and carrying back around 10kg of stuff

back to my room! i lack a fridge here. The staying arrangements are

quite weird, There's like a flat.....err...... an huge room with a door,

and that huge space is divided into separate rooms, two separate

bathrooms and one kitchen. All this in the huge room i mentioned. The

kitchen has just one fridge, which is kinda crowded, gotta ask around

for prices of a small fridge!


Well, these few people taught me some stuff which i'd forgotten, like in

the supermarket, things at the eye level are always the highest prices,

things further down and further up will be much cheaper than things at

your eye level. But sometimes these people, i think, try to save too

much. Well, I'm not the "extreme saving" types, but i'm not a

spendthrift too, I guess people in the hostel are gonna faint if they

hear i ate at subway! Well, it made me happy! Felt like home! :)


It's 7 in the evening and the sun hasn't set, this can create some

problems in the future with my sleep cycle! My German dictionary is

finally coming to use! It's helpful till you memorize some translations

and some sentences like "where is the toilet" :| I kinda finished my

calling card quite soon, in one day :| 20 Eur in a day to call India!

This can't go on forever! but then, tomorrow is the day i'll be getting

my internet (hopefully) and so i guess i'll have to manage till then!

without cellphone and without internet, is like, too bad! That's all i

can say, cause i'm lost for words! The weather is very pleasant, it's a

warm 26 Deg Centigrade in the daytime! Clear but busy skies, cause of

the nearby frankfurt airport, the sky, when you look up, is at least

full of 2 or 3 planes. Sometimes the whole sky is cris-crossed with

streaks from airplanes, with as many as 15~20 streaks! people are so

happy with the weather that they come is all sorts of short clothes! the

only people wearing full clothing are the ones from the middle east,

Asia, Micronesia, Africa and India, Everybody else, take most of it off!


Met some classmates too, So far one guy from India, former techie - IBM,

2007 passout from chemical engineering, Arkapovo Goshal, one girl from

Greece her name is pronounced "Andro-mahi", gotta ask her to write it

down and paste it on her chest, Chemical engineering masters holder.

Another one from Philipines, Angeli, Civil Engineering. Two guys from

Africa, one from Ethiopia and one from Eritrea, I don't remember the

names, cause they needed another African to explain, in German, how to

write the name, to the insirance office girl! So i saw no point in

trying to remember it on the first day! There's William (i think) from

Brazil.


There're two seniors i know so far. Alexander Mack, Civil Engineering

Graduate, German National, a real fit guy and Ameen, Irrigation

Engineering Graduate, From Iran who knows everything about the Hostel

and the university, a pro-active guy, and quick witted, but quite

friendly, sometimes "bossy" and the "all knowing" type, but a real nice

person.


Bought plug converters (with grounding)! so finally my MacBook is safe!

There're a lot of things that happened yesterday and today! I forgot

what i have tomorrow! with all my mails in IMAP and no connection to the

internet, I'm kinda stuck without internet! well, that's cause the

college corresponds to me only via email. I'll have to search out my

fellow classmates and ask them what's up for tomorrow!


One more weird thing i notices is when i'd been to the insurance office,

i saw 4 book which showed you how to exercise various parts of your

body! they have that here cause if you don't do it and you end up

falling sick or injuring something, they have to pay for it! :)


Ah the first drops of rain in Germany! :) nice to see! Cheers!


-Gecko.

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