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Here I am, this is me
There is nowhere else on earth, I’d rather be…
[A song by Bryan Adams]

Well, working in the same company for the same client, there is no other place where I can go other than Germany. So, I’m back in Germany for an extension of my previous project but this time only for 20 days.

On a Friday morning, my manager called me and said “You have to travel urgently to Germany and reach the office on Monday. The client wants one person from here”. There were so many things to be done, booking the tickets, getting a laptop, getting my foreign exchange, booking the accommodation and what not! Phew, I had to do everything and make sure I reached the customer’s office on Monday morning.

At the end of Friday, I managed to get most of the things done but for the ticket which was the most important thing. Thanks to our travel team, they work on Saturday too; I got the ticket in the evening and was supposed to travel on Sunday night. Since the notice period was very short, there was no direct flight from Bangalore available and my travel co-ordinator booked the route Bangalore-Bombay-Dubai-Hamburg.

Sunday morning, I started the packing and left my place at 6 PM to catch the flight at 9:30 PM from Bengaluru International Airport. The journey in the taxi took an hour and half with the chauffer Basavaraj. As soon as I got into the taxi, Basavaraj asked me if I wanted the A/C to be switched on giving a hint that he did not want it. I said the natural air is any day better than the conditioned air. He was very happy. During the long talk with him, I realized that being a taxi driver is no easy job. They should know English, should have passed 10th Standard, should know the in and out of the city, should have 5 years of driving experience, should be aged at least 25, should be courteous to the passengers and the list of requirements goes on and on.

Even with so much of qualification, the sad thing is Basavaraj does not have a fixed salary per month. Everyday, he has to pay 900 Rupees and take the taxi from the office and start his day. He then starts bidding for calls and if he is in luck, the call centre employee assigns a request to Basavaraj. He then has to fill the fuel for the taxi out of his own money and drop the passenger to the location. Whatever the customer pays is his salary. On a given day, he may make anywhere between 100 to 1000 or sometimes 2000 rupees. Just one phone call from an irate customer to express his dissatisfaction is enough for Basavaraj to lose his job. His is a job where even a single mistake committed makes him deprived of the essential needs to run his family. The traffic jams in Bangalore add to his woes when customers scold him for not reaching the destination on time.

When we were talking about all this, I reached the airport, paid him the money and checked in my luggage at the Jet Airways counter; thus started my journey to Germany.

I reached the Chatrapati Shivaji International Airport, Mumbai at 11:30 PM because of a slight delay in the flight. In Mumbai, the domestic and International airports are different and there is a free shuttle service for the passengers who visit Mumbai as a transit point. I approached the shuttle helpdesk and obtained a coupon with which I could board the shuttle bus and waited for the call after collecting my luggage. Soon, the announcement was made and I sat in a Volvo bus which was to take me to the International airport. On reaching the international airport, the task at hand was to locate the Emirates Airlines entrance for the check-in. The check-in did not take much time; I got a window seat from Mumbai to Dubai and then an aisle seat from Dubai to Hamburg.

After waiting for 6 long hours, I boarded the Boeing aircraft which was fully loaded with In-Flight-Entertainment (IFE). Each seat had a small LCD display monitor. The passengers had to use a small handset which served as the input to the IFE. About 200 odd movies in many languages were available to watch and about 40 audio channels for different kinds of songs. In addition to the audio/video, there were two cameras installed in the aircraft; one at the nose, another at the bottom. The view from these cameras was telecasted as two channels in the IFE. The takeoff and the landing views were very nice though the clarity was not good. Spending 4 hours to reach Dubai was not at all boring. The meal provided wasn’t good though.

The Dubai Airport is not good when compared to the Frankfurt airport. But the choice for shopping is more in this airport although the costs are a bit high. I was hungry as usual and started looking for something vegetarian. Soon enough, I found an Indian restaurant, McDonald’s serving a Veg Burger and a shop selling croissants. I quickly exchanged 10 Euros and got 49 Dirhams. Then I got myself a burger, fries and coke and sat down for my meal. It was really a very nice and filling meal as the food in the flight was not good.

An announcement was made for the 7 hour journey from Dubai to Hamburg in an Airbus aircraft which had little less in-flight-entertainment than the previous flight. I spent most of my journey sleeping and watching one of the most stupid movies ever made, “De Taali”. I really fail to understand who can think of such stories for a movie and spend so much of money for making it!

The temperature in Hamburg was around 14 degrees; sunny but cool. I waited for my luggage for about 20 minutes and then hired a taxi and reached Pali’s place in an hour’s time. Kusum received me at her place and I quickly freshened up and had a little bit of rice and dal and then left for the customer’s office.

The manager at the customer’s office was in a meeting and he could not meet me. The time was about 4:30 PM. Since there was nothing to do, I left the office and put my memory into test. The test was to remember the way back to Pali’s place which is about 4 and a half kilometres away from the office. The leaves from the trees dropped to the ground very frequently from which I remembered it was the autumn season. The golden yellow leaves on the road and the pavement looked very beautiful as though somebody had laid a carpet. On the way, I came across a traffic signal where I had to cross a road. I stood near the traffic signal waiting for it to turn red for the vehicles and green for the people to cross. A minute passed, but the signal did not turn to red. I thought it may take some more time and waited for another minute only to realize that the light was not turning red. I thought I should just run when no vehicles are around as we do in India just when a small girl came on a cycle and stood beside me. The moment she came, the traffic signal showed green for us to cross. I was wondering how lucky the girl must be to get the green light as soon as she came.

Only after I reached to the other side of the road did I realize that no luck is required but a little bit of observation sense. There is a button in a pole beside the road. When this button is pressed, the traffic light goes to red for the vehicles and the pedestrians can cross. I did not notice that this button was just beside me when I was waiting! Having learnt how to cross the road, I reached Kusum's place in a couple of minutes. Quite a few new guests had come to stay at their place, all from another company in Bangalore. During the dinner, we introduced ourselves and thus ended my first day in Germany.

Read this na

Bhaskar: "Hi da macha, what you are doing?"
Kunal: "Hi Yaar, I was just doing time pass man. So, tell"
Bhaskar: "I told you na, that girl, remember? I saw her again da"
Kunal: "Awesome dude, full seeing girls and all nowdays aa?
Bhaskar: "Maannn!! She is awesome man"
Kunal: "So, what next dude? You will propose?"
Bhaskar: "Hey What da, I simply saw her thats all, just for that only if I propose off... thats all"
Kunal: "Ha ha, I was just kiddin man"
Bhaskar: "You are always kidding paa"
Kunal: "So, what was she wearing? Where did you see her? Tell me also no"
Bhaskar: "White T shirt and light blue jeans da, she was looking very hot da, awesome"
Kunal: "Wow dude, but where you saw her? You are not telling only"
Bhaskar: "Wait da, I will tell. Simply don't make urgent. I saw her in the mall with her mother"
Kunal: "Did you speak with her?"
Bhaskar: "No da de, I got afraid da, her mother was there no, that's why I avoided her fully"
Kunal: "aaawww. Its okay yaar, you will see her again, don't worry."
Bhaskar: "So, we will meet today or not?"
Kunal: "We will meet yaar, I told you yesterday na ki we will meet in front of the Pani Puri shop. You forgot?"
Bhaskar: "Oooo.. ok ok. I remembered just now. Ok macha, I will come there at 5 PM"
Kunal: "How you will come there? Get the bike yaar"
Bhaskar: "Mah bro will finish me off if I ask for the bike now da. Let me see, I will ask him anyways"
Kunal: "Ask your brother now only"
Bhaskar: "hmmmm, wait. Anna, can I take your bike today?"
Bhaskar: "No luck da, he is going with his friends somewhere"
Kunal: "Where it seems?"
Bhaskar: "Don't know pa, he will not tell that and all"
Kunal: "Okay yaar, both of us will again come by cycle only."

[At the 'adda']

Bhaskar: "What ra macha, you came 10 minutes late, you were doing make up-aa?"
Kunal: "Something and all you will tell yaar, I was stuck up in the traffic"
Bhaskar: "You were stucking in the jam? hopeless no, this jam? I hate it da"
Kunal: "Okay yaar, me feeling hungry, come we will have something"
Bhaskar: "No yaar, my stomach is not okay today. We will sit here come"
Kunal: "So, what your brother told about your plan of going abroad?"
Bhaskar: "The course is good it seems, he told me to start preparing"
Kunal: "Cool man. So, when will you give the exams?"
Bhaskar: "I have to start preparation now man, don' t know when I can give the exam"
Kunal: "So full belting now huh?"
Bhaskar: "Nothing like that da. Hey! look at those two items there, superb no?"
Kunal: "The red one is mine, you can take the other one if you want"
Bhaskar: "Bugger, I saw them first, the red is mine okay!"
Kunal: "Leave these girls man, you will anyway get videsi ones. You can enjoy fully there!"
Bhaskar: "Yeah da, it will very nice there. I'm just waiting to go there"

DISCLAIMER: The characters in the above conversation are fictional and any resemblance to any person is purely co-incidental.

Go to any public place and you can easily get to listen this kind of a conversation around you. Qualified software engineers who work for clients in the USA, UK or any other English speaking countries use this accent and vocabulary while talking. The effect of the vernacular languages creeps into English unknowingly and becomes a part of it by default. No wonder, the westerners make fun of our language.

Young kids too when playing in the neighborhood talk only in English even if all them talk in another language at home. But if people who have finished their education and working in a professional capacity talk in this way, it is seriously a very sad state. The importance of knowing the basics of English is very important at least in the industry that I am working in.

Many a times, business requirements will demand the employees of an organization to travel to the client's location to work which is referred to as 'Onsite' in my industry. In one such occasion where I was given a chance to travel to Germany for a month's duration, all I did was to observe how my peers would communicate with the client. A manager from a different project from my company was also working with me in Germany. His way of telling how the quality of a deliverable can be improved by following the processes defined in the system was

"We should.. like focus more on process aspect also.. so, then no, automatically the quality work will be there. So, the quality of the product will increase then"

The primary eligibility for a person to be let to work in such an environment is fluency in the language. Imagine what can the other guy understand when a dialog like the one above is said! Poor guy, the expression on his face was a rare sight, he just nodded his head and changed the topic!

If managers themselves are of this level, what can we expect from his reportees? Another famous expression used is "stuffs like that" or "kind of things" to generalize something.

"See, George told me that we can not do the module now and those kind of things. I just told him to finish the work by tomorrow and update the status. Otherwise, these kind of stuffs will be always pending only."

I'm trying to make a compilation of all such famous dialogs which I'll post shortly. Until then, either you keep wondering why is it so difficult for people to learn this language or you start enjoying the literal translations from a regional language to English, its your choice.

My choice is definitely the latter. Because, "I am like this only"!

Enchanting Devarayana Durga

Picture this:
Beautiful shades of green around you, the bright green leaves, the dark green leaves, the rain has just stopped and cleaned the environment thoroughly, absolutely no vehicles around, no people around... just you and mother nature. Just the way to spend a weekend, isn't it? Well, this place is just 75 kilometers from Bangalore, Devarayana Durga.

Maddy and I set off on a Saturday to explore Devarayana Durga, very near to Tumkur. We decided to have our breakfast on the way in Kyathsandra which is very famous for 'tatte' idly. We left Bangalore at around 8:30 AM from Maddy's place. The traffic was horrible in the so called 'National Highway' number 4 till we went past T Dasarahalli. The climate was just perfect for a long drive, no sun, no wind. I did the driving all the way till we reached the destination. Even without being serviced, my Pulsar cruised at 100kmph easily, what a bike! I just love it.

The first pit stop was at Kyathsandra's Ravi Darshan Hotel for the breakfast. Times have changed; so has the hotel. What used to be a very old looking hotel with typical wooden seats and tables now is a plush hotel on the highway serving the customers seated on cushion seats and a separate family room. I fail to understand the concept of these Family rooms. No A/c, no special ambiance, no better taste but the rates are high. The steaming bisi bisi tatte idlies were served within minutes. The taste of the chutney was very different from what the usual hotels serve. The big fat and flat idly had a ball of butter on it which started melting right away. The taste of the idly chutney along with the butter was the typical-Kyathsandra-taste. Ah! superb. Though we were somewhat full, our greed ordered a Masala Dose each. The crisp Masala Dose was smelling full of ghee and was loaded with the aalugadde palya inside. The idly and dose filled our stomach beyond the usual capacity.

We took a deviation from the NH4 just beside the hotel and proceeded towards Naamada Chilume, which is just about 20 kms from the hotel. The roads are really very good. There were absolutely no vehicles around us, full greenery on either side of the roads. We felt really close to mother nature. We in fact got so close to mother nature that we stopped the bike, got down and just walked towards the trees to relieve ourselves in the arms of Mother Nature! After hanging up the nature call, we spotted beautiful small birds atop the tree which were giving nice Bose (Pose) to be framed in his Olympus camera.

Naamada Chilume has an interesting story. It seems when Rama and Sita were on exile, they were passing through the forests in this area and it was time for Rama to pray for which he had to apply the naama (tilak). Since he could not find water around, he pulled out an arrow and shot it on a rock. This created a hole out of which water started flowing. Even to this day, the water has been flowing continuously. Many people have tried to find out the source of the water, all in vain.

The entrance fee to get inside this place is Rs 3. I wonder what purpose it serves for the government to collect just 3 rupees as the entrance fees. We were greeted by our ancestors, monkeys as soon as we entered the gates of Naamada Chilume. Seeing their antics for a while, we spotted the deers taking rest under the shade of the trees far away. A couple of photos of the monkeys were shot by the upcoming photographer, Maddy.


The hole from where the holy water flows out has been protected with grill around out so that no one can pollute the water or do something unwanted. The water that flows out is collected in another man made hole for people to sprinkle it on themselves and consume it as theertha. We sat on the rocks for a while when admiring the beauty when a few skinks (haavu raaNi) creeped up the rocks.

Maddy shot this beautiful photo of a big skink. It was really difficult to get this angle, a brilliant effort I must say.

We then started off towards Devarayana Durga which has 3 temples all near to each other. The uphill ride was truly an enchanting experience. We just saw green hills around us everywhere with very few vehicles passing by. There is a viewpoint on the way to the temple, we got down from the bike and spent about half an hour gazing at the beauty of Karnataka. Maddy shot another very good landscape even with the lighting not being photo friendly.


Both of us were not interested in going inside the temple and hence, we did not seek the darshan of the Lord. While climbing the stairs to the temple, Maddy spotted a very small bird lifting off from a wall adjacent to us. He also noticed that this small bird was the parent of 2 baby birds that were residing in their nests within the gap between the stones of the wall. Both of us wanted to watch the mother bird feed its children and waited for about an hour sitting near the wall. Though the mother bird came near the wall, it did not risk feeding its children fearing if people discover them.

We then moved away from the wall and let the parent bird feed its babies with small worms. Maddy climbed the wall till he got a clear view of the babies. It was really difficult to stand still with the little support that he got from the stones. I switched on the camera, took off the lens cover and gave it to him.

He stood there for about half a minute and this is what he could get. What a beauty to see these innocent ones which even haven't opened their eyes.

People passing by were giving suspicious looks at us wondering what we were doing standing by the wall and not going inside the temple. One gentleman asked us where the birds were, we said we did not know and that we were waiting to see if any.

It started to drizzle and we thought it was time for us to head back to Bangalore. Both of us not hungry, courtesy - Ravi Darshan Hotel. We ate a couple of sliced cucumbers and had tender coconut water and started the ride back to Bangalore. The ride back to Bangalore was pretty slow with both of us discussing all possible things and also singing a few of our favorite songs, praising the composers of the songs, the singers and we reached Peenya by 4:30 PM. I was tired of riding for about 150 kms and gave the charge to Maddy to complete the journey to his place which took about an hour because of the heavy traffic.

Expense wise, it was a real cheap outing and one of the best ways to spend a weekend.
Fuel : 250 Rupees
Breakfast at Kyathsandra : 70 Rupees
Cucumber and tender coconut : 20 Rupees
Entrance fees at Naamada Chilume : 6 Rupees
Admiration of nature : Priceless!

Route taken from Vidyaranya Pura : Tumkur Road - Kyathsandra - Siddalinga Mutt - Devarayana Durga - Tumkur Road - Vidyaranya Pura.

Foreign Return

It was almost time for me to complete the remaining work at the office as the deadline was fast approaching. I had completed the work much ahead of the schedule for which the customer was happy (Okay, I know that this is not my appraisal form. What a pain it is to talk about self!). With just 2 days left after the beautiful Paris weekend, I had a relaxing time at office with just about 4 hours of work per day. I finished the final delivery of my project by late morning on Tuesday. Stinky was on leave for a week so I had to meet another smart German Project Manager regarding the delivery. He thanked me for having finished the project, I thanked him and his team for helping me, he thanked me back for finishing it on time and I again thanked him for the help Stinky had been for this project. At last, the thanksgiving was done with!

I met all the member's of Stinky's team, bid them good bye and left the customer's office for the last time. Pali picked me up at 2 PM, I had the rest of the day to do my packing and settling of the bill for my accommodation. Only when I started the packing did I realize that I had indeed bought quite a few gifts for my family and friends. The suitcase weighed around 19 kilos after the packing. Kusum had given me a few toiletries as gift but unfortunately I did not have space in my suitcase to keep all of them. I took the deodorant and the after shave lotion and left back the shower gel, some creams etc...

The packing got over in an hour and I started browsing the net to pass the time. In the evening, when all the colleagues returned back, we sat together and were chatting for some time and I had my last dinner of the trip. Post dinner, it was time for settling the bill, checking if the dates of all the bills was correct and of course, paying the final money to Kusum and Pali. When calculating the amount of the bill, Pali gave a discount of 10 euros for an unknown reason. We decided to leave home at 4 AM to avoid problems of traffic and changing schedules of the flights. I got up at 4 AM and we left Pali's place at 4:30 to reach the Hamburg airport at 5. The journey at 4:30 AM with a temperature of 2 degrees was amazing. Pali touched a speed of 210 kmph on the highway, what an experience it was! We reached the airport very early as there was no problems on the road, I thanked Pali for everything; so did he. I pulled out my suitcase and dragged it towards the check-in counter. After the check-in which did not even take 5 minutes, I had 4 full hours before my flight left to Frankfurt. The wait was really very boring, I bought a sudoku book and solved it for an hour, roamed around all the shops near my departing gate and had my breakfast at 7:30.

The breakfast was a vegetable sandwich and black coffee. After dozing off for some time came the announcement to board the flight. The Lufthansa aircraft reached Frankfurt in and hour and a half. I just had one hour till the next fight would take me to namma bengaLooru. I was really happy to be going back to MY place and share my experiences with everybody around. The immigration officer stamped the seal and allowed me to go out of Germany. The moment I came near the terminal for the departing flight, I suddenly felt as though I was in India. Most of the people waiting were obviously Indians, gave a homely feeling! The announcement to board the flight was made and I happily boarded the Boeing aircraft. My co-passenger, also an Indian kept to himself all 9 hours during the flight and I ended up solving a few more Sudoku puzzles and watched the movie Laaga chunari mein daag, what a horrible movie it is! If you haven't watched it, please don't dare watching it.

When we were almost near Bangalore, the air hostess gave us the immigration check forms to be filled up. I filled up all the fields but for one which asked me the amount of goods being imported in Rupees. I was in great confusion not knowing what to fill up for that field. Lot of questions were racing in my mind; Should I ask my co-passenger? How will he know what I have bought and how much it would cost? Should I tell him what goodies I have bought for my friends and relatives? Should I just write NIL in the field? Oh my God, please help me! Atlast, I decided to roughly calculate the cost of everything that I had bought and convert them into rupees and write the amount. The instruction on the overleaf said upto 25,000 rupees worth items are duty free. My calculation came upto 10,000 rupees approximately. I boldly wrote 10,000/- in the specified field and felt proud about myself for having solved the problem without anybody's help.

As soon as I finished filling up the form, a person sitting near me asked me for my pen. I gave him with a smile and just was seeing what he would fill for that field. I was dismayed when he wrote NIL for that column and returned my pen back. Minutes later, my co-passenger also filled NIL for that field. Should I tear this form and ask for another form? Should I tell them that it got tore by mistake? Will a duplicate form be issued to a passenger? What if the customs people detain me for buying goods worth 10,000 rupees? I did not even have the bill for all the items that I had purchased! Will I be asked to show all the items that I had bought? Will they take away all the gifts that my suitcase had in it? Why the hell did not I ask anybody what to fill? Why the hell did not I write NIL? SHIT!!

The plane touched Bangalore's ground bang on time and holding my passport and the immigration form, I came out of the aircraft to be welcomed by the warm weather of our city. As soon as I entered the building a long line was already queued up for the immigration clearance to enter India. Waiting in the line, I again started thinking about the justifications that I would have to give. Sir, by mistake I wrote something in the form sir, forgive me. Sir, this is the first time I'm traveling, I did not know what to write, sorry sir. Oh! Have I written 10,000, how stupid of me! Sorry Sir, I must have done that by mistake.

With all possible explanations ready, I went to a counter and handed the officer my passport and the form. He looked into my passport, saw the form, and gave me back a portion of the form which I had to submit to the customs official. Thank God, I'm allowed to enter Bangalore! The wait for the baggage was really hopeless. I stood there for almost an hour and then came my black Samsonite without any damages. I picked it up and at the exit door was a customs officer collecting the remaining portion of the form and letting the passengers walk out. I handed him the form with fear, he did not even see what was written! He simply took the form and nodded which meant I could go!!! Wow, a happy man I was!

My dad, brother in law and friend K had come to pick me up, the time was 1 AM. We talked, talked and talked till we reached home and back I was at my place!

It was an amazing feeling to see the beaming faces of my parents, their son is 'Foreign Returned'! One month of stay in Germany was truly a learning in experience in all sorts. An experience that I can never forget!

Paris PraNaya, Day 2

Before retiring for the day on Saturday, we decided to check out from the hotel by 9 AM on Sunday and complete the Paris-on-foot expedition. We were so tired after walking for more than 20 kms that we woke up at 9:45 AM on Sunday. By the time we got ready and hit the dining hall, we saw only empty plates and glasses left unattended which meant, the breakfast time was over. My colleague had planned the itinerary for the day based on the inputs from the old man whom we met the previous day.

The first thing on our agenda was breakfast. We searched for a bakery nearby to our hotel and bought hot sandwiches. We just left the bakery and it started to drizzle. We sat in the bus stop and hogged our sandwiches, started walking again towards the first place of the day, Place des vosges. It was nice fun walking in the rain, the water was very cold; our legs were still crying with pain. We were told that there was a very nice museum in this oldest square of Paris. When we reached the place, we saw lots of shops, a church and a small museum which had a few modern art paintings displayed. Both of us were not very keen to seeing the paintings and we decided to walk
past it to the next place. The next place was a small island that is situated just beside the island in which Notre Dame church is present. We were told by the old man that this was a very quiet place and a typical Parisian colony.

The drizzling continued; so did our walk. We walked till the island of Notre Dame. There is a small road that connects the two islands, we were not able to locate that road. So, we came to the other side of the Notre Dame island and saw the map. There were about 3 roads that were leading to our island, we started walking towards the first road. We walked for more than 5 minutes but were still not able to find that road. My colleague rechecked the map to realize that we were walking in the opposite direction, thanks to my sense of direction; I had held the map upside down! He started cursing me and it started pouring heavily. We sought the shelter of a restaurant and were waiting for the rain to go away. A couple of street artists started performing break dance in the rain which helped them earn the money from the people who were waiting for the rain to stop. After a while, we continued our walk and reached the island in 5 minutes' time. This place suggested by the old man was again not what we were interested in. It had only buildings everywhere and nothing else. Small roads and small shops could be seen apart from the boring buildings. We just walked through the island to reach the other side of the river and got out of there in just 10 minutes. 2 places till then were not good. The third place suggested was the Basilica of Sacre Coeur in Montmarte. The area was quite far and we certainly could not walk at all. We reached the main road and were waiting for a taxi. A wait for 20 minutes did not even yield a single taxi on that road. Cursing our luck, we started walking down the road hoping we would get a taxi. Atlast, we spotted an empty taxi standing in a traffic signal, we ran and hopped into the taxi and showed the driver the map and told us to take him there.

This church is on top of the highest hill of Paris. The vehicles can directly go on top of the hill or people can climb the stairs from the bottom if they want. We chose the former; courtesy, the previous day's walk. The church is really huge and very beautiful. The view of the fog-filled-Paris from the top of the hill was as though we were seeing the city from almost the 1st level of Eiffel. The rule of the church was that nobody should talk or use the cameras. We walked around inside the church and sat down on the benches meant for praying. It was indeed a huge relief for both of us as we got to sit for sometime after walking for about 6 kms from morning. Sitting for more than 15 minutes we decided it was time to leave as I was a bit hungry. We came out of the church and spotted a small shop nearby where we could get something to eat. They have this dish which looks very similar to Dosa. I don't know what it is called, but it tastes very nice. The batter had a lot of beaten egg in it. He spreads the batter on the tava and tosses it just like the dosa. After it comes out of the tava, you can ask for your choice of spread on the dosa. I asked for a chocolate spread. He smeared the choco spread, rolled that 'French Dosa' and gave it to me. It cost me 2 euros. The taste was nice, something different but nothing like our own dose!

We descended the hill through the steps and walked around in Montmarte till we were hungry for lunch. There were many small restaurants which sold hot steaming pizzas. I really wanted to eat one of those by my colleague doesn't like them and we ended up in McDonald's. I bought myself a large fries and a large sprite and that was my meal. After our lunch, we spent some more time on the roads of Montmarte and hired a taxi to reach the Charles de Gaulle Airport. The driver dropped us at the international airport as we could not tell him where we exactly wanted to go. We had about an hour for our plane to depart when we reached the international terminal. We then had to take the train that runs between the airports to reach the domestic terminal. We got into the EasyJet aircraft at 6:30 PM and reached Hamburg at 8 PM. Then a taxi drive for about an hour landed us at Pali's place at Buxtehude.

2 days spent in Paris, about 30 kms of walk seeing some of the most spectacular things; what a trip it was! A perfect weekend getaway and the most successfully executed plan of mine!

Paris PraNaya, Day 1

The last weekend of my trip was nearing and I was all excited about seeing one of the most beautiful cities of the world, Paris! A colleague, also staying at Pali's place wanted to visit the city with me. Without a second thought, I just logged on to the net and booked two tickets to Paris. It cost us 150 euros both ways, pretty cheap. Pali helped us with the hotel booking. He managed to find out a hotel in the city center that charged us 32 euros per person per night. We did not know what all places were worth seeing in Paris and I sought the help of my dyaddy! Hats off to his memory, he remembered every place that he had seen way back in 1983! He gave me the list of the places and me and my colleague were all set to explore Paris.

Friday, Pali dropped us to the Hamburg airport and our low-cost EasyJet airlines took us to Paris in 1 hour and 20 minutes. The first aerial view of the Eiffel tower during the ascent was awesome. It seemed to be a very small pillar with yellow light. We reached Paris at 10:30 in the night. The Charles de Gaulle airport is probably the only airport in the world that has the runway for the flights as flyovers, over the roads of the city. What an architecture! Needless to say, even this airport is very very huge. As our aircraft landed and was taxiing towards the arrival gate, we saw the vehicles on the roads busily moving around below the runway.

After we came out near the exit gate of the terminal, the search for a taxi to reach our hotel began. There was board put up for taxis. People have to stand in a queue and wait for a taxi to come, get into the taxi and then tell them the address where we had to go. Our taxi driver was aged about 50 I think. He had worn a full suit and a long coat over it. He had white hair on his head which bald at the center. He was wearing a golden framed spectacles [like a typical Marwadi in India, the glasses on the nose]. The driver looked like a manager in a company and I really found it difficult to believe that he was a taxi driver. He saw the address where we had to go and set his foot on the accelerator and the Peugeot was soon speeding on the highway. The temperature in Paris was around 12 degrees, pretty warm I should say. The drive to the hotel 'Paris Bruxelles' took about 35 minutes. The bustling streets at 11 PM was nice to see. The roads are quite dirty in Paris when compared to Germany. I could see small paper covers, cigarette butts, wrappers of food items etc... on the roads. When I said dirty, the definition of 'dirty' slightly varies in Europe. What is 'clean' in Bangalore is 'dirty' in Paris. We reached the hotel and my colleague paid the money, the driver said 'merci' [thanks in French].

We opened the door of the hotel and were welcomed by the receptionist. He said, our room was 403 and it was in the 4th floor. The hotel was undergoing a renovation and the walls were also getting new colors on them. The smell of the wet paint was very much prevalent. We took the lift and reached the 4th floor. A small board in the lift said the maximum capacity of the lift was 4 people. Trust me, not even 3 people could stand inside the lift, it was very small and as soon as it reached the intended floor, it would stop with a loud thud and gave a feeling that it was about to crash. We located 403 and opened the door to find clothes all over the floor, the bed was not done and a couple of suitcases opened up. We locked the door back and informed the receptionist that the room was already occupied by someone else. He then apologized for his mistake and gave us the key for room 206. The room had 2 separate single beds and a small TV mounted on the wall. The windows were quite huge and another hotel was visible from the window. We switched on the TV to see if any English channels were aired. For our disappointment, only 5 channels were being telecasted, all in French.

We dropped our bags in the room and realised that we had not eaten anything from 2 PM. Kusum had packed about 6 egg sandwiches for us for dinner. Both of us did not like the sandwich and we decided to eat out. Just outside the hotel was a McDonald's, we bought a couple of burgers, coke and fries. It was about 11:45 PM and we could see a lot of people on the streets and vehicles moving around busily. Friday night! We then walked back to our hotel and were ready to sleep as we had to start early the next morning. Before sleeping, mother nature called me and I opened the door of the bathroom to relieve myself. The bathroom was not even as big as my cubicle in the office. Just after opening the door, I saw a wash basin, beside that was the WC, beside that was the smallest possible shower room. I was not even able to stretch my hand fully in the bathroom. What more could we ask for in a hotel that charged only 32 euros per night for a person! It was enough for us. We decided to leave the hotel at 8 in the morning and slept. Somehow, neither of us woke up before 8. I woke up my colleague and we were ready by 9. The hotels in the West have the concept of bed and breakfast. We went into the dining room in the 1st floor and had 2 portions of bread with butter and jam. We were also offered a glass of orange juice and hot chocolate. After the light breakfast, we asked the receptionist for a map of Paris and started day 1 of our exploration.

[This is going to be my longest post, be prepared! I have already crossed 1000 words!]

As soon as we got into the street, the first thought that I got was what would we do for lunch?! Getting vegetarian food was very difficult in Paris. So, I suggested my colleague that we would buy some bread and coke so that we don't have to search for restaurants. He agreed and we bought 6 butter croissants and a bottle of coke. We were fully set to start our adventure. We searched for Musée du Louvre in the map. It seemed to be quite near to the place where we were staying. My colleague suggested to commute by the Paris Metro. We went into a metro station and spent 5 minutes trying to figure out how to buy the tickets. None of the people around us knew English and I wanted to explore the city on foot.

So, holding the map against our faces, we saw the road that would lead us to the museum and started walking towards it. Only a few shops were open at 9:30 AM. One big difference between Germany and France as I observed was that people in France use 2 wheelers a lot, at least in Paris. I could see only a handful of bikes in Germany. But in Paris, a lot of scooters are used. The brand of the 2 wheelers widely used is Vespa. The 80's scooter in India is still being used in Paris. Apart from the typical scooters, new age scooters are also used. They look similar to our Kinetic Blaze. The shield on the handle is so huge that it covers the face of the rider too. Most of the 2 wheelers were black in color. While walking on Rue de Rivoli [a street], I saw on the map that the Notre Dame church was on the way to the museum. We took a left turn and started marching towards Notre Dame. The big and beautiful river Seine has to be crossed to reach the church. The river is not very big in terms of width but the several bridges to cross at different places are very nice. We saw a few men swimming in the river with a guy driving the motor boat. The colour of the water was totally brown. We walked further down the road and saw magnificent buildings in the area. We then reached the church. There was a very long queue to get into the church and my colleague was not interested to go in. The church is really huge, 43 meters high from the ground!
I badly wanted to go into the church and managed to convince him to go with me.

The church is marvelous. The number of people inside was a big turn off. But the surprising thing was that even with the large number of people inside, there was absolute silence! I was imagining the queue in in our temples during festivals. How much of sound we people create while going in the queue. We are in contrast to these people in a lot of aspects. The art on the colored glass inside the church was mesmerizing [I'm learning new adjectives!]. I was wondering who had the patience to do such wonderful things. The work on the walls and the roof, the colored glass art, the wooden doors of the church, the work on the outer walls... whew! Brilliant people have lived before us. We spent about 20 minutes inside the church and hurriedly marched back towards the main road to reach the Museum.

On the way to the museum, we saw a huge building named Hotel De Ville. Both of us saw this majestic building and wondered who could afford to stay in a hotel like this. We then learned that it was not a hotel but the city hall of Paris where the Mayor sits! Thank god, we did not ask somebody how much the hotel would charge for a day! Wierd names people give to the buildings. We started walking further down the road and finally reached the Louvre Museum. We could not figure out the entrance to this museum. After strolling for a minute or two around it's compound, we found an entrance and went in. We had entered the Cour Carre of the museum. This area is a huge quadrangle between the walls of the museum. We were not able to find the entrance into the museum here either. I had read the 'Da Vinci Code' and was all excited to see the pyramid and the paintings inside. As soon as I came near one door of the quadrangle, I saw a real big glass pyramid infront of me. There were 2 big fountains beside the pyramid splashing water and 2 small pyramids, beside the larger one. There are 3 pavilions in the museum named Denon, Sully and Richelieu. Each of the pavilions have 4 floors and trust me, it will take at least 3 hours to see one floor of one pavilion fully. The Louvre Museum is that huge! It holds some of the most famous works of art in the world. The mostest famous [what a word, mostest!] being Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci. We entered the museum through the big pyramid and bought 2 tickets in the vending machine. We started with the Denon pavilion and started seeing the artifacts in a selective manner. The sculptures done look absolutely real. The sculptors have taken care off the very minute details like the curl of the hair and the buttons on the garment. The facial expressions are so natural that you get a doubt if it is a sculpture or a real face, no exaggeration. We quickly walked through all the sections waiting to see Mona Lisa. All the paintings can be viewed from such a close distance that you can touch them. But Mona Lisa is protected by 2 gaurds around her. There is a railing that has been put at least 15 feet in front of the painting. Nobody can get close to the painting. I had expected it to be a huge painting. But it is just about 77X53 cms in size. We then saw the other masterpieces of the museum and spent about 4 and half hours in total. I am not writing much about the museum because I am not knowledgeable enough to appreciate the art of the greatest artistes ever.

Out we came from the museum to have our pre-packed lunch, the croissants and a bottle of coke. We sat under the shade of a tree and started feeding the pigeons that were around us while feeding ourselves. We then came out of the museum and a saw a pillar that had a gold covering at the top. Its name is Concorde. The square is called Place de la Concorde. These countries call junctions as squares in contrast to our circles. Standing in front of this pillar, we saw the Champs Élysées [the main shopping street of Paris], a huge building to our right which had about 4 French flalgs fluttering in front of it and a really big building a little far from us that had a wonderful glass roof. We started walking towards the building with the flags in front of it. It was the Assemblée Nationale, the lower house of the French Parliament. While walking towards this building, we saw another building which had a golden dome at its top. We were not sure if it was the assembly of some other building.

After doing a pradakshiNa around the National Assembly, we proceeded towards the Hotel des Invalides, the golden dome building. This was built by the king Napolean Bonaparte for his men who were injured in the wars to be treated or for people who retired from the army who could stay. The Les Invalides has a museum now and a church inside it. Unfortunately, by the time we reached, it was closed. We then walked in the opposite direction to reach the glass roofed building. It is called the Grand Palais. This was built in 1900 AD for an exhibition. It still functions as an exhibition hall which was again closed by the time we reached. While we were clicking a few snaps of this palace, an elderly man said that the building is really beautiful. I started a conversation with him and came to know that he had been staying in Paris for the past 6 years. He enquired about our visit to Paris and was kind enough to suggest a few more must-visit places in Paris that were not in our list. The moment he got to know we were from India, he asked us if we were software engineers! I was suprised when he said he had heard my company's name too! A gentleman he was.

We were done with seeing the on-the-fly-decided spots, and we had to go to the Eiffel tower from the Grand Palace. Our legs were not ready to take us as we had been walking all day long and had not sat for even an hour. But the excitement of going on top of the tower was far more than the fatigue. We sat on a bench for about 10 minutes and then took out our map and reached the Eiffel tower in about 20 minute's time. The tower seemed to be not so long from a kilometer away but as we were nearing it, our necks had a tough time. When we reached the base of the tower, we could see the tower touching the skies. What a sight it was. There was no way of seeing all the 4 legs of the tower in the frame of my camera. It was about 7 PM and the sun was beginning to retire for the day.

We sat on a bench infront of the tower and both of us were dumbstruck looking at this mega structure. How could anyone think of building such a monstrous tower? Gustav Eiffel is the man who designed this tower. This 325 meter tower was built in just 3 years from 1887 to 1889. It was built as the entrance arch for the 'Exposition Universelle', a world fair marking the centennial celebration of the French Revolution. Have I improved my History? Thanks, Wikipedia and Microsoft [ctrl-c and ctrl-v!! ha ha]

The serpentine queue to buy the tickets to go up the tower was very long. The croissant had got digested even before it could reach my stomach and both of us were so hungry that we could eat just anything given to us. Luckily, there was a small eatery at the base of the tower and even that had a queue. Both of us lined up and I saw that the only that I could eat was a sandwich that had egg and vegetables in it. After about 45 minutes, my turn came and the shopkeeper said "Only Hamburger and fries available". I was not sure if the fries was made only from potatoes. So, I safely purchased a bottle of mineral water to stop the bandicoots running around in my stomach [for those of you who could make any sense, hotte nalli ili alla hegNa vodaadtaa ide, asht hashvu anta heLteevalla, adanne inglees nal barde]. My colleague doesn't eat Ham and we ended up drinking the half a liter water. We then lined up for the queue to buy the tickets. About half an hour after we were standing in the queue, the illumination of the tower was done as Mr. Sun had gone down to sleep. The yellow sodium vapor lamps made the tower glow with a golden color. The brownish-gray tower turned into a beautiful golden one. Added to this glow, a series of flash lights started sparkling the whole tower. Every hour, for about 2 or 3 minutes, these white lights start flashing all over the tower. If the tower is viewed from far, it will look as though the whole tower is sparkling. The wait lasted for about 2 and half hours until we reached the counter to buy the tickets for the third floor. The tower has 3 floors, the first floor has a restaurant and a couple of shops for people to buy the souvenirs. The second floor is the main viewing area which also has shops. The third floor is the top most, that is the peak of the tower. People can buy the tickets to any floor of their choice. The lift takes the people till the second floor from the ground. Everybody has to get out of the lift as there is another one that takes people from 2nd to the 3rd. The minimum waiting time to switch the lifts is about 45 minutes. People have to stand in yet another queue for switching. We did not get down at the 1st floor and directly went to the second floor.

The spectacular night view of this beautiful city from the second floor was ... [sorry, I don't have words to tell, you have to experience it once in your life] I could see small yellow dots everywhere as far as my eyes could see. The bridges over Seine were illuminated and the cruise boats in the river looked really nice. One can go to each corner of the tower and see the whole city. It was very windy and I put on my gloves and monkey cap to avoid problems in the third floor. The distance from the 2nd to the 3rd is almost same as that between ground and the 2nd. We waited for about half an hour more and got into the lift to go to the top most point in Paris. As soon as we came out of the lift into the viewing area, I felt as though I would be taken away by the wind. It was very very windy and very cold at the top. Nobody can stay for more than 5 minutes with so much of wind. I thought the view from the second floor was the best, but this floor was more fun. I could not hold my camera properly because of the wind. I quickly shot a video of the night view from all the corners of the tower.

We spent about 5 minutes in the third floor and came back to the ground. The whole operation of buying the ticket, viewing Paris and coming back to the base of the tower took around 4 hours! My legs were paining so much that I just could not stand for a minute any more. As soon as we came out of the lift, we started limping towards the bench. There was no chance for us to walk anymore. It had been about 14 hours of the day on our legs. But we still had not seen the tower from far when it was illuminated, we had not seen the Champs Élysées and we were HUNGRY! With great difficulty [I swear it was very difficult for me with my new leather shoes biting my toes all the time], we crossed the road and entered the premises of the Palais de Chaillot, a palace just opposite to the tower. We were in no mood to check if we could go inside the palace, we just wanted to view the tower from this palace and get moving as we were fully exhausted. The tower from the palace was just awesome. The golder tower was beaming the search lights all across the city. A lot of people were in the palace's premises to take the photos of the tower. This is the only place I think where you can take the tower in one piece in a single photograph. Then we came back near the tower and hired a taxi to go to Champs Élysées. The sexagenarian lady taxi driver, took us to our destination in 5 minutes in her Peugeot. We got down and the time was around 12 AM in the night!

But seeing the people around us on the streets, it felt as though the time was around 7:30 PM. Many shops were open, a lot of people on the streets, restaurants were all open. The night life of Paris is amazing! We saw an Italian restaurant and went in hoping to find some thing in vegetarian. I was lucky enough, they had a vegetarian pizza! Authentic Italian Pizza! My colleague wanted something in chicken and they did not have anything of his choice. Not taking the risk of eating any other kind of meat, he ordered a Spaghetti that had only tomato sauce in it since he doesn't like pizzas. The hot, smoking pizza arrived in a few minutes and it was in my stomach in matter of few minutes! The base of the pizza was like a chapathi, very thin. There was a lot of cheese, tomatoes, onion, capsicum, Jalapenos and a few olives in the pizza. I enjoyed it thoroughly.

After our dinner, we came out in the street and started walking casually. This streets houses the famous theaters, Moulin Rogue and Lido. When we were gazing at the stores of some of the famous fashion designers, we heard loud slogans being screamed on the road. Suddenly, a lot of people were running in the street with some flag. They were shouting at the top of their voices in French. We got frightened. I asked my colleague to put his head down and simply keep walking. A gang of guys on a vehicle shouted something in French looking at us. I don't know if it was something at us or their protests. The police also arrived at the spot with their sirens blaring. Both of us were scared of what would happen and decided to get back to the hotel immediately. We searched for a taxi, got one and reached our hotel at 1:30 AM.

What a beautiful day it had been! The Notre Dame Church, the Louvre Museum, the Eiffel Tower, the roads of the city, the dinner, the 20 odd kilometer walk , the leg pain... whew! A tiring, but a superb experience in the superb city.

I don't know how many of you will be reading this line. Thanks for reading this longest post! Hope you got a glimpse of one of the world's most famous and beautiful cities.

The Hospitality

I was in my office in Bangalore when one of my colleagues told me that she was traveling to Germany for our project. She is a 'senior resource' as she had about 4 years of 'workex' (I hate the IT lingo, workex is work experience). I inquired about her arrangement for accommodation in Germany and she said she would live as a Paying Guest with a Sri Lankan family. That came as a surprise to me. I know that people in Bangalore run these PGs for the "Software Engineers" who come from all possible parts of the country. But a PG in Germany !?! parvagilve!

So, when I was asked to go to Germany, the obvious choice was the PG as I did not have to bother about food. I also did not have to bother about washing my clothes, commuting to the office, not knowing the language etc... I was very happy to hear that the family was ready to give me a room to stay with them when my colleague got in touch with them.

Kusum Perera and Pali Perera are the couple who run the show at their place. Both of them are from Sri Lanka. They met and got married in their country after which they came to Germany and settled down here forever, 25 years ago. Pali works in a hospital (I don't know as what) and Kusum is a chef at Unilever's canteen. Happy couple they are with 2 daughters. The elder daughter, Isuru is studying in London and the younger one, Ina is with her parents.

They believe, serving their guests is not just for money but for the love and affection they have for people of their race. The setup is a 'win-win situation' for them and us. They get the money, we get all that we need. The husband and wife are very kind and the first thing that I was told was to feel as though I was at my place! Felt really nice.

They gave the freedom for me to move around at their place as though it was mine. Right from towels to soaps to fork and spoon, everything was provided by them. I chose to use my own things though. Once the table was laid for dinner, all of us used to sit together and have food. No restrictions on the quantity. On the contrary, she made sure that I increased my weight. The taste of the food was very different even though it was rice and dal. The rice used to be Basmati or Sri Lankan rice. She cooked very good non vegetarian dishes is what my other colleagues who eat, told me. The vegetarian was also good if not very good. What more could I ask for in a country where people look with their eyebrows up when something that has only vegetables is asked for!

The breakfast used to be either bread or cereal. They had 3 or 4 varieties of cereal. One was called Musli, which had the corn flakes, fruits, and some other ingredients which added to the taste. Then there were 3 varieties of Jams on the table if you wanted to eat bread. The toaster would be kept inside the kitchen which could be used by anyone. Then 3 kinds of juices would also be on the table for us to start the day in a very healthy manner. First few days, I liked the breakfast a lot and then it got monotonous :( The same bread and jam became boring to eat. No other go, I could not ask for something more and I ate it all.

The dinner would have rice and atleast 2 vegetable curries. At times, she prepared Sambar or even rasam. At times, it would be only rice and curries. But everything tasted different but good. After the dinner, they would force me to eat either a real big banana or eat ice cream. They wouldn't let me go until I chose one among the two. I feel what they take is less for what they offer. It is the trust and love that matters more than the money for them. They just did not tell it but proved it to me over the days.

Kusum would collect the money once a week with a sweet 'Sarath, thank you ne' [Thats her accent, Sri Lankan-German]. The room had a small wardrobe, a big window, a cot, a light, a carpet a few swtiches, a table and even a few hangers inside the wardrobe [You should know everything in detail!! ;) ]

Pali owns a Mercedes Benz E class. The mean machine is in my favorite color, Black! It really makes a statement. He would drop and pick us up from the office in his car. Benz E class is a costly car no doubt, but on the road, out of 10 cars at least 4 will be Benz, some or the other model. It is just another car for these people!

I really felt touched when Pali asked me for permission to give accommodation to another guest in my room as it had 2 cots. I told him it was his house and his decision. He said that did not matter for him. What mattered was another guest staying with me, may make me feel uncomfortable and they were ready to deny had I said it would not be okay for me. My god! I was really taken aback.

The couple follow Buddhism and I also learnt that Kusum loved Ganapathi a lot. She asked me which God I pray. I really did not have an answer because it is just God for me without any name or religion. I said we pray Shiva as he is our 'mane devru' She then asked me if I knew Ganapathi! I said every Hindu will know Ganapathi. She then asked me if I can perform Pooja back home in India on her behalf. I was overwhelmed with the simplicity of this woman. I said I would definitely do that. She was very happy and showed me her collection of Ganapathis and Shankas which otherwise, would not be shown to anyone. A privileged guest I was!

An interesting part of their family is the love story of Kusum and Pali. Pali fell behind Kusum when both of them were in school. He then asked her to marry him, she said okay. But problems cropped up a couple of years later when they were supposed to be married. Pali worked as a sea man on a ship traveling to quite a lot of countries at the age of 17! Kusum's mom did not like Pali and was reluctant to allow them to marry. Pali convinced her that he would take care of her and they got married in the absence of Pali's mother. She said she would not accept the relation for reasons unknown to me. The couple then fled the scene and went to Germany. Neither of them had a job. Pali has saved the money during his sailing days which helped them to go Germany. He was 19 and she was 17!! They then started learning the language and then managed to get jobs and settled down in Buxtehude.

They visit Sri Lanka once a year and everybody in their families are happy with the way these people have settled down. After going to Germany, Pali worked his way out to make money and managed to shift 30 people in his family from Sri Lanka to Germany! With the minimum education, he has done a commendable job regarding the financial help offered to other family members. Because of him, lot of people in his family got settled well in life and are self sufficient now. Pali and the top boss of the hospital are the only 2 people who drive an E class Benz to work. Kudos to you man!

With our company providing Onsite opportunities to a lot of people, I wish all of them to stay with the Perera's to help themselves and the family.

I will conclude the post with a PJ. It has been a serious post till now.

Q: Why do you think Pali offers such good hospitality to the guests?
A: Because he works in a hospital!! :)

Happy Oster

The 3rd weekend was a very long weekend for us. Thank God, our customer does not work on holidays. We had an off on Good Friday and Easter Monday giving us 4 full days to enjoy. But our varuna deva was chilling at his place I think because of which we had a snowfall.

I woke up on Friday to see a pure white carpet laid on the roads, cars and trees. We had a snowfall. Owing to the weather, we could not step out of the house. If it is a holiday for companies, it will be an off for even shops here. Every small shop was closed on Friday making it a very boring day for us. Kusum was a bit relaxed on Friday and said that she would take us out for lunch. Believe me, even the restaurants are closed on holidays here. The Buxtehude city looked as if somebody had ordered a curfew! Only a handful of people were found on the road, all the shops were closed, the traffic signals were switched off as there was no traffic. What a sight that was!

A small restaurant where you can take parcels also if needed is called an imbiss. A normal 'hotel' as we call in Bangalore is called restaurant here. A hotel in Germany is a 'lodge' in Bangalore. I found it very confusing. In the main city area, there is an imbiss run by Turkish people which was open on Good Friday. Even though the roads were fully empty, Pali did not park his car on the road. Instead drove across the road and parked in a parking lot. Yappa, teera atee aaitu idu

We went inside Sultan Imbiss and Pali ordered a vegetarian dish for me. I don't know what my dish was called, but it was very tasty and it had lots and lots of oil in it. At the end of my meal, I felt like puking because of the amount of oil used. It had steamed rice, a wide variety of vegetables literally soaked in oil and some yog hurt sauce on it. After our lunch, we walked down to St. Petri's church.

As soon as I entered the church, I heard prayers being sung by people. These prayers sounded like an Opera singer singing some tragic song, no offense meant. The church is very very huge and it is said to have been built in 1196 AD. The list of Pastor's of the church was put up which seemed like a never ending list to me. I then lit a candle inside the church for the first time in my life. There was a tray filled with sand where we could fix our candles. I shot a few photos of the church and then all of us went back home. I watched a couple of movies that I had downloaded and ended the first day of my weekend.

Pali had told us that he would take us to Bremen if the weather would be good. But our varun was not in a mood to let us go. The snowfall was much more than the previous day. All day long, me and my colleague watched 3 movies.

Sunday was Easter (Oster in German). Nothing special for me or the Perera's. I lazily got up at 11 AM and had my breakfast. Pali said we could go out for a walk in the woods near his place and that excited me. Immediately I picked up my camera and 3 of us were off. Just opposite to Pali's place is a stud farm that has around 60 horses. We could not get to see the horses as the weather was suitable for them to come out. After this farm, is a forest like area that has only huge trees everywhere. We roamed around in the supposed-to-be forest for about an hour. We met a few German families that had come there to celebrate Oster. We could not tolerate the cold breeze any more and we walked back to home quickly.

The rest of the day and Monday very boring as usual. Everything was closed and varuna wanted us to take some more rest. I was just waiting for the weekend to get over. At last, the weekend indeed got over and I started work in full swing at the office.

A boring weekend and a boring post! I'll try to write something interesting in the next post.

Office Alone

The 2nd week at the office started with an exciting news for me. My manager from India called me and told that I had to stay for some more time in Germany as the work which was scheduled for a later time had to be completed when I was there. As soon as my manager told me this, I was wondering what he would tell my colleague.

Exciting for me, but saddening for her. She was asked to follow the initial plan and had to return back to India 3 days later. I quite didn't know how to react. I was very excited and happy that I had got 3 more weekends to explore this country. On the other hand, I would have to work all alone in the lab and finish all the work by myself which was being shared between the two. She was depressed a little but she said it was okay. Kusum and Pali felt very sad after learning that my colleague would leave Germany in 3 days. I tried convincing her that the schedule when we left India was that we were going back in 12 days. It was just that she had to execute that plan and my manager had a new plan for me.

We then completed the remaining work in the next 3 days in the hectic schedule as usual. Then was the time for her to bid good bye to Stinky and leave the customer's office. Stinky showed his cow teeth once more and shook hands with her. She was done with the smell here!

She had the flight from Hamburg to Frankfurt at 8:15 AM the next morning. Pali said it would be good to leave Buxtehude at 3:30 AM to avoid the last minute rush and missing of the flights. He asked me to accompany him to drop Pooja. Her luggage weighed around 26 kilos with the German goodies that she had shopped.

Early in the morning, I woke up at 3 AM and the temperature was around 2 degrees. We lifted her huge heavy suitcase and put it in the E class Mercedes. We then set off to Hamburg airport in the freezy-windy breeze. The car has superb features in it. Pali just pressed a button and within minutes, the seat on which I was sitting got fully hot and it was very very warm. What technologies these man made machines have! He told me that people will have 2 sets of tires for the cars. One set for the winter which has an anti-skid feature and another for the summer. Maintaining that car is really a very big economic concern.

We had only 3 minutes for my colleague to alight and get moving into the terminal as the car could not be parked infront of the terminal. My colleague pulled a trolley, put her baggage and she was off to namma Bengalooru!

On the way back, Pali and I talked about the cost of living in Germany and I learnt that it is indeed a very costly place [Especially me converting euros into rupees]. Theirs is a family settled down in Germany for about 25 years now. Even at 4 AM in the morning, the traffic signals were followed by every vehicle on the road. Wonder what makes them follow so rigorously.

Work in the office was a little boring having to sit all alone the whole day. The next day onwards, I had lot of work and Stinky was always there to sit with me and make me also stink! The weekend arrived and there were no specific plans made in the group. Some wanted to shop, some wanted to roam around. Finally we decided that we would be going to Hamburg to shop or roam. I wanted the latter.

Saturday morning, we got up late and reached the Buxtehude railway station at 10:30 to be greeted by other colleagues who had reached 15 minutes before us. We purchased the group ticket to Hamburg and I was told that we would be going to Harburg first and then to Hamburg. One of our colleagues had come from Bangalore with his wife and they were staying in a rented room in Harburg. Harburg is very close to Hamburg. That is all I know about this place because we got down from the train, went to his place, and got into the train again!

We went to his place and I suddenly felt as though I was in Bangalore. I could hear Kannada everywhere. It is a building that has about 5 houses all filled with Kannadigas! My colleague and his wife basically hail from Shimoga district. Felt really nice to talk to somebody who knew my language. The couple offered a light breakfast to all of us and I most eagerly said yes!

Well well well, the most unexpected tindi, the infamous uppittu was given in a plate along with sev. Baaiy chapprskond tinde naan antu. When amma prepares uppittu for breakfast, I will be the first to start cribbing to eat it. But when the same thing was given in Germany, aaha nan magandu yen tindi guru anta annusthu. The plain uppittu was mixed with Bisi BeLe bath pudi and the aroma of BBB was too good. Even though I had bread and jam at Pali's place, I took another serving of this special delicacy (only in Germany, alli matte goL shuru maadode) and savored it till the last spoon.

Along with the couple, we all left to Hamburg, the second largest city of Germany. We got down at the Hamburg Hauptbahnof, the central station of Hamburg. The group decided to meet in front of a huge electronic store, opposite to the station and dispersed. Me and my colleague were not interested to shop but we wanted to see a few places. We were simply looking around and we spotted a museum infront of the station. We went into the museum by paying 8 euros. The museum was marvelous. The give a mobile phone like instrument which we need to carry when seeing the artifacts displayed. Few of the artifacts will have an audio symbol and a number on them. If we press the number on this instrument, we get commentary about that artifact. An innovative and an effective method!

We spent more than 2 hours in the museum looking at ancient civilizations of Asia and Greece. We then went into a jewelery exhibition within the same premises and then a photography exhibition. The photography exhibition did not have any superb or breathtaking photos. It was mainly posters of advertisements that was displayed. Very nice collection they had. We had about 2 more hours to meet our colleagues infront of that store and we were hungry. We strolled in the streets of Hamburg for a while and found a McDonald's. After having a burger, our legs wanted some rest and we sat down on a bench. Even though the sun was shining, it was very cold. We could not sit more than 15 minutes on the bench. We then went into a garment store and did window shopping for a while and then met our colleagues. All of us went inside the 5 level store and saw an amazing display of all kinds of electronic products available. It took almost an hour for us just to see the products that were on sale. The time was around 6 and we had to leave for Buxtehude in the train.

Hamburg outing was not so interesting as it was supposed to be. We again fell short of time to explore the place. A plan was made to visit Hamburg on Sunday too, but the weather did not allow us to step out of house. It rained all day long.

All that we did on Sunday was to watch a couple of movies, eat and sleep till evening. In the evening, Kusum and Pali planned to entertain us by singing Sri Lankan songs for us. Pali was all excited to sing his favorite songs. He immediately put on his Karaoke CD and sung a few love songs for his wife. It was a nice evening.

A trip to the capital

SUNDAY!! According to the plan made by the 'manager' in our group of 6 colleagues, we were to visit Berlin on Sunday. The travel to Berlin from Buxtehude would take around 6 hours and we had planned to leave Pali's place early in the morning and reach the railway station by 6.

Kusum booked a taxi for us the previous night and we reached the railway station at around 6 in the morning. Our route was to reach Hamburg from Buxtehude and then go to Berlin. The herculean task that lay in front of us was purchasing the tickets in the station. Everything here is automated and it feels bad to interact with the machines and not the humans. There is a vending machine in the station where we can purchase the tickets. The system is very different here. We have to choose a 'ring' to which we are going to travel and then purchase the ticket. The whole of German railway system has been divided into rings. Ring 1 would be local to Buxtehude and the neighboring towns. Ring 2, a little bit far and Hamburg is in Ring 4. The division is done based on the distance from the source. They also have this concept of group tickets which are available at a discounted price. A group ticket for 5 people in a weekend costs 17.8 euros. This ticket can be used anywhere in Germany for a period of 9 continuous hours in a weekend. A bit complicated, but that's how it is.

Anyway, we ultimately managed to buy a group ticket for 5 people and a single ticket for the sixth person. The train to Hamburg arrived shortly and the first insight of a train was awesome. The trains here can in no way be compared to our trains in India. There is no outlet from the train in the WC's for the waste to fall down on the track. Hence, no stinking stations. Nobody gets down on the tracks and crosses to reach the opposite platform. Nobody can sleep in the station as the temperature in the night will be less than zero degrees. So, you see why the station is so clean and sparkling. The trains cruise at a speed of 80 to 100 kmph. Thats the normal train with a normal speed. Super fast trains called the ICE trains may go at a speed of 150 kmph I think. We took an S Bahn train and reached Hamburg in 40 minutes. The Hamburg station is very big and one can see only shops everywhere inside the station. Another thing that I noticed was that there no announcements made for the arrival or departure of a train. That is because every 1 or 2 minutes, a train would come or go. They have big LCD screens for each platform where the next train or the information about the train standing will be displayed, in German of course.

We hurriedly marched towards the ticket booking area of the station and our manager purchased the tickets to Berlin. There was no direct train from Hamburg to Berlin. We had to get down at a station named Schewrin and catch another train from that station to reach Berlin. The long distance trains have 2 decks to accommodate more people. We went into the upper deck. The feeling was totally different sitting inside this train. It did not feel as though I was sitting in a train. It felt like sitting inside an aeroplane. The seats are very elegant, every seat has a small trash can beside it, the windows can not be opened, the doors open by themselves. Very sophisticated. No, I really did not feel that I was traveling in a train. Every coach of the train has 2 LCD monitors which keep flashing information about the next station. It displays the next station's name and an estimated time to reach the station. The time displayed is very precise. When the train is nearing a station, there is an automated message that is announced telling the passengers about the station and which exit door they have to use to get down. Then, the driver of the train also makes an announcement in German, I could not understand what it was. Apart from the LCD screens that are visible to every passenger, there is also an LED display giving information about the stations.

Software engineers working in India have clients all over the world. We develop softwares for these LCD displays, a software that opens or shuts the door, a software that makes an automated announcements and so on. The common people in these countries enjoy the facilities while we are very much satisfied traveling in a Lalbagh express or a Kittoor Rani Chenamma express. Such a sad state that we have the brains but not the money. Nothing is going to improve unless we stop corruption.

Sorry, back to my trip to the capital. So, the journey to Schwerin took about an hour in the super-duper hi tech train where we had to wait for about half an hour for the next train. The temperature was really low and it was too windy. Even with the thermals and the jackets, all of us were shivering. Then 3 of us went down into the subway which should be used to change platforms. In this subway is the store Subway! We went there and had a sub and some hot coffee. Our manager was tensed that the 3 of us were missing from the platform as the train would arrive in 10 minutes. We then went to the platform, the train just arrived and we again got into the upper deck of this train. The journey from Schwerin to Berlin took about 3 and half hours. We finally reached Berlin at 12:30 PM.

6 hours of journey in 969 words! Now thats too much, isn't it? Who cares, I'm writing for me to remember.

I thought the Hamburg railway station was 'what a hi-tech station!' The shops inside the station made me feel as though it was a shopping mall. Berlin station-u adr appa! The Berlin station is atleast 2 Forum malls put together. It is Europe's largest railway station. The trains run at two levels from this station. The levels are perpendicular to each other. We got out of our train at the lower level which was a sub way.

The station from outside looked very grand. A huge glass building it is like a big software company in Bangalore. Far across the river, I could see the German flag fluttering and then there was a long tower which is the TV tower of Berlin. Let me tell you just a few facts about Berlin. This city is more than 750 years old! It has a record of being the largest construction site in the world as all the historical monuments are being re-strengthened to stand for few more decades. It was the border for East and West Germanies until 1989. The border was separated by a wall called the Berlin wall. This wall was brought down in 1989 and Germany has been one country since then. See, I have improved my history!

We had only about 5 hours to see Berlin as the journey back would again take 6 hours. So, we decided to take an arranged city tour of Berlin. Just as we decided this, a guy came behind us and told us that his company arranges city tour of Berlin and that we could go in their bus around the city. The offer was nice and we hopped into the yellow bus that would take us around the capital.

During the tour, we saw a lot of historical monuments the names of which are very very difficult to remember. Every seat in this double decker bus had an earphone through which we could hear running commentary about the monuments. But the quality of the equipment inside the bus was not good. There were 15 stops during the tour. We could get down anywhere we wanted and the next bus would come in 10 minutes. This way, we could keep traveling till 5 PM. We got down first near a 13th century church. This church was damaged almost fully during World War II and a new one has been built beside it. We went inside the new church. All the walls in this church have blue colored glass blocks and they were illuminated. There was no other light inside the church. The Brass idol of the God was really very nice to look. After sitting for 2 minutes there, we came out and saw huge buildings everywhere and people busily moving across. Berlin is the largest city of Germany. Due to its size, the number of people in the city is also very high. But, the vehicles on the road are very less when compared to Bangalore's traffic. The local trains and the buses are used to the maximum extent by the people here. We got another yellow bus and continued our tour. We saw the largest palace of Berlin named Schloss Charlottenberg. We could not get down and go inside as we didn't have time. We then saw the Parliament building, the embassies of different countries, a few museums, and a few other monuments whose names I don't remember!

The next stop where we got down was near a museum named Count Charlie near the Wall but none of my colleagues were interested to get in as the entrance fee was close to 14 euros. Losers in life! So, seeing the wall from a moving bus was my haNe baraha

I convinced the people in my group to get down at the Gendermenmarkt square where there is a big auditorium and a German Cathedral. The auditorium was closed as it was a Sunday. But we saw 3 artists playing saxophone and an accordion outside the theater. From there, we again got into next bus and we got down at the Brandenburg Gate. This gate, was once the entrance to Berlin. People with all kinds of costumes were seen waiting for the public to take their photographs and give them some money. For the first time, I saw beggars in Germany here. After clicking photographs of the gate and a few people in the costumes, we got into yet another yellow bus to reach the railway station. We then walked near the banks of river Spree and spent some time in the cool breeze. With another 6 hour journey back to Buxtehude, thus ended our trip to the capital. A tight, jam-packed-scheduled trip!

First weekend! Day 1

After the hectic 5 days of being fed up of seeing stinky wear the same shirt and pant, it was time for us to explore Germany and get rid of the 'stinking stinkyness'

Saturday morning, 4 of us left from Pali's place after the breakfast. The weather was very pleasant, just about 7 to 8 degrees may be. We started walking and had no specific place to go to. You have to be very careful while walking on the footpaths. The cyclists are not allowed on the road as they have a dedicated part of the footpath for them. We being Indians, didnt know that cyclists had a share in our footpath for their tires. A cyclist rang his bell and I didn't realize that he was asking for place for him to go past us, we thought he was ringing the bell on the road. People here are very kind. He stopped his cycle, called out for us and asked if he could go. Apologizing for our ignorance, we let him go and then were careful enough not to tread on their path.

The people who walk on Bangalore's footpath will find it very easy to walk here as there are no bikes honking for their way on the footpath! Did I say honking? I have never heard a horn blowing till now!! Yes, people never honk here. Strange. We honk just for fun or to inform somebody near a turning 'please dose hodibedi, ee kade inda naan bartaa ideeni' or to call a person who is one among 50 people on the road, i wonder how THAT person would get to know its a call for him.

But, our honking is fun. The people also are very silent here. Anywhere you go, unless you go very near to people who are in a conversation, you can not hear the usual chatters. People in the trains are also dead silent. So is the train! The sealed windows and doors don't let any sound to come inside and it is very boring inside the train to sit so silently.

Every road has a footpath in Buxtehude no matter how small it is. If thats the case with this small town, I'm sure the whole country will have the same kind of roads and footpaths. People follow the signals to cross the roads. That was really surprising to me. Nobody crosses the road even if its fully empty unless there is a green signal. When we were standing to cross the road, a passing thought struck my mind. In our country, how many times do we SEE the signal meant for people to cross, let alone following the signals? When big vehicles such as buses and cars don't bother to follow the signals, what are we talking about the pesky human beings on the roads.

The Buxtehude city is supposed to be a very old city, which has been built in the 17th or 18th century. During the world war II, this was one among the very few cities where no bombing happened. Two reasons. One, a rumor was spread everywhere in Germany that Hitler was near Buxtehude in a city called Stade [pronounced as staaday. Hey, I haven't told you how to pronounce Buxtehude. It is boo-ksti-hoo-dah] Another reason was that apple was grown only in Buxtehude during the war. Had they bombed this city, nobody could have got apples! This story was told by Pali to me, I don't know how much of it is true. Well, I leave this task for you. Learn the history and tell me, I'm very bad at it.

The main city area has streets made up of cobble stones. The buildings were built at least a century ago. Every city has a main administrative building called rathaus, it is the town-hall of the city. All the government buildings have a copper sulphate colored top portion which signifies that it is a government building. Beside the rathaus is the St. Petri's Cathedral which was constructed about 150 years ago. Unfortunately, the church was closed by the time we reached. I was told that people from all over the country come to this church to pray. Will visit the church again and then write about it.

While I'm writing this, its raining hailstones here. The weather has been pretty bad for a few days now. The hailstone rain then becomes ice-rain and then a snowfall. How I wish I can see all of these.

There is a stretch in this city where one can find the beautiful Margareta standing in river Elbe. Margareta is the last cargo ship that was used in Buxtehude. For the first time in my life, I saw a ship that closely. The road is on either side of this river. A few authentic German and Italian restaurants are alongside this river which I'm sure, will not have anything vegetarian. The place was very calm and clean needless to say.

The shops in the streets of Buxtehude are very attractive with the dazzling display of the products they sell. A direct replacement of Euro by Rupee would turn the situation very funny. A Mercedes Benz E class would cost 44,000 Rupees, A swatch watch would cost 140 Rupees, A Samsung HDTV would cost 2500 Rupees, A good formal shirt would cost 18 Rupees, A full suit would cost 249 Rupees. My God! Imagine if it were to be like this in India. And then there is the Euro shop where all the items cost around 1 Euro. A big packet of Snickers would cost 2 Rupees, A scented candle would cost 1.49 Rupees and the list goes on.

A simple multiplication of all these costs with 62 will give you an idea how much they would actually cost. Germany is no cheap. A haircut here costs 10 euros, thats 620 Rupees! I can have 20 haircuts done in Bangalore for that. People here value even a cent a lot. Not like us where we ignore 50 paise, its 30 rupees here!

After roaming around in the streets of Buxtehude, we all were hungry and it was time for us to search for a place where vegetarian food was available as 2 of us in the team do not eat non veg. After walking for 10 minutes, we barged into subway and ordered for a 6 inch sub with a coke. They have a free re-fill of the drink that you take, I had 2 servings of coke. One can re-fill any number of times any drink of his choice. But the weather does not allow you to take more than 2 servings. One of my colleagues came up with a whacky idea of having an ice cream in the 6 degree temperature! All of us agreed to her and we bought ice creams of our choice which cost anywhere between 25 cents to 1 euro. With the ice cream in one hand and German goodies that everybody had shopped in another hand, we all went to a park to spend some time.

The river Elbe infront of the benches in the park was just amazing. The ducks in Elbe came very near to us. The water is dirty in Germany too!! The German government has built small 'houses' for the ducks to stay and these white ducks keep roaming around the river all day long. The cool breeze, the sun setting and the ice cream... it was just a perfect way to spend an evening.

The temperature was going down and we all started feeling very cold. It was time for us to leave. A beautiful day in a beautiful city, I really could not believe that I saw all this with my eyes. A wonderful experience that I can not forget. Buxtehude, a place to visit!

The Hectic phase

The pressure to complete all the work before the deadline was mounting everyday. Me and my colleague used to leave Pali's place at around 8:30 and reach the office in 5 minutes' time. Everynight, after dinner, we had to tell Kusum the time at which we wanted a taxi, the next morning. She would book the taxi for us and give us a slip that had the message "7 Euros fixed price, [The office address], Thanks, Perera" in German. We had to show this slip to the taxi driver and then he would nod and take us to the office.

Language is a big problem here. Not everybody can understand English. If they understand by chance and respond back, we can not understand German. But it is fun. After paying the money to the driver and taking the 'quittung' [bill] we would start the work in the lab.

Our in-charge person at the customer's office [ I'll call him as stinky from now on], would come in at around at 10, shake hands and show his all yellow-orange teeth and say 'Good morning'. He would at times sit with us and explain how the system worked or would tell us that he would be back in sometime and leave the lab. Trust me, he wore the same white sweat-shirt and the black jeans for 5 days in a row! [now you know why I call him so].

He definitely needs to consult Dr.Bhatwadekar [the Orbit white chewing gum ad on the TV!!]. I will not be surprised if for some reason stinky had got a cow teeth transplant done. The smell, my god! it was horrible. Added to this, if we asked him a question, he would pull a chair and sit next to me so close that I could kiss him. Now, let me tell you one thing, I'M STRAIGHT and I CAN NOT AND WILL NEVER DO SUCH THINGS. I just wanted you to know how close stinky would come when sitting on a chair and I had to either breathe through my mouth or hold my breath and die.

For some reason, I have had a smelly experience in my company since I joined this account. My manager in India is stinky's close relative. [another post for all of you to smell them] We had to work till about 8 in the evening after which a security guy would come and ask the employees to leave! How I wish if this could happen in Bangalore. Too much to ask for? I don't think so..

Pali would pick us up and me and my colleague had to again boot our laptops and start the documentation update as we would not have got the license to use that tool while we were in office. All this would amount to 12 hours of work everyday! It has been really long since I worked so much in a day.

This hectic phase of work went on for the next 5 days until we had our first weekend in Germany. Another post for the weekend.