The first story that I am going to relate is about the pickpockets of Europe.
The first one happened to my friend, who is one of the four who went to IAG UCL , Belgium on student exchange. The story goes such. We had a great week in Italy, and had taken the night train to Munich from Milan. The train passed through the austrian alps and it was snowing like crazy and everywhere you could see the white blanket of snow. So we decided that we would traceback our journey after reaching munich and check out the snow and so we did. We had a great time. So everything went well here, so why am I telling you this? Well, its quite central to the whole story, just have some more patience.
So where was I? yes, we went to Austria, and had some fun in the snow and returned to Munich to take the 3 pm high speed train to Brussesls. We were in time and we finally started on our journey back. But as fate would have it there was a railway workers strike the very same day and so after some two hours of journey we found ourselves stranded along with thousands of other passengers in Cologne. All was not lost though, there were still some local trains operating, and we both boarded one such train which took us to the last stop on the German border. Unlike India the railway people felt responsible for the inconvenience we faced and they booked a bus for all the passengers who had to go to Brussels and Liege in Belgium. And thus we found ourselves on the bus, hoping that the time it takes quite some time to reach Brussels. Basically, we wanted to spend the night in the bus rather than in the station where there'd be no heating. But to our badluck, the bus driver drove really fast and by 12 15 in the night we were in Brussels-Midi train station. The last train was gone, the first train in the morning was at 4 45. We had no option but to spend our night in the railways station.
The stage is set -more in the next post
Ciao.
Deft Hands & European Pickpockets - Part One
The European Sojourn
Student Exchange Program( STEP, as we call it in IIMC) means that you get to spend a full term in a foreign university. Thus I was in Belgium for the last three months in a university which i am sure you will have never heard of. Nevermind. I was not there for the university in the first place.
Travelled a lot. 12 countries to be precise. Thats like the avergae number of countries any stepper in europe travels with some people even touching 18.
So whats in store for you?
There are so many things you know about Europe, about foreigners, about foreign land ... but I believe there are so many other things you don't really know. For example, roaming around on the streets of Amsterdam you realize that a place is not just people passing by on bicycles, the trams the canals, the monuments ... its much more ... And that much more will I try to express in the posts to come through personal anecdotes, observations and plain description ... for your sake and for my sake ... so that I never forget ... so that its for keeps...
I leave you with a picture of a place called Cinque Terre in Italy on the Mediterranean Coast. Probably one of the most beautiful places I have been in Europe.
Why this to start with - probably because I sat on the rocks of the craggy coastline, and sat still for an hour on the rocks, feeling like a traveller. Ironic you may say, but thats how I felt :)
So Long.
I've Got Taxi Power
One thing I will surely miss when I leave Calcutta is the ubiquitous yellow taxis. There's nothing great about them. Normal Hindustan Motors Ambassador models painted yellow with a black stripe running along the sides, with electronic meters and more often than not a Bihari driver.
But then, its the whole experience.
Standing at the bus stop, still undecided whether to wait for the bus or opt for the more lucrative taxi waiting at the corner. Pacing up and down the bus stop, letting a few empty taxis with drivers craning their neck in search of passengers , pass by and then finally deciding to call out for the next empty taxi that comes by.
Sometimes that "next taxi" never comes ( the bus arrives earlier ), and sometimes the taxi does come but the driver isn't ready to go. And sometimes when you have not even decided about your journey ( the choice of bus vs taxi hasn't cropped up yet ), pop comes an empty taxi, you raise your hand, the taxi stops, you alight the taxi and thats it.
Funny. The way things happen.
To think of it, the whole process of hailing a taxi, opening the door, and giving out instructions to the driver to take us to a certain place has some different feel to it. Perhaps a combination of power, expectation, and hope.
Mind & Body
One of those moments, when you get transported in time.
It happens to me quite often. I wake up, disturbed and heavy in the mind .. and in that heaviness listen to some song playing somewhere faintly ... and I get transported to some other time ...
My body, my mind starts feeling strange. As if I have been transported to some other dimension. Not just the mind even my body reacts to it ... The body remembers the sensation ...
Sometimes its the other way round. The heat of the summer, the smell of the rains, getting wet in the rains take me back in time ...
Maybe its just the emotional baggage that I carry( which I still believe is sub-conscious :O ), or maybe its just a disturbed sleep cycle.
Say Cheese & Die!!
Well, certainly not a nice thing to say if you are photographer.
To rest the confusion, Say Cheesse & Die is a book/novel in the goosebumps series by RL Stine ( never heard of him?? same here :O ) . The story revolves around two kids who get a camera which when used depicts terrible events which eventually occer. Quite a premise.
No, I haven't read the book and this post is not about it either.
Remember standing in a group ready to be photographed, when we were kids ? Yes, you get the picture right. Saying Cheese, and holding on to "Saying Cheese" till the photographed clicked away was one of the most arduous and unsurmountable things to do during schooldays.
I mean, the act was so unnatural, that I always dreaded the day when the school group photographs were to be distributed. Trust me. And during the photographs, that itchy feeling to either widen it, skew it .... and God knows what ... certainly scary ...
I dont remember when i stopped "Saying Cheese", but I am happy I did and I hope I dont do that to others :)
More on saying cheese :
"By saying "cheese", most people form their mouths into what appears to be a smile-like shape. Additionally, the absurdity of saying "cheese" for no apparent reason can incite glee in some persons"http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Say_cheese
Dr. StrangeLaunch - How I Stopped Using The Start Menu & Started Loving Launchy
Simply put Launchy indexes your start menu ( among other things which you can ask it to index ) and with a simple keyboard combination you can invoke it and start typing the application name to find the match and launch it. The default key combination is alt-space, and the default indexing directory is the start menu. For keyboard enthusiasts, this is THE thing to minimize mouse usage. What it has done to me is that i hardly use the start menu anymore.
More about it here
The customizations I have made
1. ctrl-space instead of alt-space , 'coz i use alt-space for maximizing/minimizing etc etc
2. Have created a folder containing shortcuts to the common folders I access, and have indexed it using launchy. Goodbye MyComputer.
P.S: This is just one of the many applications I have installed on my laptop to make life more simpler. Watch out for more in near future.
Help!!!
No matter how much i try to bundle up the wires, tie them up, i end up unbundling them when moving the laptop from the table to the bed, or when the ups line goes offline for a while, and i have to plug the laptop charger to the more distant plug point.
So much of my real 'desktop' space being eaten away by these black ,snaky wires. And I thought having a laptop would make life easier. Somebody Help Me!!
Lake Joka
You cant miss them. Seven of them in a campus of around 150 acres. Not 'lakes' in the true sense of the word, but surely bigger than what people usually call a pond. Simply put, anything thats bigger than a pond is a Lake :)
This is the satellite image of IIMC. As u can see, there is island like patch of land surrounded by the lakes on all sides. I have a strange feeling that the island is artificial. Might be. Well, that island is the Academic Complex, er ...sorry, the lecture halls and the administrative office. So to get to the lecture halls we have to follow the roads along the lakes.
Its quite an experience, especially the nights in winters, with a light mist on the surface of the lakes. And in the summers, when the lakes are still and the lights from the library make a clear reflection, its even more enchanting.
Now the waters are green and the lakes are full. Blame the monsoons.
I showed these pictures to my friend, and she felt that the lakes looked ominous. Well, it was the time you see, 6 in the morning.
Nevertheless. Lake Joka.
~Living Room Breathe Easy !
This life at IIM Calcutta
Two years, and it will be over.
It cant get sadder, it cant get happier.
Life at IIMC has been life.
Winning is everything. Getting drunk and making your life steady. Smoking and making the vision of your life clearer. Winning.
Come to experience.
IIMC. Its all about Life.
Posted here are some pics of the 'Flash Gordon Trophy' won by my wing. Footer Volley.
The Champions- Studfarm. E300's. We.
