The 'Triple J' Rajasthan trip

Triple-J or JJJ stands for Jaipur, Jaisalmer and Jodhpur - the three major tourist destination in the state of Rajasthan. In world of tourism, the cities are synonymous with the tags Pink City, Golden City and Blue City respectively. This is first post in the travelogue series of this trip. I am starting with a summary post regarding places visit we places visited, accommodation etc and in subsequent posts will share experiences in detail.



Jaipur

• Places we saw: City Palace, Jantar Mantar, Jaigarh Fort, Nargarh Fort, Amber Fort, Gator ki Chatriyan, Jal Mahal, Chokidhani(5 star village resort). All of the places I liked City Palace and Nargarh Fort, former because novelty factor and the latter because its calm atmosphere.
• Accomodation: Stayed at two places. Day-1 at Sureli Haveli in Banipark and Day-2,3 at Hotel Residency Inn which affiliate of YHAI.
• Moving Around: All credits to Raju and his auto. Right from pick up from the railway station to drop back Raju took the responsibility of our intra-city travel. We were very much relieved of catching an auto, negotiating the fare, later on negotiating the compensation for waiting time and so on.
• Food: Had traditional Rajasthani food Dal-Bati-Churma at different restaurants. Also tea and kachories at Raju's shop used to be perfect start for the day.
• Shopping: Bought a few kurtas, saree and dress material which were uniquely printed with vegetable colors. But I was irritated with excess marketing of "100 gm quilt" at all the handicraft shops which I visited or forced to visit. On top that if you stay for long term in places where temperature hardly goes down below 10 degree celcius, excess marketing increases you irritation levels exponentially as there will no need of such warm stuffs.

Jaisalmer

• Places we saw: Khuri Sand Dunes, Sam Sand Dunes, Jaisalmer Fort, Gadi Sagar Lake. Sand Dunes are the place to be evening.
• Major activities: Camel ride on Khuri Sand Dunes, Walking on Dunes at Sam which we liked more than normal Camel ride.
• Accommodation: Day-1 at Badal House(Khuri) which is a lonely planet recommendation and Day-2 at 'Hotel Payal' which is affiliated to YHAI.
• Food: Bajre ki Roti and Dokhla at Badal House. Also nice to have was "Pakwaan", a big papad with masala toppings available in a tela near Jaisalmer bus stop.
• Moving around: Local Bus, Auto and Bike. Renting a bike is good option considering cost and convenience. Never dared go for taxis and jeeps, as there was very high chances of getting ripped off.

Jodhpur

• Places we saw: Mehrangarh Fort, Jaswant ka Thada, Umaid Bhavan Palace. Other than these, not many places of interest were there in the city.
• Accommodation : Stayed at "Hotel Nirvana" which is 1 km from the railway station.
• Moving around: we tried to emulate Raju type of auto experience with a local autowallah but ended paying a bomb. So better go for a seperate autos. But traveling in Jodhpur's auto with mega leg-room was an amusing experience,
• Food: Masala Cheese Omelette at "Omelette Shop" in the market around clock tower. We also had lassis at a nearby shops which was perfect complement to the omelette.
• Shopping: National Handloom shop is a good place to buy souvenirs, designer wallets-n-purses.

Planning

• Faced with series of drop outs I had to entire planning on my own.
• My major online references were wikitravel and Arun's indiatravelblog. I also bought Hapercollins Rajasthan Travel guide and it was a handy reference for the entire trip. The strategy was to see less places with more dedication rather than being a normal vacation tourist i.e. visiting places for formality sake.
• Some part of the travel plan was so foolproof that even if I miss a train, there will be another itinerary as plan-B. Even though I ended up paying 20 INR to irctc per cancelled transaction of plan-B tickets, the less load on the mind with a back up option was good to have.

Restropect

• With this trip, we contributed around 6000 INR per head (excluding to-n-fro train tickets to Jaipur) to GDP of India.
• Badal Singh Guest House at Khuri is a must visit place. Hats offs to his simplicity and down to earth personality.
• We got saturated with sightseeing, especially forts and temples in last leg of the trip. So our initial decision to travel less and see more was right. Looking forward to cover other parts of Rajasthan in subsequent trips.
• Timing of our trip i.e two weeks before Chrismas was perfect, we experienced decent weather throughout, a must while traveling in Rajasthan and completely avoided crowds of holiday season.

Thanks to

• Raju aka Raj Kumar Lakhiwal : for his auto service in Jaipur.
• Arun Bhat: for his indiatravelblog rajasthan series.
• Naveen aka Ande: accompanying me for this trip. Traveling alone in a week long trip drains you off.
• Arun VM: for cancelling my back up Railway tickets.

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3 idiots: movie and the controversy

This post is my views on the actual movie and also the credit controversy we have been seeing and hearing for the last 2-3 days.

Well I have not written a post on a movie for long time. But after seeing this movie twice, once in a multiplex and other time in a single screen, I could not resist putting down my thoughts here.

• The movie even though based on a best-seller has it's own charm. The experience was different altogether. There are sufficient twists to keep the audience at the edge of the seat, even if they have read the novel.
• While watching the movie for the second time I didn't even get bored in a single frame.
• Protagonists have gone into the skin of the character, especially Aamir Khan right from eye ball movements to the walking style
• Apart from the director and the screenplay writer, the major credit should go to the make up man, who has made Aamir look half his original age !
• Other than the protagonists Boman Irani has also done his job to perfection in his usual style. But the character who steals the show is Chatur Ramalingam, taking credits for the best scene of the movie - his (in)famous speech for the Teacher's day function.
• The narrative is very gripping as the major part of the story is in flash back. Not so important detailing have been covered with backdrop voice of Farhan Qureshi (R. Madhavan).

Other Views abt the movie:

• Sagarika Ghose - From Three Idiots to a Nation Of Idiots
• Rajeev Masand - 3 Idiots, satisfying not best.

The Idiotic Controversy
It all began with Chetan Bhagat being disappointed by his name not being mentioned in initial Credits. It was followed by Aamir making a statement that Chetan is doing this for publicity. Then came the yesterday's dramatic press conference in which the producer Vidhu Vinod Chopra(VVC) lost his cool. The controversy entered into headlines with all major journos posting their view in social networking space.

Starting from Vir Sanghvi

I am on the side of Chetan Bhagat in the 3 Idiots controversy. Authors deserve prominent credit if their books are sources. Contrast how Danny Boyle treated Vikas Swarup even though Slumdog was quite different from the book with how Bhagat is being treated. Simon Beaufoy won Best Adapted Screenplay and said without Swarup there would be no movie and no awards.

Then Rajdeep Sardesai

Hirani should say film was inspired by chetan's book, chetan must accept that the screenplay is a raju-joshi creation.

Today when director Rajkumar Hirani in press conference discussed the clauses of the contract signed in 2005, the things became more clear. The final full stop (i hope so) is from Chetan's side by recommending a solution to the situation.

I chose to remain neutral when this credit controversy saga was going on. But the way things have built up from Chetan Bhagat's side I have lost sort of respect towards him. By the look of things I feel he's not able to handle the celebrity status properly.

• First of all being a product of India's two premier institutes how can he blindly claim that 70% of the movie is based on his novel, just because one of his fan said so? I agree he's emotional because the story is close to his heart, but still. Now he's changing tracks by mentioning in his blog that "We don’t have to get into percentages".
• Also he's sort of begging from the makers of the movie to put his name under storyline credits atleast in official records and DVD/Sattelite TV version.
• Last but not the least the following tweet from him -

Understand team 3i is in Indore for presscon today. Maybe they think Indore will be milder to them - but Indore is CB town! ppl there know

• .. CB town ?? painting the city with his name .. what's rationale for this .. an appaulause for a speech. Come on Chetan ..

Also in read in detail Veer Saghvi's take on 3i controversy.

Also read Five Point Similarities, 3 Identical Things

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HNY MMX !

Happy New Year to all, if you are still wondering what's MMX in the title, it's just Roman numeral equivalent of the number 2010 !

The celebrations this year were not as adventurous like previous year's Skandagiri peak episode, however we had a get together and did some kind of celebration away from Bangalore. The celebration started at Ankur's home where we decorated the house like celebrating a birthday with balloons and color paper tapes. After having dinner, we went to epicenter of Bangalore celebrations i.e. Brigade Road, MG Road area.

Then we made our entry into Vijay Mallya's UB City and expected the atmosphere to be electricity in the complex. But in contrast the environment inside was calm. There was some party going on inside Shiro Lounge Bar but the 7K price was beyond our budget. The year switch celebration was more or less mute in the place. There were some group of ladies enthusiastically wishing their dearest ones over phone and discussing about going towards airport. With their looks and context of their talk one could have easily made out that they were air-hostesses of the airline owned by Mallya.

After the year-switch we went to Coffee Day 24/7 outlet at Maddur which 65 kms from the city. The drive was bit exhaustive for Hemanth, as he was the lone driver in the group. The unpainted speed breakers made things more irritating. It was a big relief at when we saw red-n-white glow-sign boards on the right side of the highway around 2 AM. Surprisingly the place was still brimming with people, and many were still in celebration mode either yelling out wishes in air or dancing to the tunes played thru their car audio system. We became the part of the crowd with our formal celebration with cake cutting and having a cup of favorite coffee respectively.

At 3 AM, we decided to get back to Bangalore, to conclude our celebrations. While returning we chose to get back by NICE road which was literally nice too, as we could avoid notorious speed breakers on the Mysore Road.

That's the celebration this year, will definitely do something different next time. Share your celebration experiences too.

Looking Back 2009:

• The year which was back to student life for me. The best time was Exchange Program where I made many International friends.
• In traveling front the exchange program gave me a chance travel in Germany and Switzerland. Being at Jungfrau - top of Europe was the ultimate experience.
• The major trip in India was one week at Rajasthan. Due to time constraints I could cover important locations in North and North-West Rajasthan. Upcoming posts will be experiences on this trip.
• Never thought that my one year old SLR will be utilized so heavily in 365 days. I am yet to review and post process GBs of snaps.

Looking Forward 2010:

• I want to travel beyond either Atlantic or Pacific Ocean and also to Southern Hemisphere. Let's see how this wish materializes.
• In India also I want to cover places in the state which I have never been before.
• In Photography department I am looking capture more awesome snaps and learn more tricks of the trade.
• There are many professional and personal goals. Looking forward to fulfill them in time.

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Need a flagship train b/w Mumbai and Bangalore

There's a need for a super-fast train service between Mumbai and Bangalore for the segment who cannot afford air travel every-fine-day and will definitely pay a premium for fast and convenient train service. The present so called flagship train connection two cities is Udyan Express and it covers the distance of 1153 kms in 25 hrs! A very poor speed when compared to other inter city trains. For example Jaipur-Mumbai superfast express completes distance of 1159 kms in 17h 40m. Mamta Aunty are you listening ? There's no need to think out-of-the-box for this problem, just introducing a Garib-Rath service should be sufficient.

My opinion on this appeared in 'letters to editors' section of Deccan Herald on Monday, 21st Dec 2009.

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Post # 200: Imagining India - Breadthwise and Depthwise

It's 200th post on naanushande.com and the what better topic it can be, my views on the book "Imagining India" by Nandan Nilekani, at present chairman of Unique Identfication Authority of India(UIDAI). What really differentiates the book from other business books on India is that breadth and depth of subjects. Be it discussion on India's infrastructure, or Education or Energy Self-sufficiency or Social Security. A must read book every person who's planning to design a strategic road-map for a business in India.

I had posted a few months back about the book in discussion about India's transportation sector. At that time I had read some random chapters from the copy borrowed from institute's library. In the same period Nandan Nilekani was appointed as chairman of UIDAI and all of a sudden the book became a hot-cake in the library and it became difficult for a individual keep it issued for long time. So I opted to buy a personal copy from flipkart.com, at 15% discount and free shipping!

Overall a very good narrative, got to appreciate the way the author has integrated all the information on India available in silos in a coherent way. But the flipside of the book is that it is too bulky, not very convenient to read while traveling, a time at which such genre of books will be nice to read.

Some strong points have been discussed in the book on various topics. The following list may not be pretty comprehensive, these are just a few points which really caught my attention.

Infrastructure:

• The books discusses in depth about the root cause for current state and why government had ignored development of infrastructure in India. The top down approach of the government had led to ignorance in one of the lifeline of an economy i.e. Transportation.
• Things have changed in recent times when infrastructure became politically fashionable, the entire focus from Roti, Kapada aur Makaan shifted to Bijli, Sadak aur Pani.

Higher Education:

• Right from the establishment of three universities(Bombay, Calcutta & Madras) the author discusses about the ups and downs of Indian education system.
• The establishment of IITs one of signature decision the government but unlike institutes in US it missed public funding for research work and instead the funds were tunneled only to central laboratories like CSIR, DRDO, NAL, BARC.
• Our public debate on institutes have focused on two issues, privatization and reservation.
• The weak regulatory environment has encouraged private investment mainly from people looking to make a fast buck rather than provide effective education.
• Steps should be taken to end the scarcity of institions othewise hyper-Darwinian selection process has encouraged 'Kota-mindset' of cramming and creating coaching industry.

School Education:

• Due to regional divides across the country - single, coherent education system is impossible.
• Our educational policies have funded school, not schooling.
• Some people say "In terms of education, we will have to reach the twentieth century before we think about the twenty-first".
• In rural area, landlords protest school reforms with a straight face that effective schooling will create unreasonable expectations among backward castes for jobs are entertainment.
• Private schools have not improved the situation. As indicated by British researcher James Tooley in his landmark paper there have been mushrooming for 'mom-and-pop schools', one room enterprises with ambitious names 'Oxford School'.
• Nowadays education like infrastructure has also become politically fashionable. It started with the launch of Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan(SSA) by Vajpayee Government. But unfortunately, SSA has only enabled the pumping of more money down a very leaky pipe.

Unique Citizen ID

• There's a need for more strict tracking. Number of BPL ration cards circulating in Karnataka is more than state's entire population.
• For Single ID major databases have to be integrated. PAN covers all tax payers, voter IDs all registered citizens above eighteen, birth certificates all new borns and BPL cards the poor.
• The national smart ID system would be transformational and can function as a mobile, non transferable passbook, considering the fact that 80 percent of Indians today do not have a bank account!
• Linking smart cards to bank accounts will introduce possibility of offering direction services from pension to benefit payments.
• There will be transformation in politics, as with national ID system there will be paradigm shift from subsidies to direct benefits.

Land Disputes:

• Land never has been an easy issue. Over 30 per cent of pending court cases concerned with land.
• Unlike many countries, India has not recognized the 'right to property' as fundamental one since 1978.
• Land boundaries are very complicated within cities also. To file an FIR in India one has to experience complications in police station limits. There's a massive confusion where one station's authority ends and the other begins.

Healthcare:

• Our malnutrition numbers place us among the world's weakest countries, while our diabetes rates vaults us over the United States.
• India did not have a health policy till 1982, and the funds the government earmarked for healthcare have budget leftovers. The sector has been drastically under-funded.
• Due to dubious public healthcare system, 85% of patients are choosing private health care, even the poorest. Because of this healthcare is the second largest reason that people in rural India are in debt.

Social Security:

• Government and citizens have long agreed on the idea that services and care for the aged 'should be a responsibility of the children'.
• There have been efforts for implementing universal social security policy. National Pension Scheme (NPS) and National Commision for Enterprises in the Unorganised Sector(NCEUS).
• To reduce burden on the exchequer, the schemes should be 'defined contribution mechanism', unlike 'defined benefits' method approach of US and Europe.
• 'Defined benefits' schemes like generous pensions, unemployment insurance and health benefits can have unintended consequences, like people retiring early, taking longer breaks between jobs and focusing too little on preventive healthcare.
• Savings and social security has to provide solutions not just for middle class but also for the large of poor. With the implementation for national ID system government would be able to manage the individual account of people who live hand to mouth.

Pension Funds:

• Currently EPFO funds which are stuck in low-yield securities, some part of it should be brought into India's stock market. This should avoid swings in markets due to sudden inflow and outflow of FII funds.
• Pension funds of other counties make up almost 13 percent of FII in India. Around 150 global pension funds have all invested in Indian stocks.

Environmental Challenges:

• Development versus Environment is perennial debate - Once Rajiv Gandhi said "Development which destroys the environment destroys development itself".
• Some accuse western world shifting their dirtiest industries abroad, first through colonization and later through globalization.
• Tropical areas like India have highly complex ecosystems, and are very difficult to recover once destroyed, compared to the temperature of the West.
• Coal industry is badly regulated. The industry waste is discarded into open land, creating large areas of barren wasteland. The environment destruction from coal mining has fanned anger around the mine fields in Chattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Jharkhand West Bengal and aidded rise of Naxalite movement.
• 80% of carbon emissions come from sectors in energy and heavy industry whose investments cannot be easily replaced.

Energy Sector:

• Free electricity is the policy cornerstone of every populist politician.
• Fossil fuel led industrialization has been replicated around the world. But the further development should continue with renewable sources.
• Government subsidies should be more directed towards solar and alternated energy sources to make them more attractive w.r.t price.
• Big investments in energy investment are yet to happen, there are emerging possibilities for distributed green power and for IT-enabled grid intelligence we can create a whole new paradigm of energy generation, distribution and consumption.

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Jungfrau: top of Europe

The major highlight of our Switzerland trip was the visit to the top of Europe i.e. Jungfrau. It's amazing to witnessed how the place has been developed for tourism. Definitely a must visit place. The place out of our visit-list because of indecently high ticket price. But the improper navigation system turned out to be blessing in disguise, we gave our car a rest and decided to utilize the day effectively.

Lauterbrunnen Train Station: the place from where we started our train ride on Jungfraubahn to top of Europe. Tickets could be bought at the station itself. The total price including entry to the top was 111 EUR/head

Cogwheel Railway: A special mechanism for the trains traveling on an incline > 15 degree.

At Kleine Scheidegg: here we had to change from Non-AC train to AC train for continuing our uphill journey.

Mt. Schreckhorn: as seen from Eismeer viewpoint, one of the stations at which Jungfraubahn halts for 10 minutes while ascending.

At Ice palace: very rare group photo, thanks to a family from Chennai.

Plateau: Place to experience sub zero temperature and slipperiness of the snow.

Bollywood restaurant closed for off season. Scheduled to re-open in April 2010.

Observatory at Sphinx.

Photo spot at Sphinx: Top of Europe at 11,782 feet.

Goodbye sign in six languages German, French, English, Italian, Spanish and Japanese.

More information at Wikipedia: Jungfraubahn.

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Switzerland: a small heaven on earth

Switzerland, a must visit place in Europe especially for people staying in South Germany. The place with which every Bollywood fan can associate himself/herself as it’s been glamorized by filmmakers for several decades. Above all, a blissful place to be for avid travelers.

Retrospect

• Jungfrau is must visit.
• Equate Jungfrau's ticket price with amount of money and time investment required for making to trip to Himalayas.
  
• Carry sufficient warm clothes to beat the cold at high altitude.
  
• While renting a car, do a double check for proper navigation system.
  
• Food is very expensive in Switzerland. Prefer carrying some basic bakery items and fruits.

Driving Route:
Reutlingen-> Schaffhausen(Rhine Falls)-> Zurich-> Luzern-> Lauterbrunnen.

The Planning:
Staying in Reutlingen, i.e. in south Germany we had a plan of having a full-fledged trip spread over two days. And the obvious choice turned out to be Switzerland as it’s not so far away from play we were staying. First we thought of traveling by train, but later we decided to look for other options since traveling by train was not efficient and there was not much advantage w.r.t cost.

Then we thought of renting a car for travel, but the process of renting was not that smooth. Our first attempt was at EuropeCar, nearest car rental to our dorm Kolpinghaus, but they refused to give a car stating the reason that none of us have an international license. Then, Sivaram did some research on internet and got the info that with valid Indian driving license one can drive in Europe for first 6 months of his/her stay. So we enquired the same clause at other car rentals and ended up getting Volkswagen Turon from Sixt car-rental.

One of the motto of the trip was to save money on food. As soon as we got the car from Sixt on Friday evening(September 18th), we went to Penny Markt near university to load the boot-space with food items like bread, fruits etc which would be sufficient enough to fill our stomach while traveling.

The Beginning:
We started early on Saturday morning. As part of planning for the trip we had taken printouts of various routes from google maps. But practically it was not that helpful, as it was difficult to read the from paper for making decision when the speed of vehicle is greater than 100 kmph, so for convenience we followed orders of car navigation system.

From Reutlingen, we traveled towards Tubingen and then to Rottenberg. After Rottenberg we joined an Autobahn which was destined to German-Swiss border. In that stretch we had maiden experience of traveling in German Autobahns. It was an amazing experience to witness people just zipping beyond 200 kmph in no speed limit zone, especially people on Audis and BMWs. Within no time we crossed Germany borders and it was time to start our Swiss sightseeing. The first place on the visit-list was Rhine falls.

Rhine Falls:
The major problem traveling on our own vehicle is that there’s probability of missing the right diversion. Even after doing sufficient homework and taking print outs we failed to take the right diversion for Rhine Falls. Sivaram and Sameer, the driver+navigator pair realized it just one second late. Unfortunately, it was too late when we were moving at a speed greater than 80 kmph, so no chance of backtracking!

After missing the diversion, we somehow managed to reach Rhine Falls by Indian style of routing i.e. asking people. Fortunately we found a person at a gas station to help us with directions.

At Rhine falls, after parking our VW at dedicate place we proceeded towards the falls. One has to walk downhill, walk across the railway bridge in upstream of the falls and reach the front viewpoint of the falls. From the viewpoint one can take a boat-ride to island in actual falls area.

Amazing thing was while when we were walking across the bridge a train passed right next to us, it happened twice and very first time we were taken aback by sudden surprise zip of the engine. The boat ride to island(for 6.5 CHF) was also nice … and also climbing upto bird’s nest region of the falls. On the boat a phrase was written in several languages and in hindi it was written as – एक छोटा सा स्वर्ग.

While traveling on the boat, we met an Indian family of Husband-Wife, Father-Mother. The guy was staying somewhere in North Germany. The family were on one week Switzerland trip and were in the last leg of the trip. After realizing that we are planning skip Jungfrau in order to see more places, they suggested us to make a visit to Interlaken atleast, if not Jungfrau. Then after getting back to parking-lot we consumed our food items bread, jam, peanut butter, boiled egg and fruits.
Non-navigable Zurich
Next destination in our visit-list was Zurich. After reaching Zurich we realized that our car’s navigation system is not configured for intra city travel in Switzerland. The system just took us to the center of the city and from there on we had to be on our own. A helpless situation indeed, especially in a big city. Also, we faced a lot of trouble while parking our car. For understanding system of parking meter itself, we spent half an hour.

Then, we thought of making an attempt to fix the navigation system by calling customer center of Sixt car rental. Since the call charges through mobile was very expensive, we walked all the way to the HauptBahnnof(central station) for tourist information center to find out Sixt outlet in Zurich and also to make a phone call. The customer executive said that our car navigation system was configured only for streets in Germany, and only way it can fixed by taking the car back to Reutlingen! Our helplessness continued, the whole comfort of taking a car was partially annulled.

While walking to our car, we decided to head towards Luzern straightway as there was nothing much interesting to see in Zurich and to see some marginally good places also we had to opt for public transport which was indecently expensive for short term. The drive to Luzern was a different experience altogether. In one of the stretch of ride there was a railway track and a stream running parallel to the road adding more colors to the ride.

At Luzern:
In Luzern also we faced the problem as Zurich without proper navigation system. And as expected, we couldn’t find the way to Tourist information center and also to our accommodation. Then, we parked our car at some random place and with the help of directions from a backpacker we walked upto the HauptBahnhof. There we found the tourist information center next to the station complex and enquired there about the places to see around Luzern and also location of our accommodation. But again it was looking very complex to roam around in a car without a proper navigation system.

Then we walked back to the place where we had parked our car and started the search for youth hostel where we had booked accommodation for overnight stay . We came back to HauptBahnof by car, by retracing the route. We walked on foot and then proceeded ahead in the old town as per directions we got from the tourist information center. Finally with some amount of de-touring and stopping-n-asking process we managed to reach the youth hostel.

Day-2 planning:
At the accommodation after freshening up and making our beds, we started brainstorm for next day’s agenda. The place which we had eliminated because of price in prelims of trip planning i.e. Jungfrau came back to table of discussion. My proposition was even if we save time by visiting Pilatus or Titlis, we won’t be able to visit other places as it’s almost impossible to move inside a city without a proper navigation system. With cent percent consensus, we sketched out Jungfrau plan to utilize full day effectively. First we thought of leaving very early for getting "Good Morning Ticket" with 20% discount. Later we dropped the idea, on discovering that in "Good morning" scheme we have to leave from top on or before 12.30 pm. It was not really worthed, that to skipping free complimentary breakfast at Youth Hostel !

Dinner and Wooden Bridge:
Later in the night we headed to downtown for having night dinner. As a vegetarian I was not very enthusiastic, being conscious whether I will get something to eat or not at an affordable price. Surprisingly unlike Germany, there was an option of vegetarian burger in Burger king and as well as in McDonalds, may be the influence of veggie Indian tourist to the Swiss land. After the dinner we stepped our foot on famous wooden bridge of Luzern and witnessed beautiful 17th century placed in series along the pathway.

Drive to Lauterbrunnen:
After having the morning breakfast we started our drive towards Lauterbrunnen from the place where we had to board cog wheel train to Jungfrauouch. Again faced minor hiccupus without navigation system and got to the expressway with difficulty. The drive towards Lauterbrunnen and Interlaken was just superb. The signature tune of DDLJ was lingering in our minds while seeing breathtaking landscapes on both sides of the highway. At one place, Sivaram could not resist and made an abrupt half a location besides the lake "Lungerer See', which was one of the fishing spots. Experiencing the calm and clean water of the lake and simultaneously having a photo session flushed all the concerns of improper navigation system. [Recently while seeing DDLJ I realized that the same spot was picturised in one of the sequences of Tujhe Dekha song].

Getting to Jungfrau:
At 9.50 am we reached Lauterbrunnnen and parked our car in a huge multi-storey parking lot next to the station. At the ticket counters we bought tickets to Jungfrau for 111 EUR per head (which included entry fee to the top). The train to Jungfrauouch departed at 10.30 am and in between Kleine Scheidegg we had to change the train which took us to the higher altitude. Before getting to the top, the train halted at two stations Eigerwand and Eismeer.

On top of Europe:
At 12.30 pm we were on top of Europe-Jungfrauouch. First we visited ice palace, then to the open air plateau. There we got proper feel of the low temperature of high altitude and slipperiness of the snow. We moved towards food court section of the Jungfrauouch as were looking to have nice meal at Bollywood restaurant. But unfortunately the restaurant was closed for off-season, is scheduled to open at April 2010. Then we ended up having boiled eggs and chips which we had carried in our bagpacks as a backup. After having snacky lunch we went to Sphinx and the observatory deck experience more cold winds. I was literally shivering and without gloves it was difficult even to operate the camera. Sivaram took up the photography task voluntarily as he was well protected with gloves on and definitely in condition to operate the camera.

After spending some time at Sphinx we came back to the station for catching 3 pm train. The teen-patti saga of Sankar continued and that too in a train at top of Europe. We were back to LauterBrunnen at 5 pm and before leaving we had leftover foodstuffs to keep our stomach in right condition. We drove back to Luzern, shopped for souvenirs (famous DDLJ cowbell) at Kiosk, a convenience store near HaupBahnhof (the store was open on Sunday too).

Before saying goodbye to Switzerland, we roamed again in Luzern for a while, and again were enquired by some tourists for direction of a provision store. Don’t know if it’s because of our body-language, it happened four times in a span of 24 hours, tourists traveling in a car or walking on the road enquired for direction from us. Then finally saying Auf Wiedersehen to Switzerland we started the ride back to Reutlingen. And Sameer did major part of driving, with some zip-zaps in the Autobahn stretch making Sankar to keep heart in his mouth. And I had no option just to crib for not knowing how to drive a car, definitely missed a golden opportunity.

To conclude the trip was very exciting and memorable as we were able visit dream locations of Bollywood filmmakers. We saved a lot on food and also for transportation(40 EUR/head). The total trip expenses were around 180 EUR/head which included 111 EUR/head Jungfrau ticket. Pretty decent, if we compare the amount of time and money we have to invest for traveling to Himalayas in India.

Important Locations placemarked on Google Map:


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Strasbourg trip

Strasbourg(France) is a city virtually sandwiched between Germany and France and historically has been a violently disputed piece of land between two countries. The major significance of the city is that Gutenberg created the first printing press at the same place. The city is a seat to major European institutions such as European Parliament, Council of Europe.

Booking tickets:
The process of booking tickets was sort of a mini saga. We were constantly visitng Deutsche Bahn(DB) site for one week to check whether there are any discount offers. Till 2-3 days before the traveling day there wasn’t any breakthrough. Only option available in the site was tickets for 80 Euros per head. We were about to call off the trip, but Sachin and Sivaram didn’t lose hopes and gave a try at DB reservation office at Reutlingen Hbf(central station). They got tickets at the price of 53 EUR for 5 people, a real breakthrough indeed. The ticket was combination of Baddem-Wüttemburg pass and two way ticket from border of Germany to Strasbourg, the option which was not listed in DB site.

Important points

- Buy Strasbourg-Pass for 11.90 EUR. Breakeven can be easily attained in one day.
- People from Germany can travel upto last station of Germany by Baddem-Wüttemburg pass or Happy Weekend pass.
- Take the boat ride first, it's free with Strasbourg-Pass.

Onward Journey:
We took very early morning train at 5:47 am to Stuttgart and there at Stuttgart Hbf we had breakfast Brezel + Milch Coffee at 'Yormas' for 2 Euros. Really a cheap and effective option for the breakfast. From Stuttgart we took a train to Freudenstadt Hbf and changed over to another train to reach Strasbourg at 10:34 am. Nearly five hour one-way journey, well you have to sacrifice on time to save money. To be frank the journey was boring should have carried some books or playing cards for better utilization of time. However, Sachin and Sameer kept us entertained by narrating a few dramatic incidences from their life.

Tourist Information Center:
After getting down at the station, we straight away went to the Tourist Information Center in the station premises itself and enquired there about the places which can be covered in a single day. We bought Strasbourg-pass booklet for 11.90 EUR/head. The pass is actually is valid for 3 days and it had many vouchers from which one can avail discount or free entry at many sites in the city. And also for exploring on our own, we bought a city-map for 1 EUR! The first site on our list was Strasbourg Cathedral. We had initial plans of renting bicycle for moving around so we didn’t opt for tram pass immediately. On the way to the cathedral we realized that it’s a sort of headache for a person fresh to the city to roam around using a map even on foot. So we cancelled the plan of hiring bicycle and instead opted for the tram pass(8 EUR for 3 people).

Cathedral and the Astronomical Clock:
After witnessing 12 noon ceremony at the Cathedral we moved to Astronomical clock section. It’s a huge perpetual clock displaying time, positions sun and moon, solar and lunar eclipses. The major significance of the clock is that at 12.30 pm, twelve life size statues of Apostles walk in front of Christ's statue. There was a very big crowd waiting for 12.30 pm to happen and there was no place to sit. Suddenly, an old man in the crowd in a very bad medical state lost his balance, as he was not able to withstand the strain. The man was from England accompanied by his wife and German family friend. Immediately after witnessing the incidence, Sameer called up the emergency number 911 for an ambulance. He was unsuccessful in first attempt as the person on the other side was not speaking in English and in the second attempt he gave the phone to a French lady to request for an ambulance. Within five minutes the emergency team was there on the spot. Kudos to the medical-team and ofcourse to Sameer for showing presence of mind.

Cathedral top and Lunch:
After seeing the astronomical clock, we came outside to ascend the cathedral tower. There’s entry fee for getting to the top, but it was waived off for people with Strasbourg pass. The ticket issuer took out corresponding entry voucher from the pass booklet. The ascent by 500+ steps of spiral staircase was very tiresome. Somehow we managed to reach the top of the structure which was world's tallest building from 1647 to 1874[source wikipedia]. From the top, we witnessed almost homogeneous architecture of the city, took some general snaps and descended with dedicated staircase for going down. After descending from the tower we realized it was time for lunch. The cafes around the Münsterplatz(Cathedral area) were very expensive. We were able find a decent shop with affordable rates, there I had french fries for 2.40 EUR and others opted for cheese sandwich etc.

Euro Parliament and Rhineboat(Naviscope):
After so called lunch we took a tram from nearest station to Euro parliament. On the map the place looked very far off, but we reached the place within 10-15 minutes. Just to exaggerate one can say the map of Strasbourg is larger than the city! After reaching we just had photo sessions in front of the building and did some timepass by trying to identify flags of Euro member nations.

Next we visited Rhine boathouse(Naviscope). It was on other side of the city and also far from the nearest tram station. We did a big mistake getting to the place, apart from being far there was nothing exciting about the boat. It was just small boat with a namesake museum inside it. We didn’t even took a chance by entering inside as the entry fee had only 25% discount with Strasbourg-pass.

Boatride:
We came back to Münsterplatz(Cathedral area) and decided to take the boat ride which was free with Strasbourg-pass. The commentary on board was very informative. But we were so much tired because of early morning wake up and afternoon roam-around that we were dozing most of times. Should have taken the ride in early part of the trip. One of amusing feature of the boat ride was that there were two levels in the stream. To move the boat from downstream to upstream and vice versa there was a gate shutter mechanism which used to change the water level, in order to elevate the boat from one level to other.

Return Journey:
After the boat-ride we roamed randomly for sometime and came to Station to take the 20:22 train. We were at the station one hour before the scheduled departure and had some bakery items for dinner at Paul’s. Coming early to the station paid off since we managed to get seats in the small train and people who stepped in last had to stand literally for entire journey. The return route was Strasbourg -> Appenweier –> Karlsruhe –> Stuttgart –> Reutlingen. Totally four trains ! Major highlight of the trip was 'teen-patti' of Sankar, can't rule it out as coincidence as it happened twice in the return journey. Other highlight of return journey was our tickets were checked for first time in the day. Some sort of satisfaction of traveling with tickets, which were booked with lot of efforts.

Restropect:

• Overall, a good one day trip.
• Should have taken boat ride in initial part of the trip, in order to be aware of stories about the city.
• Avoid Rhineboat(Naviscope), it's total waste of time and instead we should have visited museums in Münsterplatz area.
• It's better to carry own food items. Bakery items should be sufficient.

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Students' Exchange Handpost

This post is for future Exchange students to ESB(Reutlingen) from SPJIMR. The basic idea is to keep essential information documented on a single platter.

Visa Processing:
It's the first stepping stone for the exchange program. While working in a company all processing headache will be taken care by travel-desk, but as a student we have to do everything on our own. Find visa application details at Mumbai Consulate - Schengen Visa. Applying for Schengen visa as a student one need not furnish all documents as in case of business visa.

The must-have documents are:

• Passport: [It's obvious :)]
  
• Filled VISA form
  
• Covering letter from SPJIMR: signed by program co-ordinator.
  
• Invitation letter from ESB.
  
• Demand Draft for Visa Fee: The amount given in embassy's website will be in EUR, so confirm the exact amount in INR by calling up Embassy.
  
• Photographs: Make sure to submit with exact requirement, slight deviation here and there will result in rejection of the application.
  
• Medical Insurance Certificate.
  
• Flight tickets.
  

Documents which are good to have. Usually furnished with a business visa application

• Bank statements: last 6 months, just to provide some sort of proof that you can bare expenses on your own.
  
• Form 16 and IT return.

Air tickets:

• Of all options we chose Emirates for cost, convenience and experience. We got return tickets at 33K INR per head, whereas the price for other major airlines was more than 60K.
• The most important plus point is that Emirates allows 30 kg of check-in luggage by default for Economy class! A huge cushion especially if you are planning to carry food items from India. Cheaper options like Gulf-Air and Kuwait-Air allow only 20-23 kgs depending on the flight occupancy.

Accommodation:

• We stayed at Kolpinghaus, a private dorm in downtown of Reutlingen. It was booked in advance by our university coordinator Heike Trost.
• The rates are very affordable price especially as per European standards. It was 200 EUR per month for triple sharing and 250 EUR per month for double sharing.
• However, due to some miscommunication we ended up paying extra amount 2.4 EUR per day for breakfast. Since we were used to having complimentary breakfast while staying aboard, so we assumed that breakfast at Kolpinghaus is also complementary.
• Better option is to have fresh bread, corn flakes and milk bought from grocery stores and it will definitely work out cheaper.
• Other point is to keep in mind for people who have already stayed abroad is that the stay won't be as convenient as your biz-trip accommodations, as the facilities such as toilets, kitchens will be shared like any other general dormitory.

Going to university:

• The best and the only means to travel to University is city-bus. Going for the first time from Kolpinghauz is quite challenging for a person who is new to the city. Luckily for us, Jonathan (one of the staff of Kolpinghaus) accompanied us for the first day.
• From Kolpinghauz one has to walk upto Bismarkstr stop in front of Unal bakery. From there take either Bus #8 or #11 to Stadtmitte(central bus stand) and from Stadtmitte to the university by bus to the destination 'Houbuch'. There’s no number for this bus, it's code is ‘H’, not sure what exactly ‘H’ stand for.

Naldo Pass:

• It's a student transport pass for entire semester which can be bought at a convenience store in Stadtmitte for 53.7 EUR.
• Definitely a must have pass to avoid paying for tickets everyday. If you make frequent visits to university the break-even can be easily attained. The same pass can also be used to travel by trains (RB or RE) to nearby cities Metzingen or Tübingen.

Grocery stores:

• The places where we bought grocery items were Asian Stores at Stadmitte, Penny Markt near University, Unal near Bismarkstr and Aldi Süd. Unal was convenient w.r.t distance but was expensive.
• The major commodity which we used to buy was rice ( Basmati rice to be pricise). It was 2.49 EUR/kg at Unal, 2.2 EUR/kg Asian stores and at Penny Markt it was 1.79/kg. Though the brands were different but saving a few cents per kg mean a lot.
• The route to Aldi stores was bit complicated. We visited there once before leaving just to buy chocolates. Artem(friend from Ukraine) helped us in finding the route.

Mobile connection:

• A must-have utility for comfortable stay especially while traveling. Life without it is virtually being like a handicap.
• We opted for T-mobile connection, 15 EUR for new a connection with 10 EUR free-talktime. Call rates were 0.05 EUR/min within T-mobile network. So make sure that everyone in your group opt for the same connection.

These are just a few important things, for any other queries do post comments.

A few important locations, including retail stores are pin-pointed in the embedded google map.


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'2 states' by Chetan Bhagat

India's author for masses Chetan Bhagat is back with his new book "2 states: the story of my marriage" a fairy-tale about bonding between two individuals whose lineage are from diametrically opposite cultures. I managed to get a copy of the book from flipkart.com at a discount price of Rs. 65 only.

The protagonist of the story Krish(a Punjabi, an IIT alum) and during his stint at IIM-A falls in love at first sight with his batch-mate Ananya Swaminathan(a Tamilian, an economics graduate). The relationship progresses from just friends to live-in and many more things. But they face difficulty in carrying it forward beyond IIM-A endeavor due to resistance from their parents.

Krish tries all possible methods in books and out-of-books to nurse the impression with his to-be-in-laws whether it was giving tuitions to his Ananya's brother or helping Ananya's father for an office presentation or helping Ananya's mother fulfilling her ambition(live stage performance in Chennai).
As in his previous books, the author is spot on in his characterization and especially in this book highlighting stereotypical opinions of people from one side of India on people other side of India.

According to me best parts of the story are
- First day interaction with Ananya at IIM-A mess and describing her as an outlier by IIM-A standards.
- Krish's mission-impossible at Chennai where he undergoes plain culture-shock.

Amusing moments are his encounter with (in)famous Chennai Autowallahs and his first impression about Ananya's home mentioning embarrassing moments such as getting orders from his to-be-father-in-law to keep the footwear outside and later on treating him as a non-existent entity by getting engrossed in editorial of Hindu!

Grab a copy of the book to read many such amusing moments. Overall, a good read especially for the folks who like to read the stuffs which have DNA of Bollywood. Regular reader of literature can skip this.

Other reviews:
Fingers to Keyboard - Chetan Bhagat: 2 states

ps: The major feature of the book is that it is semi-autobiographical and author's real life love-story has been fictionalized. Read more at When Punjabi Harry met Madrasi Sally.

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