Germany!

3 days in Germany. Amazing 200th Oktoberfest. Outstanding 4 hour walking tour of Berlin. 20 year East and West Germany unification celebrations. Inspiration at the Mercedes Benz Museum at Stuttgart with glimpses of the Volksfest and also caught the noise outside the Mercedes Benz Arena during the Stuttgart v/s Frankfurt football match.
German experience in pictures:


Day 2 Berlin :

Day 3 :
 

Guitar Splendor and the Magic of the Harmonica

The Paris youth Hostel post will be delayed as the Videos haven't yet arrived. Watch out this space for more later.

Another Weekend in Paris - Technoparade!

To get a better feel of the city and also because of the Technoparade I decided to spend another weekend in Paris. I had only been there for a day on my birthday and wanted to see more of the city. So I managed to go to The Avenue des Champs Elysees, the awesome Technoparade, NotreDame, Le marche aux Puces, cite des sciences.  It was a wonderful weekend but it was THAT final night in the youth hostel at Mairie de Clichy that made it a truly unforgettable one.

Technoparade was madness and you must read the captions. I have tried to put some videos so that you get a feel of the thing. 4-5 hours of partying on Paris streets!



That night alone deserves a special post and my next post is dedicated to Music.

Alpine Procession, Geneva and Birthday in Paris :-)

Another great weekend in Switzerland... The Alpine procession was a little over sold I think...It was interesting but missable...Hope you guys get a peek into the St.Gallen cathedral which I think is awesome....went there again because Miti was in St.Gallen and was showing her around....Geneva was amazing...It was clear day and its a lovely place to be in!

..........and since I got my residence permit it ended in me being in Paris for my birthday! Had a great day there!

I must thank Kinjal Damani though for showing me around in Paris and also for hosting me at her host family's place :P All my other friends in France were either studying or working..and my plan was spontaneous....

It was a clear day in Paris and the walk was brilliant all the way from Gare De Lyon to Eiffel Tower checking out all the historic places along the way...

You must check out Kinjal's house..its beautiful!

Hike from Braunwald - A photo album blog post

One of my best days till date in Switzerland...I'm sure you guys will like it...I hope it inspires more people to come to Switzerland...I think its a great place to be in and I really admire it...don't mind endorsing it now either..

This is a photo album blog post...we went to Linthal and from there to Braunwald to commence our hike..Please look at the slideshow or click on it..read the captions for a better experience...comments would be appreciated..Thank you

Swimming in Dreiweihern and the Crazy Fondue Night!

The swimming in the Dreiweiheren was a challenge! The buddy system guys went ahead with the plan because the weather forecast was good. But. The water was COLD! Yet, almost everyone who had come jumped in one after the other. And once inside kept saying to those outside -'Its not too cold!' hahaha....Dreiweiheren is a lake and they had made a diving board about 12-13 ft high. I don't know the right technique to dive from so high and preferred to jump from the edge. But the water was cold and swimming in it was a real confidence booster! But I had some people there telling me they had done it in glacial lakes and I was like yeah ok Tu mahaan but I come from India! Even my refrigerator has warmer water than this! Some of the girls just spent the entire afternoon sun bathing and we did that too after getting out of the water and 3 of us got into real deep discussion on..well... India, Ukraine and Singapore.I think we spent about 2 hours sun bathing and talking. We had a nice guitarist play in the background. I really enjoyed the outing. Its a place you must visit if the weather is good.

The next night was the night everyone was waiting for....it was the delicious sounding Fondue night! Since only the 4 buddy system guys were doing the event there was a limit to the number of seats. And it had gotten full really fast! A lot of people did not get to come. I was excited because I had heard a lot about Swiss Fondue and also I really love the Fondue I normally have at Relish in Mumbai (Bombay). So we had tables with Fondue, Bread ,White wine and the all important stick with which you dip the bread in the fondue...

The Fondue night had rules – If you drop your bread in the fondue the first time: you take a shot of kirsch (vodka) and its supposed to be strong!

Second time: you need to sing a song of the choice of the people who are sitting with you on your table.

Third time: Kiss the person on your left

Fourth time: Kiss the person on your right

Fifth time: Help the buddy system guys clean up the whole place!

I didn’t drop a single piece. I only had guys on both my sides.

The cheese was yummy and people started enjoying the fondue. Everyone was careful about not dropping stuff at the beginning. But then slowly, tables began to erupt and suddenly we see the buddy system guys running from table to table with the bottle of Kirsch. 15 mins later we see the tables forcing the buddy system guys to take shots! The next 90 odd minutes was total madness....all the rules went for a toss and everyone was being forced into shots....absolute pandemonium....more and more white wine kept on coming....there were tables shouting for more fondue coz it was over....buddy system guys already half drunk running in and out trying to get the next fondue pot.......people singing randomly and then all of us collectively banging the tables and singing ‘We will , We will... rock you’.....A lot of wine was spilled by the end of this song!

A lot of things happened that night...someone passed out in the room...loads of people moved to Trischily to continue the party....but all in all it was one memorable night....really crazy crazy night...

By the way, there was a notice before we had entered – ‘Puke fee - 50 CHF’

Meeting other exchange students, Bowling Night and Lucerne trip (wow!)

Buddy System Group of the University of St.Gallen had done a great job planning interesting things for the exchange students. The idea was to help us get an introduction to the university and the culture of St.Gallen and Switzerland.

So, here we were. About 140-150 people from all continents of the world. Some easy to talk to. Some who seem reluctant to interact (At least in the beginning)

Over the course of these events I met a lot of people from across the world and had a great time. Since I live alone, I don't have room mates and a lot of these guys knew each other because they share apartments. I know them now too but it would have been easier I think if I was sharing an apartment. Lot of interesting things happened during these outings. But I think its important to respect people's privacy and I won't share particular conversations or events here. Maybe some insights which I may share here and some definitely on www.ankit9doshi.com Just want to say that students in other countries work really hard. Probably harder than people in India and are much more independent(no insight here!). A lot of these guys were using their own money for this exchange programme or were on scholarship. Unlike a lot of Indians here, they were here to study and for the experience.

I didnt take my camera to the first small party they organised nor to the Bowling night. Have posted pictures of all those places where I did.

The University has its own student's bar run by the students themselves. It's called 'The Meeting Point' and thats where they took us the first day. Since we were in the happy hour, people had to play stone,paper, scissor game with the bartender and if you win you either get a 50% discount or a free drink. Not too many people got drunk and it was great chatting with people. Almost everyone seemed to be complaining about how expensive Switzerland was! This is also where I first met the 2 guys from IIM A and 1 from IIM B.

The bowling night was a lot of fun and I think this is where the ice really broke and people really started interacting. Our lane was represented by Switzerland, USA, Colombia,China and of course India. They had booked the whole place for us and we played for about 3 hours non-stop. Damages:10 CHF

There was a St.Gallen city tour the next day and we were like about 85 students moving around St.Gallen in a group. Too much crowd in one place for Switzerland I think :P St.Gallen has a lot of interesting history around it(for e.g. the meeting of St.Gallen and the bear..) and one of the most beautiful cathedrals ever. I didn't have a camera then and also pictures weren't allowed at some places. But I will click pictures and post them for sure. The library here is amazing and it has original texts some dating more than 1000 years ago. They have the oldest German dictionary as well. At one point of time, St.Gallen was so influential that kings from across Europe would come there for ceremonies,conferences and consultation. It was a cradle of knowledge and they have texts on almost all disciplines. A lot of research was done over the centuries in St.Gallen.

The Lucerne trip was memorable. We were lucky with excellent weather and the buddy system guys ensured that we used almost all forms of transport :P Bus to Lucerne, Boat to the foot of Mt.Pilatus, World's steepest cog wheel rail on the way up and Cable car and Gondola's on the way down. Let pictures do the talking now!

And another slideshow of the same trip (pardon, the pics are not in order)