Trips and trips

It's the end of the year and all the students in the town go home. Which leaves the town empty. Luckily two of my friends M&M are making a trip through the region.

They pick me up and for Christmas, we head to Strasbourg, self proclaimed "Christmas Capital".

The whole town is lit up. Unlike other towns, the Christmas market is not confined to one square. It's spread all over town. The whole vibe is very different from what I've experienced before. We walk around, and then as evening approaches, we head to a friends house for the dinner.

Unlike the previous year, this time we are mostly adults and teenagers. Basically everyone knows that Santa is guilty of breaking and entering and such behavior is not to be rewarded with milk and cookies. The conversations range over multiple topics, in multiple languages. Lots of fine wine and fine food is tasted. Finally, late after the presents have been exchanged, we head out to Freiburg where our long trip is just about to begin.

But right now, we just want to crash into bed. Next destinations and more travel later.

My legs hurt

Too many weekends went by without me doing much. I'd plan hikes and/or slackline sessions but bad weather or just low turnout messed them up. I lose my fitness level quite quickly (and take ages to get it back) and it had been at respectable levels due all that touch rugby, slacklining and cycling happening in the last few months of my "job hunting" phase. I didn't want to lose it all.

But weather ended up being routinely bad, especially on the weekends when someone planned a hike; and on weekends where I just planned  lazy activities like a small picnic with slackline and petanque, it ended being exceptionally good.  Eventually another long weekend rolled by and a friend randomly suggested going bicycling. So that's what we did today.

The terrain was mostly flat, along the river and canals. But now that I don't live in the sunny south, this "good weather day" turned out to be foggy and cold, with maximum temperatures of about 7 C. Thankfully, warm clothing was employed in anticipation. In fact, some speculate that too much warm clothing may have been used, resulting in sweating, possibly leading to more cold being sensed. (yes I know this sentence is written weirdly.) 

Typical small town on an autumn day - cold, grey and empty.

Yes, I know that one is supposed to dress for warmer weather but when one hasn't dressed for activities done in sub 10 C weather (except skiing), one routinely over/under-estimates the warming capabilities of one's clothing. Case in point - the bonnet vis-a-vis the scarf. Bonnet pretended to not be there, while Mr Scarf was busy playing the over-achiever.

Long periods of pseudo-solo cycling (I was the unfit one in the group) lead to lots of contemplation. A recurring thought being how difficult it is to motivate the few people I know to do something (other than the approximately 4-5 people who do show up). As I passed by a guy dressed in military-ish clothing (think camouflage fatigues) standing by the banks waiting to hook a fish, I remembered a surplus store I'd seen in the town center. I remember thinking that that would be a good place to look for light, warm winter clothes, or just plain good hiking stuff. I never went there again... I realized that most of the places (cool or otherwise) I found out about, and many of the people I got to know, in the first month here have been forgotten. It's as if everything I discover in beginning is scratch work, and I got rid of it before starting on the actual work. And this isn't the first place this has happened to me. Food for thought sometime...

The bike ride "mid-point" was a town (pic above) about 30 km along our route... but only 12 km away from home by the difficult route. Our way to here had been flat, but the 12 km back included getting over a small hill. around 150 m to climb and descend after 30 km of bicycling for an unfit guy is quite a lot to ask. I didn't do it all ... I walked some portions. But thankfully, I didn't hold up the other guys for too long. Overall, it was fun.

Let's hope that next time, even if it's cold, it is at least a bit more sunny.

Number 100

As I prepared to document things and post updates I realized this post will be the 100th one published. Seems like a big deal... and in a way it's strange that it has taken me so long to write 100 posts. Anyway, here go some updates.

This post was initially supposed to be titled facebook (or something playing on that theme). I've switched off my account on facebook since July and it seems I've suddenly "switched off" my friends. A few friends still keep in touch - chats, emails, phones etc - but the number of people I'm in touch with and who know what's happening has gone down drastically. It seems like most people do not know the concept of emails or random phone calls/texts.

This became much more apparent on my birthday. A Facebook birthday results in around a hundred or so notifications with messages from all the world over. Without facebook reminding people to wish me, this year ended up being noticeably calmer. In addition, me being in a new city now meant that as yet, none of the friends I have made here know when my birthday is. I wasn't complaining much, I like calm birthdays too and I didn't feel like celebrating much this year.

What FB has done though, is that it provided me a place where I could make amusing and/or witty remarks and get instant "likes" from my group of friends. Without that, these days my amusing remarks are sent to just a couple of my friends via chat messages. The blog feels like something substantial where I should write seriously when I have something of substance to post. Ah well, I'll figure it out sometime.
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My geek levels have gone through the roof. I got genuinely excited to buy myself a RaspberryPi which I then used to serve as my media center, connected to the nice hi-def TV included in my rent.

My external hard disk crashed. Crashed hard. I lost a lot of data. I have a second disk serving as a back up, but I realized the severity over days. My first concern was for all the photos. I realized I had lost all photos from 2013. I eventually found photos taken post May 2013, realizing that all raw images (and non-processed photos) from my January trip were lost. Then I realized all my work done during my MS thesis and my Bachelor's thesis was lost. I do have the final reports/papers stored at multiple places, but the programs and files seem to be lost.

That prompted me to (a) get a new external hard disk and (b) start looking to replace my 6 year old laptop.

I'm typing this from my new machine, currently running Gentoo which I installed all by myself over the last 40 hours while doing other stuff. Having already configured ssh and screen before, I could get all installation done while I was at work, checking in periodically to see how far the installation had progressed. Darktable works blazingly fast, the fan doesn't kick in when I start watching Youtube videos and I have a battery life longer than an hour.

(Note to self: compile NetworkManager with the USE flags -dhcpcd dhclient, and disable the n channel. That will solve your wifi problems.)

On to other things now...

Dispatches

I generally remark that this is a small town, but its "centre" is much larger than that of Antibes and the zone of fun activities is spread out over a larger area. Still walk-able, but the good network of buses and trams is helpful.

And loads more French being spoken all the time. I always mentioned that in France, people always assume that you speak French when they strike a conversation with you. They ignore all the other hints - the lost look on face, the obviously different facial features etc. Probably a good thing (one could almost say that they don't stereotype, but that would be blatantly wrong).

Pissaladière here has fish in it. I'm sorry, but I lived in the region where Pissaladiere was invented (or so I was told) and there, it is a strictly vegetarian onion pie/pizza. It's the same bloody (small-ish) country and you shouldn't get the basics wrong. (Err on further investigation, I find that anchovies do end up on it... but honestly, I'd never seen it before!)

So many parks in town. It's great and I went around excited thinking I could easily set up a slackline but it turns out that it's not allowed in any of the parks in the city. As I spent some hours grumbling and complaining to myself, I realized that I'd ever put the slackline in parks before. We always set it up in open areas (though, inside the city) with trees. It's kinda hard to find such a spot here. But a few weeks of roaming around has had me finding a couple of spots.

I mentioned to about a dozen people that this place is well connected to major cities. It's easy to head to a big city or to RyanAir destination (there are multiple in a radius of 300 km), to which my friends replied, "Are you so eager to get out of that city?"

Des fromages

Short post, nothing major to report here.

As I sit and attend a workshop purely in French, I marvel at how quickly my French has improved in the last 4 months. I go through entire days at work not speaking English. Then I look at the slide, I see the speaker saying that they need to collect all the info, with the words "des fromages, des fromages" in parenthesis.

Apparently, pie charts are also called Camemberts in French.

Political incorrectness

There's something about being (or saying things) horribly wrong that just tickles me. I think the world would be a better place people learn to being politically incorrect for humour (Ricky Gervais, anyone? Or Jimmy Carr? warning: links are quite offensive!).

Like my French friends here. They routinely joke that I may have been already married when a kid. They make slurping sounds when eating beef, and praise the taste. Some know that I don't like the concept of eating snails. So they make sure to offer me some whenever I mention I'm hungry.

It's all done with the slight semblance of a smile and twinkle in the eye. Knowing that what they are saying is wrong. Or sometimes with a overly fake serious face.

I counter with their stubborn insistence on saying my name wrong. Or saying American movies are plain "ollywooood". Or asking me if I want to heat because I might be angry. And I joke about how looking gay is okay. And mention how they still think they should own the world, making a poor Asian like me do all the work.

I mentioned my upcoming trip home, and immediately one guy asks: "So, can we ask you to get something from India?" I answer, "Sure. What do you want?".
- "A young wife. Probably 13-14 year old."

Autopilot

I pull out the brochures from the mailbox, walk up to my room, dump them on the bed. Their journey from mailbox to trash had a slight detour because I saw an offer for a tablet - seemed quite cheap. I can't really afford any gadgets right now (rather, I shouldn't), but once you find one interesting deal you want to make sure you don't miss any other possible ones.

5 minutes later they all end up in the trash anyway.

Nothing to cook in the house and it's past 8 pm. No supermarkets open anymore, and the choice is between a sandwich/kebab or something-from-groceries-bought-at-gas-station. Noble thoughts like "Let's save money and actually eat better" turn to "Pizza or sandwich?" on the 5 minute walk from home.

I enter the gas station, greet the cashier. I'm tired and on cruise-control mode. I know the layout of this place, and walk to the freezer. Pick up the cheese pizza automatically. Something catches my eye - the Kebab Pizza. I pick it up, turn it over to see the ingredients. My eyes skip over the Dutch (or German?) lists and suddenly pause at the list in English.

I just realize that I was looking for the ingredient list in French, with brain set to scan for the presence of "beouf". I smile to myself. But I still can't really speak the language! Conversations are a struggle. 

Then I realize that all those deals I was reading about were in French.

Anatomy of motorcycle repairs

"Change oil, remove battery and either drain out all the petrol or fill up the tank."
These are the tips I read for storing a bike for winter, 1 day before leaving for India. Naturally I scourge other websites which tell me that changing oil can be done later, after winter. When I plan to change the regulator that is apparently unrepairable.

After winter, I bring out the toolkit, fish out the pdf manual and scroll to the correct page. The battery-less laptop is upstairs, so I memorize the instructions, run down (so that I don't have enough time to forget). Start dismantling frame cover and seat.

Panic - "What does the regulator look like?!"

Run upstairs, stare at the photograph. Wonder if I am doing the right thing. Walk down, disconnect the regulator wires and start unscrewing the screws. A flimsy spanner screwdriver and rust on the threads ensures the following:

There is no way to put it back. Damn. Also realize that the new regulator has a slightly different shape and the screw would not fit anyway. "It wasn't all my fault", I convince myself. Use Velcro as a fix.

Ten thousand thundering typhoons! Bike still doesn't start.

Clean the spark plugs. Recharge battery for two days. Send out a "HEEEELLLP" post to motorcycle forums.

Next weekend:
Realize that I need to test the ignition coils. "Where are they?" The bike manual says, "under the petrol tank." Ouch. By now I am an expert at removing the frame covers. I take a deep breath and get to work at the petrol tank. Loosen the bolts. Try lifting the tank. It barely budges. Apparently I have to pull, tug, lift and wiggle the tank to get it to move. Swish, swish! Oh crap, the fuel moves around causing the tank to wobble almost out of control. Deep breath. Lift it and peek underneath - two fuel hoses. Rest the tank on the frame, run up read the manual. It says, "Turn the fuel cock to OFF position. Remove the fuel hoses." Hmmmm. Run down, tug at the hoses. They have been fixed by pressure clamps.

Re-adjust the tank on the frame so I can see the ignition coils. (Are they really the ignition coils?) Damn, I need a multi-meter. Put everything back.

The next weekend:
Procure a multi-meter. Test the resistances. Something is wrong, but you still cannot figure out what. Also, the resistances seem fine, i.e ignition coils might be okay. Pull hair out. Also, I *think* I did see the spark plugs spark when I last tested them with a charged battery. But the engine doesn't fire! I don't know what's wrong!

Realize I probably need a new battery. Order a new battery off the internet. Then realize that I might also need new spark plugs. Wait.

The weekend after that:
A friend takes pity on me and offers to help. Also, he has a ginormous tool-box with all kinds of spanners, wrenches and stuff. He has also successfully fixed his car from time to time. Kaching! We open the bike up. Successfully remove the tank and the hoses. Check the wiring, and the ignition coils - they are all fine. The scene is like this:

Yes, the manual is still a pdf on my laptop. And I figured out it's better to have the laptop downstairs. My friend then says, "Maybe the problem is not just the spark plug. Maybe your engine is not getting the correct air-fuel mix. We should check the carbs." Uh-huh.. have you done it before. "Ya, for a car, but never for a bike."

"Well, we are here anyway, let's do it", I say. "But let me take pics as we go, because the pdf doesn't really have great photos. There are too many hoses, pipes and wires running all around." I whip out the camera and the result is some amazing pictures that are of absolutely no help.

Cleaning the carbs seems too complicated. We start putting them back.

"Where did this hose go?" I ask.
"Dunno, check where the other end is", is the reply I get. So I tug at the hose. I start pulling it and it comes out completely. The other end isn't connected to *anything*. I stuff it back in. This makes no effing sense!

We put the stuff back. Apparently defeated.

The weekend AFTER that! (ya, this was a multi-week affair):
I buy the new spark plugs and the new air filter. Replace them. Figure out that the magical unknown hose was a water drain for the petrol tank. Use copious amounts of WD40 to destroy the rust at various places. Use copious amounts of chain oil to lubricate the damn thing. Fit the air filter, put the tank back, fix the new spark plug and connect the new battery.

Switch the fuel cock to the 'PRI' position, engage the choke. Pray and twist the key. The engine turns. Nothing. Twist again. Again the same. Twist again and pray..... IT'S ALIVE!!!!

French Strikes made easy

Stranger to France? Let me explain the madness (that's what I believe it is) going on here right now.

Government wants to introduce Retirement/Pension Reform, where retirement age will be pushed from 60 to 62 and the pension benefits will kick in from age 67 instead of 65. This is for people who work in the Private Sector in France.

Employees in the private sector cannot go on strike without much repercussions. Or so I have been told. And so, the French have this "system" in place, that allows citizens to protest without anyone losing their jobs. The employees in the public sector go on strike instead.

So the buses, trains, garbage disposal system etc, which have strong unions, go on strike to express the anger and frustration of the people working in the private sector. Though this time, some of the private sector employees have also joined in. Like those who work at the refineries & fuel companies.

BBC gives more updates about the matter...

So while you are stuck at the station, waiting for your train, go ahead buy some wine, cheese and baguette and enjoy relaxed life in France.

Notes: Paris

1: Too many people hyped it up for. Sigh.... I wonder why Rome doesn't inspire the same thoughts in people.

2: Holy SHIT the metro is everywhere. It's like big brother. And there is barely any region in the metro where you cannot get a GPRS signal, let alone normal cell phone coverage.

3: Can someone tell me a time of the year when Eiffel Tower or Louvre is little less crowded? Also, can someone gift me a wide angle lens before I go see these places again?

4: The river. It adds something to a city. The sight of a full, serene river is magnificent. It helps that there are 400+ years old buildings on either side of the river.

5: Roller blading / Inline skating in Paris is fun. And painful. My feet hurt for 2 days. Try it people. A map and skates and off you go.

The past few days, I have been wondering why I wasn't floored by Paris. It's lively, yes; and it's busy. It's got old, giant buildings with loads of history that made me think two things: "Whoa" like Keanu Reeves, and "umm, whats wrong with us Indians? What do we not want to protect our own structures and locations?" But is it a city to visit alone? I don't know.

I wasn't alone, in the strictest sense of the word. I met loads of new people. Partied, picnic-ed, sight-saw did some sight-seeing, lunched, roller-bladed, took-pictures, got lost, cooked, with these people. I think I made some fun friends, who I hope to catch up with soon. But there was this one moment where I wished that a bunch of people I knew, from India and US, should have been on the trip with me. A phone with internet gives you all info about a place you are visiting, but wouldn't you rather eat up half-truths told confidently?

A place where I was at bliss being alone is the Musée des Arts et Metiers. There is a link to the official website (which is mostly in French) on the wiki page. This museum holds the original Foucault's pendulum, and loads of other stuff. The best part - it's almost empty, because it's got science exhibits. The place is where the climax of the book Foucault's Pendulum is set; a book which I enjoyed a lot, even though I found it very difficult to keep up with.

Fun Fact got from the museum: To calibrate the measure of 1 meter, the distance between Barcelona and Dunkirk was measured, over a period of 7 years. They got it right to a few millimeters (2 or something). This was in 1792-9. Yea. Deep breath. Soak up that. Try measuring the length of your room correct up to 2 mm.

I spent over 2 hours on one floor of the museum, the one that housed all these stories. I rushed through the other parts, the comparatively recent exhibits (just 100 years old or so on).

Do I want to go back to Paris? Yea. I feel I have missed something. Not just the fact that I didn't go inside Louvre. Or Notre Dame. I can't pin point it, but I want to go back and stay a few more days.

Does that mean that I actually like the city after all?

The odd man out AKA how to make life in France difficult

1: Refuse to learn French before coming to France. Insist on "winging it".

2: Change address multiple times. Not receive the social security documents at new place. 

3: Be clueless about stuff. Turn up for sailing lessons without gear.

4: Be the only guy while hiking or sailing who doesn't understand French.

5: Allow your US driving license to lapse. You reason that it was valid only for 1 year any way.

6: France allows foreign driving licenses for the first year. For students, the native license is valid without time limit. Use this reason to not get an International Driving Permit while in India.

7: 125cc and below motorbikes have a little more leeway. Insist on buying and wanting a bigger motorbike. Stare in disbelief at high insurance rates.

8: Indian driving license, no IDP, a 500 cc motorbike. Get refused by multiple insurance companies.

9: Not learn Linux earlier. Install it on laptop anyway. Stare at prospects of learning Linux for work, & for laptop. Sometimes, help files for linux at work are in French.

10: Be picky about meat. Avoid fish and beef. Beef strictly. Be unpredictable about when you want to eat fish. This makes every trip to the cafeteria or restaurant a "fun" quiz for others. "What meat does this contain?", "Can I get something vegetarian?"

What's up?

I realise that I have subscribed to 32 feeds in my Google Reader. I'm also following 44 people. I have an active Facebook account, I've not switched off Buzz. And I frequent Cnn, Times of India (bad choice, I know), Cricinfo, Engadget, Cnet.

Oh, and I'm also supposed to be doing a PhD. I've re-discovered my addiction to reading. Though, along with books it includes all those above things. Which means that reading papers and work stuff is lagging behind. Shit! Hence, a recent curfew was put into place. Most forms of chat were switched off. I didn't go as ninja as this one suggests. But I have contemplated it.

So what has happenned in recent times? Trip to Venice. It's a great city. VISIT it. I would definitely want to go there again. I caught up on Tv Shows  - How I Met Your Mother and Californication. HIMYM is the simple-minded addicted sitcom thingy. Once you start a season, lack of anything better to do makes you want to finish it. I finished it. Californication is good. Though I would have been happy if they had stopped at Season 1. Now that Season 2 has ended in a way to set up Season 3, I will have to watch it.

As a way to be less online and more in the "real" world, I picked up sailing lessons. Catamarans! It's fun. Especially when 6 minutes into the sea, a gust of wind and inexperience causes the boat to flip. Not entirely, but you get thrown into icy cold water. But sailing requires you to be able to swim 50 metres unaided. I can swim, but not too far. So I need to go the pool and do them some laps. And doing them laps I am.

Went skiing the other day. I was told that since I can roller-blade and since I have tried ice-skating, skiing wouldn't be a problem. Big old overconfident me had a fun time trying to figure out how to stay standing on those skis. The repeated taste of snow+ice is not all that fun. But eventually I managed to move and stop when I wanted (almost). Success!

And finally, have been looking for motorcycles. And will be buying one in a week. In the process of doing the paperwork and insurance and stuff. So, next week a 500cc baby monster will roll in.

French Buses...

.. are not unlike those in Gainesville.

The one you should have caught is always on time (or even before time) while the one you ending travelling in is always 5 to 10 minutes late. Add the fact that the bus is every 20 or 40 minutes only, and you have a pretty sorry picture about your punctuality.

Which gets me to think about buses in India (since you always MUST compare it with stuff in India. It's a rule. Somewhere it has surely been written down). Pune has a bad bus system. I stopped using buses the minute I got my driver's license. And when I couldn't use the car/bike I use the rickshaws. The rickshaws aren't cheap (any more). And compared to the buses, absolutely not.

If I really think back hard and try to remember waiting for the bus, heck, I did actually spend 10-15 minutes at the bus stop every time. I used to have a class at 5 (p.m... I was/am sane) and I always left at around 4-ish. Distance to travel = 10 km. Actual time taken on bicycle = 40 minutes, car = 25 minutes (traffic, you see). So, there you go. It was as bad there as it is here.

But, I still crib about the buses here. Mumbai is another matter. It is so huge, that you must compare only cities like San Francisco, New York, Paris, London etc and their transport systems. So, I must basically learn to cut this place some slack. Or, buy a motorcycle and/or a car.

Snow

When talking to a friend once, I was amazed to know that he actually remembered the first time he saw the sea. I have relatives in Mumbai and I was born there, so the image of the sea has always been in my head. I don't remember the first time I saw the sea, or the mountains. My friend lived in the mountains, and he came to the beach the first time when he was 19-20 years old. I guess when you have waited that long (not that he was waiting for it!), the memory stays with you.

Based on this "fable", I had conjured up images of seeing snow the first time. I imagined myself getting off the train or the bus in the Swiss Alps, seeing a foot of snow, not knowing what to do but just staring at the whole scene and taking it in. When I saw the snow-capped mountains in the distance from my house, this "image" intensified. But funnily enough that is not how it happened. I was on my way to a party in Nice and while in the bus, we saw what we thought was rain. Now, Nice does not get snowfall generally and there was nothing to suggest that it would snow. Well, the forecast said it might snow in Sophia Antipolis, which is higher up and farther from the sea.

As the bus slowed down, we realised that the "water drops" hitting the windows were tiny white were tiny white snowflakes. I was searching for the "OMG the first snowfall!" feeling in me, but I was mostly wondering why the heck it is snowing. We got out at the bus stop, and it slowly dawned on me. It was snowing! I think the movies and books hype up the situation too much. It was a cool feeling, I admit. But my jaw did not drop.

Later on in the night, we looked through the window of the apartment and saw the snowfall. It had gotten heavier, so to say. Compared to most other places, the quantity was still miserly but it does look beautiful. We looked out of the window and could see the car tops covered with snow. The temperature wasn't low enough, so snow on the ground melted away. When we left the place for home, the cars still had snow over them. We made a couple of snowballs and threw them. We were too cold to keep playing, so the game did not last much. I don't know if I will remember this memory like my friend does, but it was a bit special. It was definitely something I did not expect, but thats generally how things go...

Lost in Translation

I was talking to this guy from Morocco, and I asked him when he had come to France. He says. "On half of March." This seems easy to understand, but when conversing, its not easy to realise that half of March means 15th of March.

*********************************


At lunch time, I'm surrounded by French speakers. They all can speak English, but speaking in French comes more naturally to them. And in a raging discussion, halting English does not have the same effect. I'm let in on the topic from time to time. Someone realises that I don't understand French yet and am offered a translation and an opportunity to contribute. But when the details and the flow of thought is not clearly understood, the whole thing appears confusing. And sometimes also very funny. Getting only small glimpses of the entire conversation makes you wonder how the thoughts were connected. Unfortunately, I can only share what I was translated for my benefit.


The first topic I heard was about a love story that everyone in France is expected to read in school. To which I commented having read works of some French authors. This turned to a discussion of French writers and philosophers. And how many people have no idea about Indian writers. I was told about this author who wrote an essay on how people should deal with each other and something about Corsica (I am guessing it was Rousseau, thanks to help from Wikipedia.)


The conversation returns to French and I am left to my own thoughts. After some time, I am told the they are discussing about how the tax on fuel might increase. In order to regulate the greenhouse effect. They ask me about fuel prices in India. I respond and slowly the conversation moves back to French. I'm left to my thoughts again. Then I realise that they are talking about colors. And their gesturing and pointing suggests that they are talking about hair.


My inquisitive look elicits a response: One of them says that he is explaining how his hair is not exactly black, but is a different shade. They remark about me having some gray hair. I smile, saying I know about it.


I wonder how all these thoughts were connected.


********************


For my birthday, on 5th Sept, we went to Cannes to watch Inglourious Basterds. In France, only some places show the movie in its original form ("Version Originale") with French subtitles. They rest show the movies dubbed in French. We did not know that the movie features dialogue in English, French and German (and Italian too!) So when we did go see the movie, we thought that the first scene in French was just Tarantino's brilliant ploy to keep the audience confused before he reveals his ideas. Once the dialogue shifted to English, the subtitles in French began. We realised things were wrong only when the dialogue shifted to German.


The subtitles were still in French!


Its an interesting experience to figure out a movie in an unknown language with no subtitles. Only bits of the dialogue is in English, and you have to rely on your meagre translating skills to figure what certain French words might mean. I still enjoyed the movie, because Tarantino still manages to make viewing it interesting. But I so wish I had seen the "good" version.


I managed to see a decent copy later, with English subtitles, and the movie is amazing. I noticed one thing about Tarantino's movies. They are more than 2 hours long, and have very little things happening in them. And yet, what the characters say and do while those few things happen is what makes up the movie. Its needs great skill to still keep us enthralled and he has mastered that art.

Culture Shock - France

I initially began to think that with all the warnings and stuff, I would be immune to culture shock. In a sense, its true. I was told stuff by the French, I read (/am reading) a book called "Culture Shock - France" - written specifically for helping adjust to this new country. So, there are many things that did not surprise me as much as they should have. But I just darn well can't help wanting to note them down.


The previous time I wrote a Culture shock post, I think I was a bit too early in writing it. I had landed in India after a year, and saw things differently. But in the first 5 days, I did not notice many things. Rather I didn't experience them. So this time, I waited. And it has been good to wait, because there is more to write. The initial feeling of not having any "shock" to write about has gone. So here goes nothing:


1: Food: one word - awesome. That is if you are a meat eater. For me, non-beef products are okay. So, I think I have gained a few pounds in the last two weeks. USA, take note: Even non-fried meat can be made to taste good. And an excellent meal is comprised of a salad, a meat product, fruits, dessert, cheese and wine. Heaven... with a few additional pounds of course.


2: Roads are narrow. In general, they are two lanes or maybe 4. The lanes are narrower. The buildings are much much closer to the road. And parallel parking is a necessary art you HAVE to master. Forget straight roads and be prepared for round-abouts, curving roads and probably pedestrians on the street.


3: Cars are almost always small. The narrow streets and smaller space necessitate it. Its nice to see small cars that you see in India - the Swift, Punto, Zen (?), an Indica variant. Its a little odd to see a big ass truck or mini-van. Almost all cars are manual transmission (hooray!). My hands are itching to drive cars here. Good roads and manual transmission is great combination.


4: Language: Its a scary realisation that the languages you are most comfortable with don't work. Sign language, phrase books and blank looks are a way of communicating. Its an interesting contrast to India, where everyone is trying to switch to English. France decides to preserve its language, and make people who want to stay here adapt. Of course, its made sure its in a position to force this.


5: Metric system!!!! Say hello to kilograms, kilometers and litres! Things make sense again. You don't have to worry about how many ounces make a quart or a gallon. Or how many ounces (again!) make a pound. But its time to remember what you learnt in school - mili-litre, centi-litre, litre. :)


6: Fuel: It seems only the US and the Arab countries have access to cheap fuel. And for some reason, India is getting it cheap too. In France, diesel costs 1 Euro per litre! Almost twice as much as in India. And petrol is even more expensive. I'm confused about this. India apparently gets fuel cheap, but taxes it a lot. US gets the fuel cheap and capitalism drives the cost down. Whats the deal in France? And Europe in general?


7: People say US is multicultural. Maybe it is. But its much easier to find your own community there and settle into it. And then not worry about interacting with others. France has been an awesome place to meet new people. In this small area where I am, I've already met people from about 7 different countries, excluding France. On a recent trip, all 5 of us were from different countries, each with different mother tongue. Its interesting that broken English is the only way of communication.


8: Motorcycles! They are a viable mode of transport. Thanks to the short distances. And you can rent them too. I am currently in a dilemma. Buy a motorcycle? or a car. * sigh *




Maybe I sound harsh on US in this. Its because right now, the concept of foreign land to me included only US. And this new addition is quite different. I've accepted the fact that I should not compare this place to India.