Certified crazy

This could probably be my last post from Sophia Antipolis and Eurécom for a long time to come. With exams done, and projects submitted, and reports taken care of, now its time to shift base to Paris, for internship for the next six months.

Time sure flew by very fast, especially this semester, as I had expected it to, and we are all saying bye bye and au revoirs to every other person who leaves Sophia for other places in France and elsewhere in Europe. A lot of parties and good bye dinners. Hugs. Pool games. Foosball. Wine. Flowers. Jokes. Laughter. Jogs. Trips to Carrefour. The climb up to Eurecom. More trips to Carrefour. Closure of EDF contracts. Trips to Issac. The balconies. Rain. Tea. Cheese balls. Maggi. French. And the struggle to speak Français. Beach. Promenade des Anglais. Crème glace. Fountain. The walks through the jungle. The complements. Benches in the moonlight. Neighbours. Sitting at the window. 321. The church. Running to catch the last bus back home. Falafel. Summer wind. Group classes during exams. Copy everything blindly from others´ notes. Open book exams. Handwritten A4 cheatsheets. Badminton. Asking for everything under the sun. And getting it. The calls. Late night speak-your-heart-out sessions. Haircuts. Cleaning up after parties. Cooking food and seeing it being eaten very happily. Pani puris. Hair bands.

Au revoir, mais pas adieu.

Past two months have been a blur and I guess the next one will arrive and finish before I can say cheese. This spring semester has kept us all busy. Some quick updates on what I have been up to.

April was home-college-home routine. Assignments and homeworks, labs and reports, projects were never ending. Had a 10-day vacation from school in May, so got my family to come over to Europe and went on a tour to Austria, Germany and Switzerland. Loved Austria - must go back if I get a chance. Ma and sis came back with me to Sophia for about three weeks. Piling on good Ma cooked food has its own (side) effects.

Some of us went to Cannes during the film festival and some friends were disappointed that they did not get to see Aishwarya Rai.

There was “Indian Dinner” organized at college yesterday. We cooked food for about 50 people. I still can’t believe we pulled that off - about 25 Indian dishes. I am amazed at the amount of spice some of my classmates can handle. Some others constantly held a glass of water in their hand. Some of us will leave college for our internships next semester and yesterday felt like a farewell dinner. I don’t know yet where I will be for the internship, but I hope I enjoy the next semester as much as I enjoyed the last.

• Exams are done. Should pass in most of the papers. (Note the “most”)
• Made Pani puri, pav bhaji at home in the last two days (including the puris - damn cool the way they pop up - if they do) and called in some French friends to taste some ethnic Indian cuisine - rotis et al.
• Project needs to be worked up - I’m putting most of my time on it, now that I have one week of vacations.
• Evenings are spent watching movies with friends. Fun.
• Cleaning up two weeks of mess after exams are done gives a really bad backache.
• Cut a friend’s hair for experimenting - results were not bad at all.
• I’ve grown to admire the brilliant way some geniuses think - Markus Kuhn is one such man.
• I need to catch up on my to-read books.
• I like lying down in the afternoon under the Sunlight in my room these days. Can make one sleepy in a matter of seconds.
• Found a place in Antibes which sells awesome Falafel. That, plus a double scoop gelato (tiramisu, rocher) = heaven.

I happened to watch Yuvraaj yesterday (out of boredom and no other handy choice) and it looked like the movie has been shot just because they had to. It seemed as if towards the end, the director  got bored of directing the movie, so ended up with the abrupt hospital scene and ended it right there. Not the sorts of things Mukta arts produced in the Past.

Paris - check
Eiffel Tower - check
Arc de Triomphe - check
Champes Elysees - check
Musee d’Orsay - uncheck
Musee de Louvre - uncheck
Hagen Das triple scoop ice cream - check
Gare du Nord - check
Onion Uttappam in Paris - check
Rosgullas from Paris - check
Sunday morning mass at Notre Dame - check (in French though)
Brunch at a French Patisserie - check

Paris is Grand! And charmingly beautiful in its own way. It is very much like Mumbai though - people are always in a hurry, well most of the times.

It was an early winter in Paris - too cold, but I ain’t complaining. Maple leaves everywhere. With less than 30 hours on hand, I tried to feel Paris. A lot more to be seen, a lot more to be heard. May be, some other time, some other season.

Did I mention that most of the tourist places checked above were done on a cold, windy evening, without a proper overcoat, in a saree?

Crazy.

I left home yesterday night to get a Masters degree at Eurecom, Sophia-Antipolis, near Nice, France. The first flight to London was good (and yeah, I did not require a transit visa - Thanks guys!) The one from London to Nice was even better.

First impressions of Nice - Wow! (The shoreline is beautiful!) It looked as though the pilot is going to land on water! (Thankfully, he didn’t) It is very quiet here - its taking time to adjust to silence.

Now, we await the shifting from the hotel to the residence in a few days’ time. Pictures will be up soon. For the moment, I’m on an insanely expensive wi-fi connection.

In other news, I’m off to Paris next weekend. In another news, I have openSuse on my laptop now - Thanks to Mrugesh!

Its a wonderful feeling, when, in a random city, at a random place, a random stranger sings out loud one of your most loved songs, to the whole restaurant. And that too, beautifully.

Amazing, what such small things in Life can do to you.

A quick update on what I have been up to:

• Took a train with Aanjhan to Pune last Friday, to meet Runa, Sankarshan and Ramkrsna. Train route was amazing. Need to take the train next time.
• Talking to random people in a train and passing time is simply awesome. Like one of them said, 77 INR, not bad at all!
• Went to Raigad and Mulshi lake. Both are awesome places to be in. Check flickr streams here, here and here.
• Runa treated us to some awesome home cooked bengali meal.
• Ramki treated us to some more of his uncle jokes.
• Sankarshan threated me and ramki with “Don’t move a muscle” while the 5 of us travelled up the mountain in a 4 seater ropeway car

A much needed vacation well spent.

Happy Birthday Garfield!