Netherlands - Part 7

Hello lovely readers, 

Its that time of the year again. Its bitter cold in Holland and all the leaves are falling. Whereas on the other side of the world in India, it's the season of festivities. People are celebrating Diwali, Durga Pooja, Chatt pooja and what not. When you see your facebook news feed sitting in your room in Holland in the month of October and November, it's quite easy to get depressed or home sick! Your family and friends from India upload awesome pics of festivities where you see all the family together, with all the nicest food and with everyone wearing nicest clothes! And what are you doing? Checking your facebook feed alone at home on Friday night :(  Thankfully because of size of Indian diaspora it is not very hard to find celebrations of Indian festivals pretty much anywhere in the world.

This year, I participated in Durga Puja and Diwali celebrations in Holland. To my surprise, there is a significant Bengali population in the Netherlands. Here is the link to the Indian Bengali Association (called Kallol) in the Netherlands: http://www.kallol.nl/. Now how Bengalis love durga puja is a well known fact. So offcourse they organize a big durga puja event. This year, i went to the durga puja festivities organised by Kallol as Sayantani was performing! It was a 4 day long proper Durga Puja celebration with puja, performances and food on each day. It was inaugurated by the Ambassador of India to the Netherlands in the presence of few mayors and deputy mayors. Below are some pictures of the festivities.

Me and Sayantani and Durna Ma ;)

Just before Sayantani's Bharatanatyam performance!

After durga pooja came Diwali celebrations. A Diwali party was organised by Indian's living in Wageningen. It was great fun. The students from wageningen university gave some very funny performances. This is probably the only time of the year when Indian's in wageningen come together. So it is an event that i always look forward too. Some pictures below reflect our mood that day! 

Shake that booty ... Shake that booty :P :P

Meri Shan with Wageningen Indian ki Shan ;)

With always smiling and cheerful Raghu, Shital and Rashi :)

Our third Diwali together...

Diwali party was followed by a crazy Halloween party at my Spanish colleague Jaume's place. I think his house on Heerenstraat host's some coolest parties in Wageningen. By the way, this night reminded me of the Halloween + Diwali party we had in St. John's, Canada. Because of the proximity of these two events, it is quite possible that you have a Diwali party and a Halloween party on the same day. So me and my friends threw a compo party with Diwali decoration on one side and Halloween decoration on another side. It is a cool concept if someone wants to try :) 

Halloween Selfie!

Jaume dressed as Aladin with his monkey Abu and another trying to be monkey Sayantani :P

Sometime ago, I and Sayantani went on a weekend trip to the Ardennes region of Belgium. This region lies in the southeastern part of Belgium and it shares its borders with Germany, Luxembourg and France. This whole area is very hilly and is very scenic with beautiful rivers meandering around hills like a snake. We went to Vresse-sur-Semois (or the Semois valley), shown in map below:

Vresse-sur-Semois, a valley surrounded by nature in south Belgium

The whole valley pretty much looks like this, or prettier...

When you live in the Netherlands, the sight of nature and hills can excite you very quickly. And Ardennes region of Belgium is pretty much the closest location from the Netherlands where you can find scenery like this. The only problem is that going to this region by public transport is a nightmare! So we decided to do car pooling. We used the popular carpooling website in the Netherlands www.blablacar.com and we found our to and fro ride from a Mexican guy who travels to Luxembourg from Amsterdam almost every weekend to meet his girlfriend. There are many small villages in Vresse-sur-Semois. We stayed in a hotel in a village called Laforet. Now just to inform you how busy this place is in summer, we pretty much got the last hotel room available in the whole region!! We got this room probably due to a last moment cancellation, but the hotel and the room was wonderful. And guess who was super excited? ;)      

Excited Shan during one of our hikes:)

Soaking in the beauty

A stop during our lazy stroll along the river Semois, my feet got attacked by tiny fishes!

The SRK pose :P

Apples grow in Europe like mangoes grow in India

As it was a weekend trip, by the time we came back to our apartment in the Netherlands, we were pretty exhausted! It was a bit too much for a weekend i guess. But it was a great trip. I and Shan always learn things about each other when we travel together. During this trip, i  learned that Shan likes to hike with a lot of makeup on :P :P

Another thing that happened recently was that Chuha came to Holland for a conference. While he was in his conference in Amsterdam, I was in Rotterdam for a Port and Terminal Planning Course. During this course, I stayed onboard SS Rotterdam which is a beautiful ship converted into a hotel. I stayed onboard this ship for 4 nights and for the first time i realized how claustrophobic living on a ship can be. Once you are on the upper deck with restaurants and all the view, it looks amazing but as soon as you go to the hotel rooms on the lower deck, its a weird feeling. I wonder how people live on cruise ships for 3-4 weeks!

SS Rotterdam, my home for 4 days 

After his conference and my course was finished, we decided to go on a trip to Brussels and Luxembourg. With Sonam and Sayantani not around, it was a real boys trip! We were in Brussels on 31st October night and offcourse, it was Halloween night :) We were genuinely amazed by the energy of the city for Halloween. All the costume shops were so crowded with customers that there was no place to stand. We somehow managed to buy costumes for us and after all the makeup, we headed to the Hard Rock cafe. I informed a couple of my friends who live in Brussels that we are heading to hard rock cafe and later they joined us ... and the rest is .... wait, i don't remember ;)

This is how it started :D

The one with the Belgian beers ... yummm

After a bit of drinking :P

In full swing with Marta after drinking a bit more :P :P

The mandatory Halloween pic with the slutty bunny and the vamp!

After a crazy night, we somehow reached our hotel. Next day, we traveled to Luxembourg in a pretty hungover state. It is one of the smallest and richest countries in the world. I was surprised to know that the steel giant Arcelormittal is headquartered there.

@ Luxembourg city center

We stayed there for one night and offcourse it was another night of heavy drinking. Chuha was in full mood to party but i was a party pooper that day and was extremely sleepy. Anyways, we walked around the city, ate some nice food and then next day took our train back to Amsterdam. Here Sayantani joined us and we went to eat in Bazar (bazaramsterdam.nl), a hidden gem of a turkish/middle eastern restaurant in Amsterdam. They have converted a vast old church on Albert Cuyp Markt into this restaurant. After eating, we went to hilton skylounge in amsterdam for a drink. Its a unique spot in Amsterdam for those who enjoy high life. With a great selection of (expensive) cocktails and a great view, its a place you can't miss.

@hilton skylounge amsterdam with chuha and sayantani

Next morning, chuha left for Huston and i went back to work. It was nice to catchup with him. It is funny how our conversations change as we grow old. We spent a lot of time talking about our families, our partners, our carrier plans etc .. things that we didn't bothered much with when we were in early twenties. 

Well, pretty much i have told you all the highlights of my life in past few months. There have also been some low moments but off course no one likes to share them in public! I will end this blog post with a picture from last weekend when shan came to MARIN's open day.

My Mermaid @ MARIN's open day 2014

That is all for the moment guys. Enjoy your Sunday! I will see you all again very soon.

Love,

Karan

Munich Trip!

Hi dear readers,

With this post i would like to share with you my Munich trip :). I and Maya left for Munich on 2nd January morning and were back to wageningen on 7th Morning. So we were in Munich for around 4.5 days and we had such a great time there! We stayed there with Linda, my housemates best friend. She is born and bred in Munich, so she is the best host and guide we could have had :)

A classic train journey in the Alps! Let the trip begin :)

With Linda, our awesome host!

Munich is one of the richest cities in Germany with a huge economy. Many German MNC's have their headquarters there. Situated almost the the southern tip of Germany, it is very near Austria and Switzerland and is surrounded by Alps. It is the capital of Bavaria province and is known for its October Fest all over the world! For the first time i saw beer houses there. Basically you can eat food and drink some classic Bavarian beers in them. They are all over Munich. You gotta love their craze for beers!

On our first day, we walked around the impressive city center of Munich, did grocery shopping and made some couscous salad filled in roasted red pepper for dinner.

Maya and Linda @ Munich city center

Roasted red peppers stuffed with couscous salad and some red wine for dinner!

In next 3 days, we saw the Deutsches Museum (largest technical museum in Europe), Neuschwanstein Castle (inspiration for Disneyland's Sleeping Beauty Castle) and Kampenwand mountain.

en-route Kampenwand mountain

en-route Kampenwand mountain

We took a rope-way to ascend 1500 m

and Linda and Maya were so scared that they didn't even wanted to look outside :P

On the top, we found nothing but snow :( and no view because of fog!

I will eat Neuschwanstein Castle :D

Maya @ Neuschwanstein Castle

In between all these excursions, we offcourse found some time to try typical German drinks like Feuerzangenbowle (you can only drink it if you can pronounce it :P).

Cheers over Feuerzangenbowle!!

Here is a nice video on how to make your own Feuerzangenbowle: 

On our last day in Munich, we were invited for dinner by Eva's family. Her mom made the best Korean food ever!

Dinner with Eva's family and friends

It was the best end of our trip i could have expected. We had to roll after dinner to reach station to catch our train back to Wageningen. I wished goodbye to Linda and to Munich with heavy heart and with a promise that i will return for Oktoberfest next year ;). As train zoomed out of Munich, I tried to catch some sleep (unsuccessfully i must say)! We were back to good old Wageningen on Monday morning :)

That's all for now, its 1 am already and i have to work tomorrow. So good night dames en heren! Lekker Slaap!

Yours,

Karan

     

Life in 2012 and wishes for 2013!

Hoi readers,

How are you all? I have been thinking from a while to write again, but you know, I am a lazy man! My work load is pretty high and I have been travelling during a lot of weekends, so time is flying at the moment. I have met so many people in past few months from KGP, its actually pretty awesome to think about it. Shivaji Bose, KC, Chuha, Sonam, Abhi Da, Dholu, Bhangar, Nirav, all passed by Holland and I got a chance to show them around and spend some quality time with them. It was great to meet you all guys! In this globalized world where people are living everywhere for work and education, it has become very hard to maintain a meaningful long term friendship. It needs a lot of hard work, calling each other, making efforts to remember important dates and most importantly, not missing a slightest chance of meeting each other. Lets hope this series of visitors never end!! My doors are open for you guys :)

Well, 2012 is coming to an end. In few hours, it will be 2013! As the trend goes, I have also made some New Year resolutions and I want to share them with you:

• To invest in property in India
• To gain decent proficiency in Dutch language
• To get in shape :P
• To write a blog post once every month
• To publish at least 1 research paper
• To trek from Rohtang Pass to Ladakh
• To take a train from Amsterdam to St. Petersburg via Moscow

All these wishes, I aim to fulfill in 2013. I have more wishes, but their execution is not totally under my control. Hence I am not making them my resolutions but I still hope they come true.

As of 2012 … well, I have to say, it was an interesting year for me! An year of emotional ups and downs, an year of personal achievements and an year of making great new friends. Here are few pics that summarize the year gone by:

Himanshu, dipping his chips into my coffee :P 

With KC and Abhi da @ Amsterdam Central Station

With Gangwal, Kshitij, Havas and Yogi @ Ranthambore Fort

Snake dance with Priyanka @ Arnhem for Holi

ISTANBUL with Saima!!

   

With Chuha and Sonam @ Montmartre, Paris

Rock and Roll party in Antwerp, Belgium!

With colleagues @ Efteling theme park :)

With colleagues @ MARIN open day

With Bobby and John @ Copenhagen

Shankar Ji on his birthday! 

Me, John and Iris made masala dosa and sambhar :)

with Eva, one of my two new awesome flatmates! :) 

For the moment I wish all the readers a very happy new year or a Gelukkig Nieuwjaar :)

Cheers!
Karan 

Netherlands - Part 2

Hello everyone,

So it has been more then 4 months since i came to Wageningen. Life has been very interesting since then. I have met some really cool people in town and my job at MARIN is very challenging. So life has been good! I dont have a lot of time to write at the moment, so this blog post will be with lots of pictures instead ;)

• We celebrated Shankar Ji's birthday in style

Birthday celebration of Shankar ji :)

Us fulfilling the 'cake in your face' ritual :)

We had a picnic at the Rhine river before Birthday celebrations!

• We went to Texel island for a weekend

Brunch with the twins before catching the ferry

We biked almost 30 km that day on texel

Enjoying at  the beach!

Break from biking :)

With Kuppu (R) and Shankar (L) near the harbour

The Texel Gang!

• Me, John and Marta hosted a big Couchsurfing meeting @ my apartment

The CS crew

I love couchsurfing :)

Food @ Spicy potluck in wageningen!

Watching Holland-Denmark soccer game with the CS gang @ the doctor's pub

lol :)

The CS crew after the match @ Wageningen Center

• My legs in Holland!

The most precious thing i own in wageningen!

• Claire came to visit me in Wageningen from France and we went to see Perrine :)

Flowers and Claire :) 

• So one of the best Holi celebration of my life was in Holland! 

Holi 2012 @ Arnhem

• I traveled to Antwerp with Elske

Yes we are tourists :P

Belgian beers and me... mmmmm

Rock and Roll party at Antwerp

We time traveled to 50's that night :)

So that's all for the moment! I have few things lined up in coming weeks and i am very excited about them. I am going to Istanbul in July to meet Saima!!!! And then Ewa is coming to Wageningen for  2 weeks in the beginning of August :)

Good times!!! :)

Tot dan,
Karan