Being interested in travelling and having travelled
the length and breadth of India, Europe was a long cherished dream. I had been
researching about Europe and particularly about France since quite some time. Getting
shortlisted for the International Student Exchange to Grenoble Ecole de
Management, France, for me, was a dream come true. All the micro-planning
started soon after. Just when I though it couldn’t get any better, it actually
got, when I unexpectedly got shortlisted for the Charpak International Exchange Scholarship, by Embassy of France in
India, being one of the 18 students from across the country!(Credit goes to the
IR Committee for informing us about it)
In the early hours of 31st December, we
landed at Charles De Gaulle Airport, Paris. After taking the train to city
centre and having realized how steep the taxi fares were, we walked for a
couple of kilometers with our heavy luggage to reach our hotel. The excitement
level was at such a high that even sub-zero temperatures, sleep deprived body
and the long walk couldn't drain our energy.
After a little rest, we left for a walk. By this time,
our hunger pangs were at a new high, and after much deliberation about eating
Vietnamese or Thai or Chinese or Cambodian, we finally settled for McDonalds,
the epitome of standardization (and Capitalism!). While we ordered at McD, we
had realized and had come to terms with the fact that there was a huge
difference in purchasing power of INR and EURO,and ironically, we got the feel
of The Economist’s Big Mac Index at a
McDonalds! We also were a little surprised that very few people spoke English
even in a cosmopolitan city like Paris. ‘Parlez-vous
anglais?’(do you speak English?) was to be our anthem for the next four
months!
31st evening, the New Year’s Eve, was long
awaited for all of us. After all, it’s not every day that one gets to celebrate
a New Year at The Eiffel Tower! The Tower, glowing in all its might, with all
the lights, looked more magnificent that it did in the photos and videos. We
couldn't help but capture it from every possible angle. Next morning, we
visited several tourist attractions such as Notre Dame, Arch De Triomphe,
Champs Elysees etc., bowled over by the city’s beauty every time, which towards
the end of the exchange program I realized, was the most beautiful city I had
ever seen.
The next day, we reached Grenoble, the town where our
Exchange School was located and also our base camp for the upcoming trips across
Europe. Situated among French Alps, this city boasts of being the host to The
Winter Olympics, 1968. With snow capped mountains all around and two rivers
flowing through it, the city was indeed beautiful. We checked into out
apartments, which didn't happen before we got all the paperwork done,
including opening a bank account. France is known to be a very bureaucratic
country but we didn't face much difficulty despite the language barrier,
probably because we had seen worse!
We received a warm welcome at our new school, Grenoble
Ecole de Management and were provided with a tour of the school followed by an
orientation program. Classes commenced soon after. I was excited to experience
studying in a ‘Western’ School. I noticed a lot of similarities and some
differences during my semester at the School. Almost all the professors
teaching us were experts in their respective fields. International case studies
being taught at our home school (IIM Raipur) ensured that case-study based
learning wasn't new to us. A major difference that I observed was that
professors here were much more informal with the students compared to that in India.
It was probably because of the theory of ‘Power Distance’, which is much higher
in Asian cultures, compared to that in western cultures. Among the entire list
of subjects, Geopolitics was the one that I liked the most. It was taught by
five different professors and all of them presented it in an interesting manner.
Euro Trip for us, started with Geneva, which was 2.5
hours away from Grenoble. This is when we realized that Switzerland was even
more beautiful than what we had seen in Yash Chopra movies. This was followed
by numerous trips in the next three months that totaled 24,900 Kilometers of
Train Travel in 14 countries and 29 cities. To sum it up, we saw the beautiful
beaches in French Riviera, the grand canal system in Venice, Art and paintings
in Florence, Leaning Tower in Pisa, Colosseum in Rome, Papal Town in Vatican,
Dachau Concentration camp in Munich, Berlin Wall in the city by same name,
Mercedes Museum in Stuttgart, Hofburg Palace in Vienna, the ‘Rockstar’ bridge
in Prague, Canals in Amsterdam, laid back life in Spain, and massive splurge in
Monte-Carlo, Monaco, among other places. Sky-diving in Seville, Spain, was
another memorable experience. The adrenaline rush of a free fall and the view
of the land beneath were exceptional.
During our trips, we stayed in hostels, which are
comparatively pocket-friendly and form an essential part of a backpacker’s
travelling expedition across Europe. The hostels have a very charged
environment, where one ends up interacting with a lot of people and making a
lot of friends. There were a few ups and downs during the trips as well, such
as searching for hostel at 1 AM in a completely new country, spending the night
at train station in sub-zero temperatures, missing trains a lot of times, etc.,
which only helped in making us more experienced. Overall, this was by far, the
best trip I have ever had. I have learnt a lot more through the experience than
I would have through books.
With
‘ghar-ka-khana’ craving taste buds,
lots of memories to cherish and tons of stories for our Grandkids, we finally
returned to our motherland.
This article is written by Vikas Prakash Singh of PGP 2012-14. He can be contacted at pgp12105.vikas@iimraipur.ac.in
