Equitably-Guileless

A Foreign Fortnight

Date: Mon, 19 Oct 2009 17:00:43 GMT
One of my friend has requested me to write a description of my stay, work, conveyance food & lodging and all other pertinent things in Liege Belgium. Hence I thought of blogging it so that I can have a ready reference of my initial days handy at all times. I took a flight at very early morning on 5th of this instant from IGI and has reached the BRU at around quarter to eight in the morning. After the immigration check and collection of luggage I went to the basement and took a through ticket to Liege Guillemins, even though I had to make it, via Leuven, to there. In the rail compartment I met a friendly couple who helped me to switch trains at Leuven, a quarter of an hour away from the airport. In my next train I met an American graduate student from Rutgers university, some Mr. Ross, who is actually going to the same university as I am, to deliver a seminar on Gravitational Lensing. That helped me pass the long 45 minutes in a jiffy. Nothing much had happened in any of these train journeys except that I tried to look at the grass outside, but, to my disappointment they were as green as they could be, without even a subtle hint of fall colours that I were told about, so much so, that I expected to see them in all of the temperate zones.


After reaching Liege station, I was supposed to make a phone call to the university so that I could be picked up by my host. I was unable to locate a coin box and hence proceeded to my hotel/apartment. It was nearby and not much of a trouble since I worked on Google maps quite a lot beforehand. I rode to the hotel by Mercedes, a bus not a cab! I was on my days end to lift my luggage weighing nearly 32 kilos to third floor without lift. On reaching the place, I conveniently called up my host and he soon arrived and picked me up to the university.

Upon reaching the university, I signed my contract and thereafter did many things one by one like the medical insurance, residence permit, bank account finding a new apartment, electricity and gas transfer for the same, registering in the library and for a on line Language course, to name a few. I could do this in just four days partly due to my efficacy and mostly due to the help my host extended towards me.

Yes, of course, I am cooking in my apartment. But only in the weekends. Weekdays are mostly with BBC's (Bread Butter Cheese for the uninitiated) and burgers and fries at nights. I have found out a Bangladeshi shop near my apartment so that I could buy fish eggs, fish, rice, lentils and some well known sub-continental spices. There is also 'alimente biologique' which brings us food without any artificial chemical in it. I have not yet very skill full at my culinary endeavours. Apart from rice, lentils, hoagen-moagen, fried fish and eggs thereof, french toast I did not prepare any Bengali dish. Tried to make some foreign fast food with fillet and bacon at home with modest results. I note here I have a gas oven here unlike most of Europe where induction heater is the most used cooking device.

The apartment is nice well furnished and equipped. Only the washing m/c or the dish washer is lacking but that is not much hindrance to me. It's just on the city centre equivalent to Esplannade at Kolkata. The city Cathedral, Opera (not a philharmonic one though), Palace of Justice are jsut a minute or two away from the door. The university is on a flat plateau atop a hill around 10 kms away from where I stay. The city station is the largest in Belgium (no comparison with Brussels midi) and may be one of the biggest in Europe. It has a roof that costs around 400 M E. The city has a big river cutting it across in three parts including the island between the streams. It is the third largest river ports of Europe.

Every Sunday, there is a cheap market alongside the river, where, people from nearby village come and sell things. I brought two jackets to drive away the winter. A big October fair is going on in the middle of the city too. It's very much like our own with the big wheels and etc.

I would stop here, even if I write more it would still be an inadequate description of a place. I really lack my camera here, which, for some strange reason I left at home.

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Carpe Diem

Date: Fri, 02 Oct 2009 17:02:26 GMT

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Good Riddance

Date: Fri, 04 Sep 2009 12:39:14 GMT
This is a story of an uninitiated aboriginal vs. cold blooded reptiles. The question is - who can outwit the other? If you are thinking about catching a domesticated lizard then of course the latter. Even you may not be successful to drive them out from your household at one go. I, being an outright average commonplace lay-bahe was almost sure to be defeated in this quest, given the amount of junk material in my room.

I, however, noticed that the creatures entered into my room via window. They did not use the door. In the hot summers I used to open my  wire meshed window pane for easier air circulation. That was my weakness those reptiles banked on. I used to close the pane in the morning but in the mean time they had returned to the comforts of the room after a night out of preying. I waited till the monsoon came and estimated about a suitable calendar day after which I no longer need a open window at night. I set my alarm on the fateful day some time after midnight. Woke up and closed the window. The lizards were just outside. They could have leapt inside as they always do in the mornings, given my slow reflex as compared to those reptiles. However, they chose to go away since it was night time.

I won ---> BackPat!

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Warning

Date: Tue, 25 Aug 2009 17:41:26 GMT

This should be self-explanatory:

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Indian Railway : Snippets Of Wisdom

Date: Sat, 04 Jul 2009 20:30:10 GMT
The first time I traveled alone inside a rail compartment was in July, 1998 for about six hundred kilometres or so. This was well before most of my contemporary's started boarding trains (alone) leaving local ones aside. But every time you board a long distance train in India you learn things, at least you revise old things learnt in the past. Likewise, I have got some lesson yesternight and today while on board a 4083 exp. christened Mahanada Exp. [or better still Mahaganda Exp.].

I boarded the train at platform no. one at NJP on 3rd of July at 1330 hrs which is approximately 0230 hrs off the schedule. I got an upper berth on the coach AB1. The first thing I noticed about the coach was that the glass pane of the door locking the air conditioning is replaced by a wooden panel on both the sides. At my side, I did not notice the other, it was held in the closed position by a hanging & makeshift metal plate so that it can not overshoot in the other direction. So far so good. I unfurled my bedroll and went to sleep, which ensued and was interrupted after a little while. A salesman, evidently loaded with Hong Kong Market goods started negotiating with my co-passengers. Exasperated as I was, told him to join politics, since he stands good chance of over-shouting his opponents. Transgenders  did board the train, as they usually do in NJP. But thankfully they did not pester.

At 1730 hrs we reached KTH and the thing I hate most occurred. One family comprising one old mother and a son boarded into the train and started nagging me to vacate my seat on account of the elderly lady (the mother) who needs a constant attendant over her, like an angel, all the time. I gingerly acceded to that, cursing my fate and god for not blessing with me with a family for myself to flaunt before public. I had always suffered this fate on ground of being a young male of the species that boards passenger trains. Law of statistics does not apply here.

I silently rolled my bedding and went over to my new seat. Here I found a short distance passenger without any reservation is traveling with me. It turned out that he was a RPF constable working in the Bhaluka Road station of West Bengal inside the district of Malda. He not only illuminated me how the current state of political affairs has filled the chicken's neck of India with Bangladeshi infiltrators, but also how adept they are at breaking the law, so much so, they would even learn a few engineering skills. They manage to stop express and mail trains by manipulating signals on railway track. What is a little less outrageous than the fact of total jeopardy of passenger safety is that they get same day bail from Malda CJM court when the guards manage to haul the culprits red handed booked either for plunder or manhandling Govt. property. In passing he notes the eerie practise of railway ( common in bureaucratic circles) to engage an Inspector matching the religion of the majority of the place he serves. He also mentions, in his native district the bail pleas will be heard only after 3 months or so of penal servitude, as compared to the progressive district of a progressive state. I felt shame about the state I belong to and how it's rulers has counted heads for only votes for a little over three decades. Eventually they did run out of it and took some as loan from the neigbhouring country.

Next morning, after crossing ALD at around 0930 hrs I found a herd of TTE's meant for the whole train. They were resting intermittently in the coupe (19-22). Whenever the train stopped they managed the stray short distance travelers for a few pices of silver into the coaches and fell back to their abode. One of them, otherwise nondescript modulo the bearing and the badge, one Shri P. P. Singh, Head TTE of Section Tundla bought some blackberry from a non-rail vendor. He ate them with his sidekicks and blurted out the seeds on the compartment floor. He then asked for another  non-rail sweeper (underage) to sweep it. After that the young fellow came to me asking for money which I declined. He then offered me 0.50 INR (locally called chiller) for my miserliness. Any progressive person would have worked himself up (like the minister of the progressive state who told today that a begger earns more than 6000 a month!). But I maintained cool and retorted why should you escape on dirt cheap - give me all you have. He came out with a enviable set of coins and offered me 10 INR from it. I repeated all - means your money, your apparel, your broom and other mundane belongings. The boy departed the scene without giving me a second glance.

If you are bored then here is the bottom line - forget about the rules that those imperialistic socialist do not follow. Forget even those rules of hygiene that the railway always announces. Let us simply commemorate the independence of bourgeois today once and above all.

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