There comes Santa

Santa Claus hanging on the balcony grill/ pipes...
showing him potential ways to enter the house??

This is quite an unique sight here in Germany.

Its cute I thought :)

Back in Germany - married!!

After a long drawn relationship, stressfull, big fat indian wedding, V and I are finally, 'officially' married (still hard to believe sometimes). Our trip to India was very hectic. Contrary to our skepticism, things went off without any show-stoppers.

We got back to germany, and "our" apartment in Wiesloch on Saturday.
We look forward to spending our new life as a 'married' couple, here among our lovely friends. It was really great to have some of them attend our wedding in India.
They left a lasting impression on all our friends and relatives who attended our wedding.
(more photos to come...)

leaving on a jet plane

V and I fly to Bangalore tomorrow to begin the countdown (together) of our wedding!!!! my gawd!! its overwhelming and exciting at the same time.

I am equipped with stress relieving, sleep inducing pills to cope with it all :) - thanks Eva :D

wedding invites

getting the wedding invites done isnt an easy task anywhere. i took this task upon myself - i would do it in Germany. phew! this personal project of mine was a difficult one. first it took me a while to decide the design, then i had these dreams of the kind of paper i wanted...went looking for it...found it...but the colors did not work right on this textured paper. so i was soon back to the drawing board.

1st round of iteration - get pragmatic - change color, change paper...

2nd round of iteration - get more pragmatic - change design to be more simple and minimalist - single sheet card!!! - white paper!!!!

• scouted for printers...mannheim; heidelberg
• explained what i wanted...when i wanted it...all the while using my limited german language skills...hoping i was saying the right thing and i will get the right result (read - the card)
• place orders...
• made it to the printer on time to learn nothing got printed due to technical problems...
• scout for printers again, this time found one right next to my apartment. a really good one. DruckHaus, Wiesloch. I couldnt believe i didnt notice this place before. More so, I even found a nice paper store in Wiesloch Zentrum. MAN!!! and I was running around everywhere.

Finally I got the wedding invites on my hand just a couple of days before taking the flight back to Bangalore. I have to say, I was (am) more than satisfied with the end result.

It was a good learning experience, I look forward to seeing my friends from Germany at the wedding. I hope it is an enjoyable experience for them in Lucknow, Delhi.

Friends & Music

It is amazing that so many of my friends are part of a band and I can watch them perform from time to time. I feel somewhat special to have my friends on the stage...doing a great performance. I can walk with a little pride in me silently communicating - "you know what, that person in the band is my friend." :)

The first invitation was from Michaela. She is part of a choir and I went to watch her choir in the Rathaus of Speyer. A really nice old building. Many of the ByD UX team members were around for this concert. The whole choir was dressed in Red and Black...I didnt know all the songs they sang as some were german. But they did sing some popular english songs too. With a twist. A 'choir-like' twist. Interesting...

With the next invite, I was more privileged. I was on the guest list of Eva Markwig - The sax player of Ngobo Ngobo. Am I honoured?? She and her band have groupies in Tokyo...and I was part of the guest list!!! how cool is that ???? :D
Ngobo Ngobo played at the Schwimmbad in Heidelberg. I had confessed to Eva that I was not aware of the genre of Ska music before I met her. She ensured me and others going for her show were prepared - she sent around some youtube videos of the famous Ska dance. I couldnt take a close look at it. For a layman, Ska is somewhat close to reggae. I was definitely looking forward to it.
Once Ngobo Ngobo started playing...man!!! I felt this was a lot more peppy than reggae. It was amazing to see the entire crowd on their feet, moving to the music. There was bunch of guys dressed in 'Ska' style, doing the 'Ska' dance...they were really really into it. Ngobo Ngobo was really cool. V and I picked up the Ska dance quite quickly...and we were doing it ourselves...we were telling ourselves, if we did this everyday, we wont need to work out. It was a lot of fun!!!
Ska definitely now features in my list of interesting music. Ngobo Ngobo ofcourse!!! I even browsed youtube for further videos of Ska music.
Unfortunately we were way too tired to stay through the concert. So we left before they finished. Needless to say, we missed the best part :( - reason enough for me to work on my 'staying up late' capabilities.

Besides Michaela, Eva...there is also Heinz who is part of the SAP Big Band, Sylvia's husband plays in a band too...I am so glad to be around such friends and in the midst of so much music :) - of different kinds.

Turkish food in Mannheim

Vikas came up with the brilliant idea to drive down to the Turkish area of Mannheim for dinner. I had my eyes set on the restaurant named 'Istanbul' since the last time I was there. I had never eaten Turkish food (apart from the ubiquitous Doener). This was the perfect opportunity to explore.
Walking down the streets, we checked various menu's but hardly found anything vegetarian. It wasnt a surprise. But the menu as Istanbul definitely was!!!! It had close to 2 pages of vegetarian dishes on its menu. To add to it, a whole assortment of Baklavas too.
They make their own bread in this place and it was delicious. This was just the starter. Then the main course. The portions were HUGE!!!! but everything we ordered was EXTREMELY TASTY. We stuffed ourselves as much as we could feeling guilty to leave behind such good food. But we did leave some space for the Baklavas...they were just amazing!!!!!!
Having such a variety of vegetarian dishes in a Turkish restaurant was a big, big surprise to me.

Post dinner, we were forced to take a walk through the streets of Mannheim to let the food settle down a bit. But it was all worth every bit.
I cannot wait to get back to this place!!!

Painting the house

I had help pouring in when I said I need to paint my house (thanks to all of you who offered). Everyone who offered to help said, "I love painting..."

I had never ever painted a wall before and perceived it as a hassle. Untill the day we did it!!

Daniel and Eva helped us a lot with this. We first made a trip to Praktikar to know what we needed to buy, the next day we worked on the walls.

Daniel, Eva and Vishal coincidentally wore white tee and black pants...they looked like they were wearing a uniform :)

As we waited for the paint to dry, we cooked and had some 'indian' food, some 'chai'...

It was definitely a lot of fun. I too join the list of people who "love painting."

Grocery stores

Ever since I learnt that Rewe is open untill 10:00 pm, it has become the (default) grocery store for me. However, depending on where I am, I have also occassionally shopped for groceries in other stores.
What's interesting is the amount of 'indian' stuff that has crept into these stores. Where they always there and I never noticed? Or is this a recent phenomenon?

I have seen packed 'naan' of various flavours; pickles, chutneys, briyani, papadam...recently Lidl had 1 week of Asian items. This included 'onion bhajji' and 'samosas', 'tikka masala...' its amazing. I never imagined having onion bhajji or papadams being available in a regular grocery store in Germany!!!

Wonder if these grocery stores stock up such items across the country? I would be extremely surprised if the answer is "yes."

Autumn colors

Trees are turning yellow, orange, red, pink, brown...between the evergreens....its a riot of colors all around here...beautiful.
Its been a long time since I am living in a place that has 4 seasons. Its been a long time since I am experiencing autumn.

'chai-biskoot' in Germany

Like most Indians, I love my 'chai-biskoot'. Especially with Parle-G (glucose biscuit) .
While I dont find Parle-G in the grocery stores in Germany, I did find a decent replacement for it in Germany - the Vollkorn (full corn) version of Leibniz Keks. It goes equally well with chai...


I realized Leibniz Keks and Parle-G go back in time and history of Germany and India respectively.
Leibniz dates back to the 19th century, Parle-G has a background of over 65 years.
Leibniz Keks is infact one of the classic 'design icons' of Germany...

A day full of surprises

On my birthday, I believed that none of my friends, aquaintances here know about it. I got calls, emails, chat messages from friends and family in India ofcourse but I went past the day without declaring it to people around me that it was my birthday. I didnt have to.
I spoke to V's parents. For the first time in 7 years, my birthday was significant enough for this. I was surprised by how 'pleasant' the brief talk was. Surprised by being encouraged by them to have a nice time, with their son. (earlier, they wouldnt want their son to be anywhere close to me) *sigh* - sometimes its interesting to be a specator to my own life and see what turns it takes...

So V and I were going to eat at a Persian restaurant - Darwish in Heidelberg. So we tried our best to get out of office at a decent time and get to Heidelberg. As I was leaving office, I get a call from a friend to wish me!!! I never thought he'd remember. I must have mentioned my birthday casually to him many years ago. I was really pleasantly surprised.

As we walk towards the restaurant, I suddenly heard V say "hello" to someone. I looked closer and I see Daniel, Eva, Fariba, Vikas walking towards us with flowers n stuff!!!! woohh!!! That was a BIG SURPRISE!!! Fariba sits across me, knew it was my birthday and did such a great job pretending not to. Amazing...!!!

Then Jeremiah joined too....i had met him during the day as well. Then Jean....i didnt even know she was in Germany. Apparently Toby and Natalie and Matthias couldnt join. So all my friends knew!!! I kept thinking nobody did.

Some great Persian food @ Darwish was followed by a heavenly BlueBerry (my favourite) Panna Cotta at Daniel & Eva's house. Jeremiah had to leave early as he had a morning flight to catch. But the rest of us were up untill 2:30 am over some esoteric topics. We pushed ourselves to get to our respective houses...

It was a great birthday. Full of surprises. It was ages since I celebrated it with such a big group of friends.

Modular furniture

V and I fixed two wardrobes in the last few days. I was always fascinated with the thought and ability make up my own furniture. I could experience this first hand. Ofcourse this is all EXTREMELY modular furniture.
One understands the real meaning of modular furniture here. Everything comes in a box - pieces of boards, nails, pins, screws, glue, instructions...then on, you are on your own. It is quite hard to go wrong if the instructions are followed well. There are precise number of screws, precise holes, slits...

We have a lot of modular furniture being sold in various furniture stores in India now. But how often have you heard of people ripping off their modular kitchen (after spending a fortune on it) and taking it with themselves to their next house? (Come to think of it, we in India invest in a modular kitchen only in our 'own' houses, only when we are sure we are going to live there for a long time) If the size doesnt match to the 'T' they plug and play/ add - subtract stuff to fit it to the new size.

Thats how 'modular' the furniture here is.

With the first wardrobe, we took about 3 hours. Hey!! it was the first time we were doing anything of the sort. The next one was done in half the time.
We are now good to offer our services :)

multicultural life

Apart from Germans around me, I also have a Norwegian german teacher; an Iranian origin, American citizen team mate; a Srilankan origin, American citizen team mate; Turkish colleague married to a German who met in Bangalore, shopped in London for an Indian wedding dress; Indian colleague married to a Russian; a Mexican origin, German citizen colleague; a half German, half American colleague...and plenty of aquaintances that come from Bulgaria, China, Ghana, Britain...

I am so impressed with the multi-cultural environment @ SAP. Sometimes it is so relatable, it is almost like being in India where we come from different parts of the country, speak different languages....
I like it!! :)

Me & the Heat @ The 'Session', Walldorf

Last night Fariba and I went to 'Session' in Walldorf and watched Me & the Heat...also some other singers. Was fun. We spent about 2 hrs there - the band was still going strong. But as we had to get to work early, we decided to leave @ 11. Also decided to do this more often.

Personalized Gifts

Daniel carefully carried a handmade gift for Jeremiah's new baby girl all the way from Heidelberg to Palo Alto. Eva told me how she went about making the gift, the materials she used...

From Eva and Daniel, I also learnt of other such personalized gifts made for friend's wedding etc. I saw Daniel taking time off to work on a book for another wedding...Then I heard Peter, Thomas doing something similar for their friend's wedding.

In today's world where time is precious, people get too busy to care/ think about people, a group of friends get together to put together a memorable, personalized gift for one among them for a special occassion. Serious effort is pitched in by people to get this going...Isnt it fascinating?

In my country and culture, we have long forgotten the warmth associated to personalized things. We are caught by the retail bug. A gift can be something as impersonal as a gift voucher from some big store, or something off the shelf which a million others can also buy...

In Germany, these friends have a lot of fun putting together such personalized gifts. They are run like 'projects'...with clear roles, responsibilities etc. Not only does it bring together the set of friends, it also makes the gift so special for the receipient.

Again, something I'd like to imbibe :)

Houses...(of natives)

Some of my friends have been gracious enough to invite me over to their houses, houses of their families. I feel honoured that they feel comfortable enough to have me in their most 'personal space.' This insight into their space is very interesting.

I notice that 'apartments' living is increasingly becoming homogenous in this 'global village.'

However people who 'own' their 'houses' (not apartments) go all out to give their house a character. Houses I visited have a noticable collection of art in there. Each collectible is carefully positioned in the most apt of places. Some of these are old memoribilias, some are things collected during their travels. Each very interesting and mysterious (as if they all had some interesting story to tell).
Many of these 'houses' have a garden, this too extends the character consistently. For some it is 'zen' inspired, for others its more rustic and wild.
What totally blows me over is most of these families do all of this themselves. With little professional help. It is so admirable. First, to have such exquisite taste to pick the right things for their house, place them in the right places, pick the right sort of plants, take care of them...its all a lot of effort.

There is a beautiful sense of romance to create this character to their house, maintain it, and build upon this character interestingly.
I experienced how'overwhelming' a visit to the Baumarkt (place to buy stuff for the house) can be. There are endless options for the smallest things.
So I know exactly the efforts involved in having such a nice "home." No wonder it is said that Germans are very picky about their house. It is no wonder that while renting an apartments, it is totally bare - leaving all room for the new occupants to give it the identity they want to.

I admire the kind of passion and thought they put in to make their house a home. I do hope some of this rubs off on me while I am here.

'Made in Germany' tag

One very interesting thing I notice here is not everything is coming from China or India or some other so called 'developing' country.
Being a proponent of retaining local produce for internal consumption, I do feel good about this.
From traditional porcelain, pottery to bath towels, it is not uncommon to find a 'made in germany' tag. I am happy to already own some of these locally made products. What is also interesting is the quality tends to be so high and trusted by the Germans that many of them choose to only buy German brands.
To me this is a huge achievement for a country.

Up close with Chris Martin :)

November 2005 was when I first saw Cold Play live in Mainmarkt Platz, Mannheim Germany: The X&Y tour. This was my first concert in Germany, my first trip to Germany as an employee of SAP. I had gone alone for this concert. I stood somewhat far away from the stage, just enough to be able to "see" the band from a distance. Considering how good the band was even then, the venue was rather small . It was not totally packed either. There was more crowd at the SAP Arena that day for the ice hockey match. 02.09.08, I watch them live again - the Viva La Vida tour. This is my first concert in Germany as a resident of Germany, as an employee of SAP AG :). So much has changed (for the better) between then and now. This time the concert was in SAP Arena; It was sold out; The props much more professional; the band has ofcourse gotten even better :) The best part was, I got to see Chris Martin REALLY close!!! Thanks to the stage set up, the crowd definitely got their money's (a lot of euros) worth. I felt like a groupie at times!!! My admiration for this band, especially Chris Martin only increased last night. As the band took one of their breaks, as the crowd goaded them to come back, we suddenly see the flash lights on the 'seated audience' of SAP Arena and thats where the band performed their next song from - acoustic, with just a mike. So amazing!!! Towards the end, the concert became even special when they dispersed colorful papers cut out in the shapes of butterflies... I loved every moment of it!!!

My First big splurge

I never realized that a washing machine could make me happy :)
At the guest house, I did not have access to one. Mrs Fug insisted that I give her my clothes - she would wash and iron them for me. While its very nice of her, it made me extremely uncomfortable to hand my clothes to her, request her to wash them for me. This discomfort made me 'plan' how to wear my clothes, so I could easily seperate out the colored clothes from the white/lighter shades bla bla
I dont particularly like lugging my clothes to a publich laundermat :(; waiting for the clothes to get done...
When I went to Palo Alto, I felt so happy to have a coin operated washer and dryer on the same floor as my room :)

So as soon as I moved into my apartments, my first big splurge had to be getting myself a Washing Machine. I did some online research and discussions with colleagues, friends about them...finally bought an Electrolux EWF 12240 W. from Mediamarkt. They promised delivery and installation too.
The installation however didnt go too smoothly. Not their fault. The input and output points werent quite working in the bathroom. The delivery guys wrote down the valves I need to buy and left!!! Ofcourse they wouldnt come back to fit them for me!!! phew!! uuggh!! They told me I could get them at the Toom Markt. So I went down there with their list...and as suspected, nothing is sans choice here. Even the simple valve had some variations and my german was put to test there...
I had to explain to the guys the entire story - mediamarkt delivery guys finding a problem with the valves bla bla...finally, an (broken) english speaking boy came to my rescue. Infact more than rescue because he volunteered to stop by my apartments on his way home just to see what was the problem - what would be required. I was very impressed. After his inspection, he said he would return the next day with the required equipments to fix it. He especially came home the next day just to tell me he didnt have time to do this work for me...that he would come the following day!! Again, I was impressed...
Finally after 3 days of owning a washing machine, thanks to this boy from Toom Markt, it worked!!!


I could wash my clothes MYSELF!!! yay!!
It is unbelievably liberating :D :P

Jogging through Wineyards in Wiesloch, Baden-Würrtemberg, Germany

A couple of days after I moved into my rented apartments in Wiesloch, I decided to explore the area a bit by going out for a jog.
The small hill seen from my windows intrigued me, so I started to jog in its direction.
I soon found myself jogging on paths through wineyards. Grapes still hanging on them, the leaves a beautiful shade of green, almost translucent against the setting, evening sun.
It was such a great experience. After recultantly working up a 6kms running schedule on a treadmill (lack of aesthetic, hassle free outdoor environments in India) - this was an extremely welcome change for me. The feeling of running in such picturesque, clean, dust and pollution free paths free of honking cars is something to be experienced. It really motivates me to put on my jogging shoes, ipod and get on the road more often.
Some of these wineyards have a shop to purchase their produce. Wow! That was a special evening. In my solitude, I felt good about a few decisions:Firstly, renting the apartments; living in a 'town/village'; choosing Germany (europe) over USA :)

Kartoffelsuppe mit Zwetschgenkuchen (Potato Soup and Plum Cake)

I was in the "first" building of SAP...from way back in the 70's. Interesting experience.
People told me that the catering here was better than normal. I was looking forward to exploring what 'better' vegetarian food was instore for me. Among other things, there was Potato Soup and Plum cake. The combination sounded a bit strange to me. Starter and desert together? Potato and Plum together? But it did look very nice. Plus, I had to heed to the curiosity and try it.
On the lunch table, as I tried to find out more about this peculiar combination, I learnt that this was traditional German from Pflaz. (so I learnt)

This definitely gets into my list of favourite German cuisine.

Country of residence

My business trip to US (palo alto) is the first one after I relocated to Germany. For the first time I wrote the name of a country other than India for 'country of residence'... It was a strange feeling. My country of residence is Germany My country of citizenship is India City that issues the visa is Chennai City I am visiting is Palo Alto, CA. phew! The agent at the rental car station wanted my 'home' address. For a minute I had to ask myself, "which home?" - Germany/ India? I gave her the address of my Germany 'home.'

The House Hunt

Having a relocation agent from systematic movement is definitely very helpful for house hunting. The quota is 10 houses - having been through the experience, I feel this is less.
Picky as I am, I saw 7 houses with the agent (several others on my own using the portal postings) and none made the mark. I was really getting frantic about this as I was just 3 houses away from filling up the quota.
The relocation agent too was getting baffled to why I wasnt deciding with any one. I spent most of my day in office looking up the portal, immobilienscout24.de, calling up people, emailing people...

Then finally, the '8th' house was the one I picked.
1/3 Hauselacker, Wiesloch.

It was a classic 'being in the right place at the right time' case. The landlady had trouble with the previous occupants and I happened to be looking...


The areas is really nice - almost everything is in walking distance. Zentrum, The Palatin, Toom Markt, Flora Park, my bank, post office...
I like it :) The only thing im missing is having a bicycle.

First address in Germany

My first address in Germany as a 'resident' was 39 Falltorstrasse, Bad Schonborn.
While the guest house isnt the most modern or aesthetic, I have to say Mrs Fug made my stay very comfortable.
The house had somewhat of an old world charm, had an old radio, TV...reminded me of stuff we had in our house many years ago.
Both Mr and Mrs Fug are very friendly, kind. Mr Fug didnt speak English, but I could converse with my limited knowledge of German. Mrs Fug however speaks good English.
I one thing I really missed was internet connection in the guest house. I really think SAP employees living in temporary accomodation should always be provided with internet connection. There were days when I had to leave the guest house at 7 am to take calls with my team in Palo Alto - breakfast was just getting laid out in the BAC building at that time.