The Initial Days

There has been so much in my life in the last three days. Denmark seems to be one fine country. And Copenhagen a very systematic and well planned city. In Copenhagen, there is a fixed time for everything to be done, which makes it a city which follows a higher degree of rules and regulations as compared to India and other Asian countries. The services offered to the Danish citizens by the government is an amazing thing to note. These include free health insurance and paychecks to the unemployed. But the government in return asks for a greater return from the citizens in the form of the 38 percent tax. Phew, a large figure.

The most wonderful aspect about the city I thought is the huge number of options available to commuters. There are trains covering all parts of the city and even the greater Copenhagen (which is where DTU is located). Metro runs in a particular area, but it is very frequent, say at an average you find a metro for yourself in maximum of 5 minutes (thats my perceived figure). Same is the case with the trains, which are very frequent indeed. The trains are again divided into various categories depending on the track they follow. Bus is the other mode often used by commuters. And with all these services, the even more important part of information dissemination is very well planned. There are city maps at every metro, train and bus station. This makes life easy for tourists and new comers to the city. At every bus stop, the complete path of the bus that would stop there, is put up. This also includes the various timings the bus would be at the stop (these are fixed times). The train stations are again flooded with various maps and routes tog uide one to the destination.
So how does one purchase the tickets for commution? Well, its just a single ticket that you purchase, and you could travel on it through any of the modes possible, its as simple as that. Also the system of tickets is quite different, but complicated to be explained here.

As a result of the frequency in the modes available, generally one does not see a rush in the buses and trains. And moreover, the populatioin of the entire Denmark is 5.4 million, which is extremely under control. And thats one reason why such highly intelligent and planned systems could work in places like Denmark. So if I assume such planning to go into India, looking at the population, one would be highly dissappointed. But more important, the complicated lifestyle as in Denmark wont be digested in a land like India, if it were to be implemented there.

The food here is quite a shock, though I had heard of it before arriving. Bread has to be at the table any and everytime, with butter ofcourse. In addition, there is a huge variety of non-vegetarian food to be swallowed. This includes beef and pork, among the conventional chicken and eggs. The other day when I went to MacDonalds, I asked them to give me some vegetarian burger. The proposal that came from the counter was we would just not put the meat in the burger, and that would be vegetarian. So, there is nothing like Aloo Tickee Burger that we normally eat in India, for the simple reason that all of the localites have non-vegetarian stuff. Potatoes also are quite famous here. Hot chocolate is one preferred drink, and beverages including coffee and tea are heavily served. Tea is available only in the tea-bags, since boiled water is served along with milk powder or cream. But overall, I think the food at home would be the best, and one would not want to eat the food served in canteens on a daily basis. And this makes learning cooking very important for a student here in Denmark.

One surprising thing is that Euro is generally not accepted here in Denmark. This is something strange, since Denmark belongs to the EU and most other countries in the EU run the Euro currency. I had some Euros with myself for the initial expenditures, but they dont work everywhere. Had to borrow some money from a friend, for the purpose of buying some initial groceries and other payments.

Today was the official start of our two-year programme. This entire week, we have the introduction programme, which includes a lot of things aimed towards making an international student comfortable before starting studies at DTU. The international students were divided into groups of 8 and a guide was allotted to them for the week. Astrid, our guide, is a wonderful girl. And the other members of the group are people from France, Italy and other places, including one Pakistani. I met them all in the morning at breakfast, and soon we all got into sharing a good rapport. Exchanging histories and plans, and other general information happened. Our guide then took us around the campus. Later we had lunch together, which included a sandwhich and a drink. Sandwhiches were available in a variety, including beef, pork and other stuff. I has the one with tuna in it, and it was seriously delicious. Later, we attended a lecture on the Danish culture, and in the evening we were given an interesting task to perform - Build the highest tower, which could hold the highest number of beer cans. The logic was to get a trade-off between the height of tower, and the number of cans it could hold, which are both inversely propotional. We had a real fun time doing it, and finally we came up with good model, though not the best.'

Later we had dinner, quite early, at around 7. After dinner, at around 8:30, we headed towards a beer cafe close by. There we all spoke, and exchanged information regarding each other. I was surrounded with questions quering things like OM and Bollywood :) and I tried to give these international guys the best possible view. Though, I mush mention, people seem to be quite impressed by India :P. At the end of it all, it was quite an enjoyable day, I got the opportunity to meet international students, and make myself culture-shock free. It seems international students are different, but I really found everyone to be quite understandable in every sense.

Would keep updating,
Take Care.