Study Abroad Counselling

10 Top Study Abroad Essentials List before going abroad

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Fri, 12 Feb 2021 07:59:00 +0000

Are you going to study abroad? Have you packed your bags? No? Indeed, you have visited this post because you are confused about what you should pack and whatnot. The chances are high that when you have asked other people, they may have brushed you off in the name of common sense.

You are right in trying to find out the items which you must choose to take with you. Mostly, it is a personalized decision to decide what you should take with yourself. However, certain items are of absolute necessity and must always consider bringing while going abroad.

Why pack essential items?

There is a saying, "better be safe than sorry". It fits in perfectly with this situation. When it comes to going abroad, packing only essential items is necessary. It not only lightens the weight but also makes it easy to find things.

Preparing for studying abroad can be a challenging task. Among various items you may pack, several of them are available in foreign nations. Thus, your priority must be to pack items that are either essential or cannot be purchased abroad.

We understand that packing abroad is a challenging task, therefore, read along, for I have compiled a list for packing essential items that you must fill in before studying abroad.

What should you consider before packing?

Before you start packing, conduct a little research about the place you are moving to for your studies. It would help you to prepare for the environment you may face while living in another country.

Furthermore, learning about their culture and people's temperament will help you mix in with locals easily. There are various other things that you might consider while packing for studying abroad:

● Liberals or Conservatives

You should consider if the country is more on the conservative side or liberal side. For instance, if people in the country are conservative, then you should pack relatable items.

● Urban or Rural

If your school is at an urban location, then you can buy several essentials from different stores. It will save a lot of space in your backpack. However, if the school is in a rural area, you may need to pack items that are not generally available in such areas.

● Country's Weather

Knowing about a Country's weather will let you decide what items you should pack. If the area is cold, you can load warm clothes, boots, or cold medicines.

Packing essentials

1. Portable charger

Mobile phone is a crucial step when going to study abroad. Thus, it will make sense to get a portable charger for yourself. Also, at times, you may not find some charger socket when travelling abroad. Taking a portable charger with you makes your life easy.

2. Medicines

Always keep a box of medicines for curing minor ailments. If doctors have prescribed you to take a particular medicine, then do not forget to pack them. When you are in a foreign nation, finding a pharmacy may not be easy.

Moreover, changes in getting same medicines which you usually take in your home country are implausible. Make sure to ask your doctor to give you a prescription of generic medications.

3. Toiletries

If you are a person who prefers buying products from a particular brand, then it would be better to pack items which you like. For instance, if you are particularly partial about a cosmetic brand, it would be better to stock it up.

Remember to take a hand sanitiser with yourself during the COVID crisis.

4. Important documents

Take all necessary documents with yourself, particularly, plane tickets, passport, visa, school acceptance document/letter, educational degrees, insurance documents etc. Remember to take out copies of all these documents.

Also do not forget to take your debit or credit cards with yourselves. You can also make copies of these card's back.

5. Clothes

It would be helpful if you take limited, location and culture appropriate clothing. The type of clothing you will take with yourself depends a lot upon the country's weather conditions. If it is a country with a low-temperature environment, then go for warmer clothing or go for light, summer clothes.

Also, consider the country's culture; for example, wearing skirts would not matter in America; however, it may not be suitable for a conservative nation.

6. Tools to pack

Pack all tools which may be necessary during your stay abroad. Specific essential tools, such as a swiss knife can be useful while travelling abroad. Swiss Knives contains various tools such as bottle opener, scissor, knife, and nail filer. It may come in handy during your stay.

Do not forget to pack it with the checked luggage; otherwise, the airport security will seize it.

7. Feminine products

Girls need to make sure to pack a stack of feminine products with yourself before leaving for another country. The chances are high that the country you are travelling into does not have the same products you use in your home country.

Also, there are nations wherein you will find these products only in big cities. So, remember to buy and pre-pack these products.

8. Kindle

Most of us are fond of reading books. It isn't easy to take all your favourite books with yourself. Apart from high packaging costs, you will get buried down under the weight of all these books.

Travelling with a kindle solves all your book-related issues. It is light weighted, easy to carry around, plus it fits easily in your backpack or handbag.

9. Backpack

Choose a durable and sturdy backpack to take with yourself. The bag must be able to carry your notebooks and laptop. Prefer taking it over a laptop bag or purse, as it balances down the weight equally.

10. Miscellaneous

Some other items, such as a personal journal, gadgets, maps, universal adaptor, and water bottle, are some miscellaneous items you can pack for a comfortable stay.

Minimalistic view

People must have advised you to follow a minimalistic view when traveling abroad. However, the case is different if you are going to study overseas. Going well prepared can save you from a lot of inconveniences.

However, better prepared does not mean you will overburden with you. It would be helpful if you still were methodical while packing your bags. Pack items that are necessary, personalized or may not be available in the country you are going to.

Endnote

Several people prefer to pack items at last time, and as a result, they forget packing essential things. Therefore, you must start packing your bags at the earliest. Making a list of all appropriate items can also be helpful while buying and packing essential items. You will feel relieved once you complete your packing.

Also, do not forget to pack your favorite snacks!! After all, you may not find them abroad.

These are the top essentials that you must take with you while going abroad for your studies.

Author Bio

Author Bio: Abhyank Srinet is a passionate digital entrepreneur who holds a Masters in Management degree from ESCP Europe. He started his first company while he was still studying at ESCP and managed to scale it up by 400% in just 2 years. Being a B-School Alumni, he recognized the need for a one-stop solution for B-School to get in touch with schools and get their application queries resolved. This prompted him to create MiM-Essay, a one-of-a-kind portal with cutting edge profile evaluation and school selection algorithms, along with several avenues to stay informed about the latest B-School Updates.

TOP 9 REASONS WHY YOU SHOULD DO AN MBA DEGREE

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Tue, 29 Sep 2020 14:01:00 +0000

In today's world, there are a lot of different careers you can choose from with no dearth of well-educated people competing for those limited seats. With abundant career choices, finding the postgraduate program that is the right fit for you can be a challenge. However, if it is business and management careers that you want to get into, then an MBA program will provide you with the required knowledge, skills, and ethics to fit right into the business community.

Whether you work in manufacturing, technology, marketing, finance, or management, getting an MBA degree will open new career opportunities and roles with greater responsibilities and increased financial compensations. An MBA will also help you to improve vital professional skills such as communication and leadership.

In this post, we will be looking at nine key reasons how an MBA can help boost your career:

1. Better Salaries

One of the major benefits of an MBA Degree is job security and high salaries. Post MBA employment reports have shown that an average MBA graduate's income is 50% higher than a graduate with a regular university degree. Even more impressive is that their average salaries five years post completing their MBA degree is 80% higher than pre-MBA salaries. This means that most students manage to recover the cost of their MBA within three years of completing their degree.

2. Change Careers

An MBA program is a great way to prepare for shifting verticals or changing careers as it covers several areas including Human resources, Statistics, technology, Economics, and Finance. Thus, providing you with abilities and tools to adapt to change of industries, the marketplace, and the way people do business.

Using the skills, you developed you can make use of changes in the industry to quickly find a new direction and take advantage of business opportunities where others simply try to survive in this harsh environment. Gaining new skills could easily be the catalyst you need to kick-start your transition from one career to another.

Even if your background is not typical for the positions you are considering, an MBA will provide you with adequate education and skills to help you become a more qualified candidate.

3. Expand Your Network

While studying your MBA program you would meet a diverse set of people including recruiters, keynote speakers, old-school businessmen, new entrepreneurs, the list is almost endless. And then you have your fellow students that are also ambitious in the business world.

An MBA program paves the way for you to interact with future business managers and executives. When the course is finished, these people could be ideal business partners or even provide exceptional recommendations on your behalf. Customarily, those enrolled in an MBA program are often sent out as interns.

This provides MBA students with yet another way to meet potential employers. The consolidated network of people you will meet while studying your MBA program is sure to prove beneficial in the future.

4. Compensate for Inexperience

Quite a few people under 30 have advanced very rapidly in their careers, only to find themselves stalling out. Maybe you rose too far too fast. If the upper management at your current company is having second thoughts about promoting you any further until you have aged, then earning an MBA is a great way to assuage their fear.

It shows that you are not one to rest on your laurels. You are willing to do what it takes to keep growing and developing yourself. Having business experience can help put your coursework in context and sharpen your focus on what you want to get out of your MBA program.

5. Expands Your Horizons.

An MBA broadens your enterprise knowledge and helps you understand the nuances of operating in a global marketplace. Many of today’s best programs include an overseas immersion trip so that graduate students have a first-hand look at how to manage a business in a global arena. This will broaden your cultural horizon and your international business career prospects. You can find companies that you want to work for and arrange meetings with potential employers.

6. Flexible Skills

MBA classes will help you develop the skills necessary to keep a company successful. The curriculum of each Master of Business Administration degree can be different hover the core subjects remain the same. Studying an MBA degree forces you to get out of the comfort zone. You will explore the latest International Business trends, apply the newest management tools and techniques, and challenge yourself to improve your business, teams, and collaboration.

7.Specializations

Because of the applications and skill set required, most universities and business schools have developed a wide range of MBA programs, specializing in different facets of the business world such as General Management, Finance, Marketing, and Operations to name a few.

8. Start Your Own Company

With a master’s in business administration, many students become young entrepreneurs. By enrolling in an MBA program, you can acquire the requisite knowledge and skills needed to develop and operate your own businesses. In an MBA program, you will be taught business management, planning, and even financial handling. These skills will put you in the perfect position to manage your own business effectively while contributing to the economic development of your country.

9. Flexibility of Program

For those executives who are currently employed and want to keep their jobs while pursuing their master’s program, an MBA program offers this kind of flexibility. A lot of the MBA programs are offered as a part-time weekend course along with the full-time study option and this option means that the students can work at a pace that is ideal for them, without feeling hassled or stressed. There is usually the option to attend classes in the evenings and even occasionally on weekends to fit your studies in with the rest of your life.

Even if you are enjoying success in your current career, you may still benefit from completing an MBA program. Obtaining an MBA will open a diverse array of new opportunities, enabling you to seek a promotion, change careers, or satisfy your entrepreneurial ambitions.

Author Bio:

Abhyank Srinet is a passionate digital entrepreneur who holds a Masters in Management degree from ESCP Europe. He started his first company while he was still studying at ESCP, and managed to scale it up by 400% in just 2 years.

Being a B-School Alumni, he recognized the need for a one-stop solution for B-School to get in touch with schools and get their application queries resolved. This prompted him to create MiM-Essay, one-of-a-kind portal with cutting edge profile evaluation and school selection algorithms, along with several avenues to stay informed about the latest B-School Updates.

Do’s and Don’ts of Studying Abroad

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Thu, 13 Feb 2020 11:50:00 +0000

Studying abroad opens many doors when it comes to education, relationships, and personal growth. The value we get as individuals from each of our own unique study abroad experiences is dependent on our behavior and habits during this special time. As a serial study-abroader, I’ve compiled a few Do’s and Don’ts to help fellow students make the best of their time away from home.

1) Do be as curious as possible.

Everyone loves talking about their own culture. The more questions you ask and the more inquisitive you are towards local people while abroad, the more benefits you will reap. When you see a menu item you don’t recognize, ask the waiter what it is. When your host family is talking about a local television show, ask them to explain it to you. People will take a natural liking to you, and you will not only broaden your knowledge, but also open yourself up to more meaningful relationships with local people.

2) Don’t expect the comforts of home

The more time you spend negatively comparing your home country to your study abroad country, the more time you waste coming to terms with the obvious: you are ABROAD! Expect everything to be different, and I do not mean just the food and the language. This experience should be shocking, uncomfortable, and challenging. Otherwise, it would not be as valuable to your knowledge and growth.

3) Do speak the local language as much as possible

This is easier said than done, for numerous reasons. English is so commonly spoken worldwide at this day in age that not speaking it can be difficult. In attempts to be polite and welcoming, lots of people – particularly in Europe – will speak English to you even if you can speak the local language. This is not a reflection of your foreign language ability or efforts; lots of people simply do not want to waste the opportunity to practice their English with a native speaker. But you need to push through. Even if your friends, the barista, or ANYONE responds to you in English, keep going in the local language. It’s the only way to get better! Which brings me to…

4) Don’t be embarrassed to make a total fool of yourself

You will find yourself in humiliating situations no matter how hard you try not to. You will make mistakes when speaking, you will misunderstand people, you will do things that are incorrect or strange in the culture of the country you are in. There is nothing you can do but embrace it! The worst thing you can do is let an embarrassing situation stop you from trying to further immerse yourself and gain as much as possible from your experience.

5) Do smile

Smiling is a sign of positivity across all cultures! Remember that you are a foreigner to the people you surround yourself with when abroad. To your classmates, teachers, and host family, you are a foreign object. The easiest way to ensure that nobody wants to interact with you is to keep a stone-cold face, or attitude, everywhere you go. No matter how lost in conversation, shocked by a cultural difference, or confused by a situation you may be, try to muster a smile when you search for clarification. At the very least, when your French classmate asks another one, “Hey, is the American guy cool?” they might respond, “I don’t know yet, but he seems nice.”

6) Don’t skip out on trying new things

Lots of what you may be offered, whether it be lunch prepared by your host mom at home or an invitation to a local holiday party from a friend, will be new to you. The first time I saw a fully intact octopus boiling on the stovetop at home before my host brother’s birthday lunch, I thought I was going to be sick. But when it showed up on my plate three hours later, I reluctantly tried it, and now pulpo is one of my favorite dishes. Take every opportunity you can to get out of your comfort zone. If not just for yourself, then for the sake of your relationships. Remember that in lots of cultures outside of the US, turning down food or invitations for a reason such as “not wanting to” or “not liking it” is very rude and can set you back on developing friendships.

7) Do set personal goals for your time abroad

Before you leave home, think of what you want to accomplish while you study abroad. By the end of this experience, do you want to have developed the confidence to take an AP language exam? Do you want to have traveled to a certain historic site? Do you want to have made an Italian-speaking friend? Think about it. Set your goals, and develop ideas of how you can reach them in your time spent abroad. This is the best way to make effective, meaningful use of your experience. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity, and no one but you can determine its value!

About the Author

Shannon is an American expat whose career in Europe began with a study abroad experience in Spain in 2013. She is still active in the study abroad community in Italy and Spain, and works as European Coordinator for Abbey Road Programs, assisting other students in pursuing international educations.

The Secret of Time Management In College

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Wed, 18 Apr 2018 15:35:00 +0000

Is there anything you can do when it comes to time management in college?

If you're like I was, you often complain that there is never enough time to get all of your work done. You have so much to do and not enough time to do it. If you wish you had more time...

The advice on this page will completely change your life.

Time management is such an important concept. It is very seldom taught in schools. The beauty of time management is that once you master it, you can apply it to both college and your career.

There is probably no better way to improve your grades in college then using your time effectively.

How To Do It

It starts with buying a planner. It doesn't matter what kind of planner you get as long as you get one. You can easily pick one up at your college bookstore or Wal-Mart for under $5.

It's vital that you get one.

After that, write down everything you need to get done the next day. Make sure you write out this list the night before. Don't wait until the morning to do it.

After you have created your list, organize this list in order of importance.

A very common way to do this is the number-letter system. Put number one for your most important task. Put two next to your second most important task. And so on.

Your number one list is your ultimate priorities. These are the things that you simply have to do. An example of this might be homework that is due the following day.

Your number two list is the list of items that would be nice to get done but aren't necessarily mandatory. An example of this might be working on a paper that is due a week from now.

Then there is the number 3 list. These items are completely optional. It's no big deal if you don't get a C list item done.

Here is the secret to doing this. When you wake up, immediately get started on your first listed item. Don't check your e-mail, watch the television or any other time waster that you have done in the past.

Get to work on that most important item as soon as you get up.

You may wake up and not be in the mood to do this task. But you simply must get in the habit of doing it. It takes a few weeks to make this habit permanent.

After you complete your task 1 move on to your task 2. Then go down the list until all of your tasks are completed.

If you are confused at all, here is an example of what you might write:

Finish Science Homework
Write English Paper
Study for Math Test that's tomorrow
Do Mathhomework that's due in 3 days
Study for Science Test that's in a few days
Write my friend an email

As you can see, it's much more important to get your A-list done on your B list. Make sure you never do a B item before an A item.

For this, to work you have to work on your most important tasks first!

It's also important to get in the habit of finishing the task. For some reason, humans have the habit of getting 95% of the job done and putting off finishing it until later.

Don't let yourself do this anymore.

If you wrote a paper, don't wait to proofread and spell check which later. Get it completely done and print it out. Have it 100% done and ready to turn in.

Why Should I Do This

If you can get in the habit of writing down everything you need to do the night before, you dramatically increase the likelihood that you will do it!

There's something about writing your tasks down on paper that motivates you to do them more.

And when you always do the most important tasks first, you sometimes won't need to do some of the B and C list items that you wrote down.

It's amazing how often you work or study for something in college that you didn't need to do. You can avoid this by making sure you do the things that you know you are going to have to do.

As far as getting things 100% done, this is another very important habit to get into. Something magical happens to you when you have just completed a difficult excitement.

The harder the assignment, the better you will feel once you get it finished. However, you only get this feeling if you do 100% of the assignment. It won't work if you only do 95%.

You can use this emotion and great feeling onto your next task. You will find yourself much more motivated to work on the next task and every other task to come.

What Else Can I Do?

There is fuel other things you can do to have better time management in college. You can always increase the speed at which you do things.

You can start by walking faster to and from class. This can save you 10-15 minutes a day if you go to a large college where the classes are far apart.

Try to do everything that you do quicker and with a sense of urgency.

Moving at a faster rate will save you time. But more importantly, it will get you in the mindset of getting tasks done as quickly as possible.

Think about your day and how you can save time. Think about all the bad habits that you do that wastes your time every day. Try your best to immediately get rid of those bad habits.

Follow all of the advice on this page, and you will be completely amazed at how much more you get done every day. And you won't just be staying busy; you will be getting quality work done.

How to keep away from Stress during first few weeks of Education Abroad

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Tue, 06 Mar 2018 10:53:00 +0000

When you start your education abroad the journey is never going to be smooth and comfortable. First, you put a lot of efforts in applying for your university abroad, collecting “Letter of Recommendation”, writing your Statement of Purpose where you have to stand out from the rest, pay a lot of money for the application and the courier and then wait for the results. If the results don’t go your way or maybe you have to settle for something below your league or worse wait for one year more to apply again, that already stresses you out a lot. But after you have been accepted to a program of your choice, the happiness is only there for a limited time until the stress starts kicking in again. You need to prepare for your departure, leave your loved ones with whom you might have spent most of your childhood and adulthood, whom you might not see for the next one year or more. You have to plan what you need, go shopping and get ready to live in an alien country and culture (especially for students from Asia going to the West and vice-versa). Sometimes you have to even learn a new language or improve your already learned efficiency in a language before moving to another country or on the other side reach that country and start learning the language from scratch along with studies or sometimes even work. Sometimes students even come in the hope that they can search for a job part time while studying and that’s how they will support themselves for some duration of their studies.

There are different scenarios and circumstances where a student can get really stressed out during the first few weeks or months. Sometimes students go through nervous breakdown and even depression. Sometimes it takes even a year or two to get settled in a foreign environment depending on your own personality whether you can accept things or not and how much time it takes you to get out of the cultural shock. Broad and open mindedness helps to some extent but when you are somewhere new and you know nobody, then it takes a toll on you and your mind. Knowing someone and forming bonds and friendship is one thing. This is the emotional part of your mind that needs to get settled and should get used to how things are done in your “New Home”. But there is the other part of your brain, the intellectual part which needs to accept the new education system, the exam structure and the way the teaching and lectures are handled. Overall the point is, it seems not that difficult overall when you look at what you have to do from beginning till the end to get your degree but when you start going through the emotional and mental trauma making small progressions step by step and taking necessary steps, you realise it will be ages before you finally taste the success. Even after you get the degree, the job hunt begins and sometimes students taste no success and have to return back to their home country without earning anything and it feels like it is pushing them more towards their doom after all that hard work and lot of money spent in getting their education sometimes even via Loan.

It is better to be prepared or to know actually what to do beforehand when you are going through these kinds of stress. There are some ways which will be mentioned in this article using which you can make your own new “family” in your new home, have fun and try to enjoy your life keeping a balance between study and social life and at worst case find an expert’s help (In this case a psychotherapy).

Try to keep an Open mind and make yourself at your new Home

Yes, you will have cultural shock. You will be in a foreign environment where you are the odd one out (Especially in smaller cities or in ASIA where foreign student percentage is still quite low). But try to keep an open mind without judging and accept the new rules and life. Accept that you have a reason why you left your country to come and live here. Try to settle in to your new environment and new home and surrounding. Try to select your house or maintain it similar to how your house was in your home country. Buy plants and paintings or whatever that makes you feel like home. If you are low on budget then bring stuff from your homeland which makes you feel a bit more comfortable to your new environment.

Think of it as Travelling rather than as an Emigration Process

When you move to another country for a long enough duration then you are basically an emigrant. But rather think of yourself as someone who has come to a foreign country as a tourist. Try to explore new places in your city, new cafeteria, and new restaurants and immerse yourself in the new culture, architecture and food. Don’t think of the local language as a barrier. You will always find someone who can speak English. You just need to have the confidence and go out.

Join Meetups and Events

My favourite website has been MeetUp.com . You have different clubs (language, board-games etc etc) and events according to your interests and hobbies and you can try to meet new people and spend some time doing great activities. If you like hiking, cooking or even partying then you will find groups according to this. Facebook has events calendar as well from your city. If you are living in a smaller city then chances of finding these are less. They might not even exist. Then better try to join some volunteering programs or take advantage of the less traffic and more natural beauty of that place and go for running and walking. Exercising regularly reduces stress and helps in focussing and in a calm mind.

Keep in Touch with family and friends but also try to make new friends in your City

Your family and true friends will be always there for you. Try to keep in touch with them via skype/whatsapp or any other way if you are going through depression or nervous breakdown. Video calling is better since you can see them face to face and it feels closer to reality than texting. But try to live your real life and make some new friends and try to experience the new things (hiking, skiing, going for music festivals and stuff) which you would or might not have done before in your home country.

Get an Appointment with your Therapist

If the stress and depression is too much. Better get an appointment with a Psychotherapist. Here in Germany it is not easy to find someone who can speak fluent English and help you. Even the receptionist speaks mostly in German and it sometimes can be difficult. But if you are lucky, you will find someone who does provide psychotherapy treatment. And it is quite useful and you can always find a recommended therapist from your health insurance.

For example for TK health insurance (Techniker Krankenkasse)

Use the following link to search for a doctor and the type of doctor you need :

https://www.tk-aerztefuehrer.de/TK/start.htm

Sometimes they will charge you for this session so be careful and make sure to confirm this with your therapist. Because these sessions can be very expensive (50 to 150 euros per session depending on the type). If you are living in another country then again health insurance might not cover it so better be ready to shell out some money but it is quite worth it.

On the other hand my personal favourite is getting online therapy with the language of your choice and for much less fees (40 euros for a week or 49 dollars per week). I came across the online therapy website called Talkspace.

It is easy to use with a simple interface, comes with an android/IOS app. Your therapist will be chosen based on your needs and your reasons for therapy and will be chosen by your first contact on this app and not you!! Here’s a useful review I found online which might be worth reading.

http://www.businessinsider.com/what-its-like-to-use-talkspace-text-therapy-app-2015-3

Well even though this is not a traditional therapy session, you still get advice and help from a professional licensed therapist who you can connect with whenever you want and have a session on the go. You can just text your issue whenever you have them instead of waiting for an appointment or trying to think what the issue was later.

Final Thoughts

Well there are many other ways you can try to relieve your stress (learn a new hobby, listen to music etc etc). But never forget that happiness and health is more important than anything you can wish for in this world. Your parents, your loved ones want you to be happy. If not, there was no point in taking the risk, moving to another country and fighting for a better life and career.

Be Healthy, Be Happy!!!

Call for Engineers with Masters : Interested Engineers can Forward their Application to Me

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Mon, 14 Aug 2017 09:53:00 +0000

Hello my Fellow Engineers,

One of my former employee is looking for Engineers in the field of Automotive, Embedded , Electrical , Mechanical , Computer Science and other fields in the Engineering department. You can forward me your application.

Criteria:
1) Completed a Masters in Germany (MSc or ME) from any University in the Engineering field.
2) Have a GPA of 3 or more(2.7 , 2.5 , etc) (In germany the lesser the number the better)
3) Average German is required but if not the application can be considered if the candidate has a good GPA.

Forward your application to me either via Linkedin or via my email id arun.engi13@gmail.com

Looking forward to the application

Four fun Ways to Learn German (or any other prominent language) efficiently and for Free

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Wed, 03 May 2017 14:06:00 +0000

I have been living in Germany for the last three years and I always wanted to learn and improve my german. Believe me living in Germany and not able to speak German sucks. I did some courses but ofcourse after starting my job as a full time employee, I was not able to continue with my course. But in the beginning of 2017, I found some effective ways to learn German for free and I realized that it improved my German drastically. In this blog post, I will talk about how I did it and how you should proceed based on your level.

1) Memrise

By far the most fun and effective app to start learning a language and improve vocabulary. If you are an absolute beginner then you should definitely start with this app. Why? Because the methodology to learn and get a word to sink into your mind is quite interesting and effective.

How does it work:

You are introduced to a word with its meaning and pronunciation (Beware some words in certain course doesn’t have any audio and that can hinder the learning). Then you must once select the meaning of the word visually, select the word based on audio, try to write this word and so on. Thus , you go through every word five times in different ways which can really be useful. If you forget the word or get it wrong then it gets listed into the Difficult section and thus you know that you must revise this word few more times to get it right. For A1 level users or for someone trying to improve their vocabulary this app is top notch. If you get the pro version , you can also watch exclusive videos (for specific languages) where natives teach you how to pronounce a particular word, or work exclusively on your difficult section of words. My tip is that sometimes you get really good offers and can even get the PRO version for 23 euros for a 1 year subscription. So , go for that.

2) Bliu Bliu

This app is just too good when it comes to improving your listening skills and even understanding the sentence formation in a language. You start in this application by first choosing which words you find easy and which words you find difficult. Then Bliu Bliu decides what level you might be at (It predicted my level quite accurately and it was just astounding to see the paragraphs which I could understand with some easy and difficult words).Then you are introduced to a paragraph , or a music video with its lyrics or a video by a bliu bliu community member along with a paragraph with dialogue text. Then you can hear an audio/video and you must decide which words you find easy or difficult. If you find a word easy but has been marked difficult then you can select this word and change its type and based on easy or difficult the color of the text changes. Words you find easy are in normal text while the words you find difficult are red.

If you find a word difficult then this word gets introduced in another paragraph few moments later and thus by going through the same word and how it’s used in a sentence context you can understand and learn the vocabulary as well as learn it’s pronunciation and context of use. Thus, for me this is by far one the most fun and effective language tool. But if you are a complete beginner then this app is not recommend. So better use this app when you have finished A2 level atleast.

The app is not free and you get 5 min of learning time and then you must wait 5 min and then you can learn again and then the waiting time is increased by 5 min everytime. I found learning for 15 min from this app was enough everyday and during this waiting time you can switch to MemRise or Busuu.

3) Busuu

When it comes to learning vocabulary or learning a language as a whole I will compare Busuu similar to Duolingo or Babbel. But what sets it apart is the conversation texts and language community to help. Busuu has amazing conversation texts which uses the vocabulary in the previous sections. So you start every lesson with a topic(Holiday, work , travel , food etc) and learn some vocabularies in this section. And then you get to a conversation text where two persons talk (along with audio and text) and you learn to use these vocabularies in these conversations and context.

Also, you can write something at the end of every section and the Busuu community corrects you , suggests you improvements and even rates your writing skills. I found this app quite useful in getting help or suggestions from native speakers and also learning vocabularies with focus on context learning. I think Busuu will be amazing with Premium membership since it will unlock the listening and writing parts of the app and make it much more useful and fun.

4) Authentic German Learning

This is fun. I think if you use this website and the materials it provide it’s more than enough to improve your german. You get daily emails (if not daily then still they are quite frequent). These, emails have german and it’s exact English translation (and not google translated) where Marco the founder talks about various things. Then there are videos where Marco talks covering different topics or day to day activities or sometimes topics related to german language or grammar (when to use AUF for example), sometimes some random videos which are nice to watch with proper English translation.

Again I would advise not to use this website if you are a complete beginner since then you can’t use the website upto it’s full potential. The only thing is that this is is dedicated completely to German language learning and you don't have materials for other languages.

I am quite sure that if you use these four language learning tools , then in a span of few months , your langauge skills can get better. Ofcourse after learning it's always helpful to use these words in day to day conversation. If you are interested you can also add me as your language buddy in the app memrise and we can compete and learn with each other. Adios !

Frequently asked questions about Masters in Automotive Software Engineering

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Thu, 06 Aug 2015 07:13:00 +0000

In this blog post I am covering some basic questions am getting again and again from students who are applying for masters in ASE/ICS/Embedded System. This is part one of this blog post since I might do another cover up post if questions asked get a bit more interesting and cover more topics related to studying here.

1.How difficult is it to get internship as internship is included in ASE course?

Getting an internship is not difficult. In fact it’s much easier than getting a full time job.

Most of the students who started with me or even a year after me have an internship now in reputed companies like Bosch, Daimler, Betrandt, Fraunhofer. Not only ASE but students also from Embedded Systems and ICS (Information and Communication Systems) have got internship in companies. The most important thing is applying for different diverse companies and not just aiming for the top reputed ones. The thing to note here is that the salary difference is not much between a company like BMW and a start-up in Munich, Stuttgart or in Berlin. And these cities have the maximum number of start-ups and jobs. Also, Automotive Software Engineering is quite specialized and is only provided by TU Chemnitz and München (as of 2015) and thus is in quite a demand. I remember also few students who did not get internship in company and started their internship in the university (which is quite good as well and there are amazing topics) but after finishing their internship in the university they again did an internship outside in an external company. So I would suggest that there is nothing much to worry about getting an internship/thesis. As for students from MNS I am not sure whether anyone got an internship or even planning to do one but I heard it’s not that difficult.

2.Does this internship require German language certificate? If so then which level of German language certificate is required?

Mostly I don’t know anyone who had to submit any language certificate or show his German professional skills (which if you possess makes getting an internship a walk in the park I think) to get an internship. In face most job posts are in German (around 95%) but you can still apply in English and the recruitment agency might contact you back.

-Can we get internship in good companies?

I think I already covered it. But mostly there is no such thing as a good or bad company. It’s more about whether you do internship in a good domain with an interesting topic relevant to your field. So again don’t focus on company. In fact even if you work for BMW the chances of getting a full time job are slim unless you have good Germans Language skills and also technical skills. Getting a PhD though is similar to internship and it’s not that difficult. The salaries like I mentioned before doesn’t change much but there are few companies which sometimes pay you more than then other (Robert Bosch for example) and depends on what kind of internship you are doing (some research internships also has grants and they pay you more but this is an exceptional case and I only know one such person who was from Embedded and go this).

2.According to your experience how good is the job prospect for a bit average ASE graduate?

Not that difficult to get a job. But getting a job in top tier companies is not that easy especially without German language skills and with no prior work experience. But apart from that again the salary doesn’t vary much and it’s rather a good choice to work in a domain which you actually like instead of just running behind a company’s name and value. There are many companies which have amazing projects and not that famous (my favorite being EFS at Ingolstadt) but have great value because of their connection with top tier companies. So, aim for those. The salary at max varies between 4000-8000 (per year) between a top tier company and a start-up/small scale industry.

3.Can u tell me some good programming(any other skills) that are helpful for ASE which I can get prepared before joining ASE because I have got 2 months left before joining?

If you are good in C and C++ then I think you are good to start. Even if you are not good in C++ it doesn’t matter and even average C would suffice. I know students who are not that good in programming and learned many things during internship and thesis (I would include myself as well I guess). Better enjoy the time you have got since life here is quite different than what you might have lived back in your country (specially students from ASIA) and try to enjoy and have fun discovering new things, travelling , spending time with your family etc. But if you really have nothing to do then I would suggest to polish your German skills. My greatest regret so far has been to not learn a single German word before coming here.

4.What about the availability of part-time jobs for students in or near Chemintz? Some say that it is very very difficult to get it and we have to completely depend on parents for living in Chemintz?

Don’t depend on the fact that you might get a part time job. In fact the chances of getting a part time job in Chemnitz without German language skills are around 1.5223% (I just came up with that number right now so ignore it :))). What I am trying to say is “It’s very difficult unless you can speak Deutsch”. Getting a student assistant job in University is one option where you work part time for around 20 hours and you get paid for doing some research or work (like building a website etc). But usually won’t be easy to do it because of lecture timings, language courses etc. But depends on how well you manage your time. Also , there are jobs sometimes in restaurant where you just have to clean vessels or something (so you don’t have to show-off your poor German skills ) but still those jobs are quite pain in the butt and also not easy to get as well ( and underpaid sometimes).

5.Accommodation in Chemnitz. How difficult is it to get one?

I would rank Chemnitz as one of the easiest to find an accommodation. Since students are arriving in flocks, there are many companies which have started real estate business there. Compared to a city like Munich (Where finding an accommodation is difficult than finding a girlfriend and also hell expensive) Chemnitz is much on the easier side and also the cheapest. Try websites like wggesucht ( beware of scammers specially when they tell that they are out of the country and you must transfer some money), facebook pages of the university or “Indians in Munich group”, GGG Wohnungen, immobilienscout24 , and of course Chemnitz student dorms( least recommended from my side unless if you get into V52 or V70).

6. What kind of health Insurance must I take?

I would definitely recommend TK (compared to DAK or AOK) since I have used it and it covers the most number of health related issues (including dental fillings). But if you are sure that you are healthy and will be then you can also go for Mawista. It's cheaper but only covers basic health issues and thus is not recommended by my side.

Part 2 will be posted with question and answers covering other aspects

Cheers

Best Country To Work and Settle In Europe

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Sun, 12 Jul 2015 17:14:00 +0000

I am almost finished with my masters and have few job offers. I did a lot of research when I started applying for jobs and found out many things and realized many mistakes I did but also many opportunities which is open out there where I can work and earn and have fun,

European Union is huge and diverse and there are a lots of countries where you can move to after finishing your masters. Even though the VISA you have or get after finishing your masters is a job search visa , which is valid for 18 months (if you have graduated from Germany or else it varies from 6 months to 1 year) you can convert it to a work visa or blue card depending upon your salary and your employer. If your salary is more than 48,000 (for someone who has not graduated from a German university ) or 38,000 (For someone who has graduated from a German University) then after probation period you get a blue card for 2 years to work and stay in European Union. With this blue card you can work like a normal European citizen with no work restrictions every year. In one of the previous blog post I had mentioned the best countries around the world where you can immigrate and settle easily.

http://studyabroadcounselling.blogspot.de/2013/06/countries-where-you-can-immigratesettle.html

But in this blog post I will list out the top five countries to work and settle (if you want to) based on different criteria. The criteria based on which I compared these countries were Average Salary, Number Of Jobs, Language Requirements, Cost of Living, Taxes , Social Life/Environment, Other Expenditures, Facilities. Here are my top five countries according to me based on all the criteria I considered and evaluated.

1)Switzerland- For me Swiss comes out as the best place in Europe to work and live. Before I put forth my points why it is the best I must also remind that Switzerland has been rated consistently as one of the most livable and peaceful countries in the world.Now moving on , Switzerland has quite low taxes compared to German Standards. The tax here ranges from 12-18% which is quite quite low compared to other countries. The Swiss people are paid quite heavy with almost thrice the income than countries like Germany, France etc.But This is contrary to the cost of the living which is quite expensive. I will use the term Döner Index to compare the cost where Döner is a fast food from Turkey which you can find anywhere around the Europe while travelling. So one Döner here costs 9-12 Swiss Frances (Swiss Frances and Euros are almost same at present). So yes it is very expensive and also the items in supermarkets are quite pricey.Transportation is amazing and some of the best I have seen but again expensive but modes of transport are quite limited with mostly Train taking over the entire load so a car is must have for travelling in and out of Swiss. The number of jobs are not as high as some of the other countries specially Germany but still unemployment rate is quite low and industries like Pharmacies and Health Care are booming. Engineering jobs are mostly distributed in bigger cities like Bern, Zurich and Geneva with lots of software companies in Zurich. Switzerland as a country is quite International with three major spoken languages ( German, French and Italian) and also English is spoken by most of the people. Country is beautiful with lots of natural scenes and natural beauties surrounded by mountains and lakes and is considered one of the most beautiful countries in the world with very less pollution. I would rate Switzerland low on facilities though, since there is not much going on here and nothing much happening for fun ( even open airs or festivals or music shows are limited). I would say the quality of life is good but still some people might find it boring specially if they don't speak the predominant language of the province they are living it (there is German, French and Italian spoken areas). But overall it is just amazing and best place to live and stay/settle. Also, if you want to start a new company (GmbH in German) than it is much cheaper (around 5000 euros cheaper) in Swiss than in Germany due to low taxes in all the commodities and overall taxes are low anyway. If you are able to save money out of your huge salary then you can travel to other nearby countries and have so much fun as well. And there is a possibility to learn languages here with local people (although Swiss German is crazy different than the GERMAN German).

2)Germany- Living in Germany is as good as in Switzerland depending on your situation. Lots and lots of jobs with the boom of engineering startups and companies everywhere Germany is the place to be right now. Low crime rates similar to Switzerland and low cost of living ( except the rent which is drastic in bigger cities like Munich/Hamburg) makes Germany quite ideal. So the Döner index here is 2.5-4.5 euros. I have not paid more than 4.5 euros for a Döner in Germany.The salary is not much compared to Switzerland but because of low cost of living it is justified. So if you are earning around 2000 euros in Germany after taxes you will earn 5000-6000 in Swiss after taxes. Did I just mention taxes? Ok so the taxes in Germany is a mind boggling 42%.Yes you read it right. It's almost half of what you had earned with your sheer hard work. If you are married and have kids this tax reduces a bit but hell that's not convincing enough. Transportation is again amazing (but sometimes the DB Bahn guys go for strikes and your life turns to hell) but what I found the best part was the bus connections. The bus in Germany is super cheap and connecting all major and minor cities unlike Switzerland where you don't have such bus facilities (MeinFern/Flixbus, DeinBus, PostBus, MegaBus etc). The flights are amazing and if you live in Frankfurt then all the super cheap flights are nearby your city even though Frankfurt as a city sucks big time. All the major companies around the world definitely having their base in one of the German cities for sure. Not to mention the numerous German Engineering companies which originated from here have most of the job and tasks done in here (BMW, Audi, Bosch, Siemens and many other electrical appliances). Not only engineering but other fields have a lot of jobs as well specially the big cities. Germany as a country is quite good and there are lot of activities to do , lot of stuff going on all the time (depends on the city) and some cities are quite amazing and beautiful ( Munich , Köln, Berlin is amazing). In my opinion if you have a satisfactory job and good salary and lifestyle then stick to Germany. Again learning German is quite easy here and specially if you live in a smaller city since according to my experience most of the Germans are not that good with their English and constantly try to speak in German to others.

3) United Kingdom-

The UK comes third in the list because of it's one of the few advantages over other European countries. First is the language. English is the primary language used everywhere ( even though there are lots and lots of different accents) and rarely you will find any industry or job where you might have to speak arabic or something (unless if you are a translator). Again there are lots of jobs (but mostly people from European Union are entitled to them who can speak English since for Non-Eu people visa sponsorship is next to impossible) in almost every major field and also every major company from around the globe definitely have their base at UK (thanks also to its close proximity to USA and other Eastern European countries). Cost of living fluctuates heavily depending upon whether you live in big cities (London for example) or smaller cities and cheaper places (Liverpool for example). Still the rent and cost of living is quite high I think and the salary is not that great. Average salary ranges around 30,000 pounds ( only if you are working in a highly qualified profession like engineering,medicine etc) for a fresh graduate and sometimes even less. Transportation system is just amazing and bus network is one of the cheapest I have ever seen ( I could find tickets for 1 pounds many times). Taxes are generally lower than European standards with average tax ranging around 20% (for an average pay). Now coming to Döner index. The cost of a Döner ranges from 3 to 6 pounds depending on the city you are living. Which is quite a good price and considered cheap ( 6 pounds is expensive but this is only for very expensive cities like Oxford, London , Cambridge etc). Overall the quality of life is really good and lot of multiculturalism going on and even in highly paced life in cities like London you can have fun owing to lots of concerts , activities and recreational stuff. Not to mention the flights from London to other European Countries are generally cheap thanks to advent of low cost airlines like Raynair, Norwegian etc. If you are a graduate then you do get a limited time visa to search for visa and if you are from a STEM branch (Science, Technology, Engineering and Medicine) then you have a good chance to secure a job. IF you live in a big city the chances of natural beauty and sight seeing is limited but living in a smaller city or town you can still enjoy some hobby hiking and diving activities. UK would have been at a much better position but the economical recession has hit it harder than the most and thus suffers a lot in this comparison.

4) Netherlands

The flying dutch is back and takes the fourth spot. Netherlands is quite amazing and infact comes behind Germany only because the number of jobs in Netherlands is much less compared to Germany but still the employment rate is quite high and amazing here. Even though Dutch is the official language , most of the poople can speak English and are as good as native speakers thanks to the changing culture there and the influence of Hollywood and English music industry. Again jobs are quite high specially in the field of science and engineering. Unemployment rate as of 2015 was at meager 7% and has one of the best universities for mechanical and electrical engineering ( Many students from Netherlands specially from Mechanical engineering after graduation work at top tier automotive companies in Germany directly). Dutch is a different language but easy to pick up if you speak German (Deutsche) and vice versa. Döner index is quite good and ranges from 3 to 4 euros (sometimes more but still cheaper). After graduation students get a visa for 6 months which is not so long but usually enough to get a job and it is always useful if you speak the local language. English is used primarily used in most of the international companies and many companies have set their bases in Netherlands ( but still not as much as in German or UK). The average salary in Netherlands is around 30000 euros per year for a masters graduate and more depending upon the career and company as well.The taxation is huge at 42% for average salary but still the cost of living is not expensive as it can get in Germany.The country as a whole is just amazing with loads of activities and stuff to do and many popular tourists destination (Amsterdam as usual being the favorite). Some of the companies originated from Netherlands include Philips, Landfighter, Numico, DSM, KLM, Nuon etc.

5) Sweden

Sweden comes fifth. Sweden astoundingly has huge number of jobs specially in the field of electronics/electrical and telecommunication engineering. In fact the number of job openings is so large now that the Swedish companies are becoming lenient and trying to incorporate English as the language of communication to attract more prospective employees. Big companies like ABB, Ericsson , IKEA, H&M, car giant Volvo, Scania, Gambro are some of the big companies born here and have loads of job openings. But the biggest problem is Swedish as the language of communication in companies. But now its changing which is a good sign but still loads of jobs require Swedish language proficiency. But for living and staying in Sweden , the language is not that important thanks to the influence of English language in the country. The next generation of Swedish nationals after 1990s are quite good in English and someone can reach the proficiency of native English speakers. This is due to the fact that most of the movies (Hollywood) being telecast-ed in TV are not dubbed (unlike in countries like Germany and Switzerland) and thus kids are learning English like they were born in the native countries it's spoken at. So no worries in that matter. Taxes are quite high in Sweden but still much lower than Germany and stands at 32% approximately. Döner index is similar to Germany and prices are around 3.5 to 5 euros depending on the city . Sweden as a country is beautiful but the climates are pretty average with heavy snowfall during winter and cold temperatures for around 7-8 months. But there are lots of festivals (they have snow festival in February) and quality of life is quite good (Sweden is also rated very good in the list of best countries to live). After graduation the work visa for job search is 6 months for non-Eu and usually if you have pursued Electronics/Communication Engineering then there is a good chance that your employer will apply for work permit for you. The salary in Sweden in average is quite good but don't expect salaries as high as Switzerland or Germany. The average salary in Sweden is around 25000 to 30000 SEK( Swiss Krona) per month which translates to 3000 euros per month before taxes. Which is quite good and enough for a country like Sweden.

I would probably rate Sweden and Netherlands to be quite similar in ranking and maybe whip in Austria at number 5th position since it's just an amazing country quite similar to Germany in many ways except tax which is quite low compared to Germany. Austria has amazing landscapes and loads of mountains and beautiful cities and again lots of jobs (but much less compared to Germany but still many German companies are in Austria thanks to it's close proximity) and good quality of life.

Comment here what do you think about this article and your suggestions and which Country according to you in Europe is the best to live and work in for.

Cheers

How To Get A Job In Canada

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Sun, 12 Jul 2015 15:13:00 +0000

The most important goal after completing the Masters degree would be to have a job offer in hand for financial and quick growth in career. In this post i would be explaining various factors that influence and are needed to be taken into account before applying for a job and how to actually apply for one. The right approach will save you the time and your search towards the position you are willing to work as.

When we start to think about the job there are a lot of obvious and important question popping up in our mind.

1. When is the right time

2. Necessary Documents/Skills required

3. Where to search & how to apply

I) When is the right time:

The first thought and the important part where most of the people do the mistake is this section. The recommended time to start searching/applying for jobs is from the start of your last semester or the right way to put through is, at least 3 months earlier from the day your last exam will be over.

Reason:

1. You would be well in advance to think about where you stand.

2. The field and the position you are really interested in.

3. what skill set you posses and the skills you would need to fit into the position you want to apply to

4. the GPA you currently have and what's required.

5. Based on my personal experience it takes atleast 2 to 3 weeks for a company to review your resume and reply if they are interested to interview you. 3 months is a nominal time frame for you and the companies to have a look into your resume and reply back so that by the time you complete your degree, you might have a job or at least might have had some exposure towards interviews and the nature and expectation in the interviews.

II) Necessary Documents/Skills required

The requirements are pretty much straightforward and this would be another important step students should be careful about. You would need the following

1. resume (A resume has to be unique & relevant for every position you apply to)

An updated resume is the key. First of all the resume has to be in the Canadian format. 2 pages maximum. List out your skills, experience so far, skills, projects and finally you extra curricular work if you have space. You can also include the project that you are working on in the current semester. list out the important and relevant projects only. just a few bullet points on what it is and your contribution in it.

2. appropriate skill set

The first few things on a resume that is must is your skill set. Mention your skills both technical, software/hardware separately and make it clear understandable. A glimpse on it should explain a lot about your knowledge.

3. work experience

It is always a big advantage to have work experience when you apply for the job. And please mention it if it is relevant to the job position you are applying to. List out the projects you were working on in the company and the important roles and work. Crisp and clear. And place the work experience on your first page of resume/CV.

4. internship/co-op

Internship/Co-op in a company is a boost to your resume. It adds another few points to your resume. You explain the part of the work you were involved in and how far you worked while you did the internship/co-op.

5. GPA

It is always and highly recommended to have atleast 3 GPA or more when applying to companies. That is the qualification criteria. Incase if your GPA is less and if you are planning to raise it by the current semester, you can still apply for companies without mentioning it but make sure you explain it to your interviewer if asked for it.

6. project works

Mention only the relevant and the few best projects you worked on and your contribution in it. mention the technologies that were used and the methodologies that was adapted in doing the project. crisp and clear bullet points are enough to do the deeds.

III) Where to search & how to apply

First update your linkedin profile with all the stuffs you have got and mention everything in detail, there is no limit in linkedin for the space you occupy. You can search for jobs in linkedin by clicking on the jobs tab. and you can type the position you want to look for and apply either on the linkedin site or sometimes the link will redirect you to their company website. Next main job search engine is indeed.ca , this has been successful for many people i know personally. First upload your updated resume in indeed, with this you have 1/4 chance for companies to look for your resume and call you for interview. Next search for the desired job and apply for the positions(based on the match with your skill set and experience level). In some of the universities you have the university job board where you can apply for the jobs directly(highly recommended). Other job search engines are, workopolis, monster, jobs.ca, carrerbuild.ca, canadajobs.com etc.

Once you have applied for the job please have patience and work for the semester as well as do some projects side by side to keep you occupied until you are being contacted by an interviewer. Please mention only what you know and what you have done in your resume. Make it clear and easy for interviewer to understand and have an idea about you. It depends on an individual and his knowledge level of getting selected in the interviews. Even if you fail in one or more of the interviews don't feel bad, it just gives you a hope that you are inching closer to your desired one. Learn from your mistakes, understand the requirements in an interview and always be neat and tidy for an interview. Always show a progress in every interview you appear for.

Author Bio

"beta" is currently working in Canada as a front end web developer and is an avid blogger and reader of this blog. If you have any questions regarding higher education in Canada post your question here and he will be willing to help and guide you in your pursuit for Masters in Canada.

Tips to secure an internship/thesis in germany

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Wed, 08 Jul 2015 22:26:00 +0000

When it comes to applying for internship and thesis in Germany specially in the field of engineering , the choices are limitless. Germany according to me is the land of Engineering ( except USA which is on top when it comes to computer science and IT jobs). But still most of the people find it difficult to acquire a position as an intern or Masterarbeiter (master thesis student). Actually people find it even difficult to get called for a telephonic interview. Many students attribute this to the fact that they don't speak German and their language skills (which means unable to speak German) are the main reason why none of the company here is interested in looking at their portfolio or CV. This is true to some extent. Maybe i can even confirm that 90% of the students are rejected because they don't speak German in Germany.

Quite obvious since most of the companies here work with German and German is the used for communication, for presentations and for dealing with other companies around (supplier companies, marketing companies, clients etc). Many companies specially automotive companies (BMW, AUDI, Porsche etc) originated here and many supplier companies (or TIER 1 companies in the AUTOSAR standard) for these companies formed as well along with them. Thereby, most of the engineering companies here use German language as their primary medium of communication. But many companies nowadays are taking intern who can speak English or who are excellent enough and a absolute add on to the company (specially IT and Software jobs in Germany lack a lot of engineers). So yes internship is possible and even if 10% is the probability of securing a job with only English, even then that's a good chance believe me. Because German companies have huge number of openings for engineers (specially interns and thesis students) and thus even 10% means that you can get a job if you do few things properly.

In this article i am going to share some of the things i have learned which might help you in securing a spot and job as an intern or thesis student.

1) Don't be Egoistic

Many people I have seen only want to apply for top companies. They are not ready to negotiate and just apply to top tier automobile companies and forget about companies which can pay as much as these companies if not more (actually I found few companies which are not renowned and famous pay more than companies which are crazy famous and people would do anything to get a job in those companies- for example Magna and Ferrari. Magna is a good company but not so big like Ferrari but it pays its intern much more than what Ferrari pays). I remember a friend who only applied for BMW; PORSCHE, AUDI, VW and few such big companies and could not find a job anywhere. He wasted a lot of time and finally worked for a company which paid him very less. Instead students should apply for also medium and small scale companies as long as the salary is good enough and the work/task given is amazing. Remember, working for BMW is not as important as working on your favorite task , being happy and making the most out of this life. Being ambitious is good but being overambitious leads to nowhere. After 2 or 3 years of experience you can always try for big companies. Applying in different companies is important since competition is heavy and the less competition you have, the better chances. Try to think out of the box and apply. One example- one of my friend from Egypt got job as a automation engineer in P&G which is one of the biggest health care company and I don't think many people applied for that position since mostly engineering graduates search for openings in engineering company after studying automation engineering and not a health care company.

2) Aim for companies which might have tie up with other companies

If you do want to work for BMW or AUDI but could not get an interview call or could not find any job openings then still it is also possible to work on the similar technology/Firm by working for the supplier companies which supplies it stuff to these giants (be it services or auto parts etc). For example Bertrandt , Gigatronik are some of the names which work on the projects of the BMW. If you secure an internship here it is almost like you are working for BMW even though indirectly. Also , during full time jobs these engineers are known as externs and even though you work for Bertrandt , you sit inside BMW campus and work on their projects (but ofcourse you get paid according to Bertrandt standard ).

3) Resume

The biggest reason for rejection I found was that students don't take their resume very seriously. Most importantly they don't follow the format. Many students from UK, India I found used a very different format of Resume than what is being followed at Germany or what usually the Employer expect and prefer. And if an employer doesn't find the resume in the right format he can't access the information he needs to go through quick enough and thus might not be interested in your profile. Remember at present the competition is heavy and each job post receives at least 200-300 applications (sometimes goes up to 1000). The Employer just needs a reason to throw your resume away and move on to the next one.

Keep your resume simple yet elegant. Prepare a two page resume according to German Standard ( has photo, experience in the form of timeline etc) and put only the most important information you want to convey. Don't put 10-15 programming languages (mention three to five which you are good at) in the IT skills or don't lie about anything since most of the interviews is based on your resume. Maybe I will create another blog post on how to create a proper resume.

4) Cover Letter

Resume is very important but cover letter is the one thing which sometimes overpowers the stuff in resume if your resume is not strong enough. If you don't have very good academics and not a lot of projects and experience you can still secure an interview call with the help of cover letter. This is the part using which you can express yourself, your motivation for the job (very important, don't write something like i have a compulsory internship in my masters so i am looking for job or similar straight reasons), what skills you have that makes you ideal for this job, why this particular company, why this particular job etc. If you have an amazing cover letter there is a good chance the employer is interested about you as a person and will contact you. A good cover letter -> A phone call.

5) Online Resources

Some people might not consider this section important but Online resources are amazing and powerful. Create a profile in LinkedIn for sure when you start serrching for a job ( I will use job from now on instead of thesis/internship). Most of the times I got contacted by employers to apply for job positions in their company because my LinkedIn profile was pretty good. You can also apply for job straightaway from LinkedIn. And of course you can also learn about companies , their products and services from LinkedIn and also the open job positions according to your profile and interest. Also applying directly to a company's job portal is a good move but also upload a resume in Monster/Indeed/Xing . My first few interviews were via Monster (even though most telephonic interviews were in German and I had to plead to them to switch to English xD). More famous and better than Monster in Germany is Xing which is much better and has more Employers, elegant and job listing. But ya everything is in German so if you don't speak it you must be patient enough and use a translator and try to create a profile instead of giving up. And make sure to include your LinkedIn profile in your resume somewhere. Keep the description about your past experiences in Resume and LinkedIn different and in much more detail in LinkedIn.

6) Extra-Curricular Activities

Mention some volunteer activities and leadership skills. Only technical skills are not enough and most of the company looks for other qualities, including ability to take decisions on your own (leadership skills), social causes and your role in them etc. If you are asked about hobbies don't tell them that you love building robots or programming or don't tell them something which is related to job (they already know you are interested and that's why you applied for it). It might be your hobby but you should mention what other hobbies you have which doesn't involve only working with computers like a geek (In case of an IT job, or working with problems and solving equations if you are maths student).

7) Being Different

Be different and mention what makes you special - During one of the interviews I was asked 'What is the one thing I am proud of' and I said ' I am quite funny and make people laugh around me, my friends mostly don't get bored when I am around'. My interviewer got impressed since mostly people talk about their hardships or how good someone can do programming etc. But genuinely, I did not give this answer because I wanted to be different but it's the truth. So be genuine and tell some good qualities about you during the interviews which makes your worth their time. The first round, mostly the telephonic interview even though short and simple is the most important since this is where most of the candidates get eliminated and most people are screened and tested. Think carefully before telling them something crazy. Interviewers many times behave very friendly and appear casual but they are listening to whatever you are saying and sometimes people let their guard down and tell them something which leads to rejection. So spending a bit of time preparing for interview is always good and keeping calm and composure helps.

Well I have nothing much to add. I think if these tips are followed there is a very good chance that you will get a call soon (hopefully from a employer and not a scam one). After that it's solely up to you guys how well you do in the next rounds and help your ship reach the shore. Comment below what do you think might be other things to focus on to get a phone call for interview so that I can add them here and also learn something.

Student Review studying Computer Engineering at Concordia Universtiy

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 00:34:00 +0000

Vignesh is studying his masters in Computer Engineering at Concordia University. He started his masters in 2013 and is going to finish it this year. He already got a job as a full time employee at a reputed company in York and is already looking forward to pay back his education loan in the next two years.

This blog post is just an interview where I discuss with him the basic questions every student has before embarking on his/her masters in Canada. I have split this video into 4 parts.

The first video the one above focused on generic questions about the finances and the chances of getting a permanent residence in Canada specially in Quebec (where Vignesh did his masters)

The second video focused on student life including day to day life , the job prospects post the masters and also the importance of french in Montreal and Quebec region.

The third video focused on admission requirements the difficulty in finding jobs after masters and the level of education and difficulty compared to India and what does the syllabus of a masters degree usually comprised of including projects and subjects.

The final video continued with finding a job and summed up the whole interview with a summary. I hope you guys find it useful.

Internship/Thesis - University or Company

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Fri, 26 Jun 2015 20:41:00 +0000

I started my masters in October 2013 and it is about time that I am done with it. It's been a long yet wonderful journey and definitely has changed me as a person for a greater good. I have become more confident, self reliant and most importantly I have learned a lot of tech stuff in these two years. Definitely more than what i had learned in my bachelors in India and believe me I had spent 4 years trying to understand what I really want to do in life (even though I still am not sure about the answer for this question :P ). But the most important part in my life during these two years was getting accepted for an internship and thesis in a German Multinational Company.

During the days when I had started my masters getting an internship and master thesis was not that difficult (in comparison to the situation materializing now). I would say if you apply to around 15-20 companies there was a good chance that you will make it to one of them (unless if you apply to only top companies out of ego and everyone rejects you because you either have no experience or your grades are not worth looking for or maybe due to higher competition in those companies).

But according to the latest information I got from many students who started in the year 2014 winter semester or later, it has become damn difficult to get accepted into a masters internship or thesis in any kind of company and most of them have to suffer. They end up either doing it in the university where you don't get paid or just they just keep applying and applying and end up wasting precious time. Doing your internship and thesis in university is not bad at all. In fact I think the working in company is kinda lenient that you in fact don't end up putting as much effort as you could have put if you had been left on your own in the university ( I am giving this statement based on the feedback I got from many of my friends who are doing their internship and thesis both in university and in reputed companies).

But there is some edge when it comes to doing your internship and thesis in a company.

INTERNSHIP IN A COMPANY

I) You earn and have fun - When you are going to Germany for your higher education the one thing which keeps you in tight spot is money. If you don't have money or if you have to think a lot before you can spend money from your blocked account or in common sense pocket then of course you can't do many activities which otherwise you could be doing (while earning money) like travelling, going to bars and clubs, leisure activities and time in other places etc.

II) When you do an internship/thesis from a company it is counted as a work experience. And believe me it is quite useful when you apply for a job since if you have worked in a company which is a part of your field you are studying then the recruiters definitely think about your resume and you have an edge over other candidates (not necessarily but mostly) who don't have any work experience. I have started interviews and I got the call because I had experience of doing my internship and thesis in a company.

III) If you finish your internship and also your thesis there is a good chance that you will get accepted for a full time job in that company. This is not entirely true for all the companies. But I have met a lot of people who got jobs as a graduate because they did their internship and thesis in a German Company.

IV) You learn how a company works, the work ethics and how a multinational company with loads of employees come together and achieve amazing things. For someone like me who had never worked in a company this was an amazing lesson.

V) You are allowed to work on amazing tools and technology which your hands might have never laid upon if you were not part of that company.

VI) You will be treated like a full time worker. But not with very strict deadlines but still you have an idea how your life will be after you land up in your dream company with a dream job. Even if you don't end up with a dream job and company you will have a fair idea whether the life after graduation will be hell or heaven if you continue in the field of your choice :P.

VII) Exclusive privileges- Yes the company sometimes keeps workshops, trips and even gives discounts on its products to the intern. Specially if you are working for a company like , let's take BMW then they give you DRIVE NOW advantage and you can use the BMW cars around the Munich city and drive it to get to different places and pay just for the Gas.

Now let me go back to doing your internship and thesis in your university. The advantages of each path will be the disadvantage of the other (Obviously). For example , mostly doing your internship in the university will result in no payment and i am quite sure for thesis no university will pay you any penny unless if you blackmail your professor with a gun aimed at their mouth (or anywhere as long as they are afraid and not Jhonny Bravo). But lets look at the advantages which I learned from other people:

INTERNSHIP IN THE UNIVERSITY

I) You don't have any working hour or strict number of hours you have to spend during thesis at the university during your thesis even though for internship you might be required to be at the university with strict timings. Even in my company there was no working hours for my thesis but i heard in many companies the students must work 35 hours per week even for thesis. That makes it very flexible and I have seen few friends of mine going on vacations (quite jealous that some of them even went to far of places like Mexico and Thailand) in between their thesis (this might increase your thesis duration but believe me you will get super busy after your graduation but anyway if you want to finish it as soon as possible then ignore what you read in this bracket. ah too late).

II) You start growing good relations with your professor( if you are charming enough). I think this is the part where you actually start getting close to your mentor/professor since you spend loads of time nagging him with your problems and sometimes working together with the tasks which are difficult. During your lectures and presentations professors usually don't care or know anything about you. Unless if they keep lots of tests and ask a lot of questions and you are the one person acting like Hermione Granger from Harry Potter and answering everything and pissing off other kids.

Keeping good relationship with professor has two positive outcomes

- He might recommend you to a company via reference or directly give the company a reference from his side about you and you might be treated very special during the recruitment process. Usually with this recommendation the students do end up getting placed. I remember my friend studying Maschinenbau who got placed in AIRBUS because his professor recommended him and he was doing his thesis at FH Koln. And most of these professors in Germany have powerful men at their disposal working in major companies so yes it works.

- If you have plans for doing your PhD in the same university then this is the time to impress your professor with lots of bread and butter (shit not literally!!!). If you are successful believe me there can be no other easy way to get into a PhD program.

III) You end up learning more than what you could have in the company . Well it might not be true for some people but according to some the thesis and internship phase can get very intensive and you learn a lot even though you might be spending a lot of time burning night oil and tearing off your hairs and clothes.

IV) No proper duration for thesis ending - This is not true in my university where students must complete their thesis in 23 weeks whether they do it outside in a company or in the university. But in many universities they don't have a deadline. So life is much more calmer and relaxed than how it can get in companies where you have a fixed deadline.

V)You also might get exclusive privileges like companies to use tools and devices in university and free tours and conference visits etc.

An important point here. Many students think that pursuing your internship/thesis in a company is not a good approach and the chances of getting a job if pursued is slim. This is entirely false. It is true that if it comes down to the line and someone has to select between a person with experience in company vs a person with experience in the University then they might select the later, but still lots of people clear interviews with experience in University. All you need is a good score and a good topic of your internship and thesis. But I would cover in another blog post how to increase your chances in getting an internship or thesis in a company.

So I have compared the advantages of both pursuing your internship/thesis in a company and in a university. But if you ask me I will definitely recommend a company specially if you are planning to work after your graduation and your plans for PhD are nowhere in sight. But if you do want to research and get a PhD then maybe doing it in a university is a good choice.

Good Luck!!

Next blog post would focus on:

-Tips for applying for internship and thesis in a company in Germany

Study abroad- Top 5 thing to focus on before you apply

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Thu, 25 Jun 2015 20:56:00 +0000

If you dream to have a well rounded- life and a commendable career track, then studying abroad should be a part and parcel of your life goals. Living abroad will expand your life experience in such a way that you will be definitely enriched by it.

It is not just about studying but also about understanding how to live in a totally different cultural ecosystem. There are many skills which you pick up along the way. But before you apply for studying abroad, do ensure that you have done your research thoroughly so that you can be assured that you have made the right choice with respect to your choice of educational institution and the country, where you intend to reside.

Know what you want and apply

Do a thorough self-analysis of the course you want to do, why you want to do this and why specifically in the target country. Choose alternatives and estimate the best match. You should not feel later that you did not choose the country properly or the course. Determine what all aspects you feel will bring you benefit- in terms of quality of education, reputation, infrastructure, cultural factors etc. If you are not comfortable with certain kinds of cultures, it is better to determine this in advance and choose a city/institution accordingly, instead of joining later on and suffering. This can happen if you choose to study in a country whose culture is radically different from yours. Your knowledge of a foreign language can help you make a better decision.

Get in touch with experienced students

Get in touch with students who have already benefited from studying abroad. Ask them about their experiences- what did they find good? What did they find easy? What did they find tough and challenging? They can definitely give you useful tips and hints on how to engage and manage your life there.

Plan your finances

Studying abroad can be a pretty expensive affair. You need to balance the choice of the university with the budget you can afford to spend for this. So, please ensure that you calculate everything before hand- the tuition fees, the travel expenses, the food and accommodation expenses, expenses on books and other activities which you will need. Determine the kind of financial assistance you have to provide the backing which you need- these may include taking loans or scholarships or assistance from family.

Your current college may have financial assistance plans in this regard. Ensure that all these are determined and provided for before making that application. Foreign universities will only take you in when they are sure that you would be able to support yourself for the length of time you are residing in the country

Travel documents should be in order

Ensure that all your travel documents are in order. This includes the tourist visa/student visa for the particular country which should be valid for the duration you intend to study. You need to do all this processing in advance so that you do not have to suffer last minute shocks. The most important personal identity and travel document is your passport. This should possess at least a few years validity and possess number of pages for the visa and immigration stamp to be stamped!

Communication and technology

Ensure that there are enough sufficient communication avenues for you and your family to interact in the new country. This is very important especially when emergencies and unforeseen events occur such as wars, accidents, epidemics and natural disasters. To be forearmed is to be forewarned, as they say. So it is not being overcautious- it is just being pragmatic enough to accept the reality of life. There should be facilities for telephonic and internet based communication.

Social networking has made long distance communication pretty much cheap and easy. Also, prepare to purchase local prepaid card for mobile use as roaming charges can be quite expensive. Try to avoid taking expensive equipment such as laptops with you, unless absolutely necessary. There may be chances of theft, especially when you are in an unfamiliar place. Find out whether your study abroad program offers you lending options to rent out laptops and computers. That can be cheaper and easier on the mind.

AUTHOR BIO

Sally Yolanda has been an educator with Amridge University and is presently associated with www.assignmentwritinghelp.com as an Academic Counselor. She assists students in development of their educational plans and helps improve their academic growth. In her free time, she loves to write poetry prompts.

5 REASONS WHY CANADA HAS THE BEST PERKS FOR AN INTERNATIONAL STUDENT

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Fri, 19 Dec 2014 17:18:00 +0000

Studying abroad is something that most of us aspire to do. As students, we wish that somehow the opportunity to go abroad is bestowed upon us. But because of the budget constraints we keep that dream aside and look for options in our own country.

Now, you really don’t need to put aside your dream. Yes US, UK, Australia etc. are still a little far fetching, but countries like Canada might suit you perfectly. Here is why.

1. One of the main criteria’s on ‘Not’ studying abroad is the plain and simple fact that it is ‘Expensive’. But Canada proves to be just the opposite. Canada’s education is pretty affordable as compared to the other western countries. The cost of living and tuition fees are considerably lower for international students than countries like USA or UK etc.

2. One might assume that because the education is considerably cheaper; the quality of education might fall behind. But that is not the case here. Canada offers some of the best educational degrees in the entire world. People from all over the globe come here in search of a good and a quality education.

3. The diversity of this country is extremely vibrant. You have people from various races, creed, color and culture. You could be a student from anywhere in the world and Canada would make you feel right at home. Because of this perfect amalgamation of cultures, Canada makes living here extremely comfortable.

4. Canada has dual language system. Both French and English are primary languages. The fact that Canada is majorly an English speaking country, makes it extremely easy for people from all around the world to easily get settled here. As a student, you won’t have any language barrier issues.

5. Canada also offers great working and immigration opportunities. Students who have completed their education form here, are allowed 1 year work permit on their student visa. International students who have some Canadian credentials and/or have worked here can apply for immigration or residency. As a student, if you are dreaming to live abroad – Canada is definitely the country for you.

Canada has a variety of colleges. From technical, applied art or science schools to top class universities. Most of the universities provide a variety of courses. For example University of Toronto has about 700 different undergraduate programs and 400 different graduate and professional programs. University of Alberta has more than 170 Graduate and 200 undergraduate programs. Apart from that they also have a variety of certifications and diploma programs to choose from.

Top courses in Canada

· Engineering

· Business Management and its related fields

· Hospitality Management

· Health Sciences

· Media and Communication

Top 10 Universities in Canada

1. University of Toronto

2. University of British Columbia

3. McGill University

4. University of Alberta

5. University of Montreal

6. McMaster University

7. Western University

8. University of Calgary

9. University of Ottawa

10. University of Manitoba

In conclusion, Canada’s affordability, degree value, future opportunity etc. are extremely viable reasons for any student to apply here. Along with the wide range of courses that are available, a student from any background is bound of find a course that is perfectly suited for them.

Author Bio: Trisha is a professional writer and adviser on education and career. She is an ardent reader, a traveler and a passionate photographer. She wants to explore the world and write about whatever comes across her way.

Study in Australia FAQ’s

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Fri, 21 Nov 2014 09:27:00 +0000

Australia is currently ranked as 3^rd most popular student destination in the English speaking-world next only on the United States and the United Kingdom. With roughly 22,000 courses in over 1, 100 academic institutions, Australia ranks 8^th in the world in terms of university system rankings. Every year, the Australian Government invests over $200,000,000 on international scholarship programs. Today, the country is home to 34,800 international students from over 140 countries across the globe. Here are the answers to some of the most frequently asked questions about earning an education in this dynamic country.

What are the standard admission requirements for Australian institutions?

While the requirements are likely to vary from institution to institution, standard requirements include the following:

IELTS Test results no more that 24 months old
Overseas counterpart of Australian high school matriculation such as the central board results for 10th and 12th grade in India
Proof of extra-curricular achievements
Work Experience certificates or letters of endorsement
Recommendations from reliable sources
Postgraduate admissions, needless to say, require a successful completion of an undergraduate level degree.

What are the usual processes/stages of applying for an Australian education?

Much like admission requirements, the usual process of applying for Australian education varies of institution to institution. The most standard application processes are as follows:

Choosing your desired course and programme
Identifying your desired or the suitable institution for the selected course and program
Completing the required tests (ie. IELTS, GRE, GMAT)
Preparing necessary essays and statements of purpose
Acquiring the necessary for recommendation and endorsement letters
Completing the application forms along with the required documents
Sending the application pack and obtaining an unconditional offer from the institution of interest
Applying for the visa once the unconditional offer is received

What is the cost of acquiring an Australian education?

Australia compares favourably to most traditional academic destinations such as the United States and the United Kingdom. The annual cost of acquiring an education is estimated to be anywhere between AUD 7,000 to AUD 36,000. Needless to say, this fee varies depending on the institution and the program that you are enrolled in.

International students are usually issued with a 6-month student visa with 6-months worth of medical coverage. It is also noteworthy how the visa issued to international students automatically includes work rights so long as it doesn’t interfere with their student status. Medical coverage is also significantly lower in Australia as compared in the US. International students acquire medical coverage for 6 months by paying $170 dollars. The same amount would have only covered a single month in the United States.

Are there any available scholarships for international students in Australia?

Most international students have to pay full fees. There are, however, more than a few very competitive scholarships that are made available to high achieving students. Australian institutions regularly announce scholarship programs throughout the year.

The Endeavour Program is also made available to international students. The Endeavour Program is an initiative of the Australian Government that unifies international scholarships so that students from all across the globe are afforded the chance to undertake academic pursuit or research in the country. There are currently 13 awards under the Endeavour Program. Most of which are targeted at post-graduate studies.

Guest post written by Deborah Jones who is an Australian freelance writer that writes about studying abroad and about companies like http://www.iemsgroup.com/

How to make admission essay for studying abroad?

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Fri, 21 Nov 2014 09:24:00 +0000

Education sector is built upon different writing assignments. While students plan to study abroad essay is one of the major components of their application process. Sometimes essay becomes the most important part of the whole application irrespective of the GRE/GMAT/TOEFL scores. An admission essay can make or break one’s admission prospects. There have been instances of exceptionally talented students getting rejected from prestigious institutions just because they did not work hard on their essay. There have also been students who got into good colleges merely on the basis of a good admission essay. It is likely that the-otherwise intelligent students did not realize that the most important part of their college application is their admission essay.

A large number of career opportunities beckon students to all parts of the world these days. In order to get through the rigorous admission procedure they should work really hard. College admission essay is one such important write up which tests students’ capabilities. An admission essay must contain important information about the student. At the same time it should be written in a sensible manner. The content should not deviate from the subject matter and it should be subjective. The essay should not be written imitating someone else. It must contain both academic and personal information of the student, but it should not sound like flattery or boring stuff. It can include a slight amount of humor, but it should not make fun of the student himself.

Let us have a look at some important tips to make a good admission essay.

1.Organize your thoughts: Before starting to write an essay anyone would have ideas buzzing in mind. It is better to jot down all the ideas on a piece of paper first and then decide which should go to the essay and which should go to the dust bin. This thought processing takes some time. The skills, major accomplishments, favorite books, movies, interests etc. of the student must be listed during this time of thought processing. The goals for future, why the particular student is interested in studying abroad and the events/people/incidents which influenced him or her must all be mentioned in the admission essay.

2. Pick a topic for the admission essay: An admission essay should not have things crammed into it, but it should have only the essential points strung together neatly. A student has to pick a topic for the essay which should draw from the candidate’s list of accomplishments, challenges faced by the candidate and interests of the applicant. The topic chosen for this essay should ably reveal the student’s personality in a positive manner and it should answer the question why the particular candidate wants to study abroad.

3. Write an awesome essay: Once the thoughts are nicely jotted down and a good topic is chosen for writing the essay, writing it down will naturally flow. Admission essays should be interesting and readable. Good language is necessary, but too many big words will not impress the readers. Grammar, vocabulary and the style of writing must be appealing. Those students who do not have great writing skills should seek help from a friend or mentor for writing and editing the essay.

Before starting the essay one should make a mental note of the points to be included in the essay. One can also talk about it to other people who can give concrete ideas on writing it. But asking too many people will have its own adverse effects on the admission essay. The essay should not only have the points, but it should have nicely written content too. It should include the ambitions of the student. A general essay will never be accepted as an admission essay. It must contain the personal and academic information of the student. Cliché, plagiarism, grammar and spelling mistakes will destroy the whole essence of the essay. If there are multiple errors the essay will take a new turn which will be befalling to the student. Since admission essay is the gate pass for an educational program it must be presented in a nice manner. In order for the essay to get nice value it should be free from all kinds of mistakes. It is the key to the dream of many students who aspire to study in reputed educational institutions abroad.

This post was written by Barry Whittle under the Guest Post Section.

Journey towards a master’s degree- starting from the time you have decided till you have reached your dream city

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Mon, 10 Nov 2014 23:06:00 +0000

Studying abroad is never easy. But the most difficult part is making up your mind and just going for it. The process from the moment you decide and the moment when you land in a foreign city is the most difficult phase of your life and the immense satisfaction it when all your hard work pays of is truly enormous. I still remember when I was in college and there were campus interviews going on (during the end of my 7th semester), I was in a dilemma whether to go for a job or for a master’s degree. Each had its pros and cons and for many students it’s also a war between your inner feelings and requirements and your family. Well they have to invest on you and if like me you are from a middle class family from India then even 10000 Euros is worth a lot of fortune and most of the students have to go for loan after mortgaging their property or jewelries or whatever their family can afford.

Making your mind up to go for a master’s education is never easy and you have to think a lot about many things. Stuffs like the study environment, life living and working alone, cooking, lifestyle abroad (especially for Asians, Africans the lifestyle is very different in Europe, Oceania (Australia and New Zealand) and America and vice-versa) and most important of all language and culture difference. So yes never an easy decision. In this article I will briefly try to explain the problems faced by students before they even begin their education abroad and I will briefly explain about the phase you have to follow or go through when leaving for higher education abroad.

When you have decided to go for abroad education the first biggest problem is money (unless you belong to a rich family and wipe your ass with money).

Let me tell you exactly how much you might have to spend or save to finish your master’s degree just for tuition fee alone. The listed tuition fee is roughly for 2 years (for UK, Hong Kong and Ireland its 1 year and for Australia, Singapore, China and New Zealand its around 1.5 years to 2 years).For a masters degree in USA it can be as low as 30000 USD to 80000 USD. The range is based on what kind of degree you are pursuing (like engineering, science and medical sciences can be hell costly compared to something like arts or natural science etc), or where you are pursuing (like New York/California is hell costly compared to somewhere like Colorado or Michigan and this greatly influences your other expenses part since the rent changes drastically) or which university you are pursuing at (some universities charge very high tuition fess compared to other universities) or how many credit points you are taking (you are charged based on credit points so depends on your degree and the flexibility). Comparing this to Australia it pretty much boils down to similar figures. It can be as low as 40000 AUD to 70000 AUD. Again depends on similar criteria. New Zealand is comparatively cheaper and costs around 10000 to 20000 AUD less than Australia. Canada is comparatively much cheaper than these three and it’s around 20000 CAD to 30000 CAD. If you go to Europe than on top of the line is UK and IRELAND and they charge around 9000 GBP to 18000 GBP (and also remember here that the course is only for a year most of the time. Sometimes it’s also for 1.5 years). Ireland is somewhat similar and charges almost the similar tuition fee. Next in line come countries like Holland, Switzerland, France, and Sweden which charges around 12000 to 18000 Euros tuition fees. Some universities in France also have no tuition fees for some specific course. Next comes the league of countries like Germany, Austria, and Norway which charges usually no tuition fees. But in some universities in Germany tuition fee is also charged .Depends on the province usually. For example Bavaria charges tuition fee while Saxony doesn’t. If you want to study in Asia (China, Hong Kong and Singapore are the usual choices) then the tuition fee in Singapore is around 20000 SGD. Hong Kong charges around 12000 HKD. In china it’s around 20,000 RMB to 50,000 RMB. Japan is pretty costly both for living and education and the tuition fees are around 800,000 JPY to 1,200,000 JPY. I have estimated the tuition cost for most of the famous destinations for higher education. Bear in mind these costs and proceed.

Next I will tell you precisely when you should start preparing for your education abroad. in India, bachelor’s degrees are usually 8 semesters while in abroad specially in Germany or other European countries (except UK,IRELAND where it is usually 6 semesters or 3 years) the degree is usually 7 to 10 semesters (depends on students- sometimes they finish early and sometimes late). Usually you should start preparing for your masters degree application process before 1 year (that’s when your 7^th semester commences). This is strictly a must if you are applying for masters in USA, CANADA and even in places like Japan. For example for master’s degrees starting in September in USA and Canada, most of the application deadlines are during January and February (very less number of universities have deadline in February and mostly in January). So better on the safer side you should have all the documents ready by December month of the previous year). For countries in Europe (excluding Netherlands and Sweden and few universities in France) most of the application deadlines are much later (like in Germany it’s usually during June/July but few universities even in Germany have earlier deadlines like during January, February). So to be on the safer side it’s better to keep everything ready by December even if the application deadline is much later. Maybe for Germany you can delay it by a month or two. But during this phase and time you should be clear where you want to go and study and also choose and aim some universities.

Next comes one of the most difficult battles of your life. That is convincing your parents, since they are going to spend money for your expenses. You have to convince them that this is one of the biggest step of your life and how it might change your life once and for all. Not everyone studying abroad becomes rich or has a better life though. So think carefully before approaching them and have a solid reason. Choose a proper destination, college and course which you are really interested at and which you think will help you in excelling. Based on your country, college and expenses get a loan or arrange for money.

Next few steps are pretty necessary and important. Applying for a passport. Many students don’t have a passport and it’s pretty necessary to get the passport first since you need this to register and appear for all the competitive examinations (including IELTS, TOFEL and GRE). Applying for a passport takes time and if you don’t have one you should apply for it by September month. It takes 1.5 months to get your passport in hardcopy. Since there are various steps, which includes getting a passport appointment, going for passport interview (it’s not an interview but they just would just check you and take your photo etc).

After you get your passport then you should choose a date for your IETLS and GRE. But of course you need to check whether your university really needs them. If you are native speaker then you don’t need IELTS. Also, if your bachelor’s degree was in English then sometimes the university exempts you from submitting the IELTS score. But this is true mostly for universities in UK, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland and Hong Kong. So if you are planning to study in one of the destinations then you should definitely contact the university and get a confirmation. GRE is mandatory for USA and some of the universities in Canada and Germany. Other than these universities nobody cares about GRE. But it’s an added plus anyway if you have a pretty good score in GRE. It’s obligatory to choose the universities you are going to apply before going for GRE exam since you can send your GRE score sheet to 5 universities free of charge as soon as you finish your GRE exam and also you get your result as soon as you finish your GRE exam. But you can also send the score later but this time you have to pay money to get your score card send to universities. Also for IELTS, for sending the score card the British council charges around 350 INR per university.

Next when you had started applying for passport you should also start applying for university transcripts. Because it takes time to get them from the university and also it’s pretty necessary when you start applying for the universities. Remember here that you don’t need transcripts when applying for Australian, UK, and universities in Ireland and also note that each Canadian and USA universities require 2 transcripts. And mostly students should apply to 5 universities. One university is always ambitious (something which they dream and it’s not easy to get), two universities they should apply are reachable but still unpredictable (something where students got acceptance in the past with similar profile but now at present its not predictable whether they will get admission due to competition), and final two universities which are reachable (where you have very high chance of acceptance). So you need 10 transcripts for applying to 5 universities. But apply for 12 transcripts in your bachelor’s university since you should always be prepared in case of any emergency. For Germany one transcript is enough but still it’s better to keep more just in case you make up your mind and want to apply somewhere else.

Next start getting letter of recommendation (LOR) from your universities and company (if you were working) and you also need two LORs for each university where ever you are going for your higher education. And prepare a statement of purpose (SOP) based on the course country and university where you are going to study. These two things play a vital role in getting an acceptance from any university so keep them in excellent detail. Try to get your LORs from someone important (like HODs or boss of your boss etc) since it increases its significance.

When you have all your documents including transcripts then you should take Xerox of them (as much as you can) and get them attested from a notary. This is pretty important step since in many universities (except USA and Canada) the notarized copies of your documents are enough.

Now start applying for universities using their online form. Here remember that if you are going for masters in Australia, New Zealand, UK, Ireland then it’s better that you approach a consultancy which doesn’t charge you anything. Since by doing this you save application fees and also postal fees for sending your documents. But if you are applying anywhere else I would recommend you not to approach any consultancy. They don’t do anything properly and you just end up wasting your time and good chunk of money. I am telling this because I was the victim of one of these counseling companies and I did not get any acceptance after spending a lot of money.

Applying to universities in Germany or any other European countries is very easy (walk in the park J ) and I have written a blog post in past regarding application procedure for Germany. It’s almost the same for France, Sweden, and Nederland. Also it’s better to attend education fairs where the universities from these countries are visiting in since they can apply for you directly in there, or at least help you in filling up the form.

Applying in Universities in USA and Canada is a bit tedious and requires proper understanding and reading of the online forms. Remember here that each forms costs 50 to 100 dollars so you should fill them a bit carefully. But nevertheless even these are not difficult and you should pretty much be able to fill them. Also you save the fees of the consultancy and can apply to more universities. Maybe in one of my future blog post I can cover the application procedure of USA and Canada and maybe give an example how to fill the forms with proper steps.

Send all the documents by courier including the printouts of your online application. There are student offers in DHL and FedEx where they charge less in case if you’re applying for higher education. Next phase is the most painful and you need patience during this time. Waiting for your acceptance. J Mostly for USA and Canadian universities you get your acceptance starting from March and till May. If you have not got your acceptance by the end of MAY then it either means you are rejected or something else is wrong. Better contact the university in-charge. For Germany it can be as late as august to get an acceptance.

Considering that you were successful and you got an acceptance. Start looking at the visa procedure and make sure you submit all the forms when applying for visa. For Germany you need to open a bank account. The visa procedure varies from country to country but make sure that you get a slot as soon as possible and before 2 to 3 months of your course commencement date. After your visa interview it takes 1 to 2 months to get your visa stamped onto your passport. Depends on the visa centre and number of applicants (sometimes in India Bangalore takes less time than Chennai or vice versa).

It’s better to either book the flight ticket after you get your visa or book it in advance 2 months after your visa interview date. And check for the baggage allowance and dimensions of the baggage before booking a flight (some flights allow more baggage while some allow very less amount). Look at guidelines about stuff which you can keep in your carry on bag (no scissors or metal stuff allowed but I had them and nobody told me anything) and make sure to follow them or Not (in my case: P). Also don’t stuff a lot of things than necessary and keep check on the allowed weight limit. Don’t exceed more than 2 to 3 kilos than allowed weights. It’s risky and the airport staff might tell you to throw them away.

Shopping the right items is pretty important and make sure you have the proper and important stuff when you are leaving your country. I wrote a blog post regarding the things necessary and important when you are going for education abroad. Also keep copies of all your documents which you might need to show (in German airports sometimes they ask for acceptance letter to allow you to leave the airport once you reach Germany but you can make some excuse if you don’t have it) or need it when you are studying abroad. Make sure that you follow a checklist and unless and until everything is ticked don’t leave your country. J

This blog post was pretty long and I think the parts in the end are not important but for a complete beginner I think this might be pretty useful. Have a safe journey and best of luck!.

Why studying abroad in germany has been the best ever thing that happened to me

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Sat, 08 Nov 2014 14:01:00 +0000

I have completed 1 year now (kinda like my first anniversary living abroad) outside India. The journey embarked on 2 October 2013 has now been going strong full of fun and enthusiasm and there is no stopping it. And without any doubt this has been one of the best experiences and decisions i have ever took in my life. Looking back at the past one year and the experiences and things i have learned , i realized that i should definitely write a post about why studying abroad has made me what i am today. A completely changed man !!

If you are from a country like India where you have to live under the shadow of parenthood from the moment you are born and at least till the moment you marry (unless if you study or work in some other place but still this is not possible until you turn 17 or 18 and its actually pretty rare) you will realize how awesome or how troublesome(for some) it can be travelling abroad. People or students usually don't travel around much outside India or even in India the trips are usually taken with parents or some family member (of-course you go for trips with friends but still it doesn't last long and still parents are to be informed). And yes its not applicable to only Indian students but it happens all around the world(albeit more in India or other Asian countries for sure). So many students actually dunno what real life experiences are or what is the culture in other countries or how people are. Heck India is a culturally diverse country and every state is a foreign to another and there is no doubt even travelling around in India can be quite a hectic challenge sometimes. but there are lots of similarities and scenarios which are pretty much common throughout the country (right from taking a bus ticket to shopping etc). and even if there is a language barrier throughout the country (mostly in south and northeast since Hindi is not spoken much in these places) there are lots of people throughout the country who can speak Hindi and English.So its an entirely different scenario travelling and living abroad and in India and travelling and living in foreign(and particularly in a country where the language you speak is not spoken like Germany and most of the countries in Europe). So in this blog post I am gonna discuss or I mean I will just point out some of the changes which happened within me and why i think i am better than before (even though there are lot and lot of betterment necessary in me and maybe some things have changed in me which people think are not good and actually have made me worse :P )

It made me very open and friendly from the guy i was back in India

Well in India , I was not into making many friends maybe because i did not like the attitude of the few i met and i had many awesome friends anyway. I was quite open to them and was pretty much straightforward about stuff. But still never had the opportunity to go to parties , meet a lot of people and make a lot of friends just like that. There were usually no social gatherings or meetups which are typical here and in other countries all the time and usually the college tours was the only way to meet some new people ( but again the other people or students have to be open and friendly and Indian culture just doesn't allow that to happen in a free and easy way). But yes my best friends are still Indians with whom I have been in contact for 8 years now and I just love them very much.

I could make friends easily and talk with Locals

It made me independent and I realized my responsibilities

Well of-course i had to cook my own food, take care of the room, take care of clothes, shop stuff for myself, schedule everything and learned to procrastinate stuff a bit less( but still i do it quite often since i am a lazy douche). This the first time i started spending money from my own pocket earned from my own job and the joy it gives me is just immense.Even though i am a bit careless when it comes to money and I lament it quite often but still at least its not the hard earned money of my parents (now that i think of it , i will spend it in the same way even if it was from my parents but still happy that its my hard work which has given me the power to earn my bread outside :) ) Also it gave me the power to try things which were not possible due to no income and yes money is power sometimes.

Kebab Pizza quite a handful

.It made me open to many other activities and sports

In India all I did ever was meet my friends during weekends, or watch movie with them or play cricket or do a bit of jogging and exercising. Pretty much nothing unusual happened in weekends. It was monotonic and pretty much nothing was planned beforehand. Now during weekends I travel , plan or go for meetings or meetups, cook dinner with loads of people and have fun watching football or rugby. I realized how cool it is to drink beer and believe me there is nothing wrong in it ( research actually suggests beer is good for health and increases lifespan). and even though i am not suggesting people to drink beer, just wanted to tell you people its fun to drink some during social meetings. I started eating non-veg food when I was in India because even though I am a Brahman, I realized one day the word GOD means nothing to me and consequently no religion or caste or culture to follow. And even though its sad animals are being killed and being vegetarian removes that guilt from people but i just love meat and so no guilty consciousness. So after i come here I tried different varieties of food and i just realized that not only the Indian food tastes awesome but there are lot of superfluous yet awesome tasting food around the world.

Hiking became a regular part of my life

It made me realise that nothing is perfect and experience is the only thing to realise that

Well everyone is proud of their country and I am a proud Indian as well. But people in India just boast how good the Indian culture is and actually think bad and low of foreign cultures (my parents specially my mum does this and so does most of the others). They just think that people in foreign just marry each other without thinking anything , have sex before and after marriages and then divorce happens. And it might be true to some extent. That's the image of a foreign land specially of white people. But nobody talks or knows that people here actually also fall in true love and take care of their family as Indians(or any other race which thinks this way) do. Its true people are pretty much open here but that doesn't make every girl or a guy a slut or less worthy than us. Indian arranged marriages are successful but divorces happen here as well and the only reason why the divorce rate is low is because women are much less independent here and have to depend on their male counterpart to feed the family and the kids. And its not just a bluff. Before leaving India for pursuing my masters in Germany few incidents happened in my neighborhood. I have seen two cases where women wanted to give divorce to their husbands but could not because they are just housewives and can't earn on their own. And in one of the case the male actually beat his wife after consuming alcohol (which you can't witness easily in abroad).

Oktoberfest Weekends were quite amazing

But then same applies to Germany and Germans. They are just so proud of themselves that they just consider themselves to be better than most of the countries. Again even Germany is not perfect and there are many things I prefer the way its done in India rather here. I discussed some of them in one of my previous articles and maybe you can check that out. For examples most of the children are not able to take care of their parents and just leave them and the parents don't expect much from their kids as well (not true for everyone but applies to many here). The relationships here are kinda shaky sometimes. All in all,different cultures and different lifestyles. Lot to learn from each of them. But unless you stay in a place and spend time with the locals you won't realize the positives and negatives from a culture so its not right to compare and to just talk that one is better than the other without experiencing it.

It made me a much much much better cook

I can cook most of the Indian foods now which are being cooked in the household everyday around India.I can make roti easily,daal,dosa varities,upma,pongal ,pasta,pakodas,biriyanis,rice varieties,panner matar, butter chicken, different curries and sabjis(in german its Gemuse) and ofcourse now many german and bavarian foods(currywurst,schneitzel,salad varieties, potato salad,dumplings) etc. Germans enjoyed my food a lot and were becoming pretty lazy sometimes because I cooked food for them. :)

German Beer and German Kuchen is just out of this World

It made me embrace various cultures and lifestyles and take the positives out of them

I realized there is a lot to learn from each culture. Some of the common characteristics I found in some of the cultures were Honesty beyond ordinary,drinking beer like its their last day, and very good in managing time from Germans, being cheeky and take a chill pill attitude from australians, being very open and making the first move from americans, caring and being polite and humble from Indians, and also I love the accents of Irish,Australian and Spanish people who speak english. Ofcourse the characteristics are not in everyone but its just a general perception which I got from my friends which I made living abroad. Kinda matches with the stereotypes about these countries but these characteristic are in friends. So I am not being stereotypical but just being realistic. :)

For the First time in my life I started planning my weekends and made every weekend and day count

In India I did not care much about Holidays and Weekends and after i came here I realised the loads of possibilities and stuffs/things I can do during any weekend. Wish I was like this when I was in India. I could manage my time better and also did something worthy and unusual now and then. One of the reason might be because I started earning on my own and so I could spend and travel without much worries but I think I started utilizing my time properly because I saw my friends here and saw how cheerful they were about everything including weekends and realized that's how life should be. Also I became a travel freak and since Europe is actually diverse that there is so much to explore.

Innsbruck one of the cities i visited recently

I learned a new Language

Yes I am still learning Deutsche und es ist sehr schlecht aber ich kann verstehen wenn meine freunde sprechen. Learning a language is awesome and it gets you closer to a race/culture and you connect with the people. Even though I would rather prefer learning Japanese and Spanish because I like both of them especially the former but in the end I still have to learn German at least for better job prospects and I sometimes find it funny(like someone is given a throat-job) and harsh(to kick ass). No offense to German language even though that's my personal opinion :) . I also improved my English a bit (which should not be expected since I am in Germany but it did somehow :) ). I was close to western culture more than ever in my life and so I watched more and more English movies and listened to lots of new albums in English and also my openness to different music genres changed (i moved on from Enrique Iglesias and even though I still like and Love him , I started liking music from Ed Sheeran, Seether and many other different vocalists). But I still must say even though that I love English albums but the feel and passion/romance in some of the Bollywood songs are still top notch maybe except few artists like Sam Smith, Adele, Bruno Mars in West (but the plot and theme in most of the Bollywood movies are still shitty and worse compared to most of the Hollywood).

My perspective about life and people changed entirely

It made me more enthusiastic and I have really started loving life more than ever. Even though it doesn't mean that I prefer living here than in India , but its just that I realized that life has so many adventures and beauty to be discovered that there is no use crying about so many unnecessary shit happening around you. I realized that its time I stopped living for others (which is pretty common in India) and satisfying other's need and start living for myself.

In the end I could feel the changes in Me and I am still glad the day I decided to go for Masters rather than doing a job in a software firm in India. I am not sure if everyone will go through these changes but you never know unless you try. I hope you guys found this article and its just a personal perspective. Comment below the changes which happened to you and maybe where you study and what you learned from their culture.

What Germany and Germans(G&G) can learn from India and Indians(I&I) and maybe from Others

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Wed, 24 Sep 2014 21:44:00 +0000

This post might sting some of my fellow Germans but its just written to give a reality check and also to prove nothing is perfect. In one of my previous post I just covered some of the things Indians and India (I&I) should learn from Germans and Gemany(G&G).

http://studyabroadcounselling.blogspot.in/2014/09/what-indians-can-learn-from-germany-and.html

It was just the part 1 of the article which means I would follow that article up with another article which highlights some of the other points missed by me, which we should learn from G&G. Some people mailed me that the article was a bit harsh and that I was actually ridiculing the Indians, but believe me I had no such intentions and all I want is that things should change in India and in us and we should try to learn positive things from others. But surprisingly most people told me that , I was absolutely right and that they could relate to whatever I was saying , and they felt that India has to change and so does Indians. But How?

my friends in the apartment (4 Germans)

That's a story for another day. Today I would focus on few things that they can learn from us or from other countries. And some of these points doesn't apply only to Germans but also applies to Indians as well. But nevertheless this article should be focused by Germans and its with perspective of my views and also views of some of my other international and German friends :P . Few things might bite you ! But let me remind you again that these points apply to most of the general population and not to each and every German living in Germany.

1) Pretty Much Mind Their Own Business-

Most of the Germans I have come across mind their own business. Which is good sometimes, but mostly it doesn't cultivate relationships (friendship and getting to know others). For example, I lived in dorms and no German was interested in talking to me nor doing something out of selflessness. I approached my neighbors , introduced myself, and also invited them for a dinner. I am not expecting dinner invitations, but mostly I found that Germans mostly interact only if its absolutely necessary. I lived with my friends in a house, but I had to take the initiative to make sure we share our stuff and also I used to cook for them and they loved it and then they started cooking for me and for other roommates who were also German. They mostly used to keep their stuff separately and buy and shop stuffs for themselves. I also lived in dorm sharing the kitchen with an Indian and we used to share our bills, cook for each other etc. After he left, there was a German who actually told me to separate the space in fridge and also to cook at appropriate time so that he can cook after that and there is no conflict. I had no problems in sharing the bills and it was actually awesome.

my Budapest friends

2)Pretty shy and not very open unlike Americans/Czech/OZ/NZ etc

Germans even though look very foreign to Indians but except the beer drinking culture here, people are not so open. People don't speak unless they really have to . Unless they are meant to they don't approach you.Sometimes the beers and alcohol do give them the ability to just approach any stranger but usually they are very shy. Even during my internship here in Munich there are many students who just sit all alone eating and doing their work. I just had to start talking with some of them and suddenly we became good friends. This is certainly not what I expected in a third world country like Germany.compared to this , indians are much better and mostly can start a conversation and ask about the someone's whereabouts even if they are strangers.

3)Germany just doesn't feel like a place to be unless if you speak German

I mean seriously even in Munich which is considered one of the most international places to be in Germany , I have met people from so many other countries who feel lonely , because they have no one to talk to and in some of the meetups I have been here, people from UK,Australia,USA,NZ etc have told me that it just doesn't feel right here because of the language. But let me tell you , these same set of people told me that they would love to be in Warsaw or in Prague rather than in here for the rest of their life.

my australian friend-met at prague castle (still in touch !!)

4) There is always a negative energy and aversion towards foreigners or people who don't look similar to Germans

Look at India. Indians just love foreigners. You visit India and people look at you with a sense of welcome and they feel proud that you have visited their country. People love to talk to foreigners and get to know about them. Even if you are stared at , the stare expresses joy and awe of meeting someone who doesn't look like them. I think Indians love foreigners more than anybody else. But sadly Indians hate Indians. Kinda ironical right? That's something to be ashamed about. On the other hand, in Germany I never felt a welcome and positive kind of feeling. I am brown and people stare at me like I should leave this country soon or else I am dead. Well there have also been instances where people are welcoming but mostly I found the cold eyed stares everywhere. I have also been given love but I am talking about the general response from the public in day to day life. I was literally yelled at by a German chick "dieses Land verlassen. Scheißausländer" which means "Leave this place you shitty foreigner". I am not bringing a racism war here being from India ( more racism than anywhere else), but its just that I felt the openness to other cultures and people is not as much as its in USA, UK or in OZ. And this perspective is not just shown to people of different skin. Usually Germans don't prefer anybody who are not basically from here and don't speak their language or at-least don"t look like German.

5) People are mostly comfortable to speak only in German even if they speak good English

In Germany if you meet a group of Germans , they just keep talking among themselves in German no matter if there is a foreigner among them and if he/she is not getting anything. Unless if someone is really interested in knowing about you they will switch to English language. Unlike in India, where if some member joins a group and people are talking to him/her then they communicate in a common language which is English. Like in my bachelors engineering even if my mother-tongue is Tamil , we (me and my Tamil friends) always used to switch to Hindi or English based on the people with whom we are interacting and in that process we also interacted among ourselves in the same language as the new person prefers. When in dorm and in apartment I had a series of meetups here and people would just continue in German, even if they knew I spoke just the basic. And its not because they thought I would learn German but because they prefer in talking in that language.

6) Being too direct sometimes and not caring about the person's situation

Sometimes I had problem with Germans with this situation. I was ill but on this day I had to clean the kitchen and I was not spared. Its good to be punctual and follow rules but sometimes people should also understand other's situation. Once I made some Indian food and I came from gym so was quite tired. One of my German friend ate everything because it tasted good.This happened to me when I was in dorm. Was kinda pissed off because now I had to eat bread and milk ! And I was not sad about this situation, But few other things happened where the situation was not understood and I had to suffer. This has never happened with me when living with Indians. I must say we Indians have a very good understanding about other's problems and try to help as much as I can without thinking about ego or about who has done more and who has done less. Here this was just one example. This has happened numerous times so I had to make this as a point.

friends from Philippines, Armenia and Germany (the most humble guy I met in Germany :P)

7)The small gap which remains in Friendships

OK, this was not experienced completely by me but few of my German friends just told me how friendship works out in Germany. They told me how some of their best friends could not help them in their dire situation. For example my friend (German) had to go to UK for work. Then after returning she had to go and visit a place where her friend lived. And when she asked her best friend (6 years they were together) for a place to stay( not even a place. all she asked for was a roof on top . no bed. no bed sheet and stuff) all she got the reply was " I don't know whether my parents would agree to this". And I heard few more such examples from my fellow German friends. I have a very very good friend here in Germany and he's the most different German I have ever met (all the above points doesn't apply to him). But still there is a friendship gap, kinda like a hole between us I think, which I never felt between my Indian friends or my friend from Austria and Philippines.

8) The Ego, some of the Germans feel when it comes to doing some particular stuff

I have many German friends who have found simple things like cleaning a toilet or doing something physical being a bit uncool and unpleasant job. Particularly the first point, which is about cleaning the toilets seems to them like a crime. I think it also applies to people from other third countries. Which is kinda odd since no job is bad as long as you feel like it. Every job and the person doing it should be respected as long as its bringing a good around them or the society.

Let me remind again that some of these points may seem so ludicrous and untrue to few of you , but I am talking about the majority and not about few specific nice and awesome person that each country has. My friends here (many Germans) mostly have some of the traits above, and there are few who are like the gems from the ocean.

Comment below if you are not from Germany and have experienced some of these things in your life. I would come up with the part 2 of this article after thinking about the few points which I might have missed. Until then stay fit, stay focused , spread LOVE and PEACE everywhere.

3 Beneficial Tips for Preparing Overseas Studies

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Wed, 17 Sep 2014 08:15:00 +0000

At any given time there are people living overseas for academic reasons. It is advisable to be properly prepared for your new environment to help make your transition less stressful and allow you adapt more easily to your new lifestyle.Studying abroad poses many questions that can cause stress and anxiety. Here are the 3 beneficial tips for preparing overseas studies:

Research

You will feel more secure if you educate yourself about your target destination by conducting the right research. Research the destination country including history, culture, customs, laws, Social morals, dress codes and language. It is imperative to research about religion and traditions. Before you go, learn a few words and phrases of the local people. Conduct research and be equipped with necessary information pertaining program literature and any information pertaining students accounts studying in the host country. Contact program administrator and know what is expected of you before you go. Never hesitate to ask program administrator questions about your career and all that which is expected of you. Conduct research about the financial implications including hidden charges not in the fees structure. Research about your accommodation and ensure that you have somebody familiar with you to welcome you and orient you about what is expected of you.

Letting go

Before letting go, take time to make most of the study abroad decisions to act as a guide on what you are supposed to do. Make use of relevant bodies, documents and research resources to help you make informed decision. Be prepared to have limited communication to your motherland country. Exploit opportunities pertaining what you are supposed to do before you go. Talk to people who are studying abroad and be prepared about the emotions they say they are experiencing. Set your mind that you are going no matter what to avoid getting demoralized on what you hear later from those already studying abroad. Ensure that you pack light but wisely to take with you relevant materials. Ensure that your packed bags are what you can easily handle for your swift movement. If you are taking any prescription, ensure that you carry extra supply. Before letting go, get a note from the doctor if you have a medical case.

Safety

Safety encompasses things to do with finances, security, food and health. Establish a plan of communication back home to boast your safety. Be prepared to start a blog to keep your family and friends informed about your adventures abroad. A blog is the commendable channel because it is inexpensive. Have enough finances to boast your safety and well being while abroad. Ensure that you have emergence contacts at all times to boast your safety. Learn on how to be responsible with finances before you. Have the opportunity of handling finances before departing to overseas. Write down a plan of the expenses you expect to incur abroad with a clear guideline of wants and needs. Be clear about financial, social and academic responsibility.

Author Bio: I'm Richard Martinez, an educational composing fanatic. And composing articles associated with educational place are specialty. I generally deal with separate phd dissertation writing service as well as assist others in finding good composing projects.

An MS in Economics from Australia Promises a Bright Career Option

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Wed, 17 Sep 2014 07:51:00 +0000

An MS in Economics from Australia Promises a Bright Career Option

A Degree in Economics from an Australian University is highly regarded and recognised worldwide. The following post gives an overview of the same.

Acquiring subject based advanced knowledge from the top foreign universities, is like a dream come true for many ambitious students. To gain the desired knowledge and be a Master, students from more than two hundred countries has chosen Australia. Studying in Australia is a unique experience as the country boasts of some of the best universities and colleges that shape the future of students.

While MBA in Australia is one of the most coveted courses, a degree in Economics from Australian Universities are not only highly regarded but recognised worldwide.

About MS in Economics in Australia

A Masters’ in Economics can usher to a profitable career. Many top universities of Australia provides a Master of Economics program for potential graduates to secure a job in the leading banks of Australia and abroad. So, opting for MS in Economics in Australia is a sensible decision if one has high interest in the subject. Post Graduate programs in Economics provide scope for financial analysis, Environmental Engineering Management, Economic Geology and Medical Statistics. Master in Economics is generally a one year degree program which consists of 8 courses (4 core courses and 4 elective courses). The four core modules of a Post-Graduate in Economics program includes

Macroeconomic Analysis
Microeconomic Analysis
Mathematical Economics
Econometric Analysis

The universities of Australia also provides a wide range of elective subjects to choose from which includes Applied Econometrics, Strategic Market Behavior and Government Regulation, Choice Modeling, International Trade and many more.

International Students’ Applications

Students enrolling for Master in Economics are both from Australia itself and abroad. International students applying for such master degree programs come from all across the globe.

An Indian student applying for a Master degree in Australia must have a three year full time bachelor degree in Economics. Application forms can be downloaded online and submitted online as well. Sometimes consultancies also help students in cracking into their desired institution.

Top Universities

Infinite opportunities are provided by the top universities of Australia to the students from more than hundred countries aspiring to secure a degree in Economics. Some of the top universities in Australia where one can pursue an MS in Economics are explained below:

University of Queensland, Brisbane

The University of Queensland is a public university located at Brisbane, Australia. It is also known as UQ. UQ is famous for its Master degree program in Economics. The course available here provides knowledge in main economic principles and the electives offered gives knowledge about specific areas like environmental economics, health economics, economic development, natural resource economics, public sector management and lot more. The Master degree program in Economics is a two year full-time course and the cost of the course is AUD$ 26400.

New South Wales University

University of New South Wales is mainly a research focused university in New South Wales, Australia. This is a popular university for their success in the fields of Computer Science, Math, Engineering, Economics and Psychology courses. The Master in Financial Economics is a unique program offered by them which helps the students to carry on research in the fields of economics, mathematics and finance. The UNSW also allows applied learning both inside and outside the campus which helps the students to critically analyze the modern techniques, practices and theories of the chosen subject. The University allows both full-time and part-time internal programs and a minimum score of 600 in GMAT is required to get admitted in UNSW.

Monash University, Melbourne

The Monash University is Australia’s top university which provides world class teaching, research and scholarships. The Monash University offers a wide range of courses to study from. The Department of Economics of the Monash University stands out in performance and the academics publish the best quality journals. The department is also awarded a five star ranking in by the Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA).

Australian National University, Canberra

This is a research college and public teaching university located in Canberra, Australia. A wide range of programs are offered by the University and it has seven colleges under it The Masters’ in Economics curriculum was started 30 years back and was the universities first bench work master program. This course includes one core subject and has a wide list of 30 other elective subjects to choose from and the indicative course fee is AU$31,593.00.

Apart from the above-mentioned institutes, international students can chose from a wide variety such as University of Sydney, University of Melbourne, University of Western Australia and many others. So, if you are planning to pursue your higher studies in Economics from a foreign country, this time shift focus to Australia!

Author Bio: Sampurna Majumder is a professional writer and a passionate blogger. Currently she is writing content for several websites such as Shiksha.Com that cover latest trends related to education in India and abroad such as these. The above post provides an insight into best Australian universities where one can pursue an MS in Economics.

Coming to chemnitz? : This is how you should expect your life to be ! - Part 1

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Sun, 14 Sep 2014 13:53:00 +0000

I have lived in Chemnitz for around 10 months (oct 13 to aug 14). I have traveled to most of the places in and around Chemnitz (quite a small city actually) and I have lived both in dorm and also in WG (you know a bunch of people living together) with 4 Germans. In this article I would like to share some stuff regarding the life in Chemnitz and what you can expect and what your expectations should be before coming here. This article is focused on everyone and not just on people coming from India.

The first and most important advice from me before coming to Chemnitz would be to look for a Wg house rather than a dorm . and try to live with people from other countries or ethnicity. Why? Because its time for you to finally come out of your comfort zone. and add some fun and excitement and spice in your life. And by spice am not telling you to live with an Indian (which you can and should and not because i am from India, but because we are one of the most different and intriguing humans you guys would ever come across :) ) .

Your life would be much more unpredictable and filled with enthusiasm. People usually tend to live with their own kind (Germans with Germans, Indians with Indians (and worst north Indians with north Indians and south Indians with south Indians etc). I took the name of people specially from these two countries because :

1) Chemnitz is in Germany so obviously many Germans will be studying here and they tend to live with other Germans (either because they are comfortable only with Germans or people who can speak the German language).

2) The Indian population in Chemnitz specially of students is huge (and by huge i mean it !! and its ever growing and ever increasing. I think it might be highest Indian population in a university outside of India and in Engineering you can find everywhere people with brown skin and black hairs sitting in front,back and around you )

So, try to live with people from other ethnicity and if possible with opposite sex (specially guys should try to live with girls because they make you more disciplined and the life is much more beautiful not just because every girl is beautiful but because you can look at life with a perspective of a stranger girl). And try to learn to cook their food or speak to them in their language or try to learn about their culture. Thus, your life is much more interesting and you can make friends from different groups and countries easily. You can search for house in wg-gesucht.de website and here just remember one thing. Never transfer money before coming here if someone in that website asks you. The website is full of fraudsters and it will be really difficult to recover your money back. Its not easy to persuade a German to give their room to you specially if you are from India. So, try to write a nice e-mail, explaining why they should live with you and why you are the best person to live with(turn into the best salesman and do live up to the expectations you have created).

Next don't bring lots of clothes ( I was such a douche). You can get most of the clothes here for more or less the same price. Focus more on jeans and undergarments. The brands here are not good for jeans at least and they tend to be pretty costly sometimes. But I could sometimes find even good quality jeans for less price. So, don't waste your time and breath in lot of luggage. This point I just added so that you guys have to go through less pain than me. You see am a well wisher :P .

Now coming to the life after you reach here. If you don't speak German , don't expect too much of interactions with people here unless if you live in wg (one more reason to go for it) and you have German friends. And I am talking not only about Chemnitz. People do learn English here but they are speaking mostly a little bit(average) English (some of my friends do speak above average but still not good enough for them, and thus they tend to switch to German). And some speak very little English and thus to save themselves from embarrassing( which I think they are not) they usually converse only in German. If you do live with Germans, then during get-together s or during meetups or parties , everyone speaks mostly in German , unless if you ask someone something in English some stuff. But they would take interest in you unless you do something interesting enough and if they know English very well. Else, believe me you are doomed. A common notion is you can only involve in conversations if you understand what others are saying and getting points from those and talking something out of it. But since you don't get anything you just start talking sometimes something different and it sometimes feels kinda weird (this has happened with me :P ). Even if you get some English words from their conversations in German, you tend to make a different meaning out of it !!!

But what if you are living in dorms (v52, v70 are the best out of the worst dorms around the TU Campus). Here people usually mind their own business. Sometimes events are organised by CDK ( the university club called as club of cultures or in German Club Der Kulturen), but most of them are pretty boring and more focused on cultures and stuff than on parties. You do have salsa nights, game boards nights etc but don't expect much fun unless you find someone really interesting enough or some event really interesting enough for you. But these events happens usually once or twice a week.So, What about other days? Let me tell you one thing. The classes organised by the university comprise of only 5-10% of your day . Maybe less if you skip few of them. So what people usually do after this time? Well there was a time in winter when going outside was pretty difficult due to snowy weather, so people usually tend to be inside watch movies or have beer. If you don't drink beer ( and believe me many students at least from India don't in case you are wondering), then let me tell you that life would suck pretty bad in parties and clubs: maybe not that bad in clubs but in parties or get together s there is a high chance that you would feel lonely since most people would be drinking beer and it won't be that nice and cool to just be there trying to converse. Also to remind you these events are almost finished during examination and during the holidays. Dorms have their own pubs and clubs (for example wind canal is pretty famous). But then again, mostly its a small place with not much place to even dance. So, for me it was not much fun.

My apartment -Beers and Parties was Pretty Common

Don't expect that you will start building robots or that you will be the reason for the revolutionary changes in the world after you start your studies here( with a perspective of an engineering student :P). After reaching Chemnitz, and as soon as your course starts, the focus will be more on the theoretical aspects and on getting a good score rather than actually trying to do something new and innovative (you do have practicals but still they are more like a curriculum rather than projects and self do it yourself kind of stuff). If you have come from a place where education was really bad (like me) and you have a feeling that you are going to study in Germany which is land of research and technology, so it will be awesome and everyday you will learn and create something new then I guess you should drop such lame thoughts. If you really want to involve yourself with some research then you should either do it voluntarily spending your own money and buying your own stuff or else approach a professor for any work or any project which has a place left and fits your skill set. He might actually pay you if you really do a good job. But mostly they don"t pay you( has happened with my friends here).

Again if you don't speak German don't expect to get a part time job that easily in Chemnitz. Most jobs expect you to speak German even if it involves cleaning a floor or working in a market. So, while coming here make a mindset regarding your survival without any job and how you are gonna do it. Best place to look for jobs is via online website called as jobmensa. You can find all kinds of part and full time jobs in this website. Also quite useful is the tu-chemnitz website where each department has listed jobs related to their department (the only difference between jobmensa and tu website is that, all the technical jobs are in tu website, while jobmensa has both technical and non-technical jobs). Specially students love the amazon job , which is given during December month during Christmas. And, for one month they pay a lot of money.

I will continue more on this , in my second part of this article since I want to keep it short and come back on things which I have left. Chemnitz can be pretty fun , or damn boring depending on the kind of person you are and how you are trying to live.

And to make your life more fun here. Here are a few:

Tips to make your day/night life a bit more fun without much cost-

There are a lot of clubs and places where entry is free and you can have fun.

1) Kraftwerk Mitte in Dresden has free entry for students till 11pm every Friday- Just check what kind of party there is in their website (because sometimes there is gay and lesbian party and you don"t want to actually end up there). Travelling till the club is free using the TU Card.

2) In Chemnitz there is not much to do but you can go to brauclub and Club Fx( aka foxclub i think its called that- its near to the TU Strana campus)

3) There are sometimes festivals near Chemnitz. One of the famous is Kosmonaut festival. The tickets costs 60 euros for 2 days but its worth it. Happens during June Month.

4)There are many barbecue parties going on so you can always join those. Check events in Chemnitz page in facebook

5) Sometimes University arranges visits to various places or events so those are quite fun as well.

6) You can always visit Prague-Warsaw during weekends or anytime in between if you are free. The best way is to go till Deichin for free(using TU card) and then buying the ticket to Prague (costs very less).

7) You should definitely visit Saxon Switzerland of Germany called as Bastei which is again in saxony and you can travel for free there. One Advice- Go during Summer.

8)Joining the Gym is the best way to kill time during evening/morning and staying fit.

9) You can also visit Tier Park if you like animals, and zoo and stuff. I think the ticket costs 9 euros for a single person but do check it.

10) There are also theaters and opera houses in Chemnitz but its not my kind of thing. But if you love it , then you should visit them in theaterplatz. There are shopping malls but you can't go there just for fun, unless if you have to buy something.

If you are from Chemnitz and you feel me (if your life had few similarities to this) then please like and subscribe to my blog. It will motivate more to write more for you guys.

I will also be following this up with articles on life in Munich ( since I live in Munich now) and also what you can do here. Stay tuned.

What India and Indians(I&I) can Learn from Germany and Germans(G&G)- Part 1

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Wed, 10 Sep 2014 20:05:00 +0000

I first kept my foot in German soil during October 2013, feeling quite happy and keeping a open mind, thinking that I would embrace the culture and also teach them something if i have something positive to offer. During the first few days of my stay i came to know so much about the Germans and Germany(G&G in short). Their sense of discipline, their time management skills, their ability to be honest beyond ordinary ( well most of them are and you can't expect everyone to be). I thought everything was perfect about them , and i sometimes felt bad that why Indians can't be like them. But then i made so many German friends and then slowly and steadily I had a closer look at their life and insight and then i also realized the so many short comings of Germans and their attitude.

This blog post is the first part of a series of posts which will post on the positives and negatives of this country and what I learned and what they need to improve based on experience of me and some of my friends. This post is gonna convey more about the positives which I think others should adapt (specially my motherland India). The second part which focuses much more on the negatives is specially for those who actually avoid Indians and think being with Germans is much better and cooler( well i felt this way and i still do but i also realized few things which Germans don't do or care unlike Indians). This blog post might be scrutinized by lots of my fellow Germans but this is just a broad picture of what i observed and applies to most of the population. It is also possible that some of these positives and negatives are found in people from both of these countries but i am talking about the overall general population so don't bite me :). Nevertheless comments and suggestions are always welcome. Thus the story begins. I begin with few things which i love about G&G and why it should be implemented or followed in India, and why Indians should learn these things from them. And the other half (mostly it would be another article, like a part 2) i would focus on the things which i hate or things which Germans should try to learn from us Indians or others(and these are the things which are pretty important in day to day life )

When i came to Germany 10 months ago, the first positive impression me and most of my friends got was that of the train timings and traffic. I mean seriously If there is god, they should show mercy on us Indians. The train timings are precise and even if there is a delay ( i never faced any delay but one of my friend told me that his train got delayed by 20 minutes which is still a short time) its not as long as how it happens in India. In India , train gets delayed sometimes by 5-6 hours (yes it does happen). Also, in India if you check online that your train will arrive around 2:00 pm the chances of it arriving around 2:00 (take 15 minutes more or less) are bleak. In Germany there are timing boards in every bus and train/tram platform which mentions the arrival/departure timings of the respective transportation. And they are pretty accurate. I mean deadly accuracy. Its unbelievable to watch the transportation system being so precise here after coming from India. And let me be clear , this timing thing(y) was precise only in Germany. I was in Czech republic and sometimes there used to be delay of 3-5 mins in local trains( which is still pretty much less) but it was pretty common. The place where i lived in India(I am from Chennai which is one of the major cities there), there was no timing scheduled for local buses. Depending on the amount of people taking the bus(the more the people, the early the bus would start), the bus used to start off early or late.

Traffic is pretty controlled and everyone follows the traffic rules ( sometimes people do drive past the green signal but that's when nobody is walking on the road and its completely deserted). Most of the population here uses zebra crossing and obey traffic signals ( sometimes people are upset if someone breaks the traffic rules. has happened with me when i did it once :) ). There is a side lane specially for cycles and one for people to walk around places which is pretty neat so that other fast drivers can use the main lane/road without hurting any other slow vehicles. Contrary to that in India,most of the roads doesn't have a separate lane for cycles and roads. Cycles (or fahhrrad as its called in German) are mostly ridden along with other vehicles (which kinda sucks for them since they have to drive accordingly). Russel Peters once told in one of his jokes that in India we have the policy which we call it as "create your own lane". Which is actually true if you have been in India and witnessed it. If there is some space available where there is a possibility for your vehicle to go through then people just create their own path across no matter what rules are being broken. Mostly people don't give a shit about traffic rules ( i think this is also possible due to illiteracy in some parts and they don't know what these lights are for and maybe they just think these are lights to make the streets more fun !! and believe me driving tests are a joke and nobody takes it seriously). And population is not the reason why the traffic is so bad in India. I think the lands are big enough to control and make people to follow the traffic rules but it's the people's mindset which has to be changed. People just cross roads whenever there are no oncoming vehicles, and zebra crossings are as meaningless as studying an engineering course in India which is different from Computer Science.

The last remark also brings me to my next point. Students in India mostly take engineering or medicine because they think its their destiny. They already know that they will do engineering while in their kindergarten or school. Mostly they don' t follow their interests (parents pressure plays a vital role here). They just know that they should take engineering so that their parents stop bothering them and also they gain some respect from the society. That's the reason I think India has one of the highest number of engineers graduating in the world. The next intriguing thing. In India whatever Engineering course you take , it doesn't matter since int the end , either they are recruited by a software company or you are expected to work for a software company. Again I don't mean all the students but most of the Indian colleges and universities follow this pattern. For example i studied in a shitty college ( that's the reason it won't be mentioned ever !! ) and people studying civil engineering, mechanical engineering, electrical engineering , electronics and communication engineering , computer science , etc etc all got recruited by companies like CSC, WIPRO, INFOSYS (all of these are big software and IT giants in India). I mean you study building dams and stuff for 4 years (in civil) , or engines and crankshaft (in mechanical) and in the end you are only expected to know C,C++ or JAVA which most of these students learn during their High School.

Its entirely different here ( and I bet in rest of the world). Students just follow their passion without thinking about what job they will end up with or what they will do after finishing their degree. My first roommate , who was highly passionate about mathematics , made quite an interesting point. I was talking to him and I just asked him what he's planning next (whether job or masters) and he told me that he has no idea what he's going to do after his bachelors (and he was in his final semester writing his thesis). I asked him why he's doing his bachelors in mathematics and his reply was pretty simple and honest. Because he loved it. My another friend (German) who is also studying masters in automotive software engineering like me , also confirmed that he was quite passionate about vehicle modelling via software and embedded design and he took the course to be involved with his interest. And i can always find his blog full of interesting projects he tries out every week. And if germans don't like their course after finishing a semester or two (which is 0.5-1 years) they usually change their course to follow their passion. Usually Indians continue with their course whether they like it or not (but that's because we never learned to live Independently and this is a huge decision , earning our own money, financing our own college education and we usually have pressure since we study using our parents hard earned money).

Mostly people end up in their dream fields (if not jobs). Civil Engineers intern at construction based companies. students studying biology or chemical really have hands on experience in their respective field of study. And here studying is all about learning important and small concepts. Unlike India where we cram through huge books before our exams. I am not saying all the Indians take engineering just because they have to, but most of them take it for granted ( maybe including me but I still love programming so in a way not a bad choice).

Cleanliness is the most important aspect which I loved in here. Every household and buildings have a trash compartment nearby. People usually separate their trash into bio, plastic, glass, paper etc. and thus its pretty simple for garbage collectors to just collect them and put them in their respective areas. Highly helpful in recycling wastes and generating bio gas.The yellow trash box is for paper, the brown one for bio wastes or organic, the black one is usually for plastic.In India its different. Indians usually through liters around (at least in village but have seen in city as well). There is only one trash can and mostly everything is mixed (but I have also seen some Germans do this ). But the difference is , the trash in Germany is usually kept inside a polythene bag (specially for wastes) and this bag is thrown in the compartments thus the trash compartments doesn't stink and people are much more comfortable in working there. In India there are bags available but mostly people don't use them ( i used them, but sometimes even I used to thrown the trash in garbage box without any polythene).

Some of the above points are pretty much common in many other countries but its not in India and I want Indians to learn from them.

Most of the above points focused on German system and Germany. But now I will focus more on Germans and their culture.

The most amazing thing about them is how open and friendly they are when spoken to. Most of the Germans are pretty friendly and they want to know more about what you do if you are pretty interesting enough, and want to get to know you in person. But speak good German and you can catch their attention. Else, its never easy to get friendly with them (unless if you are a hot chick). Even though I also get the feeling (and its true) that they usually don't embrace all the cultures , and are quite adverse against foreigners. But the next generation of Germans (specially students) are pretty open. During the first few weeks of my stay i saw many Germans helping other fellow Indians and other foreigners, in opening bank accounts, and helping in other basic stuffs. But they are pretty shy. Unless you make the first move , you won't be shown any shit ( and by shit I mean any help). Which means you should make the first talk. Germans are pretty shy unlike Americans ( I have few friends here in Munich ). So, if you want to make friends , you have to approach them.

Germans are pretty straightforward and honest. If they don't like your habit , they will just tell you. Which I think should be embraced by Indians (in most of the cases we should just tell what we feel instead of being tolerant).

They are pretty hygienic and take care of themselves well. From normal attire of day to day life and till the night life and parties you can find them dressed very well and taking care of their body odour. Since we Indians are coming off from a tropical and hot climate , we usually sweat more and we should make sure that we use deodorant everyday (good for us and for others around us). While most of the Indians do this, there are some who don't which kinda creates a bad persona about us ( I heard it from my fellow German friends when I asked them what girls think about Indians).

Most Germans spend money as necessary and try to have a good fun time. Well I was never a miser myself and spent money like a king , there are many who save much more than needed and thus end up being the talk of the place (well its fine to be miser due to other pressures and loan but too much of anything is good for nothing). Here I would also like to add that there are also few Germans who were living miserly (not spending money when necessary and depending on their friends) but overall most of them have a good quality of life ( the problem with Indians being that most of them compare the money according to the exchange rate in India and thus find most of the stuff expensive and it just forces them to lead a shabby life).

Germans don't put stress on people and mostly tasks are given which don't put too much burden on you (be it in work or in class). Unlike in India where people are forced to work more than 10 hours sometimes and are still underpaid. Here its illegal to pay less and also churn out more work from employees. Here I found few Indians who are managing restaurants and they hire mostly Indians so that they can pay them less and get more work from them illegally (which is cruel , sad and I really feel angry when I see the tendency of such Indians). Mostly in India you don't get the respect for the work you do unless if you are working in a top tier company. Why do you think people leave India , to work for companies in other countries (even though you earn a lot of money, its the respect which comes along and the reduced level of stress which attracts them).

Life is much more fun here since usually during your studies you can also involve in lots of other activities and also involve in lots of get together with different kind of people and go to clubs and bars which are pretty common unlike in India where you have to search for them like a needle in a stack of hay. Life is never tense and people have fun drinking beer( too much sometimes, getting drunk has its own fun), sharing stories and keep it easy attitude. But the most important thing for me is how Germans (be wherever they are from) live together united (sometimes problem do occur but its because of someone's mistake and not because of the religion,caste or culture). Unlike India where there is lots of racism which I have seen. Well it never happened to me because I speak fluent Hindi and also maybe because of my attitude but mostly people from south and north usually don't get along well. They remain in their own group and actually hate talking to the other Indians from other culture or ethnicity. Even people from north east are considered not being from India in some parts in India which is a racial abuse according to me. Even though there is a bit of racism here, specially in the world of dating ( I actually found that German girls prefer Germans or people who at least are white or speak their language) , but I think compared to India its nothing. Love Marriage in India is still a dream come true and I don't think most of the population would still be ready to see their son or daughter getting married to a person from other ethnicity/religion or caste (actually in India there is a devil called as caste and usually people prefer the bride or groom from the same caste to get married).

To keep my article short (still pretty long though) I will sign off now with part 1. I never meant to show that Germany is better than India , and I never felt like why the hell did I was born in India ( I am proud to be an Indian). This part was just the heads part of the coin. Soon I will be back with the tails which also shows why Germans can never be like Indians and what they can learn from us. The follow up of this article will be a article which covers the other positives about Germans. And an article divided into two parts which covers the negative aspects of this culture. Stay Tuned !

[ NOTE- My points are not well organized and mostly random because am just typing whatever is coming into my mind. Apologies for that. And also some points are common to many countries like the marriage system and the openness to other cultures. I think people from USA,Australia, Czech are much better than Germany in terms of open embrace to other cultures (and I pointed only these countries because I have many friends from here and I have been to Czech).

The Lag In Articles and Quick Followups

noreply@blogger.com (arunkumar) — Wed, 10 Sep 2014 08:51:00 +0000

Its been a gap of 3 months since my last blog post and even though I had given up actually on the blog thinking that nobody actually uses it , I reliazed how popular my articles have become suddenly thanks to so many followers and students who are specifically going for higher education in germany.

I got request to follow up my experience in germany and particularly education in germany and chemnitz and since the response was huge , I am getting back to kick starting my blog agina with set of various new articles (you might find some of them pretty interesting):

So here I unveil the plans for the next blog articles along with the dates to be released and also from now on I will try to keep it updated as much as I can ( I think I have said this before but this time I truly have lot of time to follow up with my experiences and so hopefully I will follow the schedule):

1) Positives to be taken from Germany and Germans- Part 1 (11th september )
2) Coming to Chemnitz? Expect Life to be this way !! (12th Sep September)
3)3 Beneficial Tips for Preparing Overseas Studies - Guest Post by Richard (14th september)
4) Negatives of Germans and Germany- What they can learn from Indians! - Part 1 (17th September)
5) My Education Experience in Chemnitz University of Technology - Part 2 (20th September)
6) Living in Chemnitz- Possible Fun things to do (25th September)
7) Video Post- WG VS DORMS (30th September)

This is the Schedule for this month and hopefully people find the experience interesting and intriguing. The first article will be published tomorrow . Get Set GO !!!

PS- If I receive more guest posts then I will try to post them as well in between.