The Summer of 07
A blog on my internship at EPFL, SwitzerlandArchive for Lausanne
The Student House
The student house where I stay is a really comfortable place. Air conditioning is not a matter of luxury here, but rather of necessity, and hence every nook of the room is under a centralized air conditioner. The apartment is divided into two parts with distinct doors for each, but with a common entrance door. The two parts are sub-divided into three and four chambers. The pics of the student house are at the Student house album. My three other flat mates hail from Switzerland, Singapore and France. Add to that India, and you truly have a really multicultural confluence. But I really haven’t interacted with them much, except for the Swiss guy who always is in his room. More pics should come up in the album soon.
Weather Talk
An internship in Switzerland, immediately entailed thoughts of a bag packed of thermal wear, and indeed was the case with me. The temperatures, internet portals informed, plummeted to even 10 degrees even in the summer. I came fully prepared (read with a broke back). However I have not yet put to use any of the thermal wear, except for the thick blanket while sleeping. The only time during the day when I feel the chill is the walk to the metro station in the morning. It has been a surprise to me that I have been able to handle the weather here, since I really don’t manage the winter in Bombay (much hotter that Switzerland’s summer!) all that well. The other thing that takes a bit of adjusting to is the length of daylight here. I am typing this post at ten to eight with the sun having a good 30 degrees to travel before it calls it a ‘day’.
Getting to Lausanne
My journey to Lausanne began in Chennai, where I had gone to spend a week with my family after my semester. The flight to Mumbai, which is the closest I can board a Swiss bound airline, was rather uneventful. My dad had accompanied me to send me off from the airport. He had also managed to get a return ticket on Air India, so that he could be inside the international terminal. I was to travel with my friend Adi who is also on an internship at EPFL.
I flew from Mumbai to Zurich on an Airbus 300. The flight commenced a bit late due to very Indian reasons. As soon as we took off the in-flight entertainment kicked alive. Unfortunately, I had seen the three English movies on show that night, and hard to contend with the ‘Top Hits’ audio program, which did well to defy its name. The food was rather decent in the night. The morning breakfast however was a disaster with Indian food items like vadas and poha. I was reminded of my pathetic mornings in the hostel mess. The flight was mostly smooth, but for a few patches of turbulence around Eastern Europe. The weather there was rather bad. We reached Zurich more than an hour late, and thus were informed (while on board itself) that we might miss our connecting flight to Geneva.
At the airport, we had to scurry through to the terminal where out intended flight was supposed to be boarded. On getting there we were told that the flight had left and that luckily there wasn’t enough time to transfer the luggage. So we were adjusted in the next flight, which was to start boarding in five minutes in another terminal. A little more of running around and we reached the terminal where we were supposed to be. Quite a welcome indeed. The skybus at the Zurich airport was quite a pleasure.
Flight to Geneva was short and sweet, with the only offerings on the plane being Swiss chocs. Geneva airport was much smaller than Zurich’s. The next phase in the travel was to take a train to Lausanne. The train had very cool panaromic glasses which exposed the beauty of the Swiss countryside well. After about an hour of the pleasant ride, we finally reached Renens, which is a city close to Lausanne and closer to the place we were to stay. The secretary at the Lab where I am supposed to work, was gracious enough to pick us from their on her own car. And finally we reached the hostel rooms where we will spend the remaining two and a half months.
