Kolkata,
INDIA
India is an amazingly different
country compared to any other. It’s immersed in culture, in traditions and
costumes. And despite being all the same country, each state looks like a completely
different country with their proper gastronomy and divergent ways of living.
Kolkata is located in
the East and it is the capital of the state of West Bengal. Kolkata is super
crowded and noisy, polluted and messy. I saw chickens being killed in the
middle of the street, children showering in puddles left by the monsoons. It
has around 5 million people. That’s a lot of people for such a small space! And
during rush hours, there is a huge crowd everywhere.
IIMC
Campus
Campus is 10 km away
from the city center. To get to Park Street for instance (one of the best
streets because of the “high” offer on bars and restaurants), it takes 1 hour
which means around €3 by taxi or €0,50 by bus. If it is not rush hour though,
it could take you half the time. To get to the airport it’s a longer distance
and it may take around 2 hours. The most western area is South City because you
can find some tall residential buildings and because the big shopping center is
quite western. It is called South City Mall. It’s 45 min away from campus.
The IIMC Campus is
supposed to be a place where you have everything you need to live the entire
semester without having to go to the city. This is actually true, but you end
up coming out of campus at least 2 times a week so you don’t feel
claustrophobic.
The Campus has 5 or 6
residences, each one with their cantine. Then there are 2 or 3 cooperative
stores where you can buy the basic stuff like shampoo, pens, toilet paper,
chewing gum, water, cookies, charge your phone... Each one of the stores
improvised in their own way. It’s nice and funny. You also have a “gym” (with 2
treadmills and several rusty machines), badminton and tennis courts. Undoubtedly, it’s a beautiful green campus, with many trees, seven huge lakes
and a diverse bio ecosystem (all kinds of birds, many crows, squirrels, 1
monitor lizard, snakes, around 7 dogs, etc…). It is not a new campus though.
Also, all the school facilities are within campus walls, so you can either buy
a bike and take 2/3 minutes from your room to the classrooms or go by foot and
take 7 minutes instead. :)
Indian students are
incredibly warm people. Always willing to help you in whatever you need, to
share whatever they have… And they are crazy fun! Either they study hard, and
get extremely focused, or they party like animals. They don’t really value sleeping
time. It is important to understand that Indian people studying at IIMC are
extremely educated and ambitious. During the Fall term that I was at IIMC, we
were 13 CEMS students and around 70 exchange students. We all felt welcome by
them.
Of course, there are
also some negative points. For example, for me, it was really hard to get used
to not having a kitchen to cook and have to eat the cantine’s food everyday. Either
that or you order pizza from Domino’s. In special dates, they do make an effort
to give us better food, but still it is greasy and sometimes, too spicy.
CEMS students were all
given rooms in the best residence (newest building on campus – Lake View
Hostel, LVH). However, there were some people that stayed on the top floor (me)
and were unlucky. Two of us had infiltration problems during the monsoon period
(until late October). This led to humidity in the room, and a weird smell as
well as mold in the walls. But you learn how to avoid it… Keep the window open,
don’t turn your fan off! In the 2 corridors of girls at LVH (which corresponds
to 24 rooms), only 2 rooms had these problems. In other residences, the
proportion was bigger, which is good news for CEMS students because we usually
accommodate them at LVH. Another huge challenge that arose: bed bugs. Never in
my life I had this constant contact with bed bugs. And we could ask the “plague
killer” to come and disinfect our rooms, but they would be back again a couple
of days later. The way of overcoming this is to put at least 2 layers of bed
sheets in our mattresses. We only discovered this after one month at LVH, so we
managed to get many stings until then.
Restaurants
West Bengal Cuisine:
Peter Cat (the first restaurant I went to, good service, good food), Teej
(vegetarian), Mirch Masala (excellent food), 6 Ballygunge Place
Western Cuisine (after
some time only having spicy and saucy food, you’ll feel like having a good
steak or some nice pasta): Taj Hotel (try either the dinner buffet or the
champagne brunch), The Oberoi Hotel, Fire and Ice (Italian)
Nightlife
Some place else (kind
of Irish pub with live music)
Roxy (club)
Street
Markets
New Market (the biggest
market), Behala Market, Gariahat Market
What
to wear?
Girls should cover
their legs and do not walk around with cleavages. To be honest, I never felt
afraid, but you should avoid danger at all cost. There is no need of facilitating.
Guys should not have a problem though. Anyways, don’t walk around alone, try to
be at least 2 or 3.
Weather
I arrived on the 27th
of August and the campus was flooded. The 7 lakes were 2 only and we had to be
transported by car from building to building. This was not very efficient
because we spent time with simple things such as waiting for a car to take us
to the other side. And we could not put our feet in the water because it had
harmful chemicals. Despite that, temperature was high, and until late October,
independently of the time of the day, you are always sweating because humidity
makes 35ºC feel like 40ºC. Weather in end of October and November was awesome.
Like summer in Portugal. And probably in December you already needed a light jacket.
Courses
Besides the mandatory
course of Global Strategic Management (worth 6 ECTS), we could choose between
the following courses (all worth 4 ECTS):
Bank Management
Marketing to Bottom of
Pyramid Consumers
Business Transformation
with Social Media
Corporate Social
Irresponsibility
Country Risk Analysis
Economics of Corporate
Sustainability
Entrepreneurship in NGO
Ethics and Values in
International Business
Financial Risk
Management
Human Resource
Management in MNC
Innovation in Marketing
Theory and Practice
Leadership Excellence:
Insights from the Indian Ethos
Management Control
System
Management Of Self in
Organizations
I strongly recommend
the course “Management of Self in Organizations”. You will have the chance to
have one of the most awesome teachers in a super interesting course.
Travelling
There is so much
richness to the Indian culture that it is almost mandatory to visit every
state. Rajasthan is one of the most beautiful and interesting states. Naming
some of the cities in Rajasthan, there is Agra (where Taj Mahal is), Udaipur,
Jodhpur and Jaipur. Then you have the state of Kerala that you should
definitely travel to and try the Backwaters experience. Also Mumbai and the amazing
Goa are travel destinations.
The Himalayas trekking
is an awesome experience. Don’t climb too fast though, and be careful with the
altitude sickness!
In Thailand, you have
Koh Phi Phi (islands) that are so much fun. I had such a good time there and it
is sooo beautiful! Koh Phi Phi is the perfect scenario for diving, canoeing,
thai massages for 3€, and those idealistic movie late hour beach parties. If
you are looking for some paradisiac islands, some time to relax, a good
alternative is the Andaman Islands.
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By Paula Costa, Class of 2013/2014
Term Abroad - Fall 2013
