The Real Acknowledgements: From Eurotrip

As part of my academic program at the KEDGE Business School, Bordeaux, I completed a research project. Shadin was my project partner. We obviously wrote an acknowledgment, which was all nice words. But this is the one we really wanted to write. 

The Euro-trip would have been impossible without the help of lot many people. We would first like to thank them all. 

We are very thankful to Dr. Jan Schaaper for giving us a 1.5 credit course, without which we would have failed to complete our credit requirements and been unable to complete the degree and pay back the education loan taken from a public sector bank. We might have died as a bonded PO (Probationary Officer) with the public sector bank. We are also thankful to him for making classes humorous and fun and being satisfied with very pedestrian quality of work that we did while travelling around Europe. We are thankful to few of our French, American, Vietnamese, Chinese and Jamaican Indian friends who could take time out of their busy schedules to fill the really long 3-minute survey.

We would also like to thank the very beautiful exchange advisor Ms. Amandine Gherardi, who quickly solved all our problems with her amazing smiles. She made life and campus processes easier for us in France. May her tribe increase!

This trip would have been impossible without our safe and comfortable stay in France. We are indebted to all French dogs for not biting and barking at us when we were out late at night. We would also like to thank them for not pooping, puking and peeing in French trains. Otherwise, that, combined with SNCF strikes and cancelled trains, would have spoilt our Euro-trip.  Our Euro-trip was also facilitated by presence of Doner Kebabs in every nook and cranny of Europe (except Scandinavia). Their presence afforded us our only meal of the day several times. The station authorities in Germany, Italy and Switzerland were really nice. They did not close down the stations and allowed us to stay in warm waiting rooms, without which we might have suffered hypothermia. So we are thankful to them for that. We are thankful to the numerous cheap Chinese shops in Europeans markets, from which we bought all the cheap souvenirs for family and friends.

We are thankful to countless strangers who did their best to not photobomb us. We actually tried giving that moment a term, 'Tourist photobomb avoidance run’ (ToPAR). This would usually happen when we took pictures in busy public areas. The people on the both sides of the camera (left & right and not front & behind) would stop or quickly scurry across. We really think the pop-culture should come up with a better term than ToPAR. Humans deserve better. 

We are thankful to Pakistanis for meal discounts, friendly Italians for useful hat-tips about French, Dutch for Wi-Fi on trains, Germans for free beer glasses, Bordeaux Bus and Tram Service (TBC) for late night shuttles (sometimes I was the only passenger at the stop, apart from few prostitutes), Swiss for the hotel stay at Zurich, Croats for the most delicious pastries and the very helpful Belgians. We had a stereotype perception about Eastern Europe and the Czechs, Slovenians, Slovakians and the Hungarians proved all of them wrong. Each one of them was so beautiful and so different from each other. A great thanks to all the beautiful guides who gave us free city tours (You should really visit Bratislava).

Finally, we are thankful to Central Bank of India, Bangalore city branch for giving us the loan, Centrum card for quick money transfer at the best possible (to them) exchange rate, the travel company that provided us the EU Rail card and Aeroflot for ample luggage allowance. Last and the least we are also thankful to SEP office, PGP office and the hostel office at IIM Bangalore along with the dogs, cats, rats and the Bats at P-top in IIM Bangalore.