SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to the Kapel Gupta Career Pod Show, your go-to destination for insightful interviews and invaluable advice on navigating the world of education and career development. And I'm your host, Kapel Gupta, and today we have a special guest joining us on the show, Tanmay Gupta, a bright student hailing from India, currently pursuing information engineering at the Technical University of Munich, popularly known as TUM, T-U-M Heilbronn. An aspiring study abroad students get ready to embark on an exciting journey filled with inspiration, tips, and firsthand experiences. And whether you're dreaming of pursuing higher education overseas or seeking guidance on navigating the complexities of studying abroad, this podcast is tailor-made for you. Join us as we delve into Tanme's fascinating journey of uncovering the challenges he faced, the lessons he learned, and the triumphs he celebrated along the way. From choosing the right university to adapting a new culture, Tanmeh's insights are sure to resonate with every aspiring student looking to broaden their horizons and pursue academic excellence beyond borders. So I believe you would love to sit back and relax to listen to this insightful and beautiful podcast. I'm on a mission to coach and mentor 100,000 high school students and help them realize the dream of studying in the best universities of the world and build happy careers for themselves. And so, without further ado, let's dive into today's conversation and embark on a transformative journey of study abroad experiences with Tanme Gupta. So let's welcome him.

SPEAKER_02 2:39

Hello, sir. How are you?

SPEAKER_00 2:41

Yeah. Hi Tanmeh. Hello, how are you?

SPEAKER_02 2:44

Good. Doing very well.

SPEAKER_00 2:46

So I'm looking forward to you know talking with you, interviewing you, and so that our students who are actually planning to you know go abroad, they can give first hand information, and of course, that can help them in their preparation. Right? So, yeah, how are you feeling?

SPEAKER_02 3:09

Uh a bit nervous, I'd say honestly, but yeah, let's go for it. Let's dive into the journey today.

SPEAKER_00 3:16

So, without wasting any more time, let me ask you the very first and the basic one, and I'm sure all our audience or listeners will be looking forward to it. That I want you to share your journey of preparing for studying abroad, and particularly your decision-making process and the steps you took to apply to Tom Heilbronn.

SPEAKER_02 3:43

Okay. So, uh as you just told me, uh told uh viewers that I'm a student in information engineering. So, first of all, what is my degree? It's basically 60% of computer science engineering. That's pretty general. Then it's 20% electrical engineering, and 20% is the management criteria of it. And you know that because it's computer science engineering, and okay, that's very normal that I come from PCM that we have in India. So my journey starts like every other Indian, uh, in like 11th or 12th. I was studying for my GE preparation just to go to IIT. Uh, in my 12th, uh, I could say unfortunately, I couldn't pass the criteria to be admitted into an IIT. But after my 12th examinations, basically, because I was the COVID batch, I couldn't give my final exams and then also like had pretty much breaks in my career at that point. So I thought, okay, not India. And we all know like how private colleges are there in India. Like, we think that okay, we are gonna give them 25-30 lakhs, and after that, there's no way, literally, the degrees of no use. So I thought that okay, let's go to some other country then. Is it possible? And because I also took the advice from you, you were there that okay, why not you go to Germany? Uh, I was also looking at other countries like America, Canada, Australia, for example, but unfortunately, America and Canada or Australia or any other country was way out of my budget. I thought, like, I have to pay them either get a call scholarship or I have to pay them crores of you know uh rupees in like student tuition fees. So then came the idea of Germany. And in Germany, uh, when I started to research about it, I saw that there we are required to give 13 years of education before we start our college degrees. So Germany has a uh thing for that as well. For the 13th year, you can come for basically a preparity year, and that's called student colleague. And in student colleague, you can do your 13th year, but for that you need German. Unfortunately, in after my the year after my 12th, when I started for the German prep, I couldn't get my German certification in time, and the deadlines were passed. I thought, like, uh, I'm gonna I have to have a gap year now. I have no other option. But then came the ray of light, and I got to know that there are English degrees as well in Germany. And I gave my IELTS exam, I got uh admitted to a university in India for the same. I started preparing for IELTS and for the like getting other uh things, certifications, getting my CV strong, my motivation later strong. So I started uh there were like seven, eight uh universities in which I applied, and one of them was Tom. I was quite happy about it, and they gave me an admit. So that's my journey till tom.

SPEAKER_00 6:50

Cool, cool. So finally you are sitting at Tom, right? Yeah, yes, great, great. So it was uh like a journey of mixed bags, but finally you were victorious that you are at the place you wanted to be. Okay. So now coming on to this, then because obviously there were some ups and downs, some hitches in your journey. So, what were some of the challenges you faced during the application process, and how did you overcome them?

SPEAKER_02 7:23

Okay, so uh some of the challenges in the application process were that this degree program is basically pretty new. Uh, Tum has is a very prestigious university, so I knew that it's not gonna be easy to get into into the university. And some of the problems were that as told that degree program is not new. I'm the second ever batch to be admitted into this univers in this degree program. So I didn't have a lot of alumni uh like who have uh started for this, and I didn't know that okay, is the degree program for me or not? So just to get the knowledge about it or getting some info, I started messaging uh whoever I could find at term. Like I just went to LinkedIn, found like people from term, term, term, term halbron, term halbron, and I started messaging them all. Like there are some other degree programs as well at this campus. I messaged everybody if I could get any info about this uh, you know, degree program, or how do I come here? What uh aspects should I focus on? Or some of the other things were like, is my CV strong or not? Like, what should I have in my CV? So I started doing a lot of courses just to show them that yeah, I am a student, that's good enough. I really wanna be inside this degree program. I basically deserve just to show them that yeah, I deserve. So I did some other courses as well along the line.

SPEAKER_00 8:49

Great, great. So Lingdam came to your rescue, yeah. And of course, some of the students uh who are already enrolled at Tum came to your help, right? Yes, they did guide you in this process. So we can say that uh all the aspiring students can make a note of it that there is all this is also one more way of getting to know about your course and your university, right?

SPEAKER_02 9:19

Okay, I I could say that there is no better way to know about your university or your course than asking the aluminius or the students who are actually going through the process. So, because I'm in my third semester, I'm finishing my third semester right now. So uh very often I get now like LinkedIn requests about students or like people reach me out on Instagram that okay, hi Thanmay, we are this and this, we want to come to your Germany, and like if how what's the way is the DD program literally good? How hard is it? So I guess it's the best way of getting uh information about your daily program, and if it's literally suits your ideology, you should come for it.

SPEAKER_00 10:01

Okay, so that's great news. And now as you have already reached here, right? So that I go to my third question that once you arrived in Germany, what were your initial impressions of the country and the university? Because I've seen that you know, parents back in India they have concerns regarding the safety, regarding the life, right? So, what were your first impressions about this country, Germany and your university?

SPEAKER_02 10:38

So I'll start from my time a little before I came to Germany. So uh I landed on the 29th of September, but uh like obviously I started uh looking for accommodation and all those things beforehand. So I had an accommodation in plan from initial first week of September. I had talked with the person, it was not a basically a sub uh like I was not getting rented out it, somebody else was uh the main tenant from the landlord, and then he was subletting it to me, so it was not the direct connection with the landlord, and I thought, okay, not a problem. It was good in money. I uh talked to some other students who are actually there. So some of my friends right now were in Germany, so they like pretty much told me, like, okay, it's not a scam. I also got a lot of scams at the in the like whole way, and four days before I flew uh for Germany, he came and told me, like, hey tan mess, sorry, I cannot give you the apartment. And I was like, Whoa, really? Four days before I come to Germany, I don't have an apartment now. So okay, so like okay, I said, okay, a new experience. Let's now uh like search for new apartments. I started messaging the building manager. Like, I'm in living in a student uh apartment right now. So the building manager started messaging uh like emailing her with SOS urgency, this and that. Like I created a whole chain of emails, like ma'am, please help me. I don't have an apartment. I'm literally on the streets for that. And because okay, still like before coming to Germany, I still had no apartments, so I booked an Airbnb for two nights. So also my flight was actually landing on evening of 29th, so I knew that okay, uh, I have I would I will be lead re uh reaching Heilbronn at like 12:30 in the night. So obviously, I wouldn't I need some place to rest for the night. Obviously, I need a roof over my head, so I booked a near BNB for two nights, and I thought, okay, I have some leads. So on the uh like another like the later day, I will actually go through Halbronn and to all the places and ask them literally go to the door and say, please, I need an apartment. Can you please send it out to me? And uh that was the uh thing, but when I reached like uh Frankfurt, so my flight landed on Frankfurt, uh it was a whole new experience, like so many people, and also also one uh humorous thing before coming to Germany. Uh, I told everyone that I'm not gonna come back before three years, so before uh completing my degree, and you know, the moment I stepped on the plane, not it has not even moved. The moment I stepped on the plane, I was like, Yar India up is honey, let's come back to India. Like, Germany is not good. Like then, my plane was not like didn't even move, and I was like, Germany is not good, India is good, let's come back to India, and okay, obviously, that was not the good thoughts to be have, and I reached Frankfurt, a whole new experience seeing so many people, and like, yeah, let's okay. I got my baggage and all the stuff. I had like 69 kilos were the allowed limit of it 69 plus seven. Uh, I had around 90 kilos with me, and I had to change the train twice to reach Harboron from Frankfurt. So I went there, did all the stuff. First, I did a reshuffling so that I have like less number of bags. So my bags got a bit heavier, but less number of bags is easier to handle. So I did some reshuffling, resettling. Uh, reached Harboron, and it was like 12 in the 12, 12:30 in the night, and I booked a cab. The first view of Halbron is was actually very nice for me. It's a new life that I was gonna start, and I was like, okay, let's be a bit happy about it. I saw my cab driver, he took me to the place, and the first thought um I had when I reached my Airbnb was like, I'm scammed now. I have been scammed. So the thing was that my the place where my Airbnb was, the apartment, it's settled in a place that you wouldn't be able to uh see the uh the building or the apartment from the street. You have to literally go in front of the apartment to actually see it. It was a pit back, it's not even the line. So I thought I'm scammed at 12:30 in the night, and I'm thinking, like, bro, you got scammed. You have to spend the night on the streets. I went there, hopefully, I saw the place. Not not a scam, all cooled. Uh, there was a key lying in the under the mat. For me, obviously, I wouldn't ask the host to be awake till one in the night. So uh the key was there. Second thing in the thing, I have 90 kilos, and my apartment is on the attic. So basically, we have first floor, second floor, attic. I have to climb three floors with like a lot of luggage. Like, oh man, let's do it. I had one then night, okay. Went there the following day. I messaged my Airbnb host, like, hey man, can I meet you? So, yeah, he was like, Yeah, he's a family man basically. His wife left for her like work, he was in the apartment, uh, like his house. He has a very small, like, cute daughter, four years old. Like, she's just uh turned four last year, and like I uh met him and I was like, Hey, I I want to ask you some things. Can I get a bicycle uh for rent for the day? And can I get a mattress and like table for rent here? I don't want to buy them, can I rent them? Reason was that I wanted uh I actually got an unfurnished apartment for rent, but I still had to go there and talk to him, uh, like talk to the landlord about it. And he was like, uh, I don't know about the mattress, but you can take my bike for the day. No problem. And I was like, very happy, okay. Hey, he's giving me his bike, that's cool. He was like, Okay, I'll uh fill up the tires, like do the pressure and all those stuff, air pressure ride, and then you can come down, take the bike whenever you're ready, and it's cool, no problem. I was very happy. Uh, had Google in my phone, so did that. Uh, went to uh like travel the whole city with the bike the first day in Germany and I'm uh cycling. So went to the apartment. I had four leads, three of them were in the single uh building. I went there, I asked the person, Hey, I am coming for a rent. Uh the guy comes and from the back I can hear his wife talking, hey, we don't need a rent in the apartment. Not a good experience. In short, I'm not gonna get that apartment. All the three were his, and he doesn't his wife doesn't want any tenant. So, okay. Uh from four uh three hours of no avail. I went to the fourth apartment and I had a talk with him. The landlord was not there, but her brother was there, so he showed me the apartment and everything's alright. He's like, Okay, I have to leave, so you can talk to uh talk to my sister about it. And near that apartment is basically the student apartments that uh where I actually live right now, and there was the friend I had before, and I went to him and just you know had a talk with him. So, like, how are you? and it's my first uh meet with my new friends, and you know his name is Meet. So, first meet with Meet. So, yeah, uh he and his friend were there, uh, two great chaps. I went there and was just talking to my old landlord about this. That okay, uh, I'm getting this apartment only for four months. Um, it's not complete like a six-month contract, not even a whole semester. It's unfurnished. I have to spend a lot of money to furnish it, a lot of uh costs are there, and I was just bargaining. Can you please decrease that induct this? I have to do this and that, buy this and that, I have to spend so much money, and she agrees upon it. And I just go back, I was still at the student apartments. I go back to uh Meet's room, and his friends uh like standing outside in and I asked him, like, where's the building manager? And he's like, You want to meet the building manager? I'm like, Yeah, she's standing right here. I was like, Okay, that's cool. I just went to the building manager and she's like, Are you tan me? Like, yeah. Oh, I mailed you at 10 in 10 in the morning. You have an apartment right now. It was at uh noon, 12. So, like, really, you have mailed me. And I saw uh, like I was traveling the whole day, uh, so I couldn't check my mail, but she mailed me that morning that okay, we have we just got a cancellation. If you want, the apartment's yours. So 29th, I arrived in Germany, the day is 30th, and on the mail it's written that uh you can get the apartment on 4th October, not before that, but because I'm in front of her on 30th September, she's like, Why don't you get the apartment on 1st of October? You get the uh key and everything's today, right now. If you do everything, you will get the key right now. So, to my luck, I get the key before 4th. On 1st of October, I was inside my apartment, and that's my first experience in Germany the first day.

SPEAKER_00 19:43

Okay, okay, so that was real, real roller coaster. Yeah, right. So I believe that luck was on your side, right? And your Airbnb host was very generous, very kind because lending his things to a total stranger was really you know very nice of him. And then, of course, uh you were lucky to get the student apartment because that lady you just mentioned, right? She was really kind enough to help you out in your times of distress. So I would say that your uh can we say the first impression that you can make of Germany that people were really kind to you, yeah, right? And they were supporting you even though you were meeting them for the very first time. So we can say that the life back in India and in Germany is totally different, right? Yeah, there are huge differences, and many people who have not gone abroad, whatever the impressions they have is all from hearsay, right? So if I ask you, how did you adjust to that life in a for foreign land? Because both academically, because the education system is different, the style of teaching is different, and of course, culturally, because culturally is also it's quite quite different from ours. So, how did you go about doing that?

SPEAKER_02 21:34

Okay, so first I'll go to culturally. So, when you basically listen about Germany, a huge stereotype comes that Germans are rude. Uh, my experience was quite opposite to that. It wasn't that uh when I reached Germany, as I told, I have 90 kilos, like more than 90 kilos of stuff with me, and I had to change, I had to travel through train with all the stuff. Throughout the way, whoever I could find, like German, non-German, I also found a person from a British basically, a German, non-German, Thomas. Uh, basically, my Airbnb was he's a German, my building manager, she's a she's a German. All these guys were very, very sweet to me. Nobody has been rude. Uh, I've been here since more than one and a half years. Uh, in the whole one and a half years, I could only find once the a person was who was rude or like not good with me. I wouldn't say rude, but yeah, not to my liking. Other than that, everybody has been very nice.

SPEAKER_00 22:38

You had that experience uh when you, you know, by mistake went on to Autobahn, and you got a help from the authorities also, from that lady also who helped you. Can you just uh you know, because that is that is the experience we would love to hear because how people behave uh with strangers there.

SPEAKER_02 23:00

So, one thing about German Autobahn, Autobahn is basically the highways. One thing about German Autobahn, there's no speed limit, you can go crazy with your cars. And I'm also doing an internship in Germany. So I had I was leaving my office building and I wanted to go to my gym. And from that, which was my first time, I was on a bike, and the Google in the Google uh maps in my phone is very bad. My phone could never actually accustom to Google. So sorry. So I basically went on the wrong way, and I took the road that was leading uh to the German Autobahn. Uh, the cars on the Autobahn is 150, 160. That's the minimum, like they are they go on that way, and there's no uh speed limit, so they will go till 300 and something like that. So I don't know, me, I clumsy me or whatever. I didn't understand till I was literally uh very far from the road from which I from the point I actually entered the place, and a lady actually saw me and uh she slowed down her car, deliberately went below the minimum speed limit. Uh, she told me that, hey man, you're on the wrong way. Please go back. It's leading to the actual Autobahn. Uh, you won't survive. It's not right, it's not legal or anything. I understood her, and I was pretty much in a place that I cannot go back. I there's no like sidewalk, no pavement, nothing. So you can, it's completely whole highway road. You cannot go back. And I just stood there. I waited for like 15-20 minutes, and I saw a police car came in here. She uh police car basically came and they were like, Hey man, what are you doing? They scolded me a bit, told me like asked all my IDs and all those things. I told them, okay, sorry. I even showed them that Google is actually telling me to go through this. I have the bike set it up, but it's Google's fault. I'm really sorry. It also my fault that I came here and I didn't look at the street signs. They told me they called a van, uh, like they put my bike in the van. They I sat in the police car. So in Germany, I actually have sat in a police car. Not a thing to be proud of, but uh some adventure, you know. Uh, so they made me, so we basically we left the autobahn, and whenever when I was like they left me at a safe place, I can actually uh ride my bike and actually go in the right direction. So they were pretty good. They did scold me a bit, and I did do something that was not right, but the way they handled the situation was actually very nice. I didn't feel uh violated or anything like that. I didn't feel like I'm gonna die or like it's gonna something big when something's very bad is gonna happen with me. They were very sweet, very nice. And not only that, uh in Germany you need German, right? So wherever you go, you need to speak German. I do speak a little bit, so I am professionally limited professional keep uh profession, as you can say, I'm not complete fluent in it, but still, whenever you go in a uh supermarket or any other place, and you cannot actually understand whatever what the other person is saying. Also, like the English, uh sorry, the German we learn in India uh is uh of the North Germany, and obviously, when you learn a language, there comes a dialect. The dialect in my side of the region is pretty different from the one that I've uh like learned. So the initial part, the initial uh time in Germany was pretty hard for me to understand the German in India. It was easily, but here the dialect has changed. Also, in my internship, I have the problem. But people were very helpful to me uh when they understood that okay, this guy is not able to understand, he can speak, but he's not able to understand, so they like do a little bit slowly. Hey, no problem. You want to like see that? Show me what you want to like find, or something like that. They were very slow, like adjusting to my speed, and that's something that I loved here.

SPEAKER_00 27:00

Okay, so that's really that's really really cool because yeah, your experiences are really good, and I'm sure that listening to you, most of the concerns of the parents as well as students will vanish, and they understand that let us not believe on hearsay, but have that beautiful experience because Germany is a beautiful country, right? And they are helping students to you know educate on scholarships, etc. So it's all together a good experience, right? Yeah, can can we say that? Yeah, we can actually we can because see uh what I hear from you, you have good experiences in the form of uh Mr. Thomas, as you mentioned, your Airbnb owner, then your student department director, even the cops, they were helping you. They actually you know helped you, they you know uh carried your bicycle, etc. And it uh left you at a safe place, right? And of course, so I'm sure sure it's uh good cultural learning for you, also, right? Yes, and now after that, let's come back to your university, your engineering program, right? So, how do you find the education system different from what you saw in India?

SPEAKER_02 28:31

Okay, so coming back to the university part, uh, my university um considerably is uh a theoretical university. So there are two types applied you know applied studies, and mine's a bit more theoretical. So whenever uh when it comes to uh studying, it's a bit on the harder side. So students actually find it quite hard to go through the subject that we have or just to go through the material that we have. This uh the study here, even though it's quite theoretical, the practical stuff you uh study here are in tied uh with the industry requirements. For example, uh the internship I just mentioned mentioned. Uh my internship, all the stuff that uh that's required in my internship, I learned here. So I'm a Java developer, backend Java developer in my internship. And before coming to Germany, I didn't even know the J of Java. I was a Python guy, I didn't knew programming, but I was a Python person, not a Java. I uh came here, studied Java, practiced it a bit, and then gave I went to the internship people with the company. There are many ways to actually work here. You could do odd jobs like delivery guy and all those things. Um, my inclination was towards a company job uh so that I could actually understand how the industry works, how actually how everything works. So that was my uh inclination. So I went through that and it literally worked out. Also, for like some differences that we have in Germany versus in India. In Germany, uh it's uh like quite uh strict when it comes to um cheating. And but if you actually get charged with uh cheating in Germany, uh they you get the U on your uh unterschließe on your transcript, and if you get the this thing, cheating once again, or you fail the subject once again, you won't be able to study the subject in the whole of Germany. So it's quite uh yeah, it's quite strict here. So you have to follow the rules. The rules in Germany are quite strict, but the university does a lot when it comes to your personal development. So every second week, you could say that uh we have events uh happening in the university for just socializing and this and that, so you could actually help your personal development a lot. That's what high I basically uh deferred when I uh came from India. Uh I couldn't say I don't I won't say that I'm I was introvert in India, but I didn't talk to a lot of people or I wasn't that social. After I came to Germany, I'm meeting VPs or like CEOs of big companies. That's something that Tom has to offer because it's basically the best university in Germany. So you could say that the opportunities that they offer you are world-class. I literally, uh one uh one story. Uh in the second semester, I took a subject and it was like in the evening or like afternoon, you could say the subject was there, and it was a three-hour long lecture, so we knew okay, there is probably gonna be a break after like one hour, one and a half hours, break of 20 minutes, something like that, just to you know, straighten your back, have some drinks and all the stuff. So I was just I with my friend, I was there outside the university building. I was just walking, uh, you know, getting some steps done. So we saw an event uh from across the building. There was an event happening from one of the biggest universities uh like companies in Germany, and a lady approached us and was like, uh, it's about uh the company name is Stack IT, it's all about cloud uh and all this cloud development it stuff, I suppose from the name. She came to me and my friend, and and she's like, Do you wanna take part in the this thing? I was like, Why not? First, what's this about? It's about Kubernetes and Docker and containers, and it's all about cloud and all the stuff. She was like, Do you want to come inside? I was like, Yeah, why not? We went inside there, it was like a 45-hour sorry, 45-minute long presentation, a workshop. After the event, there were some foods and free rings, and just talking to other people, I didn't know with whom I'm talking. So basically, I was talking to the VP of Stack IT. And all the board members of Schwarzgroup, the be the governing uh paid company or Schwarz IT, all the board members were present there, and the people with whom I was talking were the board members of Schwarz Group, one of the biggest companies in Germany. And I was like, okay, I was taken aback and I was like, okay, these guys are not joking, they are some big guys. So, you know, this just I never thought of meeting the board members, or like, okay, I came for my lecture. I skipped my lecture, I came to a workshop, and now I'm standing and talking to the board members of Shuas IT. That's that's the kind of uh opportunities you can get. You just talk to the highest management. Right, right.

SPEAKER_00 33:39

And if I ask you uh that what kind of support services are available uh which can help the students to navigate their academic journey? Because many a time that like uh back in India, we can say that we can go for some additional tuition, uh, ask help take help from tutors, but now all the way to Germany, you know, to a far-off land, how do you uh get support if suppose you need some additional help?

SPEAKER_02 34:14

Okay, so this is uh a place where I am actually happy about my Indian lineage. So, in even though my studies in Germany are pretty different from the ones in India, uh, in a lot of aspects, uh, whether preparing for my exam or studying more about the subject, I use Indian YouTubers, the Indian teachers who are on YouTube, and their material works very, very well. But if uh there's something that okay, in Germany there's one more thing. Apart from the lectures that the professor is gonna give, there's gonna be um exercise sessions. And the tutors in those exercise sessions are your seniors, and obviously you will have good uh relations with your seniors, it's like your buddy, you know, you will have everyday talks with them. So your tutors are your seniors, and if you have any problem that I've seen, if you have any problem, you can talk to them on WhatsApp or Discord, and they are reachable at 24-7 because they are like, okay, yeah, we we are your friends. Apart from the classroom, we are your friends as well.

SPEAKER_00 35:18

So we can say we can say that in this way the uh university supports social interaction also among the students. Yes, actually.

SPEAKER_02 35:26

So apart from this, uh this actually university is very well accustomed to helping you out, even though um, okay, if there's something that you can the tutor cannot solve, you can simply write an email to the professor, and I'm pretty sure in the next lecture or from the reply to the uh this uh the email, the professor will teach you or explain you the topic very well. Sometimes the professor actually stays for a bit more time, or prof like offers extra uh time for you or the students. So one time um I remember in the first semester, uh we had a subject called discrete mathematics, and there's a topic that uh nobody in the class actually could understand. Neither the tutors were able to teach us that very well. Uh, some of us we wrote a uh mail to the professor, and he actually gave us extra uh consultation hours just so that we understand that very well, and that's something I love about uh German professors or like universities in Germany, they go that extra mile so that you understand stuff.

SPEAKER_00 36:31

Yeah, that's good, that's good. And now coming back to uh for more concern, how to you know actually uh adapt to the cultural differences. So, how did you uh basically adapt to that? How did you face that?

SPEAKER_02 36:50

Uh for me there were okay, obviously, uh there were many, many cultural differences, and I could say here as well, the university plays a role. Um so very now and then uh there are events in Germany as well, traditions or carnivals. The university, there's a there's a thing called uh service point newsletter. So every month we get a newsletter from the university, therein there are some of the best uh things that are happening in Helbron. Uh or you go to the student services, it's a service point that as we uh call them, and if you have any problem, you can talk to them. You don't have the apartment, your movement is problematic. You don't you have a problem in the university, they are there for everything that you need. Uh, I had some problems with the taxation, they helped me in that as well. And apart from that, I could say that be open. Uh, just like when uh a foreigner visits India, we do the extra work to make them feel like home. Just like that, uh for Germans or any other person also works like that, but you have to be open as well. If you have the mental block that okay, Germans are rude, then there's no way the mental block is gonna go, even if every German behaves very well with you. And there's also one more point that uh try to be more social. If you uh something that kicks in Germany a lot is loneliness. Once you it takes a lot of gas to actually leave your home, your friends, your family, your country to come to a new country with no friends, nothing, no family. And because of the time difference as well, sometimes it's actually very hard to call, or like your family is not free, or there's something or the other, your friends are not free, they also have their own life. So be open to talking to new people. There's something called ask for help. So fun of some like some of my friends actually faced quite, they were very lonely. In the initial one one month, I was also very lonely. I was like crying all the time. Like, why do I have to come here? I'm gonna go back to India, I didn't like Germany, and also like uh as uh like as close as you come to the winters. In the winters, it's like at 9 a.m. The sun is gonna come out at 4:30 or 4, it's gonna be pitch black. So that hits you a lot. There's a term called winter depression in there, although it's not actual depression, but it all it makes you feel like very bad. So I could say that ask for help, talk to other people, meet uh other people, and the more you socialize, the easier it is to live in Germany, or for that matter, any other country, I could say.

SPEAKER_00 39:41

And if we want to discuss any extracurricular activities or student organizations you are involved in, and how did they enrich your experience in Germany?

SPEAKER_02 39:55

So basically, I'm so fortunately, I'm also part of the student council in Germany, in Tum, basically. Okay, so uh I'm one of the persons who actually does all the stuff or makes the life of other students easier. Okay, so uh we have a lot of student clubs in Germany. Also, also for Tum, we have a lot of those. Uh recently, we also started some soccer clubs, I call them football clubs. I'm from India. There's a difference from football, football is played from the food, it's not American. So, yeah, that's just uh the humorous part of it. But okay, we call it the soccer club, still American. Uh, and like every Tuesday, uh, it's not uh organized by me, it's one of my friends who does that. And every Wednesday, uh sorry, every Tuesday, uh, there's like multiple teams that uh are formed. There's a tournament inside the university building. We have pool table, so you can play pool. Uh in some one other building, uh, a new foosball table is gonna be uh set up, so you're gonna play that, and we have debate clubs, this and that. We also have the dragon boat if you know that. So uh you can enroll yourself in dragon boat uh racing as well. And there's a whole team that we have at Tum. So you can actually play officially from Tum and compete with other universities or just your peers. And okay, some other things, you know, uh feel-good activities in Helbron. There are many, honestly. Uh ice hockey or like you know, ice skating, we have polo. Uh in India, you used to do shooting range, like the shooting uh you have. Uh, we also have that, but also although you have to travel a bit because uh that's a bit outside the city, so you have to travel a bit, but you can go for that as well, bowling and all the stuff. So uh for extracurricular activities, there are plenty of them. Like you just name it, and we have that.

SPEAKER_00 41:50

Um, would you like to tell us something about Helbronn, the city itself?

SPEAKER_02 41:55

Oh, yeah. So basically, uh, as it said, it's the city of Wine. Okay. Uh yeah. It's uh it's basically a very small city as compared because I come from Delhi, so it's a pretty small city compared to Delhi. It only has like a hundred uh hundred, a hundred and twenty thousand inhabitants, so not a lot, and it's pretty easy to you know travel from one place to another with your bike. It's very easy. You can easily travel. There's a very, very beautiful river called Neckar here. You just you know, in summers, the whole view gets changed around the the the riverside, there are people enjoying all the time. You can take yacht parties or you know, just go to boats, you can go boating and all those things. And as I was telling, it's the it's a city of wine. So basically, Halbron is covered with uh vineyards, a lot of those. We also did a uh an excursion to one of the vineyards uh from Tom. So Tom organize the excursion. We went there, uh, tasted the grapes, uh, how the wine is made, did the whole thing, and was actually very nice. So one thing uh like whenever I go to India, I actually take a bottle of wine with me to just to show them okay, this is wine, and also Thomas is Heilbronna, as we say, from Heilbrona of Heilbronn, so it's Heilbrona, so he also teaches me a lot about it. It's a pretty good city.

SPEAKER_00 43:22

So, okay, so Thomas's family is a family at home there, right? Uh I literally call them my second family, actually. Yeah, the second family. And I believe uh much of the credit goes to him and his family that you are having a happy time uh in Germany, right? And you look a happy student also. So now uh if uh we look back, what advice would you give to Indian students who are considering study abroad and particularly at Tom Hellbron?

SPEAKER_02 43:57

Okay, so my advice to Indian students. Coming outside India, like coming abroad, or Toto Malbronn. So, my first thing that even I faced was everybody studies a lot. They only focus only on the marks. Marks are not the only thing that you need. Character building is very important. So, okay, Germany is the place, or okay, Tom Heilbronn, I could say Tum offers a lot of opportunities of meeting new people, socializing. Or like I just told you, I met the higher manager, highest management of a very big company in Germany. So if you're gonna talk to them, you know how you actually have to behave. If you're gonna be around here, you actually have to know how to dress properly, how to talk properly, how to behave, you know, just to in a uh uh cut short manner, you have to groom yourself very well. And that is how uh I could say that that's what Tom actually taught me a lot. Along with my studies, along with my academic part, I've changed a lot in my personality part. I could I I wouldn't say that I wasn't an extrovert or like I wasn't that social in India, but still, after coming to Germany, the way I have started uh talking to other people has changed in a very huge manner. And I could say that okay, if you do some some of the stuff, if you do that in India, it's gonna be easy for you. And the whole process is to make it easier for you. And yeah, other than that, I could say, okay, Tum is a very hard university to go through. Yeah, you you are in the best university of German, it's not gonna be easy. Yeah, that's pretty much true. Yeah. So my only thing would be like if you know what you're gonna study, if you have this name of the subject, study a little bit before the hand, like the Java thing that I had in the first semester. Like, really, anybody is able to uh score good or like even past the subject, because from one week to another, it like shoots like a J curve. That is like difficulty like goes like this, and it's pretty much normal with every other degree program is built. And there's no nothing bad about it, it's just that you are in you are in on a such high scale, you have to be like that. If you are in IT, what do you think? Like it's gonna be easy now. So that's one thing that I took like learn took a learning after I come I came here. Okay, so yeah, took a well groom well, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:29

Right, right. And I'm sure you feel lucky, you know, uh, and very empowered to be studying in such a beautiful and such a great university, right? And that brings us to the end of another enriching episode of the Kapel Gupta Career Pod Show. And I hope you found today's conversation with Thanmay Gupta both enlightening and inspiring. And thank you, Thanme, for being here, for sharing such valuable information with us, and I'm sure our audience, our listeners will be able to, you know, take note of it. And many of their concerns would have been you know resolved by this. And I'll definitely request if uh anybody has any questions, please do write them in the comments, and both of us uh will be you know very welcoming them and answering them in due course. So thank you, Thanme, for being here. Thank you. As you embark on your own study abroad journey, remember that every challenge is an opportunity for growth and every setback is a stepping stone towards success. And whether you're preparing for entrance exams, crafting your application essays, or simply dreaming of studying abroad, remember to stay focused, stay motivated, and never lose sight of your goals. With dedication, perseverance, and the right support system, you can overcome any obstacle and turn your study abroad dreams into reality. And as always, I encourage you to keep exploring, keep learning, and keep striving for excellence in everything you do. And remember, the Kapal Gupta Career Pod Show is here to support you every step of the way. So until next time, this is Kapil Gupta signing off. Stay curious, stay ambitious, and never stop pursing your dreams. Goodbye for now!