Aufwiedersehen!

I decide today to come out of my hibernation, it has been a while since I wrote any blog, or anything for that matter,  Not because my life had lost its natural humdrum, it was out of sheer laziness. Today I write about my years of work at the German Consulate with mixed feelings, I owe it a lot and even fill nostalgic about it but simultaneously I think it was about time to move on......

We need to go back in the past tense for a while:

Year 2002

I was leading a perfectly normal life, pursuing my post graduation in Jaipur, when the Future Tense of life started demanding some attention. I decided to take up a course in German language in New Delhi. What made me select German language as my first choice, I cannot still determine, it was perhaps just a whim of doing something. From this whim I was to start a stint with Germany and German which was going to change everything that I had so far expected from my future.

I was not particularly exceptional at the language but wasn't an embarrassment either, and so I completed 8 levels of the language. Simultaneously I had also started working at a Public School in New Delhi. I would like to mention here that I was however always attracted to the Shantipath, Diplomatic Enclave in New Delhi and always looked with envy at the cars that entered those big iron gates.

April 2006

 Life was slowly heading towards monotonous and may be the time had come to leave Delhi and look for other options. A good friend at the German class had recently joined Thomson Reuters in Bangalore. Being one of the herd mentality group I too decided that may be Bangalore is the place to be. After a few interviews I landed up with a job in Symphony Services, a market research company. Job wise it was not a great experience, but I made some great friends: Tilj, Priti and Survi to name a few. Priti and Survi later became my room mates too.

Tilj deserves some mention here. He was born and brought up in Germany and hence fluent in German, we became excellent friends. He too was totally and completely disinterested in the number crunching that we were doing and was looking for work options elsewhere: the German Consulate General in Chennai was one of them. The German Foreign Ministry had decided to open a Consulate General in Bangalore and had called Tilj for an informal talk. The new Consul General and Tilj shared an excellent rapport from the very first meeting and it was certain that he would leave the Symphony Services. He was kind enough to mention that there were two vacancies. I applied and was called for an interview on my birthday.

No readers not so easy, I didn't get the job just because I appeared at the interview ( I was however foolish enough to think that i might get it, this being my birthday and all that kind of superstition). Anyways I was rejected at the interview for reasons unknown to me. Tilj was obviously selected. I am a jealous person, and in this case my jealously and loss both knew no bounds. I cried and cried till the tears dried up and lamented the loss of the opportunity for a long time . Tilj joined the Consulate General, wrote me emails about the office, the BMWs and the luxuries he was enjoying. I accepted my fate and decided to look for other avenues.

Life at the German Consulate General: Since July 2007

The fortune lady decided to have some pity at last. The second post at the Consulate General had fallen vacant ( may be the girl resigned as I had cursed her so much). The Consul General had decided to convert the post to a more scientific cum administrtive one. I would have to thank Tilj a thousand times for this as he recommended my name to the Consul General for the post, who took a leap of faith and appointed me to the post of protocol officer on the 1st of July 2007.

From stammering in front of the first Consul General while speaking, to the handling of the delegations of the Defense Minister and the Foreign Minister, this mission brought me a long way in life. As a girl growing up in the small town of  Ajmer I had never thought that life would give me so many opportunities that are so different from what people in normal walk of life do. I have to thank a few superiors who showed tremendous faith in me and allowed me to work independently. I had never thought in life that I would get an opportunity to see a real Euro fighter majestically landing at the HAL airforce base, or I would get to see a real Antonov from inside or that i would moderate a show in front of a 1000 people crowd and all dignitaries.

I am at loss of words to explain the feeling when for the first time I entered the gates of German Embassy New Delhi in an "official vehicle".

Whenever I would go to Vidhana Soudha, Rajbhavan or the Chief Minister's residence or would be meeting the big names in the Industry in Bangalore, I would feel myself very proud and very lucky, after all how many people get this chance. For some it might just be nothing mention worthy or may be trivial but I simply loved this part of the job. I am indebted to  the present Consul General of the German Consulate who showed a generous faith in my ability to accomplish things. I am in gratitude for the exceptionally good work certificates that I got from the office and also from the organisations and people associated with the Consulate.

I had to take a decision to bid farewell to the Consulate General owing to some administrative issues there, I some how feel that it was about time too. These have been glorious five years and I thank every one for making them so.

Grüsse

suyasha