restless-in-paris

[restless-in-paris]

Jojoba in my hair

and other rituals for self-care…

One breezy morning, towards the end of my first month after moving back to Paris (September, 2019), I noticed that the dandruff in my hair was starting to get out of hand. My hair was severely dry and badly in need of some nourishment. Which is why, a certain Friday evening, I went to a store in Gare du Nord - the Indian/Sri Lankan neighbourhood of Paris - to look for some hair oil. I entered this particular store called VSCO Cash and carry - if I remember correctly. The store was full of people, full of familiar and not-so-familiar sounds, smells and skin tones. I spent some time just making my way through the crowded aisles just to get a gist of the place initially, before finally looking for what I actually came there to buy. In the second aisle, towards the corner, I finally found a shelf with a variety of hair oils. The regular ones - coconut and almond - as well as more exotic ones - tea tree oil, cactus and jojoba. I started doing a little pro/con, SWOT analysis in my head to decide which oil I should get and how much of it. I often go into deep pondering states like this while shopping, to be REALLY sure of my choice. Which is why I prefer to shop alone I guess. After much thought and deliberation (and some ad-hoc googling) to choose between the regular Parachute oil and a new, Vatika jojoba oil that I hadn’t seen before, I went with the latter. I bought two bottles of it. While at the cash counter, I made sure to follow my instilled french étiquette of wishing bonsoir and bonne soirée. All this while the khayali pulao in my head was seasoned with sounds and syllables from Marathi, Tamil and Mandarin by the other people waiting in the queue. I stepped out of the store, and took the metro back to place de la Nation.

That night, before going to sleep, I opened one of the small bottles of Jojoba oil to massage some of it into my hair and let it stay overnight. There was a sweet, rich smell that emanated from the chartreuse yellow liquid. I took some in my palm and rubbed it gently into my scalp and the roots of my hair. My roommate asked me what the smell was. He didn’t seem to particularly like it. There are some people in this world who have different tastes, and then there are some who don’t have any at all. I replied it was the oil, and he asked me to open the window to let the smell dissipate. I did so.

The next morning, I washed my hair with some egg shampoo, dried them and put some oil back again. It felt nice. It seemed as though my hair had been thirsty since a long time and that now their thirst was finally quenched. I stepped out into the Saturday morning air and walked towards the Carrefour store near my house. As the wind blew over my hair and by my face, I felt grateful for that moment. And for all the million moments of self-care, repair and reflection that living in this city allowed me.

After a week or so of applying the jojoba oil to my hair, my dandruff had virtually vanished! I was amazed at how effective it was. And that’s why to this day, every morning or night, I rub a little jojoba into my hair to keep them nourished and healthy.

Self care ritual #2 Cooking with love, eating with gratitude

In a couple of months, I have progressed enormously in terms of what I cook, and how much attention I pay to what I eat and how I make it. Being inspired from the international environment that I get to live in - whether it’s seeing a spanish girl using ‘Laurier’ leaves as a seasoning, or seeing my Czech friend Markéta make a zucchini tarte - I have started experimenting and creating recipes of my own, combining Indian cooking techniques (the little that I know thanks to my mother) with local ingredients that I find here. Last year I posted about my Poha made with hazelnuts. In this section I’ll take you through some of the other food I’ve been cooking for my meal prep routines.

#1 Pulao with laurier (bay laurel leaves) and échalotes (shallots)

This was a pulao that I made where I just replaced the onions with french shallots and bay leaves (tejpatta) with laurel. The result was this rich and flafourful rice with a beautiful harmony between hints of European and Indian tastes.

#2 Pâtes Gratinées (Gratin of pasta)

This was a gratin of pasta that I had made because I didn’t want to make regular, lazy student-pasta. Making a gratin is a rather french cooking technique in which you cover something with béchamel sauce and top it with a layer of cheese and then bake it. Undoubtedly, a gratin of anything becomes very filling and acquires a rich creamy texture (along with fats, but that’s okay as long as your portion sizes are humble). And this turned out to be a very successful experiment because this was literally the first time I was even using an oven. It tasted pretty good and the persil (parsley) added just the right kind of seasoning it needed. The next day when I made my boss taste it, he was visibly delighted as well and commended me on having upgraded my cooking to a new level. Ah the little joys of life.

#3 Tarte aux légumes du soleil (Tart with vegetables of the sun)

This one is partly a combination between a recipe I found on marmiton.org (a french recipe website), a recipe by my friend Markéta (from the foyer where I live) and my own taste. I made this quiche with a combination of vegetables known as ‘légumes du soleil’ (vegetables of the sun) for some reason. This includes zucchinis/courgettes, bell peppers, aubergines and tomatoes. It might be interesting to find out why it is called so. Perhaps because these vegetables are grown in sunnier parts of Europe? In any case, the resulting quiche again made for a nice, creamy and fairly healthy meal. My own twist on the recipe was to add oregano seasoning, mozzarella cheese and replace the aubergines with mushrooms.

Self care ritual #3 Mental and emotional self-care

When you move to a new place, no matter how much you love it and how eager you are to integrate yourself, there are some emotional and mental bumps that you need to take care of along the way. Currently I am working on creating mental and emotional self-care routines to deal with these. Different people have different coping mechanisms for managing their emotional and mental health. Some people meditate, others do drugs, alcohol or other substances, some people might binge-eat, indulge in social media, have boyfriends/girlfriends, exercise, or engage in a hobby and so on. This year, I have decided to engage in writing, exercise and introspective walks to create new self-care mechanisms for my emotional well-being. Along with talking to friends of course. Which goes a really long way.

One of the mental bumps I’m currently facing is dealing with the phenomenon known as french "humour". The french sense of humour seems to primarily rely on a sort of irony that’s always expressed with an extreme poker-face and is intertwined deeply with the language itself. This makes for some tricky situations at work with a colleague of mine who is particularly adept at this sort of humour and prides himself in it. The key difference between this kind of humour and the anglo-saxon and indian influences on my sense of humour is the almost complete lack of self-deprecation. Using techniques such as ‘second degré’ which is the french term for speaking ironically, french wit seems to consider itself as a sort of verbal jousting where the objective is to bring down the opponent with pointed and nonchalant sarcasm. Whereas a more Indian/American (?) approach would be to invite someone in ridiculing a third-element, a situation or a circumstance, instead of targeting one another. I’m not sure if describing this difference as the same as ‘laughing at someone’ vs ‘laughing with someone’ would be completely correct, but it does seem to be the case a lot of times. To illustrate with an example, say, you’re walking on a street with a friend and they accidentally step on some dog poop. Now, a typical french reaction to this incident would be to say ‘Oh no, watch out, I’m gonna start smelling irresistible now’. You see the kind of extreme lack of self-deprecation and an abundance of the opposite that I’m talking about? Following this, how you react to this phrase will be key in judging your ‘frenchness’ of sorts. And mind you, it’s all the more difficult to process sarcasm and absurdity when it’s in your second or third language. Maybe a decent reply, following the guidelines of french humour, would be to suggest to your friend to give away his bottle of Dior perfume to you since he doesn’t need it anymore?

Does this sort of explain the subtle, verbal back-and-forth that I’m talking about? Now the reasons why this is creating some mental hang-ups for me are: 1) Personality dissonance In English, I’m used to being fairly (somewhat?) quick-witted and funny. Or maybe I’m not. Who am I to judge? Anyhoo, my personality in french is yet to catch up to the one I have in English. Which makes for some dissonance and angst when I am not able to express or react as effortlessly as I would in English. But, at the end of the day, this is just a matter of time and patience I guess.

2) Integration Anxiety As a fresh, new immigrant (am I allowed to call myself that yet?), I am extremely eager to integrate myself culturally to the fullest. Which becomes kind of counterproductive because of the self-doubt that this eagerness creates. Counterproductive because, being french and being funny in french seems to be all about being EXTREMELY confident in oneself and bringing the other down with shade that would be considered dad jokes by anglo-saxon standards, but a heritage of Molière by french standards (which kind of makes sense given he’s considered the dad of the french language. Like father, like son). This sort of bring-the-other-person-down attitude doesn’t work too well with my kind of self-deprecating humour and also because I’m a nice person okay? who likes to laugh WITH others and not AT other people :p. Anyhow, the point is, I need to be patient and appreciate this attempt of understanding the french funny bone that I’m currently doing. Maybe my knowledge of shade-throwing, which I’ve been blessed with as a gay man might be of help? I just need to figure out how to translate this shade-sense into french. Another crucial thing I need to do is to believe in myself and my abilities, and NOT let this dissonance and anxiety affect my sense of self because you are worthwhile and adequate regardless of the language you speak, and just the way you are. I think I have reached a point in this article where my rambling has sort of stepped into the incoherent territory. So I’ll stop here for now. Sorry for the abrupt ending but don’t worry, there’s some more exciting writing planned for this page. Keep an eye out, my few dear readers and feel free to let me know if you have any ideas for what you would like to read about.

Until later!

AJT

[restless-in-paris]

Getting back to Paris: A how-to guide for Indian interns becoming Salariés

Hello dear readers!

It’s been more than a year since I last wrote on this blog. But finally, one of my most long-awaited dreams has come true. I HAVE FINALLY MOVED TO PARIS. This time, for an indefinite period. My friends and family know how eagerly, desperately and patiently (sometimes, not so patiently) I have waited for this. So here’s to another chapter of blogging, and a new chapter, heck, a new VOLUME of my life. But before we get into it, I’d like to take advantage of this blog post to briefly explain all the work that went into making this happen. I will try to keep this post detailed yet succinct (and hopefully avoid emotional outbursts on the way).

The objective of this post is to make life easier, for all the folks who might find themselves in a similar situation as me. The situation being - you are a student, just about to graduate, and you’ve been offered a job in France - so do you think you can be a salarié? If you’re in a similar situation, this is what it took to work it out.

Remember, this process is NOT for those who have done a masters in France - there are different steps that need to be followed for that, often shorter and slightly easier.

At the beginning of every step, I am also mentioning the month to give you an idea of how long every milestone in this process roughly takes. Also keep in mind, that all of this is from the perspective of the employee-to-be.  There might be steps that I might have not known about simply because it was my employer who took care of it. Having declared this disclaimer, here goes nothing.

Step 0: The proposal - July, 2018

So the first thing you need to have to move to France as a full time worker is, duh, a job offer. A lot of people get their jobs after completing their masters in France, and there are already a lot of resources explaining how that works, so I wouldn’t be getting into that. In my case, I was an Indian student, who was at the end of his Bachelors Program at NID, India and finishing up his graduation project internship at a French design studio. At the end of this internship, after a couple of conversations and discussions, I was offered a full-time job at the studio. I got an official mail from my boss, explaining the details of the offer. And boy, oh boy, was I excited. But hold on, this isn’t even the beginning.

Step 1: Hello Pôle emploi - September 2018

After I confirmed my acceptance of the offer to my studio, the first thing we had to do was - wait for it - put up the job offer on Pôle Emploi. This is the national governmental organisation that helps people find jobs in France. We learned that an internship (stagiaire) visa (the one that I was on during my internship) CAN NOT be directly converted into a SALARIÉ visa (the one you need to legally work in France). And thus began the process of getting a Salarié visa. The first step in this - to be done by the employer - is to put up an ad on pôle emploi with the exact same offer that has been proposed to the foreign employee. In my case, my employer prepared and put up this ad in September, 2018. This mandatory administrative step is to ensure that French employers give top priority to French nationals when looking to hire. Which makes sense, any country in the world would want that. Anyhoo. So, your employer has to prepare an ad for Pole Emploi and post it on their site. They might receive applications in response to this ad which they should be able to turn down - if they REALLY REALLY want you. This ad needs to be up on the Pole Emploi website for a certain period - 2-3 months as far as I remember.

Once the ad period is over, and your employer has not received or accepted any responses to the ad, you can move on to the next step.

Step 2: DIRECCTE, mon amour - December 2018/January 2019

Towards December, it was time to take the ad off the Pôle Emploi website and start preparing the application to the DIRECCTE - the French Labour authority. Using the Pole Emploi ad reference as proof, that they couldn’t find a suitable candidate in France, your employer now needs to prepare an application by including the following documents:

1. Pole Emploi Ad reference

2. The proposed work contract using this form - also available through the service-public.fr website : https://www.service-public.fr/professionnels-entreprises/vosdroits/F22782

https://www.formulaires.modernisation.gouv.fr/gf/cerfa_15187.do

3. Your CV

4. Proof of your educational qualifications - since I had not yet had my convocation ceremony, I did not have my actual, final degree. So we had to make do with a provisional certificate from my college instead - stating that I had completed all the requirements for my graduation and that I would be graduating in January 2019. As it turns out, this provisional certificate was enough proof.

5. Scanned copy of your Passport

6. Scanned copy of any previous French visas you may have had

With the above documents, your employer needs to prepare a dossier that is to be submitted to the concerned local department of DIRECCTE. In my case, this was DIRECCTE Île-de-France. The dossier was submitted to them on 15th January, 2019.

Step 3: Wait - January-May 2019

Once the dossier has been submitted to the DIRECCTE you need to wait. And just wait some more. The official minimum waiting period to receive a response from the DIRECCTE on your dossier is 2 months. But, life never plays out according to plan. During this waiting period, once the two months have passed and in case the DIRECCTE has not replied, it is HIGHLY recommended that the HR person in your company keeps checking up on the DIRECCTE via email, telephone, arranging an in-person rendez-vous, whatever means possible. French administration is notoriously slow and unresponsive and you/your employer need to be actively engaged and push them if you want to make this happen. In my case, the first time we heard back from the DIRECCTE after the submission of the dossier, and after several phone calls and email to the DIRECCTE, was in May, 2019.

The response we got was that, the application has been denied in its current state - because the candidate is overqualified for the remuneration being offered to him. Basically, this was DIRECCTE’s way of saying that, if you want this application to be accepted, you need to increase the salary you’re offering. I had a back-and-forth with my boss regarding this, and, thank the lord and bless my boss’s angelic soul, he was ready to rewrite the contract and increase the salary offered. And also, importantly, this delay in the process meant that we also had to shift the tentative starting date of the job. What was earlier scheduled to be in May, was now shifted to September. (BTW, if you’re very anxious and at the same point in the process, and want to find out the salary amount that finally got the application through, send me a DM, I’d be happy to help with that info)

Now that the contract was edited with the changed salary and starting date, it was time to submit it back to the DIRECCTE.

Step 4: Wait some more - May-June 2019

Now that the ball was back in the DIRECCTE’s court, it was time to wait again. And just in case you’re wondering, during this wait period, I had taken up a job at another company in India - because, well - you need money to live. You can’t just wait like a princess in a castle and do nothing until prince charming arrives. You gotta get up on the terrace of the castle and start a damn terrace garden to feed yourself honey.

Anyhoo, getting back to the process, the rewritten contract was submitted again to the DIRECCTE. We waited for 2 more months. My incredibly patient and highly dedicated studio manager kept sending mails and phone calls and even visiting DIRECCTE in person to make sure the dossier gets reviewed on time. And then finally, oh blessed be that day, my employer received a mail containing the cerfa_15187 form that was submitted earlier, STAMPED and SIGNED by the DIRECCTE official, declaring that the employer had obtained a permit to hire a non-european foreign employee for the period declared in the proposed work contract. Phew...

Step 5: Get your documents together - June-July 2019

Now that the DIRECCTE has granted the work permit to your employer, you can heave a huge sigh of relief. And once you’re done heaving, pull up your organisational socks cause now the administrative ball is in your (employee’s) court, baby :p

Following the reception of the granted work contract, my employer sent me a scanned copy of the same. At this point, the third french governmental organisation involved in this employment immigration juggernaut comes into play - the OFII. After the DIRECCTE acccepts the application and grants the employer a work permit, it forwards the dossier to the local OFII. The local OFII office verifies the dossier and once it is done, they forward it to the nearest French embassy/consulate in the country where the candidate resides. It takes about two-three weeks, between the reception of the work permit by the DIRECCTE to receiving another letter from the OFII stating that the dossier has been forwarded to the embassy/consulate. In my case, my employer got the DIRECCTE letter on 12th June, and the OFII letter on 11th July.

Oh, and of course, it goes without saying - your employer needs to keep politely bugging OFII and DIRECCTE via email - to make sure that the process keeps moving. A week after the reception of the DIRECCTE letter, my HR manager sent a mail to the OFII asking them about the status of the dossier and whether it had been forwarded to the Mumbai consulate or not. The next day she got a mail confirming that it had been forwarded to the Mumbai Consulate. Once your employer has received the OFII confirmation letter, ask them to send you a scanned copy of the following: 1) Autorisation de travail stamped by the DIRECCTE 2) Letter from the OFII confirming the forwarding of the autorisation de travail to the consulate in India 3) A promesse d’embauche including all the necessary details such as type of contract, your name, DOB, nationality, number of hours, remuneration proposed etc.

Step 6: VFS application - August 2019

Still with me? great. Now this is the final lap of the marathon, where you need to collect all the documents from your employer’s side, create some from your own, and submit everything in a neatly packaged application to the French consulate in your city in India via the VFS. These are the things you need to get in place to submit your Salarié visa application to the consulate in India: 1. Flight tickets to France 2. Accommodation Proof - a rental lease, attestation de logement at a student residence, etc. (for first 3 months at least) 3. Travel Health Insurance 4. Promesse d’embauche (from the employer) 5. Scanned copy of the DIRECCTE approved Autorisation de Travail (Cerfa 15187*02) 6. Scanned copy of the OFII letter received by your employer 7. Any last visas you have received for France 8. Your CV, copies of qualification proofs (Degrees, Diplomas etc.) 9. A covering letter explaining your reason, motif for the VISA application. 10. An active passport (duh), valid for the next year. 11. A printout of your visa application generated from France Visas portal 12. Two passport size photos as per EU visa photo requirements

Arranging all of this could take up to a couple of months, so submit your resignation papers to the company you’re currently working at (if that is the case) accordingly. And also take this into consideration while fixing your appointment on the VFS portal. Also, since you’ll be fililng out your visa application on the France Visas website portal, you’ll be needing some of the info from the documents mentioned above, such as the accommodation address details etc. So ideally, the best thing to do is:

1. Figure out accommodation as soon as your employer has received the autorisation du travail from the DIRECCTE 2. Ask your employer to send you scanned copies of the autorisation du travail, a promesse d’embauche (ask them to make one if they haven’t yet) 3. Start and submit your application on the France Visas portal once your accommodation is finalised, you can use details from this and your promesse d’embauche to fill out details regarding your address and means of sustenance in France. 4. Figure out all the other documents mentioned in the list above. 5. Once you have all the docs in place, you can take an appointment with the VFS to submit your application accordingly.

Step 7: Submit, wait, pray, get ready and pack your bags.

With all the documents mentioned above neatly arranged in a folder, turn up well in advance for your appointment at the VFS. Submit your documents, pay your application fee and make sure to take a receipt of the payment from them and keep it carefully. Also make sure you give them an active email address/phone number so that you can keep track of your application status. From the day of your application submission to the reception of your passport, it should take between 1-2 weeks. I submitted my application at the VFS Mumbai on 29th July and was granted the Visa on 5th August. _____________________________________________________________ In conclusion, these were all the steps and formalities I completed and the process I followed, to lead up to a successful visa application that was granted in the end. Granted it’s kind of an ambiguous process and there are so many factors to consider, and thus I cannot guarantee if the exact same process/documentation would apply in every case, but if your case is similar to mine, this is what it took. Although it was an enormous amount of admin effort, both on my company’s and my side, it was SOOOOOO worth it. Hopefully this is one of those rare boring, admin related blog posts I have to write, and I look forward to sharing some blissful, learning-filled and joyful moments from my new life here, in my soul city. À bientôt. :)

[restless-in-paris]

No nit-picking, only pique-nique-ing

Salut les copains!

Je suis back avec another article enfin. (Pardon my franglais, ze french language has wiggled its way into my head like that earworm you sometimes get with particular songs).

Anyhoo, today’s post is about a particularly Parisian ritual, the spring picnic! And boy, did I enjoy pique-niqueing by the Seine. It all started with getting everyone to meet at the same spot. Which was a real exercise in organisation, given that all of us were scattered across Paris, but we managed to co-ordinate and find each other without much trouble.

Here’s a view from the place we decided to meet up at. Captured thanks to my friend Pavlina’s curious eye (we met at the foyer where I’m currently living). There’s something very hypnotizing about the gentle waves of the Seine.

And here’s a little streetscape, filled with the lingering sound of the accordion. A city’s gotta live up to its image (read:clichés), you know?

And voilà voilà, after struggling to find a green spot by the river bank - which was natural given that it was spring plus good weather plus the weekend and thus it seemed that all of Paris had flocked to the river - we sat down and put together our little potluck. Which comprised of the following.

Salad Pasta, fresh tomatoes and cucumbers, bananas, boiled eggs, wine and cider, white chocolate, barbecue chips (not visible in the picture) and some bonsbons (sweets) in the form of the Schtroumpfs (smurfs) packet that you see.

And thus we began our pique-nique. Over the course of our evening by the Seine, the things we talked about ranged from EU politics, local politics, growing up and going to school in our respective countries, exams, and so on. By the end of it when we were a little tipsy, the topics became slightly less serious and more silly (and now, hard to remember as well, given my quasi-stupor). Here’s a little demonstration of a very important skill to have when you’re in Paris - how to open a bottle of wine.

- Step 1: get a bottle of wine. - Step 2: Find a tire-bouchon (corkscrew) - Step 3: If you don’t have one yourself, just walk up to one of the groups of young students such as yours, say bonjour, and ask them if you could borrow theirs. They will happily oblige and let you use theirs. - Step 4: give the tire-bouchon to an experienced friend (in my case, Jungmin) and see the magic happen before you try to figure how to do it yourself :)

And there we go, some beautiful red wine from Bordeaux, paired with a Parisian sunset and beautiful, glowing people.

Pavlina and Thomas in deep conversation about a certain je-ne-m’en-souviens-plus.

And here’s a picture of the beautiful impressionist sky on our way back to the foyer.

All in all, it was indeed a day well spent. And here’s the wonderful set of friends I’d like to thank for making this Picnic a success.

(L-R, Pavlina, Thomas, Jungmin, and some font nerd)

And that’s it for today. Until later, dear readers! Keep shining

[restless-in-paris]

Here’s some stuff to amuse your bouche - vol. 1

After having spent about one month in Paris I realised that at any given moment, an average Parisian always has one of the following three things in their mouth - a baguette, a cigarette, or another mouth ;) And admittedly, yours truly has had the fortune of having two of these things on a regular basis too. As for which two, let’s just say that I won’t be getting cancer anytime soon so yeah.

Anyhow, in this series of articles, I want to talk about the thing that we put in our mouth the most often - food. Being in Paris, I am lucky to get to taste some of the most wonderful viennoiserie (french term for all the different kinds of bread), wine and cheese. Possibly some of the best on the planet :p

But naturally, Paris being one of the most expensive cities on the planet, one has to learn how to survive by cooking their own food. On this note, let me serve you an appetizer of some of the food I keep making at my foyer  -

One of my very first attempts at cooking Masoor Bhat or Lentil rice as taught by my mother. My first few trials with rice ended up being a sort of sticky wallpaper paste. But it tasted kinda alright.

And my inexperience with cooking also meant that I had to face problems such as this one - sticky burnt rice at the bottom of the vessel. Ah this was a pain to scrub clean.

But soon enough, things started getting better. I started figuring out how things work while cooking - managing the utensils, creating a workflow, keeping ingredients ready, multi tasking. The above is an example of the Poha I make sometimes. Very easy to cook and it hits all right spots on your tongue. My new friend Thomas, who’s french btw, was an instant fan of Poha and even asked me to teach him the recipe :) I was very happy to share this tiny part of my culture with him. Once we even decided to do a dinner deal - I cooked Poha for both of us one night and the next night Thomas made this wonderful Zucchini-coconut milk curry with rice :

Chef Thomas Motti serving his hungry fans with some of the delicious curry. Miam!

And so to end this post on a yummy note,

Here’s one of my culinary successes - Rajma Chawal or Rice with red kidney beans. Ah, this was one of the meals I cooked that I was genuinely proud of. So proud, that I wished my mom was here in Paris to taste it. But it did happen after a lot of patience and practice naturally.

After practising how to cook rice a few times, I finally got the hang of how to make fluffy, warm rice whose grains are nicely cooked and separate. A huge improvement that’s wayyy far from the wallpaper spackle I used to make in the beginning. Some of my quick tips -

1. Soak and rinse the rice before cooking it AT LEAST three times. Make sure you run your fingers through the soaked rice to get off all the starch. And also, if you’re in Europe, check if the rice you’ve got can be directly cooked from the packet. There are some kinds of quick-to-cook basmati rice that can be directly cooked from its plastic pouch. Always read the instructions before cooking anything just to be sure you don’t waste your time doing something you don’t need to :P

2. When cooking regular rice and not the quick-to-cook one, add rice and water in almost equal proportions to your vessel. Remember, if there’s less water you can always add some. But if there’s more, it’s not possible to take it out. Often a higher water-to-rice ratio is what made my rice sticky.

3. When the water starts boiling, add a few drops of oil and stir. This tip is courtesy of my mom. She also says it makes the rice cook quicker.

With that, I’d like to end this edition of Amuse-bouche. 

See you next time and until then, Bon Appetit!

[restless-in-paris]

Graphéinomania

Bonjour everyone!

Today’s post is dedicated to my wonderful and amazing new friends, colleagues and graphic design gurus at the studio where I am currently interning - Graphéine. (Graphic + Caffeine, because here at grapheine we’re as addicted to graphic design as we are to our coffee :)

The quaint little sign on the door to the studio.

At Graphéine, it was the first time I was immersing myself in a completely francophone environment. Ah, language. The thing that unites people, divides people, confuses them, makes them question, makes them communicate. And it is again language that I’d like to blame, for not having the words to express my gratitude towards my colleagues and friends - Jérémie, Leslie, Philp, Manon and Maxime - for being so patient and encouraging with me. I had learned french for two years in high school, which was four years ago. This meant that initially, things were a little difficult in my life in Paris. I did take some time getting used to things, processing them, settling in a little and losing the fear to ASK when I did not know or understand. And it was with the help of the wonderful people at my studio that I realised how important it is to just ask. Without fear, without judgment and without the imaginary scenarios in your head of what might happen if you ask that question. Because, let’s admit it, we’re not telepaths yet. And as people who design visual communication, you need to communicate fearlessly with those around you. 

In any case, my french has improved tremendously thanks to all the graphéinomaniacs and their contagiously optimistic attitude. A few years ago, I never could have imagined, in my wildest dreams, that I would have the opportunity to work in France, in a francophone context, and get to be so deeply involved in the amazing projects here. If you think I’m using too many flattering adjectives to describe my experience here, even at the risk of sounding insincere, it’s because that’s the only way language allows me to even come close to describing my feelings during this experience in words.

This is one of the many manifestations of the Graphéine logo that can be found at the office. And trust me friends, this pill is highly addictive. You’ll always want more than the recommended dosage of good graphic design.

Happy moments - When your studio wins yet another pitch. Which tends to happen pretttty often at Graphéine. Featured in this particular celebration, some champagne and macarons and Jérémie (L), Leslie (Center), and Manon (R).

Lunch at the nearby Pizzeria. Featuring Leslie (L), Philip (R), and Ajitesh who’s trying to hide behind his smile all the embarassment and disappointment at failing to eat a pizza with a fork and knife :) But thankfully, the graphéinomaniacs are awesome and graceful enough to support me through my attempt and we all had a good laugh and sharing sesh at these tiny cultural shocks we all encounter.

A team that eats together, stays together :) This is the dining area on the mezzanine floor. There are two skylights that let in the beautiful Parisian sunlight (whenever it happens to be there). And the room has plenty of graphic design curiosities, memorabilia and knick knacks such as a super-sized delete button.

The studio space

Here are some images from a conference we attended organised by “Sensotalks”. This was where Mathias Rabiot, the other co-founder of Graphéine who heads the Lyon office gave talk about the studio’s approach to branding and visual identity. One lesson from his talk that really struck me and stayed with me was the motto “Décrire le donné, pointer le visé”. This literally translates to “Describe the given, point out the intended”. And what it actually means (as I figured later) is that while a brand’s visual identity should have a basis in the existing visual codes of the brand’s universe, it should also try to push promote new codes. Basically, learn the rules of the brand’s visual universe, use them cleverly in your identity and then bend them to establish your own new rules.

Every now and then, the postman drops by our studio with some sort of gift or graphic design paraphernalia. Such as this one:

This book is a compilation of posters paying homage to the typeface Helvetica on its 60th anniversary. Studios around the world were chosen to contribute to the collection and Graphéine was one of them. Here’s the poster they contributed for this tribute project:

A poster made of all the helvetica posters they could find. Notice how the little red Graphéine pill makes its appearance in the bottom-right corner. The versatility of this logo never ceases to amaze me.

Jérémie locking the studio after yet another fun and discovery-filled day. Can I just say how much I appreciate the french work culture and their attitude towards having a work-life balance? There’s a lot to be learned from Graphéine in this aspect too :D

Me posing on the studio’s stunning library of books filled with inspiring work, thoughts and ideas. Shall be writing a post dedicated to this soon.

And that’s it for today folks! Hope you enjoyed reading and thanks for making it to the end with your eyes wide open and awake :P And remember, there’s more to read where this came from. Stay tuned for a few more articles on the magic that happens at Graphéine.

Until next time. Bonne journée et au revoir.

[restless-in-paris]

A li’l Ghent, a li’l Bruges (but a whole lotta Lille) - Part 1

Hello to all my readers. Time flows in weird ways. And your percetion of it keeps changing depending on things like the weather, your state of mind, the people you’re with etc. Having said that, let’s go through the time I spent enjoying my first weekend trip, during my very first week, in Europe.

Me and my friend Srajan (who stays at the same residence as me) waiting for our bus outside the Bercy bus station.

The park outside Bercy bus station, morning, 7.30 a.m.

Soon, our bus arrived. We hopped on, and spent the first few minutes expressing our mutual appreciation for Flixbus. But seriously guys, contrary to all the warnings we heard from the people at our residence, flixbus isn’t that bad. We managed to find a charging point, no decent wifi tho, comfy seats, affordable ticket prices and a lively bunch of co-passengers (admittedly, some of them a little too lively though.)

Bus interiors, Duh.

A patch of woods waking up from winter that followed us as we headed to Ghent, Belgium.

Suburbia

And finally, after a journey lasting about 4 hours, we reached Ghent. (or GAND - as they call it in french. Pardon my french to all those who understand hindi ;)

I see posters, I click pictures - Life of a graphic design student. In the bottom right corner poster (IN DE BAN VAN DE TIJD) you can see an example of the very trendy web brutalism movement that is quite in vogue these days. Check out brutalistwebsites.com

And so we got down onto some deserted (by indian standards) bus station in the suburbs of Ghent. Which is funny, because Ghent is so small as a city that you can literally walk into it from the suburbs, no metro/trains/buses needed.

A street in Ghent on a pleasant, sunny day.

As we were walking through streets like the one above, both of us pleasantly kept wondering - Where are the humans?

"Bros, this is a legit ghost town where all the people just got taken away” - answered Mr. Abandoned Bicycle whom we crossed paths with on the way.

First panorama picture in Belgium! Human to boats ratio in the picture = 1:5

But soon enough, we finally reached the parts where we found evidence of life. Tourist life that is.

Our first meal in Belgium - belgian fries in an american-styled café

First belgian chocolate I ever tasted - Daskalidès

Nothing gets people to your restaurants like an actual illustrated sign.

The oyster is a symbol that is seen in a lot of places in European culture - paintings such as the birth of Venus, a lot of European heraldry, flags and as you can see here, in the streets.

We visited some really great monuments after reaching the city centre and our belgian breakfast consisting of fries, waffles and chocolates. We walked the entire day so there’s no guilt about that breakfast mes amis ;)

Gravensteen castle, Ghent. There is even a tiny moat around it. Much medieval, Such Disney.

Entering the castle.

One of the colourful glass windows - not stained glass exactly.

The medieval weapons museum inside the castle.

Now would you look at that engraving on that coat of armor. This guy was a real slayer (was that a pun right there?) an a e s t h e t i c slayer.

Seriously though, these guys loved decorating things. This was probably a container for wheat or a dagger, or something. Sorry I’m really bad at remembering these medieval museum things.

Speaking of slaying, here’s a colourful rainbow flag adding some fun to the gray castle. Now it has something more to be proud of. Everything’s better with a bit of rainbow in it :)

The view from the top - there’s gonna be more of these haha.

On the second/third floor of the castle, there’s also a section dedicated to medieval torture methods -

A wedgie - circa 1200 AD

An actual guillotine.

Branding tools. Sometimes I wish we could use these today to give ever-lasting brands and identities to our clients.

STAMPS!

A designer executing a logo and branding project for a client in the dark ages. Seems like a real success given the number of people around them.

Some more views from the castle -

After we were done with the castle, we stepped out into the streets and wandered in the true spirit and tradition of Eurotripping.

Graffiti for a cause.

Me signing a petition for a better, more humane solution to the refugee crisis in Europe.

Market Hall - by Marie-José Van Hee + Robbrecht & Daem

Market hall peeking at the end of an alley.

A local administrative building.

The next place we went to was the Belfry of Ghent. A belfry is basically this room at the top of a really tall tower that was a common feature in a lot of European cities. And inside every Bellfry is a set of huge - wait for it - Bells! That were rung whenever there was an emergency in the city.

Views from the Belfry. Trust me guys, the photos don’t do justice to it, the climb is totally worth it.

And then we climbed down (which is pretty tricky btw in these medieval towers that are narrowest at the top and wider at the base), and went for a boat-ride through the city canals. The ticket costs between 8-10 EUR. Make sure you ask for a student discount/under 26 discount to whichever tour, historical monument or museum you go to in Europe. In most cases, your visa will do as proof of student status, but it doesn’t hurt to get the ISIC student card :)

Srajan and I being tourists.

This city does have a lively graffiti culture.

And that is how we ended our day in Ghent. Soon it was evening, and it was time to head to our hotel. We booked it on booking.com for a reasonable price. It was located somewhere in the suburbs of Ghent, in an area known as Ghent-Expo. We thought it wouldn’t be that far and so armed with google maps, we started walking towards Ghent-Expo from Ghent city centre.

Which meant that again, we had to pass through territory that literally had no humans. Just cars. It wasn’t until 30 minutes into our walk that we saw two people.

Ajitation in his element.

And voilà! Finally, for walking continously for about 40-50 minutes, we reached our hotel Holiday Inn located in Ghent Expo. From the Ghent city centre, crossing over to the other side of Sint-Pieters-Station, over a bridge and finally in Ghent-Expo. If you guys are not so big on walking, you can also take the tram from anywhere in Ghent to Ghent-expo. A ticket should cost about 4-5 EUR max, and its free on all sundays.

Rejoicing at finally having found our hotel.

In the lap of luxury after a long day filled with walking, talking and being tourists.

With the warm shower, and the beautiful bathtub in our hotel room, there couldn’t have been a better way to end the day. Really comfy room at a decent price - around 35 EUR per person per night.

So that’s it for today. See you later in Part 2!

[restless-in-paris]

Ça y est = Sahi hai

“Ça y est” is a french expression which means “that’s it / you got it / that’s perfect”. “Sahi hai” is a hindi expression that also means kind of the same thing. And this expression was my continuous state of mind as I travelled to Paris for my internship and un unforgettable phase in my life.

Paris : Day 0

(Disclaimer : A blog being a more serious platform, the readers will get to read a very personal retelling of my experience. I will try to include the good, the bad and the ugly to the best of my abilities. While trying to keep it fun too. I have a feeling this blog will tend towards being kind of unfiltered and almost like me talking to you personally, as a friend, over a chai/coffee/vodka. So if you’re expecting a neatly curated, coherent, lonely planet travelogue, you might be in for a slight disappointment. If life isn’t linear, why should its retelling be so? Here we go. Allons-y!)

Waiting to board my first international flight ever. Paris written in devanagari reminded me of my aunt’s gift that you’ll read about in the following paragraph.

Ah. Paris. The city of lights. And museums. And artists. Baguettes, les grands places and love. There are as many clichés about the city as the number of cheese varieties in France.

As for me, I think some of you reading this already may or may not know this story, I’ve been a HUGE francophile since I was seven years old. Thanks to my aunt who gifted me a 70-page bilingual (english-marathi) guide to learning french. Ever since then, visiting and living in this city has been my biggest dream and now that I have the opportunity to live it, the word that comes closest to describing how I feel is : overwhelmed. Positively, of course.

After being in the air for 9 hours straight, snow covered Parisian suburbs signal the end of the flight and the beginning of a journey.

For most of my life, I’ve always seen double digit temperatures. So when the door opened, and I found myself breathing in the -7 degree celsius air as I landed, it almost felt like being on a new planet, not just a new country.

But from that moment itself, I felt a certain existential happiness. That feeling when you feel happy about just “being”.

The view from my hostel window in Paris. Oh la la, the french sure do love their windows.

After settling in, unpacking my bags to whatever extent I could, my first day in Paris was spent in relaxing and getting a Navigo mois card (for the Paris Metro, Bus and tram network managed by RATP, the Parisian public transport authority). I slept early that night, given the jet lag of course.

And I woke up early too. To this :

The first, and one of my several, “Paris, je t’aime” moments.

And so began my first morning in Paris…

Yours truly, Agité