After my bachelor's in Electronics and Communication Engineering from VIT Vellore in 2008, and two years of work experience in a Salesforce.com Partner Company in Chennai, I applied for the Erasmus Mundus International Master in Service Engineering Programme, also known as the IMSE.
(See: http://www.erasmusmundus-imse.eu) The Erasmus Mundus Programme is a co-operation and mobility programme in the field of higher education which aims to enhance quality in European higher education and to promote inter-cultural understanding through cooperation with third countries.
On completion of all the application and visa procedures, I landed in Stuttgart, Germany on September 1, 2010.
Since then my life has been nothing but “better than the best” in all aspects. Universität Stuttgart provides a very friendly atmosphere and excellent facilities for its students. The courses and quality of lectures are fantastic, and the professors are friendly and helpful. Stuttgart is otherwise a fairly big and beautiful city, with excellent local transportation connectivity.
In Stuttgart, not to be missed are the local food — especially the sausages, maultaschen, spaetzle; the Stuttgart Volksfest, and the Christmas Market in Esslingen.
After finishing the examinations in Stuttgart in February 2011, I landed in Heraklion and started my term in the Technical University of Crete. Heraklion is a very small town with a population less than 2,00,000. The local people, culture and cuisine here is something entirely different from Germany, and a very unique experience.
‘Must do' in Crete
Greek food — Moussaka, Tzatziki , Olive Oil + Feta Cheese, Souvlaki ; a walk in the Heraklion City Center; beaches – Chania, Rethymno, Ammoudara ; archaeological sites;
In July 2011, we were done with the exams in Crete, and the next destination was Tilburg , The Netherlands.
Since August 2011, I am at the University of Tilburg, which is the parent or coordinating university for this programme. Tilburg is also a very small city (considering that the whole of Netherlands is smaller than Kerala). The university is massive, very well organised and with excellent facilities — the lecture rooms, the labs, the library, the cafeteria, etc.
I am living here in the university dormitory accommodation, with a wide variety of students hailing from Germany, Brazil, Italy, Belgium, Turkey, Spain, Finland, China, Russia and Indonesia. Living with them and getting to know them is a phenomenal cultural exposure and an experience of its own.
During this period, I also managed to travel to Munich, Hamburg, Barcelona, Amsterdam and Sicily. In my next semester, from January to June 2012, I will be doing by Master Thesis in a company, and will graduate in July 2012.
Therefore I strongly encourage students to apply for the Erasmus Mundus Scholarship programmes. It is not only about the high quality course content and study, but also the funding (which makes life very comfortable) and the whole multi-cultural experience.
http://www.linkedin.com/in/suric
