Friday, April 20, 2007

The Quintessential Guide to Surviving Manipal

"Study in Manipal. Get inspired by life."

manipal.edu


10. Get all the vaccines and immunity shots known to mankind prior to coming to India;
Polio, Tetanus-diphtheria-pertussis, Measles, Typhoid, Japanese Encephalitis (if you’re visiting the boondocks *coughManipalcough*), Rabies, Hepatitis A-to-Z… If you survive all these needle jabs, you might possibly survive this country.

9. Bring your own homegrown, Malaysian flavoured Maggi mee.
Regardless how “quaint” and “exotic” Masala Maggi sounds, I assure you that it tastes pretty much like horse-sh!t – only with less horse and more sh!t.

Horse-sh!t.

8. Learn how to say “Less sugar,” when you order anything from a local eatery – even things that don’t usually contain sugar (refer also #7).
There's apparently a national obsession with the sweet stuff; your standard cup of tea here is one part water and two parts sugar, and there are cakes so sweet that you'll actually screw up your face in sugar agony as soon as you take a bite. One out of every four diabetics in the world is an Indian; that's some seriously insane amount of sugar pee if you ask me.

7. Invest in a good, anti-halistosis1 mouthwash or breath-freshener.
The staple vegetable here is onion. The pasta here is smothered in onions. The pizza here has more onions than cheese. Heck, even if you specifically ordered a bowl of fried rice with NO onions, you’ll still find onions hidden somewhere at the bottom. If you don’t like onions, you will die of starvation.

6. Practice a good, forbidding frown in front of your mirror.
I found that the beggar kids will scatter and run when you frown at them like this;

"This oughta put the fear of God in them scruffy whippersnappers!"

5. Take swimming lessons.
During the monsoon season, you might have to swim to get anywhere at all – class, meals, shops, the swimming pool, etc. You might even want to consider buying a yacht if you're rolling in paper Gandhis. Imagine non-stop torrential rain. Back-to-back. Day and night. For months.

4. Pork can be found at Tasty Bites and Thai Lin. Mutton (and beef)2 can be found in the Valley View Hotel.
What everybody needs to know.

Forbidden pleasure.

3. Watch old reruns of Fear Factor to prep yourself mentally.
Ever wondered where the producers get inspirations for those stunts where the contestants get locked up in claustrophobic chambers full of icky bugs and are forced to eat god-awful, disgusting animal innards/juiced insects/beastie genitalia? That’s right; from the life and day of an average student studying in Manipal, India.

Ant infestation in my room.

Deep fried hemorrhoids3

2. Own a laptop and apply for broadband.
This will be your sole source of entertainment. Your holy shrine. Your altar of worship. Your meaning of life. The nearest mall (which is about as big as two good-sized shop-houses) is located a fair two-hour bus ride away. The nearest decent bookstore would require you to board an hour-long domestic flight to get to it (or 12 hours of butt-busting bus journey, whichever works for you). Don’t even get me started on movie theatres and McDonald’s.



… and the number one pointer to surviving Manipal is…









































1. Don’t come here. Stay away if you value your life. What the hell is wrong with you? Malaysia not good enough for you is it?


The Manipalite,
k0ks3nw4i

1
A fancy and scary sounding way of saying 'bad breath'. Boy, I can't wait to tell my patients in the future that they have halistosis and prescribe them Tic-Tacs in pill bottles.
2
Cows are practically royalties in India. Seriously - all vehicles would even stop and wait patiently for cows to cross roads in their slow, sluggish cow-pace. When I tried the same thing, I got honked to kingdom come.
3
Okay, fine - it's cauliflower. In spite of its appearance, Gobi Manchurian (that's what it's called) actually tastes pretty good.

15 comments:

Wanster said...

boring life, huh? maybe you can do a remake of RK curry house's prank in india and see if all ur jogging sessions had paid off :)

fuolornis said...

the maggie noodle here seriously taste like shit. Two packets of them back home is a small matter for me, but here not even a single spoonful of the noodle

Michelle Chin said...

PHEW! FINALLY! Your comment page is able to load. I've been trying to drop comments about how interesting your blog is. I can't help but just to love it. I WILL link you up because it makes me feel that I'm some armchair traveller. ( India ) That's what I need to know. And the cauliflower thing looks like fried squids to me.....

Anonymous said...

Fried haemorrhoids OMGWTFBBQ LOL!!!

Perhaps you could tell your future patients that if they refuse (your very specialised) treatment of halitosis, they won't be able to score any $$$ in the future *winks*

Anonymous said...

OH MY GOD!! Is manipal that bad? sounds like a shit hole. I can't imagine how im goin to survive there next year. Thanks for the guide line. At least it gives me a rough idea of how bad stuffs can be.

k0k s3n w4i said...

@wan yean
"Boss, I want your specialty... err... that BEEF CURRY..!"
LOL. One day... haha.. one day

@fuolornis
Damn sucky right? Dunno why some can eat it day and night.

@Michelle Chin
Thanks...
You've a pretty neat blog yourself too and I WILL link you as well. Coincidentally, fried squid here also looked like hemorrhoids - the locals just lurve their crimson food colouring.

@michellesy
LOL, Talk about double entrendes. I've, in fact, listed down a ton of tricks to pull on my patients next time (House is a real bad influence for wannabe MDs like me).

@Anonymous
#1... Run! Run while you still can!!!

sXydeViL said...

WOOTS! someone's blog is getting popular! see told ya blogspot CAN make a difference!

Anywayz, i love pointer #6. I burst out laughing reading that. I can soooo imagine myself carrying the hallmark frowns around whenever im outside the campus. SUX!

And yes, manipal is flora n fauna!

k0k s3n w4i said...

@susu
Popular? No la. Just got a great bunch of people to talk to!..
And the muka sueh really can repel beggars one wei. Tested few times d. They actually made way for me, haha

AhPau said...

haha...nice one there! pretty much the same for Russia that Number 1 & 2

mg said...

eheheh.. dun be so modest.. popular dy!!

Jen said...

oooo.. good to know. considering i've never actually been out of the country before, this is starting to freak me out. haha! and i cant live without some yummy meat.

i'll keep #1 in mind =)

Mischique said...

You could almost easily be describing Sg.Petani but of course the situation is definitely less bad.

By the way...why did you go to Manipal if you dread the life there?

k0k s3n w4i said...

@ahpau
But Russia got snow. I've never seen snow in my life. Sad right?

@michelleg
:p ... Popularity is relative.

@jen
The KFC here actually has separate vegan and carnivore counters. Vegetarianism was practically invented in India. If you want to study abroad, go to someplace cool like US or UK or Aussie. I heard kangaroos taste delish.

@mischique
Yea. At least you're still in Malaysia.
I came here because i get to spend the second half of my course in Malacca. Anyway, there was no conceivable way that I was able to find out how bad this place is. Hindsight is 20/20.

sXydeViL said...

Doinks! India oso got snow k! I enjoyed the snowball war plus ski-ing IN INDIA trip k! YES INDIA~~~~~!!!!

k0k s3n w4i said...

susu
Diu... you went North la!!! Manipal got snow ar now? Bring come my house let me see. Here ice-cream also don't taste good, ok!