First Week in Dundee

I’ve finally got round to writing my first blog article since I left the island last Monday. I’ve been busy settling in to Dundee, completing assignments for the course I’m on and meeting new people and so I have not had time to write about what has been happening until now.

My journey to Dundee last week was surprisingly stress-free. The only difficulty was negotiating my way with a very large suitcase on the London Underground from Waterloo to King’s Cross. Other than that it was just a case of sitting down for over nine hours on the train.

 I got into the accommodation in Dundee at about 8pm and was introduced to the other people on the programme and the co-ordinator from India who works for Sannam S4. There are nine of us on the placement scheme who will be working in a number of different areas, from engineering and architecture to the non-profit charity sector. I will not describe the others on the scheme any more than that because I have no doubt that at some point many of them will end up reading this blog, but we all seem to get on quite well. At the moment the group is split into two student flats, but as they are both on the same floor it feels like it is just one big flat.

During the week I have had to go to careers sessions for the course related to the programme. Most of the advice given is just common sense, but it has enabled me to learn about techniques that will be useful when applying for jobs when I return from India. As well as the people on the India programme I am sharing the classes with a larger group of students on a Scottish internship programme which has been quite useful because they know the area much better than we do. In one of the classes I had to complete a questionnaire on what roles I would fulfil as part of a team. From my answers I was given a written profile which described me as a bit of a ‘loose cannon’ which came as a bit of a surprise.  So I am not entirely sure how that particular exercise will be useful for future job applications.

At the weekend we visited a couple of museums in Dundee. The city is famous for its history of jute spinning and so we visited a museum in one of the old mills. That was particularly interesting because jute products are now produced mainly in India and so the museum had a section on how they are manufactured today in Calcutta. We also visited the Discovery ship museum which tells the story of how the Discovery was made for Captain Scott’s voyage to Antarctica. It had been snowing all day and so by the time we got to the ship it was cold, wet and very slippery. In a way that improved the experience because it meant that being on the ship was more like it would be for the scientists travelling to Antarctica in the early 20^th century.

It is the first year that the University of Dundee have run the work placement scheme in India. This means that there are significant teething problems that we have to put up with. This explains why I found out about being accepted onto the course so late. Indeed, some of our group have not received an offer letter from their employers in India yet. The original plan was to fly out this Sunday, but because the visas have taken so long to process we are now expecting to fly on Wednesday 30^th January. As it is the first year the course fees have been waivered so to a certain extent we just need to put up with the delays and be flexible. I do now know that the placement will be 6 months and so I will be due back in July.

I expect that the next blog article will be from Delhi so it will probably be a lot more exciting than this one. Between now and then I have three assignments to complete so I should probably get on with those instead of spending time writing this blog. Until then enjoy the cold weather and think of how much of a shock it is going to be for me when I arrive in Delhi from Scotland