CURRENT MISSION

Grow in wisdom. Have fun. Make friends.

ABOUT ME

I'm a westernized, elderly gentleman of Indian origin but English upbringing. Educated by Irish Loreto nuns in Kolkata and Belgian/Canadian Jesuits in an English Public Boarding School in Darjeeling(2100m in the Himalayan foothills with perhaps the most spectacular view of the Himalayan giants ever) till I was 17 then in Beaumont College, Old Windsor (on the Runnymeade of Magna Carta fame), Lincoln's Inn, London. and King's College, Cambridge, followed by a Dip.Ed. by correspondance from London University in 1974. I married a Frenchwoman from Nice (whom I met in Cambridge) in 1963, my son, Prof.Dr.Dennis De, was born in London in 1964, and my daughter Yasmine in 1965. I have three grandchildren. I worked as a teacher from 1965-1981 in London, Saudi Arabia, India, Zaire and 1971-81 in Germany as a "Gymnasiallehrer".German unemployment forced me out of the teaching profession in 1981, and while continuing in evening schools for some years (English, autosuggestion, "Third World")I worked 1982-2004 as a freelance Representative for a Publisher in Barcelona, Spain, and Triesen in Liechtenstein with working tours in about 70 countries, with such success that I only needed to work about 3 months a year, half days! Parkinson Syndrome joined Diebetes Mellitus and I retired in 2004, living with my Czech friend in Cheb and my own flat in Fulda(Germany). Interests include Hypnosis, Astronomy, India, I've been divorced since 1982. I speak English and German fluently, French and Hindi and Bengali moderately.

PHILOSOPHY

We are here to grow in wisdom towards God. I believe in re-incarnation. I judge life's decisions from my deathbed: experience, kindness, count for more than money, fame, possessions.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

I'm new and presently travelling, so no participation till now. I hsve a two-room kitchen bathroom flat in Fulda, Germany and Cheb, Czech Republic. Both flats have a couch in the living room, with bedsheet and blankets.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

Positive experience in Copenhagen, Hamburg, Nuerenberg, Cambrdge, Istanbul, Delhi, Agra, Varnasi, Darjeeling, Bengaluru, Aluputzha, Prague. Did a lot of hitch-hiking all over W.Europe after finishing my "A-Levels" and as a student in London and Cambridge, with plenty of wonderful memories. When asked by my Jesuit boarding school in Darjeeling to give a talk on "Studying Abroad", which I had been doing the minimum of, all I could offer was "Hitch-hiking in Ireland"(I haven't been asked to give another lecture)!

Interests

India, Hypnosis (autosuggestion), travel, UFOs, Astronomy, history, geography, world affairs, physics, philosophy....

• arts
• environment
• dining
• flying
• traveling
• painting
• hiking
• hunting
• skydiving
• muslim
• soccer
• swimming
• astronomy
• teaching
• freelancing
• geography
• history
• physics
• hitchhiking
• tours
• beaches
• rivers
• mountains

Music, Movies, and Books

1940-60 music, movies. Historical books, eg."1421", books on India, world politics, travel...

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

Being an undergraduate in King's College, Cambridge, soaking in the wonderful environment. The view from my living room over the college Porter's Lodge, the Chapel glowing in candlelight behind the great stained glass windows and echoing to the Choir's Evensong, Punts on the river as I looked through the arch of Christopher Wren's Gibbs Building across the front quadrangle and lawn beyond Gibbs. Living in the "Bush" in Zaire, among the very hospitable 'Natives' without electricity, piped water, but with bouganvellia and fireflies and crocodiles, and some of the most inspirational and impresseve men I've had the privilage to meet ...the 'pilgrim' buses flying the green flag of Islam with uniformly dressed pilgrims of all kinds and converging across the world's greatest sand-desert, the Rub al Khali, on Mecca and Medina ... Sunrise over the still lethally growing High Himalayas from Tiger Hill,Darjeeling, suspended 9000ft above the silver shimmering rivers of the worlds largest and deadliest river delta combining the power of two mighty rivers, the Ganges and the Brahmaputra, as one looked southward, and to the north, floating golden almost 5 miles above us,left to right, Lhotse, Everest, Makalu, Janu, Kabru, Kanchenjunga, Pandim, four of the five highest peaks of the world visible, the legendary Himalayas, laid out symmetrically like a necklace of pearls glowing in the dawning sun in succession like candles in a sublime cathedral... Helicopter flight and landing on the floor of the unbelievable Grand Canyon, return and flight along illuminations of "The Strip" in Las Vegas at night...the fantastic billion-dollar hotels along "the Strip"... riding the roller-coaster atop "the Needle" a the 300m high Tower in Las Vegas... Skydiving over the deserts of Utah, ... the Hoover Dam, outside and insid, and Lake Mead, unreal in the barren landscape of the Grand Canyon... the Golden Gate Bridge soaring over the deadly waters... Alcatraz Prision...the majestic Queen Mary in Long Beach...A Soviet and an US submarine and aircraft carrier... the billion-dollar J.Paul Getty museum in Los Angeles and its wonderful predessor copy of a Pompeiean villa ...Disney world and Epcot in Orlando with their shows, Acqarium, Sea World in Miami with the Orchas...Cape Caneveral and the Space Center with an IMAX 3D film "The Blue Planet" showing our beautiful, fragile, tiny jewel of a planet... The magical Niagra Falls and the ride on "The Maid of the Mist" up to the falls....Tour of coral reefs on an underwater "scooter"in the Bahamas...the billion-dollar Atlantis Hotel in the Bahamas... swimming and playing with sea-lions in Florida... the Coral Castle in Miami, an "impossible" monument of love... a luxury cruise from New York to the Bahamas via Cape Canerveral and Miamiin a beautiful ship with a dozen fine restaurants and a 1,000 person auditorium... New York's historic Empire State building and the late World Trade Centre...hot-air Baloon flight over Phoenix, Arizona... flight among Sedona's rugged rosy mountains in a red triple-wing open WW1-style "Baron Richthofen" aircraft in Arizona...Flyby of the High Himalayas in Nepal with glimpses of Tibet beyond,, Everest towering 13,000ft above our aircraft and glaciers below ... Stephen Hawking's lecture in Cambridge...Unexpectedly "bumping into" the Dalai Lama in a corridor of the legendary Taj Mahal Hotel in Mumbai... suddenly seeing the familiar New York skyline for the first time when I missed my exit on the highway from the airport... the breathtaking Eiffel Tower presiding over Paris... St.Peter's in Rome with Michaelangelo's dome suspended over the city and clasped by Bernini's arcade.The inscription across the church's facade proclaiming that the building was built for the glory not of God, but of the Borgias, is at least truthful!St.Peter's was also built in competition with Constantinople's Hagia Sophia, as was the Blue Mosque, to show who was boss!... the historic and legendary Hagia Sophia and Islam's victorious Blue Mosque opposite...Venice, Serenissima, Queen of the Seas... The Rock,Gibraltar...hitchhiking around Ireland and overnighting on the floor before the family hearth in a lonely farmhouse on the edge of a fjord where turf was cut and burnt... the "Trimurthy" in Elephanta, India, reputedly the best depiction of God made by man and used a a target for cannon shooting by Portuguese soldiers ...Ellora's Kailash Rock Temple, where 100,000 tons of stone were removed 1,300 years ago to make the world's largest freestanding monolithic sculpture, almost double the size of the Parthenon in Athens... the cave temples of Ajanta, India...the Taj Mahal, Rabindranath Tagore's "teardrop on the cheek of Time" and Itmud ud Daulah's mausoleums "built by giants and finished by jewellers" treasures of one of the most powerful and wealthy Empires, where marble and semi-precious stones replaced stone and paint...Angkor Wat main temple, larger than Vatican City, of the mysterious million-strong City of Angor, largest city in the world, now largely swallowed and digested by tropical jungle,"sic tempit gloria"...Egyptian Pyramids, implacibly defying Time, accompanied by the enormous and ghostly Syphnx... the largest pyramid of all, near Mexico City ...Abu Simbel, raised, and reconstructed facing the Sun, above the Aswan Dam's giant lake...Unexpectedly recognising India's Tejas state-of-the-art jet fighter,smallest in it's class, in flight doing demonstration rolls during an aero show in Bengaluru. Indian/Russian supersonic Brahmos cruise missiles...the pomp and circumstance of India's Republic Day parsde in New Delhi... the 60 hectare Sri Ranganathanswamy Temple inside seven walls and under twelve towers full of sulptures...the incredible Vietcong tunnels at Chu Chi showing indomitable spirit and ingenuity...the rain forest in Brunei...the elephant training in Thailand including football and painting! ...the exreme and proximate contrasts in feudal India,...triumph of the human spirit over adversity in Kolkata...the "White Nights" in midsummer St.Petersburg...a crematorium near Kalighat in Kolkata...10 days imprisonment in London, including friendly chats with murderers and rough treatment my wardens...4 days of grilling by Scotland Yard in Holburn,6 days in Wormwood Scrubs Prision till my innocence was proved... sharing a cell waiting for my case to be heard, with an Indian inmate who was integrated as privileged, with an unlocked cell, home-cooked food, unlimited mobile phone usage etc. who told me that if I returned to prision he would arrange to have me put into his block, with advantages.
The postponement of my hearing neccesssitated an overnight in prision and the Indian did take care of me. I could even choose the colour of my prision toothbrush!...the Market Square of my present abode in Cheb, looking like a romantic stage setting...

Teach, Learn, Share

Autosuggestion, India and the future, Astronomy

Countries I’ve Visited

Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba, Austria, Barbados, Belgium, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Cayman Islands, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Denmark, Dominica, Egypt, Estonia, France, Germany, Gibraltar, Greece, Grenada, India, Ireland, Italy, Jamaica, Jordan, Kenya, Lebanon, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Maldives, Mexico, Monaco, Morocco, Nepal, Netherlands, Pakistan, Panama, Poland, Portugal, Russian Federation, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saudi Arabia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, Trinidad and Tobago, Turkey, Turks and Caicos Islands, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Vatican City State, Viet Nam

Countries I’ve Lived In

Antigua and Barbuda, Aruba, Austria, Bahamas, Barbados, Belgium, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Cayman Islands, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Democratic Republic of Congo, Denmark, Dominica, Egypt, Estonia, France, Germany, Grenada, Hungary, India, Italy, Jamaica, Lebanon, Liechtenstein, Maldives, Mauritius, Mexico, Morocco, Nepal, Panama, Portugal, Russian Federation, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saudi Arabia, Slovakia, Switzerland, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkey, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Viet Nam

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