These days I am in Kaiserslautern, Germany for a two and a half months Internship at Deutsches Forschungszentrum für Künstliche Intelligenz (DFKI) or German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence in English. DFKI is one of the most prestigious research organizations in Europe. Its shareholders include Google, Intel, Microsoft, BMW and other technology and industry giants. A total of three students were selected for the internship, fortunately I am one of them.
This internship is a part of an ongoing two year long project collaboration between DFKI and KFRL. Dr Muhammad Khurram is leading the project from Pakistan side whereas Dr Syed Saqib Bukhari, who is a Senior Researcher in DFKI will be leading the German side. The main goal of project titled Water Resource Management (WaRM) is to demonstrate efficient irrigation water management techniques within the context of Pakistani agriculture. The project also involves training, workshops, joint research in water management and of course internships for research students associated with KFRL. 1st Pak-German Workshop on Smart Irrigation (SIR’16) was conducted by KFRL, CIS Department, NED University in May, 2016 under the same project.
The students selected for internship will have a chance to develop their expertise in Machine Learning, Deep Learning, Data Mining and other techniques in Artificial Intelligence. They will also have a change to explore the tools, techniques, frameworks and methodologies involved in AI based solutions.
This internship is also my first international travel experience so naturally there was a lot of excitement, albeit not without a sense of responsibility and gratitude. We (I and the other two students) flew from Karachi on 1st June to Istanbul Ataturk Airport, Turkey and then from there to Frankfurt, Germany. The flight experience was pleasant except for the part where my ears hurt for God knows what reason, I was told by a fellow student that it is normal and will end in a few minutes but it took about an hour after landing that I got my normal hearing back.
Airport experience was good as well. We only stayed for about an hour at Ataturk Airport. The view from waiting lounge area was beautiful and astounding. I could see Turkish Airlines’ planes landing one after the other. Quite a busy airport it is!
At Frankfurt Airport we were greeted with a pleasant rain. If you are coming from Karachi where temperature nearly touches 40 C you are sure to be delighted by the calm cool breeze and refreshing air. We were taken to the main Airport Building via a Bus. The baggage claim went smooth as did everything else at Frankfurt Airport. We bought SIMs and informed Dr Saqib of our arrival.
The next step was to reach Kaiserslautern and for that we needed a train ticket. I had read a lot about the famous German Rail or Deutsche Bahn now it was time to actually experience it. We had some trouble finding our way to the Bahnhof (Train Station) but were soon guided by a kind German lady. We bought tickets, the arrival was in about 30 minutes.
The train arrived and we got in, only to realize that we had boarded the 1st class and will have to march our way to the 2nd class – not an easy stunt to pull if you have 38 kg of baggage with you. We gave up and just stood at what could be called a buffer area between two 1st class compartments. No one seemed to mind it, we were accompanied by an Australian couple who had made the same mistake.
We had to switch the train at Mannheim. That’s where the fun begins. With the help of sign boards we reached the platform number printed on our tickets only to find that there was no escalator and we will have to carry our baggage up the stairs. Once we were at the platform there was a confusion about which side of platform we should stand on. Perhaps it is obvious if you are a frequent traveler but not so for us. So we asked a kind person at the platform who told us that we are at the wrong side of platform and should hurry to the opposite side. With only a few minutes to train arrival we made a run for it, again carrying the baggage down the stairs while people around us looked at us in rather strange way. So finally we are at the opposite side of platform and we ask a person just to confirm if this is the right place to be. He directs us to the information counter. One of us goes there. A few seconds later, much to our surprise we see our ICE train arriving on the opposite platform. The guy who went to the information counter had come running back and confirmed that indeed we were at the right platform in the first place – now we have to run our way back to the opposite side – again.
Now these ICEs don’t wait long so there it is – Mission Impossible. We carried, in whatever way we could, our baggage again up the stairs. I got into the ICE and secured the door while the other two passed in the luggage. We had barely made it. After we caught our breathe we laughed at each other while remarking that this will be an experience to remember. This was my first roller-coaster style experience with Deutsche Bahn. Finally we arrived at Kaiserslautern Hauptbahnhof (Central Train Station) where Dr Saqib received us and took us to our apartments in his car.
So finally I was in Kaiserslautern after about 15 hours of travel! It was a fun and exciting experience!
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