CEDES
No Bollywood in the Alps
From Kolkata to Landquart in search of a new challenge
Before arriving in Switzerland, Subhankar Sarkar, 29, knew about as much about the country as most of India’s other 1.3 billion inhabitants: it is in the Alps, and the Alps are beautiful. For more than half a century, these mountains have symbolised love in Bollywood. They are places for dancing, kissing and getting married. But Bollywood is not the main story here. Far more significant than what Subhankar Sarkar knew about Switzerland on arrival is what he has learnt since crossing the border on 29 April 2019: that people here naturally call him “Subi”, what “Uf Wiederluaga” means, and that life can be rather good in a place with just one-sixteen-hundred-and-seventieth of Kolkata’s population.
What I enjoy most is how challenging my job is.
Subhankar Sarkar
A passion for development engineering
He now has his own flat in Landquart, a little way from the station. It was not the romantic mountains on the horizon that brought Subhankar Sarkar here, but a job as a development engineer in CEDES’s R&D department. At the CEDES Science Park, a complex with a distinctive test tower just outside the village centre, he develops equipment that tests products automatically, saving time and money. “I put a lot into my work.”
Whenever Subhankar Sarkar takes the nearby cable car into the mountains, he pulls out his smartphone, opens the camera app, stretches out an arm, smiles and takes a picture. Contrary to every Bollywood stereotype, the love of his life is not beside him, but 496 kilometres away in Chemnitz, where they both continued their engineering studies after completing their bachelor’s degrees in Kolkata. They share a fascination with how things work, with technology, understanding and solving problems. They married back home on 10 March and planned to fly to the Alps afterwards. Instead, their honeymoon became weeks in quarantine. Subhankar Sarkar was only able to return to Switzerland on a repatriation flight at the end of April. “The only problem here is loneliness,” he says. He feels it most on Sundays, when even the shops are closed.
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A supportive working environment
Two things help him cope with loneliness: the internet and the people in the building with the distinctive tower. “I hadn’t expected the working environment to be this good,” he says. He often has lunch with his colleagues. “I like the Swiss approach: friendly but direct.” They help wherever they can and are understanding when he struggles to find the right words. The B2 German course he completed is enough for “normal conversations”, but not for detailed technical discussions. Subhankar Sarkar does not let such hurdles stop him. He simply looks up technical terms on Google. “What I enjoy most is how challenging my job is,” he says. Learning new things matters to him.
As soon as she finds a job, Sarkar’s wife will join him in Graubünden. They plan to stay in the area for at least ten years and perhaps start a family. Until then, Subhankar Sarkar will keep pulling out his smartphone, stretching out an arm, smiling and taking a picture. Because two familiar truths hold beyond Bollywood: the Alps are beautiful, and beautiful things are even better when you share them with someone.
