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Congratulations on getting an admit from TUM!There's a bunch of things, you'll need to do now. So, this is going to be a long answer.Four major things:a. Admission to TUM, Enrollment into your course;b. Opening of blocked account, Visa procedures;c. Preparing yourself, flight bookings etc.; andd. Finding a place to stay in Munich[EDIT]: I am elaborating here from an Indian student’s perspective in general. So, a few of the steps (e.g. visa procedures, opening of blocked account etc.) might not be relevant for you.Some of these steps need to be taken up together, as you would see.:a. Admission to TUM, Enrollment into your course:Accept your study place offer on the TUM-online portal. Once that is done, you will get an option to pay the semester fees. That's the next step.Pay the semester fees, as directed on the TUM portal: you may have to visit your bank for this. Get done with this step at the earliest. Preferably before Mid-May. Make sure you follow the directions for payment that have been given on the TUM portal (e.g. adding a note with your sem, application number etc. when initiating the transfer).Once your admission requirements (as asked for on the TUM-online portal) are fulfilled, you should get the admit letter from TUM at your postal address. You would be able to download the same from the online portal also. The admit letter is a critical document, which you will need for Visa, city registration, availing loans etc.b. Opening of blocked account, Visa proceduresFor visa purposes, as you might be aware already, you would need to get a blocked account opened in a German bank. It's basically an account which would hold the minimum amount of funds (in Euros) required for German student visa. You would be able to use it for your expenses once you get to Munich and unlock it after you are done with Munich city registration (more about this later). Personally, I have found Deutsche Bank to be best-suited for this purpose as they have plenty of branches in Munich -some fairly close to TUM campus as well, and there are several branches in Indian cities as well. Edit: Kotak Mahindra Bank also provided this service last when I checked in 2016, though their procedure is a little different.Once you are done with the fund deposit in India, and other formalities of opening the account from DB branch in India, it takes about a week or two for the account on the German side to get set up. Collect the document confirming blocked account set up and Euro funds deposit in the DB counterpart account in Germany (gets set up at the Hamburg branch as far as I remember). You will get this letter from the local DB branch. You will need this for the visa -next step. Also, you will get details of an account set up in DB India, with debit card etc. I think while opening the blocked account, you are required to deposit a minimum of INR 100,000 in this account. You'll need this DB India account during your initial days in Germany (more about this later). You may alternatively get in touch with DB Germany directly, courier them the required docs, and by-pass the whole process of having to open an additional DB India account.Visa: Plan your travel to Munich -an approximate date of travel would suffice at this point, as long as you finalize your date of travel to be AFTER the date that you decide for the Visa. Mid-September should do, as the Winter semester starts in Sep-end or early October. Visit the website for German student visa, set up the visa interview date -in your case with the local office at Kolkata (check here: Germany Visa Information - India (Kolkata) - Home Page). Make sure you have all the documents necessary for the visa interview. Rejection rates are low, but make sure you are prepared and have all the documents in order. You would need to buy a temporary travel health insurance for the first few days in Munich, till your German insurance starts (more about this later). There’s also the option to already start your German Public Health Insurance. Check TK or AOK websites for this. Do get done with visa documents submission/interview at the earliest. Takes a while for the visa to arrive.c. Flight bookings, Preparing yourself,etc.Book your flight when you have finalized your travel plans -preferably AFTER you have received your student visa. I would recommend calling up the airlines that you wish to travel with and request luggage concessions in view of your student visa. Many times, airlines let you carry upto 40kg of luggage instead of the standard 30kg if you have a student visa. Every kg will matter, you'll see.Moving to Germany -or any new country for that matter, is a big step and has its own set of challenges in store. More so if you do not speak the language. It would help you a lot, if you prepare yourself for the challenges:Start learning German, if you haven't already. German is the lingua franca and the only official language in Germany. Even though you will be able to manage somehow with English in Munich, eventually you will have to learn. The sooner you start, the easier your transition to living in Germany would be. Learning basic German is easier than people make it to be.Study. You won't generally get this advice from most people. However, since you will be in Germany for a masters course, it would be best if you revise stuff from your bachelors course. Revise Algorithms, DS, AI etc, the best you can. The teaching and exam processes at TUM is generally a bit different from how things are generally done in Indian universities. The exams are tough, and test your fundamentals thoroughly. Also, most lessons and profs will assume that you have a good grasp of the fundamentals. If you have bandwidth to study and prepare now, get started.Connect with other people. Check blogs for tips for people travelling to Germany/Europe from India for studies. It will help you prepare for packing and other things. Join internet/FB/Whatsapp etc. groups for this purpose if you can. They are handy.Spend time with family and friends: The time that you have before you go overseas is limited and valuable. Spend some time with your family and friends. You're going to miss home. Everybody does. Make sure you make the best of time at home while you can.Relationships: This point may be irrelevant if you're single. Speak to your girlfriend/boyfriend about how you're going to manage the long distance stuff with different time zones. Set realistic expectations. You're going to have parallel lives and some tough times. It's not impossible. It takes a little maturity and effort, and a whole lotta love.Learn to cook! This is an important skill and you will have to learn how to prepare basic dishes for yourself. All hostels/rooms etc. have access to a community/personal kitchen. You get most of the ingredients for preparing Indian food (spices, veggies etc.) in Munich, though a few times as expensive as in India. But, you will need to cook for your sustenance. Everybody does -students from all nationalities cook their meals themselves. Eating out is generally expensive and not too healthy to be consumed for all your meals. So, if you don't know how to cook, start learning. You might even find a new passion.d. Finding a place to stay in MunichAt this point, I must let you know that the steps a. through d. are in increasing order of difficulty. One of the toughest things to do is to find a place to stay in Munich. Most people would agree that, for people who got selected for a course at TUM, getting through the course was easier than finding an inexpensive place to stay in München. Not impossible though, fortunately.Start looking up on internet for hostels or sub-lets etc for staying in Munich. If you find anything for less than EUR 400 a month, consider yourself lucky. Start looking ASAP -your chances of finding a place before you arrive go up if you start early. Believe me, you would want to have a place to crash at when you reach in Germany.The body which administers and allots rooms to students studying at universities in Munich is called Studentenwerk (Accommodation - Studentenwerk München). However, rooms are few, and the allotment is on first come, first served basis. So, waiting periods can be anything between one to two or even three semesters. Apply as soon as you can (Wintersemester registrations start on May 15, I think), but don't depend on StuWe rooms -there's a good chance you will have to wait at least one semester.Start checking up on internet/Facebook groups, try your network of friends and relatives -you might just be able to find decent housing for the few months (or sems) before you get a room from Studentenwerk. There are a bunch of other housing options suggested on the StuWe website, check those out as well.Once you reach Munich, there are a few things you would need to do before you start your course at TUM. Get yourself a three day pass for the MVV (Munich public transportation system) at the airport U-bahn station (Read up about the MVV network) when you arrive. You are going to need this pass till you have your student card and semester pass. At this point, I hope you have a place to stay in Munich-atleast temporarily.Register at KVR: Register yourself at the Munich circle registration office (Kreisverwaltungsreferat or KVR) at Ruppertstraße 19. You have to register your address of residence here, post which they give you a confirmation of city registration. You will need this for unblocking your blocked account as well as for setting up your student insurance membership. Check the website for docs required and KVR timings. You will have to get this done, every time you change your address.Student health insurance: Go to TUM main building (at Arcisstraße) during office hours and look for desks set up (by TK, AOK etc.) for student health insurance. Take your passport, a photograph, city registration papers from KVR and details of your bank account. Set up health insurance with any of them. This is mandatory. And you need the confirmation from your insurance company for completing admission formalities at TUM.Complete admission at TUM: Once you are done with the Insurance, take any other pending documents, and go to Immatrikulationsamt (admissions office) at TUM (main building again) and complete admission formalities. You may get your student card right away, or they will let you know when can you come and collect the same -most probably next day.Unblock bank account: Go to Deutsche Bank head office at Marienplatz (the city centre) with the city registration document from KVR, your passport and the letter that you had got from DB when you were in India. You'll need to unblock your blocked account. When you leave for Germany, make sure you carry some Euros in cash and in a bank account with you (the DB India account from b. 2. above will help, or you could get a multi-currency Forex Card from India), for survival and sustenance till the blocked account is unblocked -takes about week from your initiating the process. Remember that only chip cards work in ATMs there, not the strip ones. You might not be able to use the Indian chip cards especially Visa cards at some stores. So you may have to withdraw cash.Extend your visa: The student visa that you get while leaving from India would be valid for 3 (or sometimes 6) months only. Once you are done with settling in and have your student card, bank account, and insurance ready; you will have to go to KVR again for extending your student visa for the whole duration of your course. You can do this any time before your visa expires -but the earlier you go, lesser the rush would be. You may have to take an appointment for this and the interview room for this would be different from your previous visit. Check on KVR's website. Go early, avoid the rush.That should get you started. Munich is a beautiful city with amazing people. At TUM, you would get to study and work with people from all over the world and from many fields. Also, Munich is connected to many places in Europe. (I have done weekend trips to Prague). There are some challenges, of course, that you'll face sometimes when settling into life in Germany. A sense of adventure, a little humour, and a desire to widen life's horizons always helps.As they say, magic happens outside your comfort zone. Good luck!(Some edits for Grammar and content)

This dichotomy was born out of the contemptous presumptions that the top 1%-er are not entitled to their bounties, while the bottom and lower halfs are mostly unfortunate hardworking honest souls that is duped out of their fair share.I agree with the idea of some profession being hugely overpaid and overinflating cost of an industry. Entertainment industry being one of the biggest economic transgressors. No matter what you can tell about how amazing these human talents are or how hard they work behind the scenes, all in all, you are just admiring your own knowledge and world perspectives.CEOs, Professional athletes, scientists, all worked their arses off, taking physical and psychological stress to themselves to achieve something.Strictly speaking, I am not even within the 1%-er, for whatever reason. But then again, I lived, witnessed, and observed the everyday life of these 1%-er myself. Thus, I know that people are mostly just have their own limited perspective and infented their own self-serving narrative. It happened to me too.When I was in high school, my complaint about life was simple: I have to do all this stressful hard work without pay. The argument seems convincing enough for me at the time.I accompanied my parents to help them run the family business, or sometimes help my relatives look after their businesses too. I grew up with industrial brochures, instead of comic books filling my personal drawers. I don't know Iron Man, but I definitely know Blue Scope Steel. I don't know Marvel Comics, but I know GE making industrial gas turbine. I don't know Frank Miller, but I know Wärtisllä that's the brand of diesel my uncle used for his paper mill. I know how Cummins gave lame excuse on why their diesel don't work with Indonesian fuel quality, while the MTU's one worked just fine. I don't think of it as any special, being high schooler, for me, I just substituted my comic book-reading time, which is common among my friends, with business proposal / brochure-reading time.The same goes when I entered college. I was super liberal and pissed at how much at the bottom of the food chain I have to start my whole life, despite growing up quite happy. I think the rich really “robbed” from the poor like me and a lot of my colleagues at the time. I was very isolated from my rich relatives during this time. I started reading comic books, watch animes, and American TV series. I began to relate to SJW-ey and emo Marvel heroes.I tried everything, including buying into “get rich quick” motivational advices, from the superficial “generally okay” ones like Tony Robbins to the technical wannabes like Robert Kiyosaki. Hell, at one point in my life, I believed that I would be rich by doing Multi-event marketing business as participant, before joining with one myself and see for myself on how to create fake successful stories to gleeful people that shower your colleagues with praises for “making it in life”.At this point, I become super cynic, and believed that I can manipulate all people however I want by promising them wealth. After all, nobody seriously bothered to background check these “successful platinum diamond duck shit” dudes for real.So, after graduating from University, I began to join fund raising activities. Generally, indulging my liberal-SJW passion, after years growing up indoctrinated by Hollywood culture. I used to believe that “I can make a difference” by making people to sign up to direct debit charges donation scheme for various charity organisations, including those sanctioned by the UN.The pay was definitely not good, but not that bad either.But finally, I did answer the call from various job offers, and began my white collar career for real.And like I said, I started from the bottom.10 years on, and here I am.It is not easy being anybody.Over time, I grew up watching people, from poor to rich, from various background of careers and field of works. They all tell the same story: they hide something from the whole façadeSocial justice is all fine and dandy. It is what we are striving for. It is what we are trying to achieve. As a good citizen of the Republic of Indonesia, it is my duty to help the nation to achieve social justice for all of its citizens as the national ideology “Pancasila” implied in its 5th principle.Let me tell you the Indonesian version of social justice instead of the ego-ridden American ones.As much as I believe in capitalism (communism is forbidden in Indonesia), I still believe that capitalism shouldn't be the zero-sum game that conveniently discounts side-effects of total chaotic mess of “free market” in order for the “natural” market forces finds its own equilibrium, organically.This “organic” forces are usually riddled with manipulative hands of greedy capitalists unwilling to spoil their monopoly of the bounty. In Indonesia, we intervened early, before unhinged capitalism took all the economical power and hold the economy hostage in exchange for some political power or influence. We let the government set up a state-owned enterprises, tasked with idiosyncratic mission of “providing and competing” in the free market. It works for some business, but clearly don't for many others.In China, their measure are even more extreme, with the goverment imposing total control on all resources. Like “hey guys, these are all the amount of toys you can play with, be nice, ok?”What causes the social situation in the US and industrial revolution era Europe to worsen is because they allow the capitalists to retain the political power.In US, lobbying is legal. In Indonesia, it constitutes corruption, because one way or another, it compromises our government's integrity. It has happened before, and happened quite a lot under the table. Since then, the law enforcement were strengthened.This has worked quite fine, and curbed the all-powerful capitalists from getting too much power.As a result, we rarely see our top 1%-er to be quite evil like the Western folks do. They comply with the laws, then it is fine.What we are not keen on seeing is how rich people and influential politicians are sometimes able to escape the long arm of justice, or how the justice are often weak when it comes to them.So, what's the deal for the “lower half” of the population?Unlike in the US, we don't think that everyone got to own a house with a pocket fence and rambling roses, and a decent pick up truck.We have not wiped out our indigenous tribes yet, or at least the Dutch “didn't completely wiped them out”. We know that some of this still largely tribal societies still hunt for sustenance. Our modern economic model don't work for them, as they don't pile wealth like most of us do. They generally just live each of their day to the fullest. Back in the early days of our independence, we tried to “modernise” these tribes, to various results. Yes, we have successfully taught them to fly planes, but we can't teach them how to save money for the future. They generally spent their entire pay day wealth for booze and drink themselves to death. Because, tomorrow's another hunting time. A fat boar will set you for the rest of your days, just like Jungle Book's “Bare Necessities”.As much as Indonesians tried to be SJWs, we would become the more pragmatic libertarian when pushed to the fringe, than a full blown social democrat, let alone a socialist. Venezuela were easily swayed by western socialists, that if they controlled the resources, they could be as successful as China. But only if they were as smart as China do, the thing is, they elected a bus driver to figure it all out. I'd hire him to manage public transportation, but definitely not the petrodollar affairs.In short, we are not arrogant enough to tell people on how they should live their life.Americans brand of social justice reeked Rudyard Kipling's “White Men's Burden”.On the knowledge of how to best live your life, the American SJWs have the monopoly on that, and they would insist on you to follow their beliefs. When they encountered a redneck that dig worms to fish for their sustenance all by themselves who earn less than $1 a day, they are taken aback. Come to follow is the narrative to destroy and villify such “poverty" culture.In Indonesia, when we encounter such anomaly, our SJW sense reverted back to Star Trek's Prime Directive, and made us think really hard.Can we really think of the definitive lifestyle standard for these insular tribes? Constitutionally, they should receive equal treatment, including entitlements to our national standard education, healthcare, and welfare. But, how do we ensure that all of these resources spent on them, will benefit them, and not wasted for nothing?Luckily, our politicians are not sophisticated enough like their American counterpart, to polish their statistics and figures to window-dress their performance for the next voting round.We let them “poor people who don't feel poor”, “ignorant people who feel fine”, to live their lives as peacefully, and as best as we can help to provide them to achieve it.There are a lot of ways for the “bottom half” in a socially fair society. It is not my place to tell them to earn their money the way I do to success. For those who want to make it in the urban space, yes, they might want to work harder to earn better income.In Indonesia, we subsidise their education, healthcare, and basic needs. Sometimes, to improve their educational quality, we from the “upper level” volunteers ourselves to become temporary teachers and share our life lessons to achieve success, how to be “frugal happy”, how to socialise with people of different social strata, and so on. Top 10 tycoons are racing to buy buses and donate it to our municipal public transport operators.We don't just came down to the streets to chant angry protest slogans to the government to villify the riches.Sure, despite their higher tax rates, it still means nothing to them, they make way more money than we all do. Our lower tax bracket, doesn't directly translate to “fair share”, because it is a significant portion of our wealth. However, we are not resenting other people's profit here. They still contribute way more than all of us combined. That's the fact that we accept in Indonesia. In the west, they allow their individual ego to reject this fact, and concentrate all of their efforts to make the life ever more difficult for rich people there.We in Asia, know, that if we do that, these rich people will flee elsewhere. Rich Indonesians will flee to Singapore. That's a given. We don't inherit strong military and financial power like the USA to bully “tax havens” into submitting to our demands. Thus, we maintain a careful balance, between allowing the rich to enjoy their bounties, while giving them all the necessary platforms to contribute even more to the society and take credits for it, beyond the progressive tax policies.

I think after I moved here (which was a long while ago), there's a good amount of differences.1. Cities: in Algeria yes we have urban areas but in almost every town that has neighbourhoods the houses are integrated within a commercial environment. For example, in the morning you can walk less than 1/4 of a mile to go get a breakfast croissant/petit pain at a bakery, fresh. You could also walk less than 200ft to buy groceries, and as well visit a park, all within walking distance of your home. I loved and still love that convenience. Where as here in the Americas everything is way more spread out. Houses and neighbourhoods in general tend to be separate from the stores and businesses. When you go outside for a walk, you see repetitive scenery: houses, trees, houses, trees. You need a car to get around (in some areas that don't have great bus coverage).2. Coffee: in most of the Arabic speaking countries, the coffee tends be espresso shots or cafe au lait, served in espresso glasses and coffee mugs respectively. Here, coffee comes in many flavours, blends, mixes, and sizes. I don't think I've ever seen iced coffee in Algeria simply because it is just unheard of and it sounds unappealing.3. Organization/Professionalism: I think one of the best things about the West in general is the level of organization that exists in almost every single professional sector. In Algeria there are professionals who are organized but not to a level like here. Here, everything is easy to access, easy to do. If I wanted to file a form, I can download the form online and fill it out, send a email or submit to a server. In Algeria, there still exists a sort of 90's mentality of endless physical paperwork and filing cabinets (however some things are starting to get automated, I was there very recently). This tight and inefficient system has seriously demotivated many people from (for example, filing papers to start a business) doing what they want to do simply because nobody sane enough will want to chase papers. And sometimes, not even those high up in bureaucratic offices do their work. So people resort to heavy networking (example: like my brother is best friends/knows someone who's close with some minister, etc.) and Islamically unlawful bribing. Unlawful money has no good in it whatsoever and will have consequences sooner or later. It makes me appreciate the way things are done here much more. I think one more point to add here is that there is a serious need for usage of cheques and debit cards in Algeria. Cash payments are still the prominent way. Although methods of payment are and have been changing gradually.4. Education: much like my 3rd point, in Algeria the education system is almost an exact copy of the French system. There's a Baccalaureate exam every single high-schooler has to take to gain entry into a university. It includes some very useless/redundant subjects. This system demotivates some from studying in that the amount of pressure to do good on this exam and pass it with some certain score is too much for the youth. The pressure doesn’t come from their peers but rather the entire society around them has this perverted ideal that if you don’t pass the Baccalaureate exam, you’ve failed in life. Some do pass it and do great, others don't and look to do other things like study some thing else at a technical institute. The oxymoron though, is that there are tons of people who never passed it in Algeria and you find them living miles better (have a good job, a house, car, marriage, kids, etc) than some people who did pass it. Not only that, but there is mass cheating on that exam by those who have links to higher authorities. Here, you graduate high school (having done some form of standardized test) yet your SAT score doesn't say much about you as an individual. That is to say, even if you do badly in SAT/ACT, you still have your projects, GPA, or volunteering activities to back your university application. Also, community college I think is a good invention.5. Weather: In Algeria the weather wins, hands down. I live in the Pacific Northwest so constant rain and cloudy skies isn't much of a morale booster. Neither is this region a source of Vitamin D.6. Pets: as some might have said already on here, in Algeria people are not very obsessed with pets, at all. Sure they do have pets, but birds, cats, rabbits, and turtles tend to be favourites. Dogs, compared to how I've seen them here, are regarded as guardians and nothing else. Like security...here dogs are very very popular, something that I've just struggled to grasp why.7. TV: In Algeria, TV is free in that the only way to get it is through your own satellite dish. Yes, there is no cable subscription (no annoying tv bills in the mail). You just need to point it at the right direction, program the receiver correctly, and we get a plethora of channels from all countries: France, Germany, England, Italy, USA, KSA, UAE, Qatar, Egypt...to name a several. Many people in Algeria are very informed about all things Western being able to freely watch channels in other languages and topics. Here, we got tired of having cable and only a few useful channels (the rest are just plain garbage, just mindless drivel). So we use IPTV. I think here if more channels from around the world were shown in most cable networks, people can learn about other faiths, cultures, etc. & expand their opinions.8. Society: I don't know if this point qualifies as 'societal' but here in the Americas families tend to be spread out and not as helping as I've seen in Algeria. For example, you have an uncle who really wants to buy a new car, he works with good pay, but its not enough. So you have a couple close family members pitch in some small amounts to help. Sure, it might not be enough to pay it off completely, but its the gesture (he can pay it off later with set payments). Here, people are more self oriented. 18 year olds tend to go far and rely on themselves for everything, this is great in that it teaches life skills quickly yet humans are social by nature, we need to be social.9. Mobiles: here there's tons of payment plans/contracts for cellphones and data. Hidden fees as I've seen can take a person's phone bill from $50 to $130 and they don't even know why. In Algeria you have more control. You fill up however much data and talk you want, and you are in control of how much you use and you can also send someone else minutes to talk with. Personally I find this system very good in that you know what you're spending and the choice of phone/smartphone isn't limited to any carrier. In fact, cellular call quality in Algeria is far superior than some of the landlines.Hopefully I've highlighted some important distinct things. Don't think of it as ranting but rather comparisons.