First week in oblivion….

Yes! One week and I am still going strong. But when I think of the five more years of my life I need to spend here, I start having second thoughts. Let’s however do a reality check of the life here in LA. First I will list the good things that I must say, I have come to admire when it comes to the “american way of life”.

1) The Americans are very helpful. They are quite friendly and more often than not, will initiate a conversation observing the niceties on the slightest pretext. At the same time, it tends to be a wee bit odd at times as I feel an artificial touch to the whole exercise.

2) Traffic is well organized and pedestrians are given due respect. I just hope I don’t get into an accident when I go back to India after having been habituated to the rules here.

3) One can find anything and everything just a block away at the maximum. The prices though seem to be exorbitant.

4) Unfortunately, downtown LA fares far worse than some Indian cities when it comes to safety. I must add that at this stage, my chances of surviving without any untoward incident seems low at best.

5) Universities here are well organized and managed. But time for retrospection for indian varsities is long gone. Differences seem insurmountable!!!

As it stands!

Well, simply put, I am ready to fly. I am done with almost all the things i was supposed to do and I can’t seem to come up with anything else at this stage! All that is left now is arranging my bags so that they fall well within the specifications set by the airlines with regard to the maximum weight allowed!

Just to let everyone know, I have been quite busy the last few weeks!

1) I am finished with all the shopping I had to and must add, was quite an indulgence!

2) I have completed the formalities wrt for-ex and am now in possession of the necessary $ to travel and survive in the states!

3) I have got the endorsement from Air India to carry 3 check in cases instead of two – being a student helps!

4) I have now got a new joint account with my parents which i will use in part for any money transfer.

5) I have closed my DMAT accounts and also cancelled my credit cards (took 2 weeks!!!! – ICICI sucks)!

6) I am done with most of my packing as well.

And to add to the cocktail, I was fortunate enough to attend my cousins wedding!!

Now I am busy figuring out the modus operandi of survival in LA!!!!

PS: If anyone has any issues with regard to any formalities to be completed/done with regard to university admission, feel free to contact me anytime!

next post: $$$ matters

“Food” for thought!!

For those of you who are planning on going for their grad courses, your flight will be the first experience which would mark the incipience of your graduate experience. A great “in flight” experience is always welcome. And for me, food comes out on top as the most important part of any experience!

I found this website which would be useful not just for students going abroad, but also for other professionals. Moreover, you could also share your experience with others through the same!! I hope people will find this useful

http://www.airlinemeals.net/

Apart from the airline food, the site has a lot of other interesting information which I am sure many will find interesting indeed!!

Feeling nostalgic….

Sorry for not posting anything yesterday! Had a very eventful day with loads of things to do and some depressing times to just dabble up the day! I was cleaning up my room yesterday and found a few pages from my 6th standard ENGLISH notebook. PLEASE FORGIVE ME FOR DEVIATING FROM THE STANDARD GRAD BASED AND EDU BASED POSTS. I APOLOGISE TO MY READERS FOR ANY LOSS OF TIME AND OTHER ISSUES WHICH MIGHT OCCUR DUE TO THIS POST……

I always loved being alone. Back in my school days, I always liked the idea of a lonely trail with a train track on my side and I used to picture myself trudging along the tracks. I loved the poetic beauty of loneliness – and that too when I was just 8 years old. I know how much I have transformed in the last few years. I got hold of two poems yesterday which I had, in all probability, penned in one of my many boring class lectures. They seem childish and immature – and full of naivete, something I dearly miss. I must however confess the real reason for my feeling a bit lonely now. I see myself going on for another 5 years of lonely life in a distant land. My best friend just got into a great school and I know for certain that my chances to get in with him are in negative percentages at best. I, however, do know that I once was, and therefore could very well again be a loner…….that’s what I am!

HOME ALONE

I remember a day not long ago
when I was in the home alone
The house was quite
and I was full of fright
With the thought of demons in my mind
I leaped at the sight of a mice on the blind
I ran as fast as I could
and finally found myself in the bed room
Alas, I was again in the bed room to bore
but suddenly I saw a light near the store door
Just then the doorbell rang
making me think of some mysterious gang
but when I had the door ajar
I found my mom and dad standing beside a car
I was so happy that I don’t remember the rest
but what happened was for the best
……..but I would never forget what had happened that day
when I was in the home alone to stay…….

This poem reflects the kindof person I was back then. It is a weak attempt at trying to club words and meanings into a tentative cohesion to forge a meaning of sorts! I was and will always be on the “path” to perfection. I am determined to start penning poems again as a way of letting out my emotions in a healthy and fruitful way. I hope I am able to do so for my own sake.

Life is full of lessons. Each has its own way of showing up. I have faith on a higher power, always have had, and thus would like to put my life in his hands once again. Let’s see where the winds of change will take me this time around!

PS: I would get back to my normal self and post pertinent information from tomorrow

Brain Drain – from UK

And you thought brain drain was a problem of the subcontinent!!!! 

How many of us actually get an opportunity to study from Cambridge or Oxford!? Not many I am certain! And those of us lucky enough to get in will definitely grab the offer, specially British citizens! An increasingly growing trend among some of the most brilliant brains in UK seem to think on the contrary. The trend seems to be in favour of ivy league schools in USA rejecting good offers from such elite universities. Some of the reasons for this growing trend include:

Better research opportunities
Higher number of fellowship/scholarship opportunities
The expectation of working during the grad years (adding extra income)
Good placement opportunities

American schools are able to provide good financial packages which in turn make it possible for them to draw the best of the lot! The same trend can be seen when it comes to other regional trends as well. For most Indians, the trend is and would remain to be one favouring USA.

An interesting point which I read another day comes to my mind! For coutries like UK, the percentage of grads actually going to USA (or other countries) is very less. In all around 11000 UK nationals are doing their undergrad/grad studies in USA. India sees around 5% of its educated lot going abroad! Still nothing when compared to a few countries like Ghana (50%) or guyana (80%), where it is truely a haemorrage of sorts! For India, it actually presents a blessing in disguise! With many bright youngsters going, it opens the doors for others who might be equally capable and thus stimulates higher education back home. With adequate funding, the research conducted might as well reach newer uncharted levels! - being optimistic always helps!-

Source: timesonline, others

Time out!

I just took a moment off my boring routine and delved into the archives of the famous few. We seldom get to read good things on the Internet (let alone hear them in person) and being grad students / graduates, I feel we should indulge in the same more often! I am going to present to you, a collection of various articles which I found on the Internet….. These are truly enriching and invigorating speeches which will surely teach the reader a thing or two. So my friends, do indulge me………

• Swami Vivekanada – Golden words. -article- 
• Gates Graduation day speech at Harvard. “Don’t let complexities stop you! Be activists. Take on big inequities. It will be one of the great experiences of your lives”. -full speech-
• Bad anologies – i am as tall as a 5 foot 9 inches tree!!!!! -full article-
• Steve Jobs commencement speech at Stanford. “stay hungry, stay foolish”. -full speech-
• Bill Allen on “the right idea”. -excerpt-

PhD – What does it mean!?

Some light humour (please forgive me for being a bit blunt in the things I write here!!!)

I compiled this list of all the available full forms of PhD (sometimes makes me wonder how very creative geniuses are out there doing PhD – no wonder they are grads) …. here we go -

Pretty Hard Deal
Poor Hungry Desperate
Patience Harassment Donkey-work
Passed High-school with Difficulty
Permanent Head Damage
Possibly Hard to Describe
Potato Highly Defected
Paid HoliDays
Peacefully Hibernating Donkey
Perfect Husband Discovery
Person Hard to Describe

(at this stage I must add that I am getting this feeling that there is a need, urgent need maybe, to get some positive meanings as well)

- Now some good ones (had me laughing!!!!) - 

Procrastinating Hedonistic Delinquent
Patiently hoping for a Degree
Philosopher headed for Doom
Patiently hoping for a Degree
Piled higher and Deeper
Professorship? hah! Dream on!
Please hire. Desperate.
Physiologically Deficient
Pour him (or her) a Drink
Philosophically Disturbed
Pathetically hopeless Dweeb
Probably heavily in Debt
Parents have Doubts
Professors had Doubts
Pheromone Deprived
Probably hard to Describe
Patiently headed Downhill…
Pulsating heaving Disaster?
Pretty homely Dork
Potential heavy Drinker
Professional hamburger Dispenser… “Would you like fries with that?”
Post hole Digger
Professional hair Dresser
Perpetually Hallucinating for a Degree
Predetermined Harmonized Dementia
Piano hauling Drone
Pizza hut Driver
Pretty heavy Diploma
Phinally Done !!

(in Bengali) – Pothe Holo deri (means delayed on the way)
(in Hindi) – Pagal Hoke Dikhayenge (means we will prove it by becoming mad)
(in Hindi) – Paka Hua Dimaag (means riped brain)

The credit again goes to the unnamed soldiers of this fraternity – MAY GOD BE WITH YOU!

Sorry for the inconvenience! – DOWNLOADS not working

As I have already mentioned; being a newbie, I face a number of challenges! I suddenly realized that many of my hosted downloads were not working (using filefactory) and moreover, the parent site have started posting objectionable material of the worst possible kind! Keeping in mind the growing issues I was facing, I decided to shift to rapidshare. Please co-operate for 24 hours while I shift all files to rapidshare. I deeply regret the inconvenience which many of you would have faced and apologize for the same. I would also request that whenever you see such issues, just inform me so that I can rectify them for mutual benefit…. we are after-all a fraternity – remember!

Also for GRE and TOEFL test takers – A host of new downloads are going to be available. The list includes

Anology Bible
BARRON’s Wordlist
Unique FLASH CARD Software
IVY Leagus Vocabulary
ARCO master the GRE
ETS – intro to AWA
BIG BOOK
NOVA PREP
GRE BIBLE
OXFORD DICTIONARY
WEBSTER’S – essential vocabulary
MEGA vocabulary bundle
Sentence Completions
WORD POWER

PS: It is an attempt from my end to make up for the trouble I caused you unknowingly with filefactory!