TGTs...

With the world becoming truly globalised, with people realising the theory of "Survival of fittest", nowadays people moving to other countries has become a normal phenomenon..There can be either two results of this phenomenon..
either the person travelling from the native country changes himself and gets imbibed in the other country's culture immediately.transforms himself/herself...that's when and why, you get to see Indians returning from foreign countries with their hair styles changed into spiky ones and with ear phones (now IPOD!!) in their ears..
the other lot are the ones who act as their country's cultural ambassadors and spread their country's culture..i witnessed this latter phenomenon when I went to the Downtown in Toronto to get my tickets for my planned trip to Niagara falls (details/blog on the same to follow soon!!)..There was a dance show going on at the Dundas grounds (the Downtown area..)..With no work left, we decide to pass the time by watching the dance show..there were some group of 4-6 students dancing for some hippy numbers..we watched the show for sometime and suddenly to my surprise, the speakers began to bang "Metro Channal munna paru..munna paru..Cable TV pinna paru...pinna paru.." in Tamil in the middle of english numbers..all people..Canadians, Chinese, Americans were moving their hips and were dancing to the tune of the song..

What makes this happen..If people say that music knows know boundaries and hence people would dance to any number played on the stage..i fail to disagree..., I would attribute this to the culture the Tamils have imbibed in the Canadian society..the dominational cultural change and the culture change, the effect they were able to produce on the other society...

and I was so happy and proud that we have established ourselves 15000miles away from our native..

After all I am also a fanatically Truly Global Tamilian..

Experimentation continued...

My Experiments with cooking are on and today all of a sudden, backed up by the confidence of having Mom's cookery notes, I decided to make Hyderabadi Biryani...Yes guys..u read it right..Hyderabi Biryani.(For those of who cannot get what I am talking about, please Google..).Though I was sure that I will not be able to make it upto the real Hydrabadi's expectations, I wanted to make it a decent success..The best part wen u cook for many people is that the work gets divided and the main job gets easier...Onions, Beans, Garlic, Ginger and other spices were cut into fine pieces. After the main gravy was made, the vegetables and pre-semi-fried rice were added into it..and was boiled for 10 minutes..There was a air of silence in the room as the expectations ran high...and Finally..the vessel was opened..we could smell some good aroma...It was well above the expectations except the fact that it was a bit spicy and the gravy was less compared to the quantity of rice..

So what..There is always a next chance and I am sure that all these negativities will be OKayed that time..

and Finally what marks would I give for this Biryani.??..While the expectations were to score 90 marks out of 100, this Biryani scored 75 out of 100..far above the pass marks of 40!!

Desi Classroom vs Videshi Classroom

Often we have heard people complaining about the education system in India.people often complaining about the "spoon-feeding" the Indian teacher does to the student..Spare the IIT, IIMs, NITs (Being from NIT, I had to!!), rest all fall under the same dump..

I did my entire schooling and engineering from India..One of the sharp contrasts I noticed between the Indian system of education vs the education system here is that in India the Professor/School teacher is less willing to share the old piece of papers using which he teaches in the class..You can be rest assured that you can score the full marks in the exams if you manage to get those old yellow colored papers photo-copied..

Here it happens the other way..Before you attend the class you are given the pre-course reading material...You will know that what is going to be taught in the class..and you can be ready with the questions, you have, if any...Once your lecture is over you will be sent the lecture notes via e-mail..and boy..believe me..if u miss the class, u can relax..the class discussions are recorded and sent to you..The professors here like all the works to be done through computers and are as computer-savvy as we are...Another sharp contrast from the typical Indian professor who thinks the gadget as his replacement and always criticises it..

But remember everything comes at a price..i would still bet with the Indian education system if we are considering from the "Value for Money" angle..Indian professors still are among the best lot and given the fact that the knowledge/techniques an average Indian student gains with his limited resources when compared to his/her non-Indian counterpart also justifies why Indian students always excel in their studies.!!

My Experiments with Sambar...

"Cooking..That too Sambar..me??..U must be really crazy..."

Thats what the answer you would have got from me had you asked me before 1 month ago whether I know cooking.

(For those of who don't know what Sambar is..Its a South Indian gravy item that is usually mixed with rice and eaten)

See how time changes and the wheel of fortune rolls.. Within the past 7 days I have made Sambar twice and that too for about 1o people each time (including 2 girls)...and Surprise..Both times it turned out to be very good..Was so good that people started drinking Sambar..and was in big demand!!.

Credit goes to my mom for that exceptional Sambar powder-without which this success would not have been possible. I had an intensive, step by step training from her on how to make good sambar..Her rule was very simple..Be it any work..Follow the procedures religiously, and the results will follow themselves..The result here-A good Sambar.. Thank you Mom!..U must also have done ur MBA!

Now that my confidence level has boosted, I have decided to upgrade to the next level and try other items as well!!

Settling with Rotman..

Finally, after some struggles we managed to get a good apartment, near to the subway..We had to OK ourselves with the "apartment entry date" of October 1st..Meanwhile in College, we got introduced to some 2nd year students in the "Settling with the 2nd year students" program.The conversation is more or less similar with everyone..

Me: Hi, My Name is Janakiraman.
He/She: Hi.My name is XXXX. So how is it going?
Me: Yeah..Enjoying the time out here at Rotman. So far it has been good.
He/She: Hmm..Enjoy yourself. Because once your college starts u will not find time for all these.
Me:??????

An MBA in the making..

7 days have already passed..Time flies fast..Super fast..

My First day at college started off with the Breakfast session.I could see a lot of people from all around the globe. Think of any civilized country in the world and you would find a student from that country. You could see various hair styles, hear various english accents, get to meet people with variety of experience, (This year, A Doctor from Iran has come to do his MBA!!) . We also had a brief chat with some of the current 2nd year students. And Ding!. We heard an announcement. "Guys. Good Morning!!. On behalf of the Dean and other staff members, I welcome you to Rotman and we hope you would have a great time with us in Rotman over the next 2 years. The classes wil begin in another 5 minutes and please try and finish your conversations and be in you class rooms". My "Quantitative Methods" and "Accounting" Pre-MBA classes have begun.

On my personal side, I had a lot of work pending..Had to configure my laptop for the Univ. wireless network, get the Univ. Student ID, get the Univ. Health Insurance card, get a mobile connection, find an apartment and finally(??) pay the Univ fee!!.

My Firsts..

And Finally..I have also decided to enter the blog space..I thought it would be apt to post my first blog after having made my first visit outside India- to Toronto to pursue my career goals.

After waiting for almost 2 hours to collect our baggages at the Pearson international Airport, me along with my friends headed to the main city of Toronto in a car.While the car cruised at 140Kmph, my friend (who had already been in Toronto) started explaining me about the city areas. Thanks to Sid, we settled in the city very easily. So nice of him, he had arranged accommodations for us in his friend's place. We reached the place at 11PM in the night. The next day morning we had to go the College at 8:30AM for the Intro session!!

My first impression about the city is that it has High rise buildings everywhere..Everywhere you could see!! It is also very very clean and organised. Subways are the main life lines for commutation of this city..Unlike Indian trains, here, the trains here are neat and clean..and their freqency is very good..so good that u can travel a distance of 4-5kms in 5mins. Toronto is a "Multi-Cultural" city and you could find people from all round the world!! There are also lots of Indians..especially Tamils and Punjabis..While I am told that most Tamils are of Srilankan Origin, the Punjabis come from Amristar..Oops..I could feel that when I came in the flight from India..When I boarded the Delhi-Toronto flight that flies via Amristar at Delhi the flight was half filled..When the flight stopped at Amristar, the rest of the seats were also filled with the Punjabis..so much filled was that a Sardar began asking the Air Steward "Are..U r travelling in a Punjabi (???) flight..aur Punjabi nahin aathi tumhe??".

One of the friend joked that " Every year 3 Punjabis from each family travel from India to US/Canada and only 2 of them return back to India..the other one who will be illegally staying in US/ Canada..Harpreet singh will become Harry !!!"...

I don't know how true this statement is??