1 Year anniversary in US
Hello all,
I will be completing a year here in the USA in just 12 days. I am a master's student here. Just like other Indians I came here to fulfill my dreams and achieve milestones through the easy path. I knew myself. It was obvious that I will not be able to crack the exams for IIT's and IIM's in India so I just gave GRE and came here.
Comparing myself with the person that I was a year ago:
I believe I am like super matured as compared to a year ago. My life here at the US has taught me the value of everything from making a cup of tea(which I still don't make) to taking big decisions at each step of life. I learned the importance of living independently. Before coming here I was like yes I can't do everything on my own. But when I started doing everything by myself from cooking to laundry to the never-ending studying part I realized the importance of my family. I realized how my parents used to do all my work for me without complaining about it. I lived in a typical Indian family where my mom used to take tuitions and my father used to go to his office and in the evenings they used to go on walks. So basically my mom handled the cooking and laundry part and dad took care of all the things that I wanted. It was the daily routine so I never realized that it is a super important part of my life.
The hard part started as soon as I started my journey on the longest flight that started in India. Sitting still in a 15-hour journey is like sitting inside a prison. I am a student at UTD. Dallas doesn't make you feel like you are in the US bcoz the number of Indians are actually higher than Americans. I travel by bus to the university - 50 Indians and sometimes 2-3 Chinese students. You can hear students speaking in Marathi, Gujarati, and Telugu all the time. Sometimes I feel like its more India than India itself. Sometimes I feel that it is good that I am surrounded by a lot of Indians by then I feel like it might be a hindrance in my growth curve.
My day starts with setting a routine for the particular day. Class timings are different every day. We follow a backward planning scheme like if we have a class at 4 in the afternoon then we have to catch the bus at 3:40 for which I have to leave home at 3:30 and finish my lunch at 3 for which I have to start preparing it around 1:30. Similarly for all other things that I have to do like assignments, gym, exam preparations or online certification courses. A new time table is followed every day.
Calling is a major part of my daily routine. I have to report everything to my boss(Mom) in India from what I made to when I woke up to when I am going to sleep. I constantly get instructions from my mother regarding cooking, keeping things properly and keeping the house clean. My sister lives here in California and she is actually very big support to me here. My friends from India never sleep and I get calls every day. I try to talk to my gf as much as possible. She is in India. We are in a long distance relationship and to maintain that calling plays a major role. Because of this, my mornings are almost over in attending these calls.
I have been cooking and buying grocery myself from a year now and now I know what is costly and what is cheap. I know how much water to add in a cooker to make perfect rice. I can even make round chapatis. I know a lot of recipes now and I can even cook for 4 people at a time. I know some instant food recipes as well. I wash all my utensils just after eating only or before leaving for college. Every Friday is Walmart day for us. Our university bus goes to Walmart for which we make a list of things to buy on Thursday. Going to Walmart is the easy part but carrying all the stuff from the bus stop to the apartment is super difficult because of you carry milk cans which come in gallons and other liquids then it is so painful to carry everything for a 10 min walk. In my starting days, I struggled a lot because of this and I used to go every Friday for grocery shopping. As time passed I learned how much to buy at a time which reduced the number of times I had to go for grocery.
Attending classes and studying every day what is taught, completing the weekly assignments. Maintaining a good GPA is not that easy when you to have cook and study. My university provides scholarships if you study well which acts as a big incentive for me to study hard. Sometimes everything feels like a burden. But this is the main part for which I came here and not for cooking and grocery shopping. Handling home and studying at the same time is very difficult. But once you learn this skill you are going to feel proud of yourself.
After completing this full year I can confidently say that I can easily cook, shop and study and do everything on my own. I don't think it was possible if I was living in India. Even if I was studying at IIM or IIT it was not possible to learn all these things that I learned here. If you go to universities outside of your hometown in India I still feel like you are not out of your comfort zone. In India, we can get food very easily. There is no need to cook anytime, you can get food at very cheap prices at any mess. Living independently and learning moral values is a very important lesson of life which I learned only because I left the country and came so far for studying.
Thanks for reading.
I will be completing a year here in the USA in just 12 days. I am a master's student here. Just like other Indians I came here to fulfill my dreams and achieve milestones through the easy path. I knew myself. It was obvious that I will not be able to crack the exams for IIT's and IIM's in India so I just gave GRE and came here.
Comparing myself with the person that I was a year ago:
I believe I am like super matured as compared to a year ago. My life here at the US has taught me the value of everything from making a cup of tea(which I still don't make) to taking big decisions at each step of life. I learned the importance of living independently. Before coming here I was like yes I can't do everything on my own. But when I started doing everything by myself from cooking to laundry to the never-ending studying part I realized the importance of my family. I realized how my parents used to do all my work for me without complaining about it. I lived in a typical Indian family where my mom used to take tuitions and my father used to go to his office and in the evenings they used to go on walks. So basically my mom handled the cooking and laundry part and dad took care of all the things that I wanted. It was the daily routine so I never realized that it is a super important part of my life.
The hard part started as soon as I started my journey on the longest flight that started in India. Sitting still in a 15-hour journey is like sitting inside a prison. I am a student at UTD. Dallas doesn't make you feel like you are in the US bcoz the number of Indians are actually higher than Americans. I travel by bus to the university - 50 Indians and sometimes 2-3 Chinese students. You can hear students speaking in Marathi, Gujarati, and Telugu all the time. Sometimes I feel like its more India than India itself. Sometimes I feel that it is good that I am surrounded by a lot of Indians by then I feel like it might be a hindrance in my growth curve.
My day starts with setting a routine for the particular day. Class timings are different every day. We follow a backward planning scheme like if we have a class at 4 in the afternoon then we have to catch the bus at 3:40 for which I have to leave home at 3:30 and finish my lunch at 3 for which I have to start preparing it around 1:30. Similarly for all other things that I have to do like assignments, gym, exam preparations or online certification courses. A new time table is followed every day.
Calling is a major part of my daily routine. I have to report everything to my boss(Mom) in India from what I made to when I woke up to when I am going to sleep. I constantly get instructions from my mother regarding cooking, keeping things properly and keeping the house clean. My sister lives here in California and she is actually very big support to me here. My friends from India never sleep and I get calls every day. I try to talk to my gf as much as possible. She is in India. We are in a long distance relationship and to maintain that calling plays a major role. Because of this, my mornings are almost over in attending these calls.
I have been cooking and buying grocery myself from a year now and now I know what is costly and what is cheap. I know how much water to add in a cooker to make perfect rice. I can even make round chapatis. I know a lot of recipes now and I can even cook for 4 people at a time. I know some instant food recipes as well. I wash all my utensils just after eating only or before leaving for college. Every Friday is Walmart day for us. Our university bus goes to Walmart for which we make a list of things to buy on Thursday. Going to Walmart is the easy part but carrying all the stuff from the bus stop to the apartment is super difficult because of you carry milk cans which come in gallons and other liquids then it is so painful to carry everything for a 10 min walk. In my starting days, I struggled a lot because of this and I used to go every Friday for grocery shopping. As time passed I learned how much to buy at a time which reduced the number of times I had to go for grocery.
Attending classes and studying every day what is taught, completing the weekly assignments. Maintaining a good GPA is not that easy when you to have cook and study. My university provides scholarships if you study well which acts as a big incentive for me to study hard. Sometimes everything feels like a burden. But this is the main part for which I came here and not for cooking and grocery shopping. Handling home and studying at the same time is very difficult. But once you learn this skill you are going to feel proud of yourself.
After completing this full year I can confidently say that I can easily cook, shop and study and do everything on my own. I don't think it was possible if I was living in India. Even if I was studying at IIM or IIT it was not possible to learn all these things that I learned here. If you go to universities outside of your hometown in India I still feel like you are not out of your comfort zone. In India, we can get food very easily. There is no need to cook anytime, you can get food at very cheap prices at any mess. Living independently and learning moral values is a very important lesson of life which I learned only because I left the country and came so far for studying.
Thanks for reading.
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