Get off her back…

#430, Khamkhwa {``the ``author`` forgot to add his promise to work towards reunification of pakistan into india to make ``Bharatmata`` complete... ``}

And you will go to great lengths to make a total fool and a complete nuisance out of yourself. :) You will twist anything, including yourself, just to get constipation, won`t you?

g. schol in engg was relatively cushy in mid-eighties..you got assistantship of 1000-1200 pm, a few hundred more from indian mafia in computer labs, and if you were in east or west coast, moon-lighting at $10-15/hr tax free as a grunt working in some professors startup...good experience. as a result most engg PIGS (poor indian grad students) lived a happy comfortable life based on 4 pillars..department-apartment-advisor and budwieser..even had good money for air-tickets, an old car, and spring-break using peoples-express

Re: # 412

What nonsense theories our doc has to offer:

Anyone having an idea about the classical military hierarchy knows that before you become Generals you have to remain majors and lt cols for a long period of time...................and to theorize that when they get promoted one rank they suddenly become corrupt and well off is just unbelievable theory................tell me all ye doctors in obfuscation how many years does an officer remain a General before retirement?.........may be not more that 3 years on an average?...........so the same officer remains a honest, hard working chap for 8 years......turns into a dishonest and rich person when he gets promoted?

What fantastic stories and generalizations are constructed around this nonsense thesis??We can see megalomaniac brain of the brilliant Pakistani Rommel in action spewing propoganda....................................................

Re: Harimau #434

Sorry, should have said Category I research schools usually have a lot of money. I was in Economics and we had money because all the Business majors had to take micro and macro with us before they could apply to the business school; usually had about 500+ kids taking each class per semester; paid for a lot of TAs!!

When my brother and I went to the US, the competition was relatively easy; not like it is now, and 1600 SATs were unheard of. I`d like to think that I would still have been able to get in, with money, but now I`m not so sure....

I knew quite a few Indian students like the ones you describe; honestly, I`m not sure I could have lived that way. My dept was much more generous than many (PoliSci, IR and Soc were awful; so were some of the Engineering depts with their Master`s students) and so we had a comparatively cushy life--or as cushy as a grad student`s stipend lets it!.

Ref dost-mittar #406

[harimou:

``That is the result of equal educational opportunity because of democracy.``

I agree if you are talking about higher education. There is no equality at school level.]

No need. You enroll in one of those coaching institutions like Agarwal Institute or Brilliant Tutorials to prepare for the IIT entrance exams. With that kind of preparation, one is guaranteed admission if not into the IITs at least into some dumb-shit engineering college. If you guys are willing to stomach a steady diet of idli-dosa and rice and sambhar, Tamil Nadu has plenty of vacancies in engineering colleges all for those with enough money to pay for it.

Nobody goes to state-run schools in Tamil Nadu anymore. Everybody is sending his kid to an English-medium school no matter what it costs. Yes, if you are pulling a rickshaw (not really, since hand-drawn rickshawa are outlawed in Tamil Nadu!) your child might go to a government school but even the lower middle-class has given up on Tamil-medium education.

[In my time, the govt. allowed someone going abroad a foreign exchange of only eight dollars.]

I know the routine... I went through it myself.

Ref fuzair #429

[For graduate work, it really depends upon which university you go to. State ones are usually quite stingy and you often have to pay for a semester or two before you can get any kind of an assistantship. Private ones usually have much more money for their graduate students.]

Really depends on how much money the professors bring in on research grants. You will find quite a few state schools (Ohio State, Penn State, U of Maryland, for instance, the entire Univ of California system) flush with research assistantships.

[As an undergrad, I had a full ride scholarship for all four years. My brother, the brains of the family, had his pick of schools in the US, literally. He had a low single digit score in his O levels (back when they still gave out points and not just letter grades) and left before finishing his As, on the strength of his SAT, Achievement and O levels. He went to an Ivy League school that paid for everything...]

Kids from India who score 1600 in SAT (there are a couple in Tamil Nadu alone every year) get admission in their choice of Ivy League (NOT Rutgers!) schools with all expenses paid. Kids with good grades from a variety of non-descript engineering colleges get admission to the MS/PhD program. Though these guys are generally denied financial aid upon admission for at least the first semester, the track record of Indian students is so good that most get an assistantship within the first month. It helps when you are seen as part of the eager-beaver crowd of Indian grunts willing to do whatever it takes to keep the research projects on track.

[The better universities have a lot of money, for both undergrads and grads, for really good students.]

But you had better be really really good to be able to snag any of the money.

[I also know of quite a few people who have gone the route you describe but, no offense, they all went to places like UT Arlington or North Oklahoma State or some such school.]

What is that place in Stillwater, OK? I understand a Pakistani who flunked out of that school is running a pizza joint which is patonized by all the Indians. PhD graduations are celebrated by (vegetarian) pizza and Coke! Talk about poor graduate students!

But what surprises me is that places like Utah State Univ in Provo, UT have about 200 Indian students. Where I studied, there were 25! And it was/is a far better (private) school than Utah State. At that time, Utah State probably didn`t have a single foreign student.

Re: #430 by khamkhwa

I have watched various interviews of the average man on the street in pakistan, as well as read many newspaper articles in this regard.

There seems to be a HUGELY popular myth in Pakistan - that India would absolutely LOVE to take over Pakistan.

The reality, of course is that NOTHING could be further from the truth. Getting PoK back might be popular, depending on how it is presented to the public. But the rest of Pakistan? Whichever Indian administration suggests it will never win any election again.

What`s a `fancy hajaam`??.The author of this article seems to be a very complicated person.

Mr. Chauhan #428 No doubt the Pakistan Military should award you a Sitara-i-Juraat for speaking out on its behalf. But seriously, I agree that the foundations for military rule in Pakistan were laid when it was fashionable to have dictators. And some dictators did good for their country - like Park of S. Korea, or the role played by the japanese military overlords during the Meiji Restoration that built modern Japan. In Pakistan`s case, we also inherited strong military influence, given the military traditions particularly of the frontier, baluchistan and the panjab - the only jobs considered fit for a man used to be farming and soldiering.

But all that is past now. The day of the dictators and kings is over. And the sooner musharaff gets it, the better off we will all be.

Re: # 428
[The author abhors and condemns all acts of rape, violence, discrimination, or anything that Mr. Temporal finds distasteful - including using tragedies to further one`s insidious political agenda.]

...the ``author`` forgot to add his promise to work towards reunification of pakistan into india to make ``Bharatmata`` complete...

Romair,

For graduate work, it really depends upon which university you go to. State ones are usually quite stingy and you often have to pay for a semester or two before you can get any kind of an assistantship. Private ones usually have much more money for their graduate students. Its also much easier to get a money for a Ph.d than it is for a Masters; the Masters route is what you describe, even in private schools. I had 4 years of TAship (all tuition and $12,000/year for room and board) and a Dissertation fellowship my fifth year. As an undergrad, I had a full ride scholarship for all four years. My brother, the brains of the family, had his pick of schools in the US, literally. He had a low single digit score in his O levels (back when they still gave out points and not just letter grades) and left before finishing his As, on the strength of his SAT, Achievement and O levels. He went to an Ivy League school that paid for everything, including a ticket home every two years (not sure about this last perk; I think thats what he had, but he had one heck of a sweet deal; even paid for his health insurance!). The better universities have a lot of money, for both undergrads and grads, for really good students.

I also know of quite a few people who have gone the route you describe but, no offense, they all went to places like UT Arlington or North Oklahoma State or some such school.

Tahmed Sahib #424 {I am pro-military as long as the military conducts its necessary role of ensuring the defense of the nation, and on that count it deserves credit for ensuring indian ambitions at being the neighborhood heavy end where the pakistani border starts. However, the military has betrayed the trust of the nation by not upholding the constitution``}

Sir, let me congratulate you on posting #424, which is a lot better than the #420 character here!

In defense of Pakistan`s military, may I suggest that the poor army is a victim of fashion? Yes, back in the 50s and 60s when Pakistan made the fateful decision to go the military route, it was considered fashionable to have a dictator - Egypt, most of Latin America, even Portugal and Spain, not to mention Turkey and several Southeast Asian nations were making quick strides in development and education - all because of their military governments. Even some major democracies were calling in their war heroes - US and France, e.g. Only India was languishing under a stale democracy - slow, corrupt, and inefficient. But along with huge cars, hula hoops, and the twist, military dictatorships started to get stale starting in the 70s.

Of course, Pakistan by this time was addicted to strong leadership, efficient bureaucracy, and rapid development. Having rid itself of its less efficient and darker half and then executing the architect of that load shedding, Pakistan raced into the 80s with a strong, handsome, and heavily-medaled leader in charge. India was too busy blowing up places of worship and killing its minorities by the thousands. But the commitment to democracy continued unabated, despite the lack of dividends. Then, when the noble leader went to heaven following a divinely-orchestrated aerial accident, Pakistan constructed a ``democratic`` facade to show the world it had class, all the while practicing its long-cherished militancy in secret. A pair of young, brilliant, and completely honest rich kids took the helm, while the real controls were in the engine room staffed by even more brilliant and totally honest angels in uniform.

The young pair learned to share, take turns, and quickly mastered the art of off-shore investing. It seemed that everyone was leaving Pakistan - doctors, capital, engineers, and even ex-military types with their heavy commissions (no not the military type, but the sales type!) for ``investing`` abroad. With a dwindling population of literate people and even a more alarming reduction in capital resources, the always-reliable military jumped into the arena once more and saved the nation from death by emigration. This of course, was preceded by an aerial courtship dance involving high-altitude game of chicken to see which would hold out longer, the fuel in the plane or the bladder of the head soldier.

To his credit, el presidente, halted the emigration by encouraging the exile of the young pair of politicians. He installed the NAB regimen and the Paki rupee stabilized around Rs 59-60 per $1 US - something it has done consistently since, while most pundits were predicting a Rs 100 to $1 US rate in 1999. El presidente improved the economy, steered the ship clear of the icebergs of war, Tally Bans, Al Kayda, and Indian military posturing. But it was too late, Indian democracy had yielded tremendous dividends - institutions, education, employment, exports, high-tech environment, growing cities, and a mushrooming economy with a blossoming middle class. All Pakistan had left were the IOUs, loans, and foreign deposit receipts carefully collected by the young pair of exiles.

Six years later, things are a resounding mix of good and bad. Too much rape, not enough compassion. Too much hate, not enough love. Too much materialism, not enough spirituality. Too much religion, not enough God. Too much violence, not enough security. Too many madrassas, not enough literacy. Too many crocodiles, not enough tears.

NOTE: The above is not to be misconstrued as an accurate history of Pakistan, India, or anywhere else. It is a satire (Did you hear that, Tempy?) and not to be taken too seriously and defintely not literally or even rationally. Remarks about rape are not intended to show insensitivity. The author abhors and condemns all acts of rape, violence, discrimination, or anything that Mr. Temporal finds distasteful - including using tragedies to further one`s insidious political agenda.

romair: as a matter of fact, there are plenty of scholarships offered by the US to pakistan. you wouldnt know about them, being in the military. i could have taken a scholarship to do a PhD in demographics that was available to a research institute in pakistan where i worked 6 months as my first job after my MA. i didnt take it since i didnt see myself doing demography research all my life. my brother received a scholarship for a masters in engineering in germany, which he took. and the vast number of pakistanis - many well established in the US and elsewhere - of course simply didnt need any scholarships. And in fact, the average pakistani emigrant is in fact from poor economic households (I wont call them ``lower class``, since in my book ``class`` has nothing to do with economic wealth) starting with the mirpur emigrants to UK in the 1960`s, and including the vast majority of immigrants in europe and the middle east and the US today.

Dost-mittar #425: I don`t know about India, but in Pakistan, there aren`t that many scholarships offered. Though the number is increasing now. The only scholarships I know of were the ones, through govt. assistance of S&T, or some that were offered directly to the military, at no cost, during the Afghan war. Plus a few other here and there......

I don`t know what a Ford scholarship is, but if you got one, then that separates you from the normal students, like the rest of us. You may not be Abdus Salam, but you are above-average.......

In Pakistan, just to get a student visa, one has to first show a lot of family income and bank accounts. That, itself, puts one in the upper-middle class. Then one has to pay for the ticket. Then the initial accomodations. Then the first semester or two, when one does not have teaching assistantship. Then books, room boarding etc. No middle class person can afford this, without a scholarship like yours. There are only 100 or so such scholarships, that I know of, given out, like that in Pakistan, per year. While there are thousands of Pakistani students in USA alone.......And more in UK, Australia, Turkey etc.

I had expenses for around nine months. That combined with my assistantship, combined with my odd jobs, etc. got me through the program, in a couple of years. However a normal middle class person couldn`t have afforded an airline ticket......nor would he/she have even gotten a visa.......

I did notice that a lot of Indian students, with me, seemed to be from more middle(r) class families. But the Pakistanis, other htan the odd few on full scholarships, were all upper-middle class in Masters. And very upper class in Bachelors.........

Re: romair # 412
I attended two schools in the US and did not pay a dime for my education. You get most of you tuition fee waived if you make it to the deans list and the rest you can get through the various scholarships available.
I had one advantage, my sister attended the same school and both my parents had attended the same school.

Regards,

Faruk

Romair#413:

I understand that universities are not as generous now as they were back then. But for a reasonably intelligent student at a good Indian institution like Delhi School of Economics, with good marks and letters of recommendation from an alumni of an American university, it was not too hard back then to get admission and financial assistance from graduate schools in the U.S. In my case, my Ford fellowship also provided my air fare and the amount was suficient for me to even send some remittance from my allowance to my parents in India.