WNI celebrates achievements of members of the community
Vaibhav S. Thotapalli ( Vibe) - Vibe is a wheelchair user who has learning difficulties and ADD caused by cerebral palsy. This incredibly brave person passed the California High School Exit Exam in the 11th grade itself by working 2-3 hours everyday for the past year. Vibe also convinced his High School Principal and Coach to include him as part of the School Basketball team. His role- Substitute Assistant Coach!! Also, Vaibhav met his idol Kobe Bryant of Lakers and spent 20 minutes with him. He made it happen with his persistence. Check out Vibe's website.
Rahul Joshi, 7 years old, passed Stanford Gifted Math 4th Grade Program in January 2008. Rahul began reading when he was 2.4 years old. He was promoted in school and missed 1st grade. He is currently in 3rd Grade and has completed the Gifted Stanford Math Program. He was also selected in the Talent Search by John Hopkins University. Rahul also placed second in the regional Vocabulary contest organized by the North South Foundation. He has been a student at Genius Kids since he was 2 years old.
Krish Chandani was honored with the First Prize for the Painting contest at Los Altos Elementary School District in March 2008. He is pretty much self taught, with a few sporadic art lessons over the last couple of years. He is 12 years old and is in the 6th grade. His closeup profile of a tiger won him the prize.
Send in your recommendations for the WNI honor roll via our feedback form.
Given the fact that South Asians in the US have much more in common with each other than they do with their American neighbors, it is rather surprising that Indians and Pakistanis rarely intersect in the social stream. We have different celebrations, different grocery stores and different gatherings.
Gungun Kapoor Padala and Tariq Masood are taking a small step on Friday, May 2nd to bring their communities together in the Jashan-e-Baharan Musical Dhamaka at Chandni Restaurant in Newark, CA.
Gungun, who has been singing since she was a child, came to the US from Canada to work for a public relations firm. She took a musical hiatus when she married till she was asked to sing at a wedding and got rave reviews. While looking for a keyboard player who could accompany her professionally for other wedding shows, she came across Tariq Masood and his wife Shani who were bowled over by her talent.
Now the two are collaborating towards a musical evening in the season of Basant (spring), a season celebrated in both countries. Calling themselves IndoPak Basant, the group has put together an evening of eclectic performances from Gungun and Harjeet Mehndi( Daler’s brother). They plan a 3 hour non-stop performance of a variety of music from the subcontinent – from ghazals to Bollywood songs to dance numbers. Afghani singer Farhad Zada will present Rafi songs while kids perform choreographed dances in the background. Poet Noshi Gilani, whose verses have been put to music by artists like Ghulam Ali, will recite some of her work.
Check out this musical ensemble on May 2nd. Tickets are available at major Indian grocery stores and also at Sulekha.com. Here is Gungun singing Tu Meri Zindagi Hai
Jashan -e- Baharan
When:May 2, 2008 at 7 p.m.
Where: Chandni Restaurant, 5748, Mowry School Road, Newark, CA
Tickets: Presale $40 adults/$15 kids. Door $45/20. Dinner Included. Contact Shani 510-461-8463/ Kanika 510-456-5121/ Tariq Insurance 510-744-6900 WNI readers, mention Water,no ice and get your last minute tickets for just $30.
Perhaps the x= x+1 syndrome has been around from the time desis started coming to the US. For the uninitiated, the x is the year in which the desi targets to return back and of course the value on the right side keeps changing and so does the time to return!Of late, however the value on both sides has become a constant and many are actually taking the plunge to return and many more are actively exploring. It is difficult to estimate the actual number of moves that have taken place, but a couple of sources have pegged this as 20,000 to 25,000 in the last 2 years.
The reason for this desire to move back is not hard to identify. Although some may cite personal reasons such as ‘my parents are aging’, ‘want to get the kids to understand the Indian culture before they become too old’, etc. but that is NOT the true reason. Parents have always been aging and the kids have been growing older. More »
Shreyasi Deb examines the trends faced by employers looking to hire a professional workforce in India. She is the HR manager for a start-up in Mumbai.
There is a sea change in the way the new generation of Indians is joining the workforce. Though the larger socio-economic changes have affected all age groups of workers, there is a distinct generational difference between those who started working in the last decade or so and are in their thirties and the ones who are entering Indian workplaces now.
This summer, give your kids a chance to connect with their Indian heritage. Several camps in the area deal with different aspects of the culture, including immersion camps and language camps.
The India Community Center in Milpitas offers many camps tailored to the needs of parents wanting their children to get a taste of India without having to shell out the big bucks for the trip back home.
Gandhi Camp: Located at the Vedanta Society Retreat near Point Reyes National park, this camp is based on the Gandhian principles of truthfulness, tolerance and self-help. Daily activities include community service projects, sports, cultural activities, discussions and friendship-building group games. Camp runs August 2-9, 2008.
Cultural Immersion Camps: Campers learn about various aspects of Indian history, geography and pop culture, whether it is Bollywood Dance or Yoga. Cricket games and field trips will ensure the child spends summer the way ti is meant to be spent, busy learning and having fun. Camps are offered in Milpitas, Ardenwood, tri-valley, Evergreen, Foster City, Saratoga and Sunnyvale on various dates throughout summer. Krishna Reddy, an ICC camp parent said "We found the program absolutely fantastic. Our mother tongue is Telugu and that is the language my wife and I converse in at home. Both my wife and I speak fluent Hindi, but, our 5 old son does not speak or understand even one word of it. But, he liked the program so much that he has been able to sing an entire verse of a Hindi song which goes like "Jeevan mein kuch karna hai to …". This made us really happy. I find this program to be an excellent way to introduce kids of Indian descent born in the US to Indian culture."
Hindi Immersion Program: Designed to give children the opportunity to learn and improve their language skills through music, games, stories and performing arts. Camp offered at various locations in San Jose, Fremont and Palo Alto.
Dances of India Camp: This unique camp will take your children through a tour of India's dances. Campers will be exposed to many folk dances and the stories behind their origins.
ICC also has a range of other summer camp offerings that can be found at http://indiacc.org.
Chinmaya Mission offers a Discover India summer camp at San Ramon, Palo Alto and San Jose. Campers are exposed to the richness and diversity of Indian culture and taught its history and geography through a series of fun activities.
USHA( US Hindi Association) offers a Conversational Hindi Camp with a creative, fun and interactive environment filled with dramatics, art and other activities to teach conversational Hindi. Camps are offered at Foster City, Palo Alto, Fremont and San Jose.
Samskrita Bharati offers an all day youth camp to learn Samskritam. Camp is for Grade 8 and above at Point Bonita, 10 miles from San Francisco. Camp is residential and conducted in a gurukul style.
Readers knowing of other India-themed camps can send us info via our feedback form and we will keep updating our post.
When your car stops at a traffic light in India, invariably a swarm of street kids collects around it. Maybe you are an IT professional. Maybe you are a tourist. Either way, your pockets are jingling with change from your last meal or chai; change that is, for all practical purposes, useless to you.
It is so tempting to hand over that change to one of the raggedy street urchins. Maybe it will buy them their next meal, save them from having to hold their hand out for an hour or two. You get the warm glow that doing a good deed creates; they get a reprieve from their unhappy lives, even if it is for a short while.
Delhi, Agra, Jaipur, Amritsar, Mumbai, Goa, Bangalore, Mysore. That is the comprehensive list of cities that my friends and I visited last summer. It was a crazy trip, to say the least, not only because we crammed in Agra, Delhi, Amritsar and Jaipur into four days but also because of the lessons that were learned along the way. More »
We have a new "Listen Now" button at the top of each post now. This is to make the website more accessible to people who may have trouble reading the print. You can also subscribe to the Odiogo feed using the button in the sidebar. This enables you to get our posts as a podcast or other auditory means.
There is bound to be some unintended hilarity as the American voice grapples with Indian names and our tendency to lapse occasionally into the vernacular. Also, videos embedded into the article will not be available through the feed. The best way to get around this is to keep the article open and cue the video when the spoken text gets to the point. Unfortunately, this is the technology that is available now( or at least as far as I can figure it out!) and we will keep updating as it improves.
Do check it out and let us know how it works for you. And do spread the word to friends who may have hesitated to check out the excellent articles written by our contributors due to visual impairment.
When my 12 year old first heard Sheena Melwani sing, his response was, “I never knew an Indian American could sing that well!” Sheena’s clear, dulcet voice, once reserved for friends and family, is now broadcast worldwide thanks to YouTube.
Sheena Melwani has been a singer “for as long as I can remember.” After singing in competitive choir while in school, Sheena joined a jazz band in high school and later went on to do her graduate studies in music. “I was singing all the time,” she says, “at choirs, weddings, functions. It never occurred to me to look for a professional gig.”
When her husband’s job took them to Tokyo, Sheena fretted because of the inactivity and decided to get a keyboard so she could resume singing and songwriting. She got herself a Macbook and a special microphone and decided to record some of her songs so she could send them to friends and family back home. More »
We are a community that prides itself on the intelligence, talent and drive of its members. Our kids consider B's to be F's and one lone extracurricular activity to be a sign of sheer laziness. We are fast-trackers, entrepreneurs, marathon runners, volunteers, activists and entertainers.
To celebrate our overarching need to overachieve, Water, No Ice would like to start a monthly honor roll. We'll feature the milestones and achievements of you, your family members, your kids(especially your kids!) and your friends by featuring them in a post with the details you send us. It could be an academic, sports, professional or personal accomplishment.
Use our feedback form and don't forget to include the following -
Loading ...
(7 votes, average: 4.71 out of 5)
