How I became a teacher ?

  While staying  in the REC  campus, I had purchased  a  two-wheeler  LML Vespa 3 gear  model. I had  used  it only  inside the campus and occasionally to go to   Chinmaya  Sree Krishna  temple at 12 th  mile or Kattangal.  In fact,  I have  gone to Kunnamangalam or Mukkam 7-8 KMs away only  once or twice, the simple reason being my fear  and more  than that  my wife’s poor confidence  in my driving after she fell down  from the scooter once. I had    got the  license to drive  four wheelers by that time. Moreover,  before  going abroad, I had already sold out my  scooter to a  colleague among the  non-teaching staff in our department. So, after coming back from  Sing...

  After the  short assignment  in Singapore,  we were  returning to Kerala via Thiruvananthapuram. The  Silk Air Airlines  had started  flights to   TVM thrice  in a week. Even though we have travelled by flight  several times, whenever we return to India, there is always some amount of mental stress mainly due to the  obstacle  called customs. I had heard about the bitter experience of  several friends, but  we can feel it only when we ourselves are face to face with it.   When we return from abroad, it is  usual to bring some gift items to our friends and relatives. Each item may cost only a little, but those who love us will accept it happily without even asking how much it costs. My  better half also had bought a few things  as per  her  list. When you are  ...

In order   to   take   up the job in Singapore, I had   taken sabbatical leave for a year.   Among  our close relatives, the only person who was not very happy in our going abroad  was my  wife’s mother. Even though  she was  happy that we  got an opportunity to work abroad, she was  half-hearted  in sending her eldest daughter to a far-off place. My  better  half’s mother and father were  school teachers and after  retirement, she became  diabetic. She  was not taking her medicine regularly and uncle was  not   knowledgeable enough about these  things as he was always preoccupied with  many things  including some farming. Their  eldest son and his wife were working in Alappuzha and for their  convenience  they had  moved to a rent...

While  I was  making my preparations  for attending  the conference at Hawaii, I received an email  from an old student  of mine from Singapore. His  name was  K.K.Sivadasan (Kulangara Sivadas) for whose  batch I had  been  taking a course  in Control Systems. He was  working in  Data Storage Institute(DSI)  Singapore, an organization  doing  research and development work on  modern digital  data storage  devices such as  hard disks. He was a member of  the  Servo-electronics  group  of the  institute  mainly doing research on the Control systems for hard disks.   As I was  not in regular correspondence with him, it was  a  pleasant communication  from  him which...

  Let us  review a little  bit of history. When the World War II  started, only  Hitler’s  Germany, France and Great Britain  were  involved in it. United States of America  was  not a party in the beginning. At that time, Pearl Harbour in Hawaii  was one  of the  most important  ports  of USA. All on a sudden, on 7 th  Dec 1941  at 7.55   AM , the  ocean carriers  anchored in Pearl Harbour were bombed by the German  bombers, without any provocation. The  reason for USA  coming into the war was not the cruelty against the Jews, or the annexation of Poland or the war against Britain, but this single  attack on the  war ships  of USA  which ultimately  resulted in the  defeat of the Germany-Japan alliance.   M...

  It is for the  first time that  I was abroad, and  the first time attending a conference abroad. Naturally, I was a bit tense. Immediately after registration, the very first thing I tried to find is whether  there is any Indian attending the conference. Only when we  go out of our country, we feel thrilled to see a brown coloured  man or woman among the audience. You will  not bother to see  whether  he is a Mallu or  Northie, Marathi or Bengali whatever.  I wanted to see an Indian badly.  Soon, I  found from the  list  of participants  in the  printed proceedings that there  is one lady from  Bengal and one Reddy from an American University. After travelling  through an aerial  distance  of 13,122 KMS from  Kozhikode, just to see an  Indian wa...

                                         United States of America is  a country with almost five times the area of India, the population being less than one-fifth of India. USA is encircled  by Pacific Ocean in the West, Atlantic Ocean on the East , Canada on the  North and Mexico and South America in the South. In the  South  East in states like  Florida,  climatic conditions are similar to what we  have  in Kerala , but most of the Northern states are extremely cold  for more than 8 months in a year. Alaska on the  North extreme  is close to the Arctic region  on South pole.  Many states are  completely covered in snow for more than three months in a year. USA has 50 states and Hawaiian Islands form the 50 th  state in U...

  Almost everyone  likes  to travel abroad, especially those who enjoys seeing   places and meeting   new people. If   one   is lucky, one   can even make acquaintance with a few  of them. For those who are  working in colleges and do  some research, the best way to go abroad is to send their research papers to conferences that are  being held in their places of interest. Large number of conferences are  being held  these days and it will not be very difficult to identify a conference venue. First step will be  to send  a  paper  to  the conference  and get it accepted. Once paper is accepted next step is to raise funds to meet the registration fee, travel and accommodation. There are several  governmental  and a few  private agencies  providing financial support ...

  While we were at I.I.T Delhi, one of the senior  professors  in the Department of Electrical Engineering, Prof.P.S.Satsangi   called  a few   of the research scholars  from different states and made us sign a  document  for formation of the Systems Society of India(SSI). This professional society   was formed to promote   interaction between   those working in the area of Systems Engineering and to conduct National Systems Conference once in a year. The founder members were supposed to create opportunities for systems related activities in their own institutions. Systems Engineering is an interdisciplinary branch where engineers and scientists in different fields will be able to work together. Developments in different engineering branches had become too complex and it was becoming difficult for one belonging to a particular branch to know everything abou...