A Season of Flights

With the class of 2018 set to fly to the USA, here are my preliminary suggestions, thoughts and contemplation on college application and college experience in the USA. My thoughts are garnered from nine month of experience in a medium sized public university in the southern state of Louisiana.

1) Network with right people

The biggest perk of attending college is connections with people with similar interests. It is said that we are an average of five people we most interact with. Therefore, be prudent to "methodically place yourself in the company of the most mature, benevolent, and competent people you can identify". When you do so ,you may be seated next to future governor of the state, roomed with future Nobel laureate, share the workspace with future General Secretariat of UN or turn out to be one of those person yourself.

           

2) Do not get complacent.

Let nobody tell you that quality of college, student body and faculty does not matter. It matters big time. However, what is more important than a college placement is your take away from your college experience in next four years. There are students who have done miserable in their college life, and there are students who have dropped out of the college even after making to good colleges. The college placement does not matter if you cannot make most out of it. College placement is just a start of your life, not an end of it.  

On a same token, you will be surprised by the wide range of opportunities and resources available in the campus. Make best use of the available resources and opportunities which may interest you.

3) Invest

A) In yourself. Money is secondary at this point of time.
This is where, I think, many people miss the trick. Do not be misled in the direction of earning extravagant money at this time. If you invest your time in the right things, you will make a hundredfold of the money and/or  fame in a long run than that you are tempted to earn now.

B) Back to Nepal 
You all are privileged in one way or another to make to this point. By a virtue of birth or by sheer hard work, you are able to get best education and come to the USA for further studies. During your travel to the USA, many of you may have your transit in Doha, Abu Dhabi or Kuala Lumpur. You will realize that very few of you make it to the next flight to the USA, while vast majority of the passengers will have to toil hard in those countries. Please, put your life and privileges into perspective, and invest back to Nepal either economically or intellectually. For instance, it only takes an hour of work in the USA to make a child literate in Nepal. The average cost to make a child literate in Nepal is  Rs. 847*, which is approximately an hour of minimum wage in the USA.

 South Korea after 1950, India during the 1960s, and other the then developing countries like Israel, Taiwan, Singapore and Philippines, among others had made a significant improvement in their economy and policy on the leverage of western educated leaders and scholars. With around 9,000** Nepalese students in the USA alone, Nepal can be another country in the list,and you all can be next Mahabir Pun, Anil Keshari Shah, Upendra Mahato or Jiba Lamichhane. 

4) Understand your personal calling and follow your passion
I would like to borrow Oprah Winfrey’s words from Harvard commencement speech of 2013. She says, “The key to life is to develop an internal moral emotional GPS that can tell you which way to go…The challenge of life is to build a resume that does not tell you a story about what you want to be, but why you want to be.” Be reflective, bold and courageous to follow your passion; do not be misguided by a dogma of being others.  

5) Comfort is not happiness

You may be ecstatic going through successful college and visa application process. You will be more so for first few months of your college life in the USA. Excellent system, diverse group of people, curriculum, location and language will overwhelm you for sure. However, these moments are not  perpetual. There will be times when you will miss your family, friends and country. Do not be mistaken that comforts will buy you happiness ,but be prepared for random emotional swings, nostalgic moments and an eternal search of happiness.

6) If things did not go well, do not despair.

Most of other students may be disappointed with their college decisions. Thousands of students apply ,but around thirty students go to top notch colleges with an excellent aid every year. It has always been the same case, and the competition has become ever so fierce with commercialization of education in last few years. Therefore, do not undermine yourself for the rejections you may have received. Cliché as it may sound: they rejected your application, not you as a person. It is a sad reality that some applicants get the benefit of doubt, while others do not. Bad luck is nothing you can do anything about.

Remember, it’s not how far you fall, it’s how high you bounce. Look at some people who have accomplished a lot and see where they started. Hari Bansha Acharya passed SLC the third time, Binod Chaudhary failed an entrance for Chartered Accountancy, JK Rowling was a single mother living off a welfare when she began writing Harry Porter, Winston Churchill was so slow a learner that teachers used to write to his mother to drop him off the school, Walt Disney was fired by a newspaper editor because the editor thought Walt lacked creativity and good imagination, and the list can only go farther. Life is a long run, bounce back!

This article was later edited and published in The Kathmandu Post on December 1, 2014.