Month: August 2018

Random Memories by Prem Das

Random memories, in no particular order:

  • Shooting pool with Ramesh Patil and others in Ashdown basement. Also foosball, we had a 507 roommate from San Antonio, a foosball ace with wrists of steel!
  • Thick-cut roast brisket sandwich at Elsies in Harvard Square: a whole meal for <2 bucks.
  • Living on one pair of jeans, waiting lungi-clad in Tang Hall laundry for the washer and dryer. After many washes, Anil Sachdev sitting across me at Campus House of Pizza saw the obvious hole in the obvious wear spot and said, “man, time for a new pair of jeans.”
  • The first thing my wife-to-be Nisha noticed when she saw me in the basement of Building 18 was my high-water jeans, shrunk from too many washes.

Continue reading “Random Memories by Prem Das” →

Slinging celluloid at Sangam

By Prem Das and Raj Melville

We lived in Ashdown when we first got to MIT and used to meet at the community kitchens, where most of the connections with Sangamites happened. Prem was recruited by Subbu to help out with some of the Sangam activities and when Raj moved into the same suite as Prem at Ashdown, he got inducted too.

scan0004 Previewing Hindi movies the night before. Prem Das and Raj Melville

In those days, Sangam was one of the only organizations that had access to projection equipment and an auditorium for free and wound up in the business of showing Hindi movies. This was a monthly event for the nostalgic Indian community, both students at MIT and other schools as well as South Asians who lived in the area.

An essential part of Sangam initiation was to manage the process of fetching, previewing and projecting the movies and pretty soon we found ourselves involved in this. Each month a fresh set of 16 mm reels would be shipped by the film distributor via Greyhound (imagine that) and one of us had to hike down to the bus terminal, which was near Park Street as we recall, to pick up these large rolls of film. Saturday evenings typically were screening parties, especially when we moved into the 507A suite. With friends dropping in for dinner, we would run through the entire movie to ensure that the reels were in the right order, that the film was not broken or in some cases the wrong reels were sent. Continue reading “Slinging celluloid at Sangam” →

Recapping My Journey Since MIT (aka Sangam) Days – Amrat Lodhia

Hello Sangam Mates,

In anticipation of our reunion, I went through the process of “Looking Back to Look Forward”. My “Rear View Mirror” flashed many memories of the terrain and distance covered. While the journey continues, its time to sit back, relax and enjoy the movie as we celebrate together.

The picture below is symbolic of how Sangam brought us and the community together.
Amrat reminiscingHowever, the real “star” here was not the actress Jaya or Guddi in this picture or those two jovial fellows. The real star was the developing FRIENDSHIPS, as we sailed through 4+ years of hunkering down to do our course work or thesis. Continue reading “Recapping My Journey Since MIT (aka Sangam) Days – Amrat Lodhia” →

संगम की यादें

An unplanned life event is preventing me to join the Sangam Hungama.  I am sure there will be a lot of stories that I am going to miss hearing. Many of the memories after four decades still linger in my minds and stir up emotions from time to time.

I arrived at MIT on Labor Day in 1973. On day 4, I was greeted by our dear friend V.V. Bharatiya outside the entrance of my dorm (Ashdown House) and was introduced to Sangam.  The new Sangam Executive took charge soon after and Bharatiya inducted me into his Committee. Continue reading “संगम की यादें” →

Sons of MIT

In the summer of 1976, I briefly had a student job with the MIT Alumni Association office. My job was to prepare personalized letters to MIT alumni using IBM Selectric typewriter connected with tape drives. This was long before the advent of PCs and word processing software.  Amazingly, an attached ink pen would also sign the letters to make them appear personal. As part of the job I was asked to organize the storage of Alumni Association in the basement of the building with the idea of creating more shelf space.

In the storage room I came across a printed version of an alma mater song “Sons of MIT”.  The song was written by an alumnus sometime in 1940s.  The song is printed on the back drop of Kresge Auditorium.  I cannot recall ever hearing the song while I was there during mid-1970s. With increasing enrollment of women at MIT “Sons of MIT” has been revised to “In Praise of MIT” sometime during the 1980s. The two versions are presented here.

Waris E. Warsi

A Botched Sailing Career – Raji Patel

SalsaAmong my meanderings, I am a MIT PE (Cuban salsa) instructor. This comes with a perk of sailing privileges at the MIT sailing pavilion. Useless, I thought, until a few weeks back I stepped in at the pavilion for the view. The guy at the desk was pretty chatty and I told him about my sailing experience almost 40 years back. Guess what, he pulled out my sail card 1976-77, from the archives which brought back memories.

Sailing Card

It was the summer of 1976. A couple of us decided to learn to sail. I think the group included Subodh Mathur, Prem Das, and myself. We took a few lessons and quite enjoyed them. The instruction for beginners was to NOT sail when white caps were showing on the river. We were also given reminders about how polluted Charles was then. (Remember the admonition about not putting your fingers in the river lest they should dissolve?) Continue reading “A Botched Sailing Career – Raji Patel” →

My Introduction to Sangam, MIT and Cambridge! – Narender Chhabra

After finishing my MS residency requirement of 2 semesters at SUNY Buffalo where I did 8 courses and made progress on my MS thesis; I joined Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute as a research assistant which allowed me to finish my thesis off campus and get my MS degree. While at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute I was recruited to come join the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory and was given an option to either work full time as a Research Engineer and do my PhD part-time OR do my PhD full-time and work part time at the Instrumentation laboratory to pay for it.

This gave me a chance to come to Cambridge during Christmas 1971, where I still work 6 days a week approaching my 47th anniversary in Cambridge. My choice for lunch those days was Lobdell. Within a short time, I met Kaplesh at Lobdell. He soon filled me in on Sangam and how he was contesting the post of President of Sangam and needed my vote. So I was taken in. That day led to my volunteering during Kaplesh, Veer, and Subbu’s terms. I owned a bug (the car) and then traded it for a Pinto, both of which came handy for Sangam volunteer work. Continue reading “My Introduction to Sangam, MIT and Cambridge! – Narender Chhabra” →

The first Ravi Shankar concert at MIT in 1972

This article is based on communications with Kaplesh Kumar

During my tenure as president of Sangam (1972-73), we were able to persuade Ravi Shankar to perform at MIT. In those days he used to come to the Boston Symphony. Through connections with Ravi Shankar’s group with Prakash Dahanukar, a close friend, we were able to convince him to perform at MIT. Pandit Ravi Shankar did Sangam and MIT a huge favor by agreeing to perform at Kresge and more importantly by significantly reducing the amount they usually charged groups to perform. Continue reading “The first Ravi Shankar concert at MIT in 1972” →

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