Gurasis: 0:19

In the intricate journey of international students, there exists a point of no return, a critical juncture where the process of adaption transcends being merely a choice. It becomes a fundamental necessity. This journey demands more than adaption. It requires a transformation, a conscious reshaping of one's identity to align with the contours of the new cultural landscape. Picture this you arrive in a foreign land, eager but somewhat alien to the nuances that define the local culture. As a natural student, assimilation isn't just about attending classes. It's a holistic endeavor. You adjust your speech to match the cadence of your peers, sand off rough edges deemed unconventional and, perhaps unintentionally, temper your ambitions to fit the prevailing expectations. Every step, every adaption is an intricate dance with societal expectations, a perpetual negotiation between preserving your essence and conforming to the norms of your new reality. Yet amidst this ongoing metamorphosis, there comes a moment of reckoning, a moment when you stand before a mirror and realize that the reflection staring back at you seems like a distant echo of your former self. The amalgamation of cultural assimilation, societal pressures and the sheer weight of navigating a new world reshapes not only your external persona, but also the very core of your being.

Gurasis: 1:44

Our guest today intimately understands the struggle, having traversed the challenging terrain of international student life. He has grappled with the complexities of self-transformation. In our conversation, we delve into the soul-searching that defines the immigrant experience. Our guest's narrative mirrors the profound odyssey undertaken by countless international students. The sacrifice is made, the compromise is forged and the indomitable resilience that emerges from navigating the paths of a new world. Let us unravel the stories, the layers of stories. A story that encapsulates the universal essence of the immigrant experience essence of the immigrant experience and, in doing so, echoes the shared aspirations, struggles and the triumphs of an entire community striving to find a place in the intricate mosaic of a foreign land. Please welcome Simranz

Simranzeet: 2:36

Hi Gurases. I'm really happy to be here and really well-written introduction. I think you really tried to capture the essence of what that experience is like for all international students and really, really well-written. As you were kind of going off, I was almost reminded of what it was like for me coming back all these years and really excited to be sharing my story. And a very good morning to all of your listeners.

Gurasis: 3:10

Awesome Welcome to the podcast, simranjeet, and, like I mentioned to you before our recording, I related with your story, you know, being from the parts of the similar country, and that's why I'm excited to have you and let's just get into it.

Simranzeet: 3:23

Absolutely.

Gurasis: 3:24

Okay, so in this season of our podcast Simranjeet, I have this new segment which is basically about turning up the fun factor a little bit. So I want to start by asking you a little bit of some fun questions, so ready.

Simranzeet: 3:36

Absolutely.

Gurasis: 3:37

Okay, so first is what's your go-to breakfast?

Simranzeet: 3:43

My go-to breakfast, I would say it's. It's evolved to be something really simple, something that I can fix fairly quickly. Um, as life has gotten busy, as work has gotten busy, I tend to rely upon a simple toast with some scrambled egg. That's probably my go-to on most days, um. And then there are other days when I skip it entirely and go for, like, a black coffee in the morning, um, but there are uh, there are less days of on the coffee side, more days on the reasonably healthy breakfast side okay, and do you?

Gurasis: 4:21

did you also used to not drink coffee before coming to canada, or were you like always like a coffee person?

Simranzeet: 4:27

I was actually never a hot beverage person. Growing up in india like, uh, my family does indulge um in a lot of tea drinking um, so does my wife and her side of the family as well, but growing up I never um had tea or chai as we know it back home, or coffee. It was just something that I think it was a habit that was cultivated in the first couple of years of my coming to Canada as a student long hours you know, like studying and everything, and that's where the whole thing, and then the Tim Hortons kind of addiction, kicked in yeah

Gurasis: 5:03

so yes okay, I think it was very similar for me. I think I didn't even ever used to drink tea as well. You know my parents would love it, my family would love tea, but I was just never a fan until I came here. It wasn't only the tea, I just fell in love with coffee. You can say, and also it's like you know, again adapting to a new culture, and you see your peers, your classmates, your colleagues drinking coffee and you end up I just fell in love with coffee. You can say, and also it's like you know, again adapting to a new culture, and you see your peers, your classmates, your colleagues drinking coffee and you end up like trying once or twice and then you're hooked to it forever and then you become coffee snobs.

Simranzeet: 5:35

At least I have kind of become a bit of a coffee snob. I really like my coffee done a certain way, but yeah anyway okay.

Gurasis: 5:44

So my next question is uh, share a favorite song or a dialogue or a movie and tell us like why it's significant to you something that I've been listening to a lot.

Simranzeet: 5:53

Um, you know, off late has been, um, there was this movie that came out, I think, uh, early 2023. It was released on Netflix. It's an Indian movie called Kala. It's about a story of a girl who's born in a music family but she's not really allowed to pursue music, and there was a song in that movie, bikhirine Ka Machko.

Gurasis: 6:23

Shokhebara.

Simranzeet: 6:29

Yes, beautifully written song, uh, beautifully composed, and that's something that I have been going back to quite a lot, uh, for some reason, uh, the past couple of days, so that's gonna probably be it yeah, no good choice actually been my one of those favorite songs, you know.

Gurasis: 6:42

And the funny enough this morning it was just part of my playlist, while I was just getting ready, and it did pop up.

Simranzeet: 6:48

That's amazing. That's amazing, really good album. I really like Amitra Vedi as a music composer.

Simranzeet: 6:55

Like again, I am very particular about my music. I think music for me is something that really sets my mood. It's something that I copiously consume, um, you know, throughout the day. It really impacts, you know the way that I think, the way that I go about my days, yeah, um, it fills up a lot of silences in my life.

Simranzeet: 7:13

So I'm very particular about the kind of songs that I listen to and, uh, I'm actually pretty diverse with the kind of songs that I listen to. Like there's no one I have a preferred genre, definitely. But yeah, um, I've tried over the past couple of years and kudos to my younger sister because she she's amazing with her music for having introduced some really amazing songs in my, uh, in my playlist. But, yeah, it's, it's interesting. Music for me is one of those things that really helps me connect with people as well. Oftentimes I feel that if you know there's somebody who mentions a song and they like that song and I happen to like the same song, it just helps break the ice a lot more. So that to me, is a really powerful, you know, tool to kind of like connect with people so interesting Absolutely.

Gurasis: 8:07

Yeah, I think sometimes it becomes like a conversation starter also, you know, maybe like a certain song or a certain movie you know end up like talking more and more about it. Yeah, Exactly.

Simranzeet: 8:14

Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.

Gurasis: 8:16

Yeah, Okay. So my next question is if you could teleport back to a particular place from your home country for a day, where could teleport?

Simranzeet: 8:25

back to a particular place from your home country for a day. Where would it be and what would you do? I'm currently in kishore, ontario. Um, if I could teleport for a day, I'd probably say, um, any any mountain in in india. Uh, mountains have always fascinated me a lot more more than beaches have, and I don't know like the silence, the beauty I think. So I would probably say somewhere around Kailash is going to be one of those places that has been on my bucket list for a really long time. I'm trying to figure out what that process will look like to be able to embark on that. So maybe I'm going to use out what that process will look like to be able to embark on that. So maybe I'm going to use your suggestion or your offer of teleporting there to save me some bucks. But yeah, that's going to be my answer.

Gurasis: 9:14

Okay, great, great answer, loved it. And lastly, if you could teach one phrase or any saying in your mother tongue, what would it be and what does it mean?

Simranzeet: 9:26

well, that's interesting. Uh, it actually makes me. Your question actually makes me pause for a little bit and make me think about my mother tongue as well, because that's such a loaded thing, right? Yeah, um, I was born in new delhi, india, and I was born in a family where, like, I'm born in a Sikh Punjabi family, so technically my mother tongue should be Punjabi, but my mother was born in Ranchi Jharkhand in India, so her mother tongue growing up was actually Hindi. So it's kind of like a different mix of languages that I've grown up around in which I have spoken to my parents in either English or Hindi. They have spoken with each other in Punjabi. So it's kind of like a really. So your question almost makes me pause and almost think about what exactly is my mother tongue to begin with.

Simranzeet: 10:19

But coming back to your question, I won't really like, again, I don't think maybe I'm, you know, digressing from the question a bit, but one phrase you know in Hindi that has stayed with me and this is something that my dad used to say quite a lot when I was growing up is, again, that's a really loaded phrase, a lot of kind of subtext in there, but it's something that I think he had picked up from, I think, an interview or something that he had heard of Amitabh Bachchan talking to his own father, harivansh Shah Bachchan. He was not really doing that well. Amitabh Bachchan talking to his own father, harivanshaya Bachchan he was not really doing that well. Amitabh Bachchan was just kind of breaking into movies but nothing was working for him. And he went to his dad, harivanshaya Bachchan, the great poet, and he told his dad and that's something that you know, my dad has used many times in my, has kind of like communicated that to me many times in my life and it's definitely something which has impacted the way that I think about life, the way that I wrote challenges, the way that I think about, um, grit, determination and what really it takes.

Simranzeet: 11:40

So, uh, that's probably a it's not really a phrase, uh, but it's just something that popped up in my mind the first time that you.

Gurasis: 11:48

Yeah, in response to your question, and how would you translate it for the non-hindi speakers?

Simranzeet: 11:55

uh I think it's going to be really poor translating it because yeah, I was trying to think about it.

Simranzeet: 12:02

I'm not able to gather my words just because I think you know a lot of it is going to get lost in translation. To be honest, you know there are certain phrases, there are certain kind of sayings in certain languages that when you translate it to another language they really lose their essence absolutely. But a very poor translation could probably be that the real essence of life is struggling and overcoming challenges. That's going to be a very poor translation, but I don't think it quite fully captures what the initial kind of intention of that phrase is. But yeah, I'm going to leave it at that.

Gurasis: 12:42

No, I think that really made sense. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay, Since you talked about you know Delhi and your family. Let's talk a bit more about that. Let me take you back to the time you spent in India. Tell us a little bit about your formative years and how was it like just growing up there?

Simranzeet: 12:58

I spent 17 years of my life in India. I moved to Canada when I was 17 for my undergraduate education but in terms of my formative years, I was born and brought up in New Delhi. I was born in a family, you know, in a joint family. So for you know, your listeners who are not really familiar with that concept, it's basically in which there's, like all the different family members you know, including your brothers, like more on the you know, father's side of the family, because, again, patriarchy is very much alive and real in India still, as well as it is in other parts of the world.

Simranzeet: 13:35

So a joint family system is one in which, you know, I grew up with my uncles and aunts, you know, under the same roof and that was, I think, for the first couple of years, and then we kind of like, each of us kind of became our own unit when, I think I was four or five years old but grew up in a family that you know that was a business class family which meant that they were into the whole business side of things. It's a business that my grandfather had actually started when he had retired from the Indian Air Force and that my dad's older brother, my dad and then my dad's younger brother the three of them, you know, eventually were absorbed into Growing up. I think I really fond memories of Delhi because the Delhi that I grew up in in the early 90s, the schools that I went to, the kind of community.

Simranzeet: 14:31

The kind of the word that I'm looking for here is mohalla, which is again a poor translation, for some of your listeners will be like a neighborhood, but a moh is a very. It's kind of like an indian concept in which it's it's a neighborhood, but you know it's more like a feeling, less of a word, exactly it's it's.

Simranzeet: 14:53

It's a really it's a neighborhood where everyone knows everyone. It's kind of like a more community community setting in which, sure, people are living in individual houses but, uh, they're very intimately involved in each other's lives. You know, kids are playing together in the evening. They grew up together. A lot of, I think, people that you see around you know like your neighbors and all they're. Basically they become like your extended family. So that was a really interesting feeling that I grew up on.

Simranzeet: 15:25

That I remember of my early time in Delhi. Other than that I would say it was a really it was a sheltered childhood is how I would probably put it. I come from, I think, an upper middle class family which you know eventually started doing okay, you know, at a time when I kind of hit my teens. But I still do remember you know times, at least from my life, early life growing up. There was a bit of a struggle with finances, money was tight in a couple of situations, but yeah, like really fond memories of Delhi, the Delhi winters which are, you know, really famous. Delhi is, I think, one of those cities which kind of gets to see the extremes of the weather.

Simranzeet: 16:07

So your summers are, you know, 45 plus degrees Celsius, and then your winters end up going down to like one or two degrees. You get the monsoon, you get the spring, you get the fall and autumn as well. So I grew up in North Delhi and very close to the Delhi University, university. Memories of the food, the people feeling in the air of what the 90s and the early 2000s were all about, yeah, well, what?

Gurasis: 16:31

what the focus was on growing up. Was it like you have to get a job, or was it like was like moved into entrepreneurship? What was it like?

Simranzeet: 16:39

I think I I was fortunate enough to have, you know, parents who were fairly flexible and open minded, to kind of like, have me figure what I wanted to do and you know, support me. In that sense. It also definitely helped that I was able to figure out what I wanted to do, what my love was, what I really wanted to focus on quite early in life. But I think just a bit of context and background to some of your listeners maybe. But a lot of business class families in India it's a multi-generational thing, right? So your grandfather started something up, your parents' generation continued it and built upon it. And then the expectation as again from a patriarchy standpoint and since I was the, you know, oldest son in the joint family, the expectation was that I, and then you know other of my cousin brothers will eventually, you know, join it and grow it even further.

Simranzeet: 17:42

Cousin brothers will eventually you know, join it and grow it even further and that's kind of like a cookie cutter template that ends up, I think, being reinforced by the family, the society, people around you, your relatives, your extended family, everyone, and it's it's very much so among the punjabi people in north india. I think that's a that. That's that's kind much so among the Punjabi people in North India. I think that's a that that's that's kind of like what the trend has been. I was lucky enough to kind of have my parents, who didn't really subscribe to that Like. When I think about it, I think I kind of know the reasons why they probably didn't want to, you know, subscribe to that, like my dad. He is a lawyer by training.

Simranzeet: 18:23

He went to delhi faculty of law. He read law, he has a master's in political science and he wanted to, you know, get into the field and become a judge in the in the high court in india and he, because of financial constraints, he never really got to do that. He had to eventually get absorbed into the family business and so I think, you know, part of it, part of it for him, was that, okay, maybe I had to do that, I had to do these sacrifices, but I want my kids to not really be bound, you know, by their parents' expectations. So I think that was one. My mother again, mother again, huge, huge kudos to her for really giving me the wings to fly, for really instilling in me that self-belief and that confidence from a very early age that, um, I could really go after and achieve whatever I set my heart and mind to. So she really kind of gave me that space and really pushed me to, you know, try different things.

Simranzeet: 19:28

Like, the approach very much at home was that you know you want to get into sports, sure, let's. You know, go try it out. You want to do something, you know academically, again, go try it out. There was no limitations. So from that point of view it was. It was. I think I've been really fortunate and blessed to have had that kind of really like no pressures. It was more, I think, on me to figure it out, but it was still, I would say, sheltered in a way, because I think every parent, at the end of the day, they they want the best for their kids and in a way, because I think every parent, at the end of the day, they want the best for their kids and growing up in the sometimes like the confines, of the house, not really.

Simranzeet: 20:20

I think they were also a bit protective slash overprotective in a couple of different ways, in which, um. So I think that's a reason why I think it was a lot sheltered.

Simranzeet: 20:28

And again for me, I realized that it was a really sheltered childhood when I actually got to see the other side, when I came out right so I really got to see the you know, the reality of life, you know, having starting to live on my live by myself, uh, starting at 17, to really go back and think that, okay, that was a really sheltered childhood. Um, yeah, uh, it was. It was more of you know like a in retrospect, but anyway, yeah, no, I can.

Gurasis: 20:56

Uh, I can actually relate to a lot of points you have mentioned, simran, and you know one thing you mentioned earlier you were talking about when talking about your family is you use the word, you know, patriarchy, and I think this is a topic which I've discussed at multiple points on the podcast and the the listener who are religious listen to the podcast. They know I asked this question to some of our guests and I think I will ask you this. So, growing up, you know I grew up in a patriarchal household. I was taught that certain things which are taught to all of us, you know, like men, don't cry, be a man. It's a task of the week.

Gurasis: 21:27

You know you're not supposed to show your vulnerable side to people. A lot of these factors are, like instilled in us and honestly, I don't blame them, because that was something which was taught to them growing up and they just tried to pass on what was they think is correct. And but we, when, how? When we guys, you know we moved abroad. We got exposed to a world which is beyond internet. You know our parents can't even think about this, something which is internet. You know they can't fathom the fact. There's something which lets you connect with people like in a click.

Gurasis: 21:58

You know a lot of like these factors came in and then you come here, you start living on your own and then you start realizing that maybe the things that were taught to me, maybe I need to shed those because they're not serving me anymore, you know. But I want to have a question to you. Is that there's any point? You know even like maybe a movie after moving to canada, or even like while you were in india what kind of impact that patriarchy had on you growing up?

Simranzeet: 22:23

um, that's a really interesting question and let me just first kind of echo a little bit of what you said and then I'm going to delve into this question and I think it probably will answer a part of your question. But when we think about patriarchy, I think it's like, I think there are different layers of patriarchy, right, there's a more obvious part, you know, the more surface level thing, in which if I go and ask someone, do you think that you know a man, a woman and then somebody who might identify as queer? Do they do they deserve to be treated differently? And I think I'm guessing most well-meaning people are going to say no, they deserve to be treated differently. And I think I'm guessing most well-meaning people are going to say no, they deserve to be treated the same. But that's a surface level patriarchy part of it.

Simranzeet: 23:11

A lot of times, you know the way we think about life, the way we think about relationships, a lot of subliminal things that impact our worldview, they have been shaped by patriarchy. They have been shaped by the environment that we grew up in and white, and you know, while we might actually feel that we've unlearned a lot of it and that we're really fair and that we don't believe in patriarchy. Um, I think the idea is to catch yourself at different, you know times and actually see that you, that it might have been a very faint way that patriarchy might have seeped into your way of thinking. So, at least for me, I grew up in a family which was a very man's man. You know, you got to be, you know, like an alpha, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And again, it might not have been communicated by my parents in that clear language.

Simranzeet: 24:13

There was always those undertones, there was something that was very latent in the way they looked at life, in the way they expected, you know, like a man, to show up and provide, looked at life in the way they expected you know, like a man, to show up and provide. And again, I not to say that I feel that, you know, men don't have that duty. They do, I heavily believe that but it's not just, you know, limited to them in their capacity as a man, it's limited to their capacity as a human being to be able to provide, to be accountable, just as it is for a woman or for somebody who identifies as a queer. So I had to do a lot of that unlearning on my own. You know, when I came here and to me I look at that a little differently For me it was not so much you know me coming into a Western, you know country that maybe you know, on the surface of it had maybe more liberal values that pushed me to do it.

Simranzeet: 25:15

I think in my case it was really moving away from home, moving away from that noise, really living by myself and having that time to Introspect also Introspect, pick up these kind of loaded questions, and I think I've been really fortunate to have started to be able to do that at 17. It was just not about patriarchy, it was about spirituality, it was about you know my understanding of you know life, or you know what exactly my purpose is in life. These really loaded questions. I got a lot of time by myself to think about it and actually be that okay, like, and it started to kind of become clear that, okay, this is what I may have been taught. This is, you know, my parents voice in my head when I think about you know this question.

Simranzeet: 26:06

But what exactly is my voice on this? Have I thought about it? What exactly are the different facets of you know this question? So, similarly to patriarchy, I think, um, I just kind of had that time, I had those experiences, I really had that um, uh, I had that opportunity to meet people from you know different walks of life, uh, who grew up in a way that was very different than mine, to really start to actually analyze that. Okay, like, what exactly does equality mean? What exactly does justice mean? What equal like, what exactly does it mean to treat people the same way?

Simranzeet: 26:40

right, Because, again, discrimination, as I said, like patriarchy, it's a really layered, complex thing. It doesn't just work, as you know. You can't sit here the way that we understand we typically understand discrimination. That is a part of it, sure, but I think in today's day and age where people again, that's my understanding and that's how I like to look at the world I like to look at the best in people, but I still feel that there are times when these things need to be checked.

Simranzeet: 27:09

People need to introspect a bit more and really need to kind of think through their positions on issues. You know, I don't think a lot of people have done a lot of that original thinking and I think to me, that's truly a measure of how much growth an individual has had. Um, you know, really like having thought about things and issues individually, to say that, okay, this, this is who I am as a person. I think that really builds character. I really think that builds identity. Otherwise, you'll just end up living a cookie cutter version of somebody else's conception of what life for you was meant to be like.

Gurasis: 27:49

But have. But have you or would you call out if you actually witnessed such kind of situation?

Simranzeet: 27:54

Absolutely, and I think I've done that in a lot of different uh instances. Um, again, I, for me, um, I very strongly believe and I think a lot of this comes from you know uh, my faith. I'm a practicing sick. Yeah, um, I have, I'm a practicing Sikh. I'm a very visible minority, you know, I have a turban on my head, I keep a beard, and there have been instances when, you know, I've been treated differently.

Simranzeet: 28:27

There have been instances where I've seen other people being treated differently and I think for me it has been a lot easier to relate to their struggles because their struggles have been my struggles. And I just feel that you know. If life has, you know, brought me to a point where I feel empowered enough to go about life and live it on my own terms, I need to pay it forward.

Simranzeet: 28:53

So, I need to pay that empowerment forward. So if it can be anything like not to go into specific examples, but it can be, you know, like calling out somebody who is being treated differently on the subway or somebody who's being treated differently at your workplace, because I think it really goes back to my fundamental belief that a everyone needs to be like deserves to be treated with respect. That needs to be the default, and then we kind of get into the questions of their conduct and you know the pros and cons and you know other things, but at the very basic minimum level, that is a like that. That needs to be the baseline. So, and I just feel, you know, my hope has always been that, because there have other, there have been other people in my life who have called stuff out on my behalf when I didn't have the words when I did not feel powerful enough and I was trying to find my voice and I really, like, I remember their names.

Simranzeet: 29:54

I remember those people and I'm so glad that they had it in them at that time to, you know, stand up for me and I just feel that, if I can pay it forward, I'm just hoping that, you know, we just end up becoming a better community overall. But yeah, that's, that's, that's how I understand that yeah, no perfect.

Gurasis: 30:18

I think I loved it and once again, I think I resonate with everything you have said, being, once again, you know, being the follower of the similar faith. That's kind of like certain teachings also kind of come up and you start like practicing them throughout your life. So I completely relate what you're saying. So for now I would like to pivot towards your move to Canada. Tell us a little bit about, briefly, about the decision to move to Canada. How was the process for you like?

Gurasis: 30:48

And also another thing I want to add to this is like I also come from a joint family and it was really hard for me to uproot myself from a joint family setting and I feel like I never felt the need to have friends because I feel like my huge family, like 15 people living in the same house, was my, was my friends and family and everything. I was very close to my cousins, very close to my siblings, and then obviously the extended families come in between right, you have your uncles and aunts and chatties and who was, and all those people come in and a small birthday party is also like 50 people at times, you know so. So I think, uprooting from that, coming to this new world. Tell me, how was it for you like?

Simranzeet: 31:32

sure. So you asked a couple of questions there. Let's first talk about the decision to move to Canada. Now, I moved to Canada in 2011, when it was not all the rage among a lot of people in India to move to Canada. I was originally planning to go to either the US or UK and Canada just happened to have, you know, a better kind of scholarship for me, and I was always very mindful of trying to become financially independent as soon as I could. So that was kind of like the reason for me that I wanted to move to Canada. But I think it begs another question that why did I want to move out of India in the first place? There are two things there.

Simranzeet: 32:18

I think the first part was, at least in my case, I, very early on in my life, kind of found that I wanted to do something for the community. Something for the community like that for me, was what I think my calling was. Um, I never really found myself fitting well into, you know, the business that my family was running, that I was almost kind of like being in some ways groomed to take over. Um, I actually want to credit my uncle on my mother's side for, you know, he, he he taken me to. So this is on my nanny's side, which is my grandmother. I was visiting her one of the summers I think it was probably 11 years old and my uncle, along with a couple of his friends, they had taken me I don't know why like an 11 year old kid, with a couple of men, to this swearing in ceremony of ceremony of this chief minister, right. So I probably saw like thousands and thousands of people. I saw like that stage with you know somebody on the stage and to, to me it was really powerful. I think at that point in time, as a kid I was really fascinated by you know somebody on stage who was swearing in and all these you know people who were there, believing that this person had the power to change their lives.

Simranzeet: 33:52

And what I kind of took from that was that, okay, maybe policy, maybe politics, maybe doing something for the community through this kind of channel, this avenue, is the fastest way for me to make an impact. And to me I kind of started to kind of figure out that, okay, maybe this is something that I want to do, this is something that I genuinely feel drawn to is something that I want to do. This is something that I genuinely feel drawn to and, as you probably know, india is not the most friendly in terms of, you know, people who want to make a career in public service right, especially people who want to get into politics. Not that at that time I kind of had figured out that I wanted to go down that path, but in India it's still very much of you know how much money you have, you know, to spend. You know there's like a dynasty kind of a thing in families in which you know there's a certain kind of like class of people that can only get into politics. It's not really open, it's not really based on merit. At least it was not, you know, when I was growing up. So my conception was, uh, that you know, if I want to do something, uh, really for people, and at that point in time it was not so much that okay, it has to be for the people that I grew up with, it just was, you know, like as a kid I was not think I was not putting those boxes on top of this to contain this. To me it was like I want to do something for the people and how do I go about it, and I think my mother was probably like, hey, if you want to go down this path, you're not doing it in India because it's not safe. So I think that was the first time that I think this thought came in my mind that okay, I want to go down this path.

Simranzeet: 35:30

The second thing was, growing up, there was no way to kind of get into the public policy, public service kind of a thing. There is an examination in NDIU, psc, but there are millions of people who you know like take that exam and again they end up becoming a part of a public service, but it's not really more policy oriented. So to me I was like, okay, I want to get into these like nutty topics and I might have to go and, you know, get that education outside, definitely acknowledging my privilege as well in all of this, because I think at that point in time my family definitely had the means to for me to even be able to think that I could go out and get that education. So again, really been fortunate on that end as well. Um, so anyway, I that's you know that's how the whole process started in my head that okay, I want to go out, um, and uh, you know, I want to delve into these topics and I want to live by myself and I want want to you know a bit of that self-discovery journey also started, and for me it was not so much about okay, I'm only going to go to Canada. I had given my SATs, I'd given my other kind of exams that at that time you had to give for the United States, for UK. It just so happened to be the case that the finances in my mind worked the best if I came to Canada. So finances in my mind worked the best if I came to Canada. So that's how I kind of landed here.

Simranzeet: 37:04

The other point that you touched on in your question was how you felt uprooted when you had to leave your joint family to come here. For me, I think the experience was a little different. I did grow up in a joint family for the first couple of years in my life, but we had kind of like started living as a nuclear family after so and I was not necessarily on the you know like best terms with, you know, my dad's side of the family. Like people were still working together, the business was still going on, but there was no kind of like that sense of loss that I experienced when I moved out. Rather, I think for me it was more about leaving that sheltered you know atmosphere in my home, you know, with my younger sister and my parents that was a bit of a struggle, but definitely I think.

Simranzeet: 37:55

But you kind of hit the nail on its head in that. The underlying sentiment, the underlying feeling of being uprooted, it's huge. I think it's really dense as a feeling and it only takes for someone to have taken that leap of faith to really realize what that feeling entails. Right, because you, and especially, I think it's a lot more profound for somebody who is doing that at the age of 17, who's kind of grown up in a really and there are a lot of other people you know who came as international students with me at that age in which you know you really grew up in a really sheltered home. Everything is kind of like made available to you. And then at 17, you're basically like, okay, you're going to the West and the fastest that we can reach you is probably in 24 hours. If we take the next flight out, it's still going to take a day for us to reach you.

Simranzeet: 38:51

But you know you as a kid are basically sent to figure life out.

Simranzeet: 38:55

But you know, you as a kid are basically sent to figure life out and that's when you, I think, when you move and then when you kind of start to encounter challenges, when life starts to happen to you, that's when the sense of loss starts to kind of like settle in, that you know what.

Simranzeet: 39:11

Now is probably like I could. I need my family or I need my loved ones around me to kind of share the burden with me. But everybody kind of, I think, experiences that loss in different ways, not to say that people who move in later in their life, in their 20s, don't experience that or maybe experience it less. I think everyone is different, everyone's attachment patterns are different, everyone has had different life circumstances and experiences. But I think a common thread among everyone's experience as an immigrant, when you move out, is that sense of loss. We just kind of realized that at the very least you know in India or wherever you know, people are. Wherever they grew up, they still had that sense of community, they had the sense of family, but now it's all upon themselves to figure life out.

Gurasis: 40:04

Yeah, oh, my God, I just love how sometimes you define certain things and I'm just amazed that you always find the correct words to say it. And initially, when you were talking about getting to this career, you said you know the person on the stage swearing and then the people who are watching him, like you said, you know they believe that, okay, this guy has the power to change the decision. I love how you just said that. I mean, everybody can see that. But again, just defining it the way you did, I really like that part. Um, and the other aspect you really touched upon is uh which, if I you know, reflect on that myself also that you said that your family, you said that you feel privileged. You see now that you are privileged that your family was even able to think about sending you abroad because they had the means to do it. Sometimes it's very underrated. You just don't consider it in that particular moment that you're able to do that up until later on you reflect on it and realize that.

Gurasis: 41:09

But moving on, let's just get more into your international student life. You stayed in Windsor. You came to do your masters. You came to study economics and not the masters. You came to study economics and political science. Right, tell us about the international student experience and how was it like just in the class as well? I remember having conversations with you regarding, uh, you know, not enough people get certain kind of courses. You know it's usually the general courses, are maybe the IT or some other kinds, and nothing's wrong in that. But tell me more about that.

Simranzeet: 41:43

Yeah, for sure. So I came to Windsor in 2011. Windsor at that time, I remember, you know, even now, when somebody asks me where your hometown is, the first thought that comes to mind is Windsor and not New Delhi. And the reason is, and the reason why Windsor holds such a special place in my heart is because that's really where I started to get more in touch with my own self, where I really started to, as I said, engage in those heavy-duty topics, to really start to understand life. I really had that space to grow up.

Simranzeet: 42:22

But, yeah, coming in at 2011, it was, I think, a couple of years after the 2008 financial crisis. So Windsor, which is a city right on the border with Detroit in the US, it's kind of like that automotive city. That's where a lot of the automobile companies are the Chryslers, the Fords and others. So, because that financial crash had happened and the automotive industry had been totally decimated by that crash totally decimated by the crash the ripple effects were felt in Windsor as well, in which most of the folks who lived in that city used to work in those plants, used to cross the border, go work in those plants, come back and then, when those plants closed down, it just ended up impacting the local economy of the city as well. So Windsor, the way people remember it today, today, was very different than what it was in 2011. It was still kind of starting to find its feet after the 2008 financial crisis.

Simranzeet: 43:22

But anyway, there I was. I still remember I think it was August 30th or something that I reached Windsor 2011. And to me, I think the first thing that kind of came to mind for me was that this air smells really different. That was the first thought that came to mind that this is unusual. I woke up in the morning and it took me a bit of a couple of minutes to kind of just orient myself as to you know where exactly am I? And you know it was like I think everything was new. Uh, I was living on, like I was living in the student dorm. I was sharing, you know, my room with someone, um, who happened to be from a different culture altogether. Um and um. That was.

Simranzeet: 44:09

I think every single experience that happened since I landed was very new. Um, most of the kids experience that happened since I landed was very new. Most of the kids and you kind of touched upon this as well most of the kids who come to Canada for their undergrad. They end up going into business or engineering. That's where a lot of you know folks from India, pakistan, southeast Asia generally gravitate towards, and I was probably one of the lone wolves in wanting to do economics and I initially enrolled as an economics and math double major and I eventually found my way into an economics and political science double major in my second year Because I'd taken a course in political science, really loved it, but definitely a huge experience for me sitting in those classes.

Simranzeet: 45:03

And again, um, I didn't grow up on American TV shows because I think, like growing up in India in the 90s and early 2000s, um, um, I think the mental gap was really huge in terms of, you know, not really knowing what the world and the vest really was all about. I think now when people you know come in, I think they've already seen a lot of that in the TV shows and the movies and other things. So it's a bit more access now.

Gurasis: 45:31

Yeah.

Simranzeet: 45:32

It's more access, it's more familiar. But for a 17-year-old entering the classroom for a first-year 101 course in economics with 400 people in an amphitheater was like okay, this is different, it's overwhelming. But I think one of the first things that I picked up on was that not a lot of people at least not in Windsor at that time, you know not like not a lot of international students and brown people took economics or they didn't.

Simranzeet: 46:06

I was probably like one of the one of the only ones in a political science class. I think another thing that I realized was that since I was, you know, in political science, there was a lot of conversations about Canadian political history that I didn't know anything about. I had to do a lot of that self teaching on my own Because I wanted to participate in the class. I had thoughts, I had ideas that I wanted to share with my peers, and there were also a couple of kind of like rough ups. That happened because I just happened to have a lot thicker accent than I do now and I was talking about all these grand ideas that I had about political science, about economics, in class and I'm pretty sure a lot of people again, I think they maybe did not really feel that I deserved to be there. So there were a lot of like couple of like run-ins that I had at that time okay, can you share any instance if you remember about those run-ins?

Simranzeet: 47:04

uh, sure, uh, I'm gonna share one with you and your listeners, which is sure, um, I think this was a third year, uh, science class, and the class was basically set up as, like one of the activities in the class, like one of the main projects in the class, was that we will do like a mock-up of a parliament, the House of Commons, in which we will divide basically people into two, three groups, depending on the number of parties, and we will do like a roll call of issues of the day, so like the top 10 political issues, and we're going to have a question period in class. Okay, and that's your project, so okay, and then the whole thing started. You have like some 100, 150 people in the class and I get called and we start, and there's a bit of that kind of like two podiums and people are kind of going at each other in the question period and, like I've been a debater, I've been somebody who has been into public speaking for a really long time as well, so, and I have ideas and opinions about things. So I was kind of started to go off and I was starting to put my points across. There was a lot of barbs getting exchanged.

Simranzeet: 48:21

All that was good and fun, but I just, you know, it happened to be an instance in which the person on the other side just ended up, you know, sneaking this thing into the conversation that, hey, simran, but you have all these ideas. And it just kind of became a bit personal, in which this person basically said, okay, simran, you have all these ideas and you think this is what we should do, but tell me something. Let's pause and say did you even grow up here? Do you know the struggles of, you, know this country, and do you even, can you even vote?

Simranzeet: 48:57

And that to me was very personal because, like, obviously I'm a, I'm an international student, I'm having, um, I still have had to kind of go through my immigration journey and everything like I'm not, but to me it really like put things in perspective in which I was really thrown off um and it took me some seconds to, you know, like, fully recover from that.

Simranzeet: 49:17

And that's something that I think, also because I was a kid at that age. I took it really personally and something that has stayed with me since. But a couple of those and there have been other instances as well at workplace- Did you react to that in any way, or you were just quiet?

Simranzeet: 49:33

No, I think I was thrown off and I was quiet Like the first time that it happened. I was really thrown off and quiet and it was more of like, I think, being paralyzed by fear almost in front of like 150 people. Right that this person didn't you know, like this person did not keep the conversation or the debate focused upon the issue, but they made it personal and I think you know it's like that's when I started to kind of realize that you know what this is, something that I have to just embrace. The more that I run away from it, the more it's going to follow me and really like, start to, you know, it'll start to make me feel bad about myself. There's this Game of Thrones quote, I think it's by one of the Lannisters, that whatever your weakness is, wear that on your chest as a badge, because nobody's going to make you forget about that anyway. So you might as well just wear it as a badge, right? So since that day, I kind of realized that you know I am going to, you know, deal with these issues head on.

Simranzeet: 50:48

Yes, I might not have grown up in this country. Yes, I might not have, you know, at that point in time I might not have a citizenship or the right to vote. At that point in time I might not have a citizenship or the right to vote, but I'm going to go back and really, you know, like learn everything that I can to really understand what the nuances are. So I think that was also, I think, helpful as an experience for me, because it really made me go back and delve into Canadian political history, like as a novice. I probably again, I think I might know a lot more about Canadian political history and the different kind of dynamics and the ebbs and flows, much more than an average Canadian can or does at this point right now. Because and I really I think it's I kind of I'm thankful for that experience, for having pushed me to do that.

Simranzeet: 51:40

It really pushed me to go into the different local communities in Windsor and you know other cities and this is, you know, a pattern with me even now, every city that I go to in Canada. For me, it's not just about you know, seeing the top three sites. For me it's like I want to know the people, I want to know the history of this place. I want to know the local communities here. I want to know the people. I want to know the history of this place. I want to know the local communities here. I want to know how people think. I want to know what their challenges are on the ground, because for me, it's always that I want to be more, and I think it's a bit of an overcompensation as well, definitely, but I think it's something that has helped me. It's definitely helped shape my world view. Yeah.

Gurasis: 52:24

You know, think it's, it's, it's something that has helped me. It's definitely helped shape my world here. Yeah, you know, I think this is such a great learning for my, for the listeners and for me as well, that how you have channelized those experiences and you now you are calling themselves, um, an overcompensation. You know, I mean, I mean this. This is something I think, I think, even for me also. You know, in general, I think, whatever I think the reason I'm able to do this podcast today syndrome is because of those experiences I've had. Had I not been through those comments and those criticism and and all that stuff, I might not be able to put the work to make sure that somebody is coming next should not face that, you know right so I I think it's.

Gurasis: 53:03

It's a good learning to really channel those and not let that affect you. And also, you said something about, you know, wearing your weaknesses as a batch. I think it makes life so easier. You don't have to really justify or start defending for things anymore. You know, for example, if you have a fat nose, you have it. What can you do with that? You know, I have a lot of beard, I have a lot of beer. What can I do for that? I don't want to because, as you know again, like this question comes my way all the time, even for the identity, if I talk about that, like why don't you cut it, you know, or why you wear a third one, and all those questions do come my way. But I end up telling them I genuinely enjoy this process of getting ready. I love this. You know, I end up saying that to them that yes, it takes time, but I genuinely enjoy my one hour in the morning. You know, for example, um, which definitely, definitely more than that.

Simranzeet: 53:54

But let's just say, if you're able to do that in an hour, good, as he said need some tips?

Gurasis: 54:01

no, definitely not. No, it takes more than that, especially if nowadays, I'm so grateful for being up, getting the opportunity to work from home, but imagine, uh, going through the same process every day. I don't even know how people used to do that I don't think so I can do that.

Gurasis: 54:15

So I'd go like once a week or once in two weeks sometimes and I remember that morning I'm up like at 5, 36, you know, doing everything and then leaving the house by like 8, 8, 30, so yeah no, I know and I think this is something that you touched on that I want to quickly echo is the whole authenticity piece yeah.

Simranzeet: 54:36

I just feel it's it's taken me um a reasonably long time to arrive at this conclusion that the best way to live life is to just be authentic and embrace. You know your shortcomings, that's fine. Embrace your strengths as well, uh, not to kind of dial down and forget what your pluses are, what your pros are, but also be very mindful that, okay, these are a couple of things that I actually fall short on.

Gurasis: 55:04

And.

Simranzeet: 55:05

I think, because I think that authentic way of living life just helps you go about life in a way which I think is better lived, is more fully lived and just makes for an overall good experience, I think, as opposed to kind of taking on these different identities to you know, please, or appease people absolutely, but just wanted to touch on that, but over to you so let me tell my listeners that my introduction was actually inspired by the conversation we had initially, and, and that you know you said something about that we as international students, sometimes, or most of the time, not have that cushion to fall back on that or that option to go back.

Gurasis: 55:52

You know, just wrap everything up and go back and, and we get into the zone of I cannot lose. You know there's no going back. And you said these few lines and which stayed with me. You said that, uh, we come to a point where where, because of helplessness, you said that you know, if you want me to speak differently, I'll do that. You want me to round up some rough edges? I'll do that. You want me to be less ambitious? I'll do that. You want me to be less ambitious? I'll do that, just and just because I want to fit in.

Gurasis: 56:22

But then, at some point, you end up seeing that the person that you're seeing in the mirror is not exactly the person who it is. You know it's somebody else and you have yourself. You said that you hit that point pretty early in your life, when you started working, and that's how we end up talking about the topic of soul searching. I'm going to tell us anything and everything that you think that can help the the listeners who might be going to the similar phase, and what were just your learnings throughout that experience?

Simranzeet: 56:53

I'm very happy to share that and I think that's a really um, interesting angle that you delve into, because I think it's every immigrant that goes through it, right. It's not that some people can just choose not to, typically speaking, I think one thing that you've got to realize, that everyone's got to realize, is that we as human beings, we as people in the society, we are conditioned to work collaboratively and think collaboratively, right. That's where the whole herd mentality concept comes in. The odd one always sticks out, right. So we're all programmed to mirror each other, to be similar. That's where that whole concept of fitting in comes from right, because we don't want to be the person kind of like being that odd one, that kind of sticks out, that you know every time gets people's attention.

Simranzeet: 57:57

That's a reason why I think a lot of people are not really comfortable also to think from a contrarian viewpoint, right? So if I basically say, okay, that you know good, ocs, this is how we do things here and you are a new member of the organization who's recently been hired, 99% of the chances you'll be like you know what. I don't want to ruffle any feathers. This is how they do work here. These are the rules in place and you know what. They might not really align with my values, but I'm just going to do it because you don't want to upset people, you want to fit in right.

Simranzeet: 58:33

In my case, I think I, as you said, I started kind of picking on these themes pretty early, in which, at 17, 18, 19, I think, the first couple of years that I was here a which might not have been the best articulated at that time, that would not really have been reflective of the way people think, the way that I dressed, even right. So there were a lot of these different things that started to come up that I realized. You know, it started seeping into the way that I conducted myself with people around me and for me the confusion really started Because for four months, when the semester is going on, eventually, you know like I started talking in a certain way to be actually able to better enunciate, so that people can stop, you know, asking me to repeat myself, so that, you know, I start to feel less self-conscious. So I kind of like put on these different garbs just to kind of fit in, just to kind of fit in, and then the funny thing that used to happen is after, like, a school year used to get finished and used to go to India, I'm a different Simran, there I'm not talking in the same way, I'm not putting on those garbs and then when I'm there for a month or two and then I'm coming back to Canada, there's that dissonance happening again.

Simranzeet: 1:00:16

So eventually, like after a couple of those cycles, I just kind of realized that, okay, you know what, I don't really know what's going on. My identity got really mixed and I think that's where I think every immigrant goes through a bit of an identity crisis. Right, there are some people who are able to take it, to take the move out of their home country to a new country, like fish to water, you know, god bless them. I think a majority of us are not able to do it that well. People struggle with their accents, people struggle with the way they talk, the way they go about their lives, what they eat A lot of times, you know.

Simranzeet: 1:00:55

I've heard from a lot of people, a lot of indians, that you know they don't really take their home cooked food to the office yeah because you know there's always that thing at the back of their mind that you know what, man, this smells like curry. I don't want to be the one sitting in the office. You know lunchroom eating food that other people might just frown upon, right so there are these different things that people, you know, go through at different stages of their lives.

Simranzeet: 1:01:21

In my case, a bit of that identity crisis started to creep in, you know, just as I turned 20, 21, in which I kind of realized that, okay, and this was more when I was finishing my undergrad and I was thinking about going for my master's, in which I was like, okay, okay, now I am not exactly Canadian, I don't feel Canadian because there are these people telling me that, hey, you can't vote here, or you don't know about Canadian history, or I'm still, you know, trying to get a grip on the accent, or there's still so much work that I got to do to justify my place here, so I'm not Canadian enough. Okay, fine, now I'm going to go back to India. I'm not Indian enough here. You're not Indian enough.

Simranzeet: 1:02:05

Now people over there are telling me that you've got a bit of an accent, or they're telling me that you know, like your views about life have changed, or you have changed, yeah.

Simranzeet: 1:02:16

So what it does to the person is you're like I'm neither here nor there, so where exactly am I? Yeah, that's what the whole identity crisis is all about. Now, this might manifest in someone else's life very differently People who move in their early 20s, mid 20s, late 20s with their families. It might look very different for them, but this was my experience and the way that I tried to kind of think about this was I had to unpack a lot of these different things, which is why I'm so big upon living in a very authentic way in which there are some things which I have accepted, that you know the color of my skin or the way that I pronounce certain words that's never going to change. I don't want to change that. If an accent came naturally to me, I'm going to pick it up and I might not talk in the same accent with my dad when I talk to him back home.

Gurasis: 1:03:20

And that's fine.

Simranzeet: 1:03:21

That's okay. Like that's how it looks for me. For somebody else it might look very different, but like, this is who I am. This is, you know, what I think works for me, simran, and I think people need to figure that out for their own selves which really works for them, how much of a concession they want to make in terms of, you know, adjusting their personality and where is that line for them. Finding that line for them is what it's all about. Like I know, as a matter of fact, that, okay for me, the decision to keep, you know, the turban or my beard, or, you know, wanting to do something for the community and look like the way that I do or the way that I sound. It's going to have its own set of challenges, but that's a line that I don't want to cross. I don't want to change all of this to be able to fit in there, because in that case, as you said, I'm not even going to recognize myself in the mirror.

Gurasis: 1:04:17

Yeah.

Simranzeet: 1:04:19

So I think the whole idea is to trying to find what your own individual, authentic self looks like. It takes a lot of that soul searching, as you said, and it takes a lot of sitting down and actually saying, okay, this feels right to me, this doesn't feel right to me. It also definitely takes a lot of, you know, supportive people around you, people who can empower you, your friends, your families and I've been really lucky to have many friends who have reinforced in me that you know, simran, you're worthy.

Gurasis: 1:04:52

You're wanted.

Simranzeet: 1:04:54

We love you the way that you are and you don't need to change to fit in, and I think that's what really kind of gave me the power to actually be like okay, these are the terms. Uh, there are some changes which are going to take time, which are going to come naturally. I'm not going to force them and I'm comfortable with those changes coming in. There are other things which I'm not going to change because I don't want to change. Those are things that make me inauthentic, right, so, it's just about that.

Simranzeet: 1:05:21

I think that soul searching is also really glorified in a lot of different ways, but I think in the most simplest thing, it just means can you wake up in the morning, look in the mirror, the mirror, okay. Can you wake up in the morning, look in the mirror and realize that you know, the person that you see is the person that you mostly wanted to be right? You see the person who is being honest and true. Um, because I think that's from where everything else flows um, I don't want to live a life where I might have to make all these concessions and really change myself and then it might end up doing really well, but 20 years from now, I'm like I don't even know, like there's nothing about my own self that reminds me of who I am, where I came from, right.

Simranzeet: 1:06:11

So it's just about figuring out what works for you and sticking, sticking, sticking to that with, with guts, right, because another, another kind of thing that I believe in, that I often tell myself that I used to tell myself a lot more every time I used to feel down is you got to have guts, man. No guts, no glory. You got to like stick to your guts, you got to stick to your guns. Gotta stick to your guns. Um, you gotta figure out what works for you and, uh, be unapologetic about it. I think in the most, in most instances, yeah, yeah, absolutely, man.

Gurasis: 1:06:49

I love that. I know a few things I want to highlight before we get into the final segments. You said that try to find your unique definition of identity, your your true self. Second, you said is you know, find a support system who can actually acknowledge and tell you that what you're doing is right and makes you stop questioning yourself all the time. And the final one obviously, no guts, no glory. So that would be my takeaway for Lullaceness. So, before we get into the final segment, is there anything you think that I have not covered that you would like to mention?

Simranzeet: 1:07:26

uh, no, I think you've covered almost everything you asked me about, uh, my life pre-canada, what made me think about canada. You made me open up um and provide a safe space in which I might have actually overshared. So, at the risk of not revealing too much, because I'm a fairly private person, I'm going to say you covered most of it.

Gurasis: 1:07:48

So, before we get into the final, last segment, I have included this new segment in this season and I call it Know your Host, where I give my guests an opportunity to ask me any question they would like.

Simranzeet: 1:08:00

Oh, that's amazing. Okay, um, give me a couple of seconds to think no tough questions, please.

Simranzeet: 1:08:05

No, no, I'm not gonna I'm not gonna make it super tough. Curious to know how you take these questions on from people, because you know I have a very unique way and a very unique approach that I've kind of developed. Um, but I want to hear from you anytime and and I think you live in you live in Montreal, right? Yes, I do, yeah. So again, I think my question to you almost is that how do you, anytime people get fascinated with a turban and they ask you questions about the turban, what are some of the most intriguing questions that you've received and how and how have you answered them?

Gurasis: 1:08:48

Oh, my God, I love this question because I do get that question a lot. You said it very correctly. Obviously, I think it stemmed right from the time I landed in Canada, which was in my class, you know I'm that was the only Indian and the only Sikh person, turban wearing person. I think initially people were a little hesitant to ask me anything because they didn't know me, but eventually, after like three, four months, they started noticing and noticing the colors of my turban. And I am a little bit one of those who like to dress up.

Gurasis: 1:09:21

I think we all sikhs in general, you know, like to match their turbans accordingly and I'm like one of those and every time I would go, every time I could see those eyes, you know, staring at me and and my turban. And then eventually I remember my professor started uh, who, who was got really friendly with us, and he started, he used to call me guru and each time I'm entering the class and, uh, for some reason I was always late. I was like one of those, you know, when I was younger and I remember entering the class and the class was started like 10 am and I would be there for like time five or ten, ten, and I remember, every time this line would come my way, there's like oh, here is guru, always fashionably late, you know. So this, this line would come my way. And the same happens with my office. Not that I'm late anymore, I'm pretty punctual but the same question comes my way in in the office and the same statement I meant.

Gurasis: 1:10:14

So the question that comes my way all the time is that does the colors of a turban mean anything? Always, and I always tell them that in general, the colors of a turban doesn't mean that much and I always wear something that aligns best with my outfit, that's all. But there are certain colors, you know, like reds, which are worn on the weddings, for example, you know, in the Sikh weddings. It was traditionally worn. Now things are changing, changing. The pastel colors are kind of coming in, uh, when other colors, like you know, maybe, uh, orange or the, the navy blue or or even the yellow, those are worn, like on certain uh, traditional or religious festivals that we wear on. So this is some, this is how usually I uh answer them. But in general, the colors doesn't mean that much and you, I just go along whichever color I feel that day, that's that's amazing.

Simranzeet: 1:11:10

That's amazing. That's that's really nice, because I think, um and you know through your podcast, that's something else that I want to just get that word out on that. A lot of times, the questions are not meant to be personal, they're not meant to personally attack you. They're coming from a place of intrigue, they're coming from a place of genuine curiosity. So the idea is to for everyone to learn and this is not just immigrants, it's, you know, I think it's a, it's a really important skill to just know, anyway for anyone, which is to know how to disarm someone in a conversation, right? So if somebody asks you, you know, like, I've also gotten similar questions, like do the colors mean anything? Uh, I've seen other people with different styles. Is that? Yeah, absolutely, how many you know like, uh, uh, you know do you have?

Simranzeet: 1:12:06

and everything do you have like? Does that mean, does it, you know, come? Does it change by age? And all that really like curious questions and to me, I kind of of look to those questions as opportunities for me to really educate and share what this is all about. Right, because I think if people take it personally or if they end up being shy, you're basically leaving an opportunity on the table for someone to genuinely know what this is all about for someone to genuinely know what this is all about.

Simranzeet: 1:12:39

So learn how to disarm. It's a friendly conversation, be engaging and don't be shy to kind of take these questions on. I think it could be turban for us, it could be a hijab for someone, it could be a kippah for someone else, but the whole idea basically being that just these are important identity markers that we choose to, you know, adorn on ourselves as a part of who we are, and we got to be unapologetic about it and if somebody has a question, feel free to answer. You know like, feel free to engage them in that conversation. And if you find yourself not being able to answer, then sit back and really question yourself why you wear it right? I think that's the other piece, like why exactly do you wear a turban?

Gurasis: 1:13:25

I think that's that to you then becomes an important question to you to ask yourself, to really kind of understand so anyway, it's going to be something that you'll end up benefiting from yeah, yeah, oh, my god, this question has woken up like a certain chapter in my mind, you know, which was just not talked about in so so long. And when you said the term unarmed, I can totally back that because, obviously, like you know, and you can see that people staring at you, or your turban or your beard, you can see that. You know, you might they might not look directly into your eye, but you can feel that certain sort of tension between you and the other person. And I think that's where I don't know somehow how I learned that or how I do that. I don't even know. But the thing which I actually introspected on was I do try to bring people to that comfort level so that they are open to ask me those questions, and I do that by asking them a lot of questions, you know, or maybe about their family, a bit about their house, maybe about their career. I ask them a lot of questions, I bring them at like a safe space, a certain proximity I try to build so that they can ask me those questions. So I try to do that and speaking of questions again, uh, I completely skipped telling you and by answering the question that you asked me that in my final presentation of my program, the program I started at LaSalle College, there was a course which was called the communication and the presentation course and in that you were asked to present anything like anything that I would like to do.

Gurasis: 1:14:56

That I remember, like in my, we were supposed to do like two presentations. One presentation was about india I actually learned a lot about india just researching and preparing for that, obviously. And second thing, my second presentation, the final presentation, which absolutely was was, you know, acclaimed by, praised by everybody, and that presentation was about the 13 questions I get asked about. My third one. That was my presentation, amazing and I answer and I still have the recording of that, the presentation I built. I have maybe somewhere down the line.

Gurasis: 1:15:27

I'll release that to my for my listeners. If anybody would like to share, I would love to share that on instagram. But yes, I answered those 13 questions to the point that in my final questions where they asked me that how do I tie a turban, I could not show them the whole process, but I did take along one of my turbans and I showed them that it's actually 7.5 meters long and you do that certain process of folding it, which is pony, we call it in punjabi, and I showed them how I do that and then a little bit of like a demonstration of how I sort of like tie it. So I actually showed them and I think it was really, really appreciated by everybody and I think each one of my classmates came to me and they told me oh my god, like we loved this. Even my professor, you know. She came to me and I think I got the full grades. I mean, no doubt, obviously, but I got full grades in that.

Simranzeet: 1:16:15

Yeah that's amazing and I think like kudos to you for having that, you know strength of character to actually share something so personal with everyone. Because, yes, it's a lot of times I think at least that's been my experience A lot of these questions come from a genuine place of curiosity, right?

Gurasis: 1:16:32

Absolutely. You really want to know.

Simranzeet: 1:16:35

And that's a terrific technique that I want to acknowledge, which is one of the great ways to disarm somebody, is to actually ask them questions so that they feel comfortable to ask you back. So, yeah, really fascinating.

Gurasis: 1:16:48

Okay, awesome, thank you. Thank you for these questions. I love that. So, simran, now you're in the final segment of the podcast. I call it Beneath the Accent. I'm going to ask a couple of questions.

Simranzeet: 1:17:02

You can answer them in one word or a sentence, or howsoever you feel like, the idea is just to know more about simran so ready, absolutely first is what advice would you give to your younger self, and at what age?

Gurasis: 1:17:11

be authentic, trust the process at, I would say, age 18, 19 okay, what's that one dish from your home country that always brings you comfort and nostalgia?

Simranzeet: 1:17:26

oh, okay, so since I told you that my mom is from bihar, that's where she grew up, um, I've grown up on a lot of, uh, bihari food. Um, it has to be boiled rice with yellow dal, and then maybe some it's called aloo chokha, which is basically mashed potatoes on the side. So that's going to probably be it.

Gurasis: 1:17:53

Okay, awesome, making me hungry already. Describe a moment when you experienced a significant cultural difference that surprised you interesting.

Simranzeet: 1:18:02

I think this was probably the first time that I was invited to uh one of my white friends's house for thanksgiving and uh just kind of like seeing that dynamic within their family um and how you know everybody kind of went about.

Simranzeet: 1:18:20

You know that interpersonal relationship and this was me at 18 probably um that to me was uh, that to me just kind of made me think about the way that we do that in a lot of southeast asian cultures and uh it's really like I think both of those are really warm, uh, but there was a bit of a difference there, so that's something that came to mind do you have any instance, any funny story related to your misunderstanding around the accent or english?

Simranzeet: 1:18:48

so my name is simran zeet uh, simran zeet with a z, but I go by simran. That's what I go by in conversations. So a lot of times I've heard different variations of Simran from people. I've heard Simran. I've heard Simran. I've heard different kind of like mispronunciations. For the longest time, Starbucks used to mess up the name that you used to put on the cups and then probably there were enough Simrons who came in the downtown Toronto core that they finally were able to figure it out.

Simranzeet: 1:19:27

But I've heard so many different variations of this name. It's not even funny, and you know it's also funny that a lot of times I think Microsoft Outlook or Microsoft Word autocorrect simran to simon. So there have been many emails in which it's been hey, simon, um, and I'm like man, this is not even like. Ask simon to finish this job for you. This was not meant for me, uh, but yeah, that's, that's something that came to mind okay, for me, the the spellings are always correct.

Gurasis: 1:20:01

It's always a pronunciation which goes from guruses to guruses, guruses, juruses. So that's where my pronunciation goes to. Okay, tell us about your first friend that you made in Canada, and are you still in Connect?

Simranzeet: 1:20:22

Oh, that's that's so. That's so beautiful, so that's such a beautiful question. Yes, the first friend that I did make in Canada was this friend, from Chandigarh actually, who happened to be a fellow international student who I had met. Um, so, you know, universities I think they still do they have these international student centers, uh, in university, so I think there was like a welcome night. For international students. That was that. You know, this place in windsor was organizing and I met my friend. His name is rohan khanna and I'm there and, uh, we're still in touch. We lost touch for a couple of years, I think from 2015 to 2018, 2019.

Simranzeet: 1:21:06

And then we reconnected back in 2020 and then we've been in touch. So shout out to Rohan he's in India vacationing right now. Okay, but yeah, we were still in touch.

Gurasis: 1:21:19

Okay, awesome. What's that? One tradition that you have adopted, like a Canadian tradition that you have adopted?

Simranzeet: 1:21:29

It's going to probably be opening conversations up with asking about the weather.

Simranzeet: 1:21:36

I love that answer, just because I think it's something that I was just mentioning this to someone back home I think it was my parents or somebody else but how? In India, you know, we never really check the weather. We don't talk about the weather that much. It just is what it is and we just kind of take it at face value. You just like get accustomed to it. But I, what it is, and you just kind of take it at face value. You just like get, get it, get accustomed to it. But I think it has. It is such a thing here in canada, and I think rightfully so, because the weather here changes so quickly, um, that everybody's always on their phone looking at you know what the latest prediction is, um, and I think it just ends up finding its way into conversations as well. So yeah, it's gonna be.

Simranzeet: 1:22:18

It's gonna be opening up conversations by talking about it, just publicly musing about the weather you know, I just realized I do that a lot too.

Gurasis: 1:22:26

I do ask a lot about the weather, and I think if the amount of times I've asked city that what's the weather outside? Right I think if she could really be a human, she'll snap at me and stop asking about the weather every single day.

Simranzeet: 1:22:40

I know right.

Gurasis: 1:22:42

Yeah.

Simranzeet: 1:22:42

Crazy.

Gurasis: 1:22:43

Oh, my god, okay, what's something that you ate for the first time in Canada?

Simranzeet: 1:22:51

It has to be the turkey dinner on Thanksgiving uh thanksgiving.

Simranzeet: 1:22:54

So, uh, you know the place that he used to kind of have like the food court at the university um did the special thing, um, thanksgiving 2011, uh, in which they they're gonna serve the turkey, they serve the potatoes, the stuffing and everything the cranberry sauce and, uh, that to me was just like wow. It was like a a net new kind of food experience and, uh, something that I actually took quite a liking to, so it was the first time that I ate that in in canada I actually tried that two years ago for the first time, and I thoroughly enjoyed it too.

Gurasis: 1:23:33

Yeah, yeah, yeah. If you had to describe yourself as an animal, any creature, what would it be and why?

Simranzeet: 1:23:39

there are so many that come to mind, but I probably am going to go with, uh, an eagle or a hawk. Um, that's the one that I identify with the most right now, um, like in the stage of my life in which there's still a bit of that independence um if you know like going about life and you know living it.

Simranzeet: 1:24:00

you know, on my own terms, On my terms yeah, also being very authentic and really looking at things from perspective and, yeah, a bit of that kind of like going with the flow, because, you know, eagles and hawks, they don't really flap their wings too much. A lot of it is, you know, just trusting the process and seeing where the wind takes them and, just course, correcting along the way. So I'm going to say probably that, yeah, eagle or hawk.

Gurasis: 1:24:29

I love that. Okay, if you could, if you had to create one law that everybody has to follow, what would it be?

Simranzeet: 1:24:38

In Canada In general any law.

Gurasis: 1:24:43

For the world.

Simranzeet: 1:24:44

Genuinely speaking, making some part of your week mandatory for community service, a hundred percent, just because I think it's going to get a lot of people out of their homes and interacting with people that they generally don't interact with, so a lot of that cultural knowledge exchange that happens. I genuinely believe that doing something for others without expecting anything in return is one of the ways to genuinely experience that joy. Expecting anything in return is one of the ways to genuinely experience that joy that if you've not done it, you won't really know what I'm talking about, but if you've done it it's a different kind of experience and I think everyone deserves to feel that at least once in their life. And I think, third is, it also will.

Simranzeet: 1:25:29

I think, hopefully it might be hard for people because it's a law that they need to follow, but eventually it might just become a force of habit. But just paying it forward, you know, and I think I I very strongly believe that, only if we could, um, you know, have more people to people, interactions within the community, in which, you know, I'm meeting people who have a very different viewpoint than myself and I'm meeting them over, I don't know, like a street cleanup, let's say, conversations are meant to happen, bridges are meant to be built. I just think it's going to, at the very least you know, make us better as a society. So I'm going to probably say, yeah, mandatory community service in some way shape or form, on a weekly or monthly basis yeah, okay, amazing.

Simranzeet: 1:26:25

Finally describe canada in one word or a sentence home, uh, is what I'm going to go with, um and uh, the reason why I say that and this has been, again, something that I remember from the first time that I came back from my first vacation to India and that I stayed with me is, and that's and that's, you know, why I've come to love this country so much because this country has helped me find my own self and it's also really provided me with those connections, those people. It really really embodies that ethos of doing something for others and being kind, right. So the reason why I said home is because and this is something that I've loved every single time that I've you know, come back, uh, from a foreign country into canada, that whenever the cbsf officer, um, it takes your passport and they do everything you could be a student, you could be on a visitor visa, you could be you know a resident or a citizen.

Simranzeet: 1:27:31

They say welcome home welcome home? Yeah, absolutely and that is so it's. It's really warm. It it really like talks about what Canada is all about, which is it's welcoming, and it really is. It's kind, in the way that you know, it sees people kind of coming in and adding to the vibrancy of the culture and the economy. So yeah, canada is home man.

Gurasis: 1:28:00

Okay. So, simran, if you could leave me with one piece of advice, what would it be?

Simranzeet: 1:28:07

I'd probably say it's great that you've started this community through my Thick Accent podcast and your listeners tune in. My advice to you will be to not give up on storytelling in any way, shape or form right. It could be through a podcast today, it could be through other means and avenues, you know next week, next month's, coming years, as you get more busy never stop telling stories.

Simranzeet: 1:28:47

Um, because I think you you personally, I think, uh, having interacted with you over the course of this podcast and previously as well I think you have a real talent with telling stories, shaping stories, um, and uh, for somebody out there who might not really have the access to come and meet people like you and me, it's easy for them to tune into the podcast and, you know, be a part of our lives and share and get a you know, sliced sliced version of our lives and you and get a you know, sliced sliced version of our lives and, you know, get to experience it vicariously, and I think that's really powerful. That's really something that can really help move the needle, if people can understand that. You know the experiences that I'm having as an immigrant. Simran and Gurasees and other people who've been on the podcast have had similar experiences. I think that validation goes a long way in terms of giving them that bit of confidence at self-belief.

Simranzeet: 1:29:44

So I think you're doing a terrific job in terms of telling these stories and my advice will be that never stop telling stories. Just make sure that if you've been chosen, if you have chosen this path for yourself, to tell these stories. Just make sure that it always remains a part of you know what you do, because you don't know who you might be influencing in what way. And yeah, that's going to probably be it. Yeah.

Gurasis: 1:30:15

Wow, I think once again, I'm so impressed the way you articulate your thoughts syndrome. But thank you, thank you for all your kind words. I really appreciate that. And finally, tell me how would you describe your experience of being on this podcast oh, it was amazing good to see you've been a very gracious host.

Simranzeet: 1:30:34

Um, you made me think about you, kind of made me introspect, and you know go back and you know think about things. You know what I was like growing up in India and when I moved here and it just refreshed and jogged my memory. I think you also went into, like certain areas. You kind of like delved into certain areas which I don't think a lot of people, a lot of hosts or a lot of question like interviewers, go into, and for me the highlight was that it was a very human conversation. Right, it was a conversation which was definitely about my experience and you know what kind of my trials and tribulations were, what my successes were, et cetera, et cetera. But it was also about you. I really like the way that you drew out pieces about you know different pieces about how I thought about things or how you summarize that towards the end. So it's been fantastic and again, kudos to you for doing this and doing this for the community.

Gurasis: 1:31:48

Well, thank you. Thank you for being on the podcast and adding value to my listeners, and thank you for being so open about all the stories and experiences that you have shared with me and my listeners. So, thank you, thanks a lot.

Simranzeet: 1:32:02

It's been a pleasure, guraseesh, thank you, thanks everyone.