Editorial…. As our Editor for the OKA newsletter Niranjan takes a break, I am trying to fill in on his behalf. It’s big shoes for me to fill, nevertheless, I am going to try. We have lots of things happening this year – OKA is turning 30! Yay!!! To celebrate the 30 years of young and vibrant OKA, we will kick start it with the first event of the year – Let’s paint it Red! The registrations are open, we have once again partnered with Sagan Banquet hall to bring this dinner and dance event for you! February – the coolest month of the year! So, all you cool cats in OKA be sure to register and get ready to rock and roll! Our seats are limited for this event – Please sign up early to get the best seats. Your EC is going to ensure that young 30-year- old OKA is going to celebrate 2018 with a bang! As you know this year our Sansar Padwa or Gudi Padwa or Ugadi falls on March 18, I remember as a kid, on this day, we would take oil baths and then line up to get ‘kodu nimba pathy’ (Neem leaves) given to us. And some sweet, and get envelopes with money in it! Those were the days!! Our Ugadi event is booked for April 7 th . We will be opening the entertain- ment entries for this soon. Be in touch with the entertainment committee via email for this. Ugadi event will celebrate our culture, our food and our litera- ture! It is going to be a lunch event and will be at SVBF. This is just a heads up. We will keep you posted on this event. I was speaking to sadanand mam and Prasad and Pramod recently. And we hear that there is a new band in town! I have shared a little information about this amchi band in this issue. They call themselves culture criminals. Do take a moment to read about their details and their inaugural performance on March 24th. Food – This is always one of my fav topics and why? Every day Ravi will ask me – what’s for dinner tonight? Or what’s for breakfast tomorrow? It’s a con- stant conundrum. Everyone is health conscious and everyone wants delicious tasty food including your truly! One of my faves in Konkani cuisine is pathar- vodo. I make it occasionally when we get the fresh leaves here. After steaming it, I also pan fry it, or sometimes deep fry it. Mmm… delicious! I also love valval. In our recipe section, I have shared a delicious and healthy recipe from Veenakka. Check it out! A big thanks to our sponsors, a big thanks to you our OKA members and a big thanks to the EC committee who volunteer their time! A big thanks to Ni- ranjan, who gets newsletter out on time! If you would like to contribute, please send us your articles on – Seniors – youth- education- employment- gardening- shopping- finance etc. by 10 th of each month. Thanks for your support, and as Niranjan would say – Jai Ho! Divya Nayak INSIDE THIS ISSUE Editorial ..............................1 President’s Message ...........2 Culture Criminals ...............3 Jevan Khann .......................4 Prema Manjeshwar Rao .....5 Our Sponsors………………….6 Contact Us: [email protected]eSamachar Check out our website and Facebook page: Volume I Issue January - 2018
Transcript
Editorial…. As our Editor for the OKA newsletter Niranjan takes a break, I am trying to fill in on his behalf. It’s big shoes for me to fill, nevertheless, I am going to try. We have lots of things happening this year – OKA is turning 30! Yay!!! To celebrate the 30 years of young and vibrant OKA, we will kick start it with the first event of the year – Let’s paint it Red! The registrations are open, we have once again partnered with Sagan Banquet hall to bring this dinner and dance event for you! February – the coolest month of the year! So, all you cool cats in OKA be sure to register and get ready to rock and roll! Our seats are limited for this event – Please sign up early to get the best seats. Your EC is going to ensure that young 30-year- old OKA is going to celebrate 2018 with a bang! As you know this year our Sansar Padwa or Gudi Padwa or Ugadi falls on March 18, I remember as a kid, on this day, we would take oil baths and then line up to get ‘kodu nimba pathy’ (Neem leaves) given to us. And some sweet, and get envelopes with money in it! Those were the days!! Our Ugadi event is booked for April 7 th . We will be opening the entertain-ment entries for this soon. Be in touch with the entertainment committee via email for this. Ugadi event will celebrate our culture, our food and our litera-ture! It is going to be a lunch event and will be at SVBF. This is just a heads up. We will keep you posted on this event. I was speaking to sadanand mam and Prasad and Pramod recently. And we hear that there is a new band in town! I have shared a little information about this amchi band in this issue. They call themselves culture criminals. Do take a moment to read about their details and their inaugural performance on March 24th. Food – This is always one of my fav topics and why? Every day Ravi will ask me – what’s for dinner tonight? Or what’s for breakfast tomorrow? It’s a con-stant conundrum. Everyone is health conscious and everyone wants delicious tasty food including your truly! One of my faves in Konkani cuisine is pathar-vodo. I make it occasionally when we get the fresh leaves here. After steaming it, I also pan fry it, or sometimes deep fry it. Mmm… delicious! I also love valval. In our recipe section, I have shared a delicious and healthy recipe from Veenakka. Check it out! A big thanks to our sponsors, a big thanks to you our OKA members and a big thanks to the EC committee who volunteer their time! A big thanks to Ni-ranjan, who gets newsletter out on time! If you would like to contribute, please send us your articles on – Seniors – youth- education- employment-gardening- shopping- finance etc. by 10 th of each month. Thanks for your support, and as Niranjan would say – Jai Ho! Divya Nayak
Dear OKA family, Namaskaru! Happy New Year to all of you! Hope you had a well-deserved time off in December during the holiday season with your family and friends! 2018 opened with a beautiful Full Moon day. Many of us went to temples, visited friends, cleaned up houses and what’s app groups and Facebook groups were humming with lots of motivational quotes and greetings for the new year. I am including one that I always think of -one that my mother always tells me (Of course in Konkani, But I have added the English Bhagavad Gita version here) – Whatever happened, happened for good. Whatever is happening, is happening for good. Whatever will happen, that will be for good as well. Do not regret the past, Do not worry for the future. The present is happening, Live in the present! Ravi and I wish all of you a great 2018! As promised, we have planned a spectacu-lar meet in February. The details are on our website as well as Facebook page. We are looking forward to seeing all of you and enjoy the new year together! Let’s paint it red! Divya & Ravi Nayak President Ontario Konkani Association
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PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE
CULTURE CRIMINALS
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JEVAN KHANN
Spinach Thumboli (Tambli) Recipe by: Veena Nayak Preparation time. 6 mins. Cooking time: 5 mins. Ingredients: 1 Bunch Baby Spinach leaves (Palak) 1/2 tsp. Cumin seeds (Jeera) 1 Tbsp fresh coconut 2 Green Chillies A Pinch of Asafoetida (Hing) 1 tsp. Ghee 3-4 Tbsp. Yogurt Salt to taste Method: Wash the Spinach leaves and then cut them into big chunks. In a Wok or Kadai, add the ghee, then Cumin seeds, Green Chillies, Coconut and Hing, saute it for a couple of minutes till light brown and then remove and transfer the mixture into a blender. On the other hand, in the remaining ghee in the same kadai add the chopped Spinach leaves saute it till all the leaves change colour. First grind the sauteed cumin, chillies, coconut, hing mixture into a course paste and then add sauteed Spinach leaves and blend it all together to a smooth paste consistency. Transfer this into a bowl, add yogurt, salt to taste mix it well. You can control the consistency by adding little water or even Buttermilk. Leave this in the fridge. This dish is served cold with hot steamed rice and/or Chapatis. Enjoy!
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At the Diwali 2017 Gala. OKA had the pleasure of paying a well deserved tribute to Prema
Manjeshwar Rao, or Prema-akka as she is fondly known in the Konkani community in
Toronto!
Prema-akka was born in Bengaluru, formerly Bangalore in Mysore State, on December
3rd 1927, which makes her just one month short of her 90th birthday! We are very privileged
to honour the eldest member of the Konkani Community in Canada!
Prema-akka’s early schooling took place at Annie Besant Theosophical School in the
Madanpalle campus near Rishi Valley, currently in Andhra Pradesh. Her father was then
transferred to Madras (modern day Chennai) in 1937, and so she attended school at
Sharada Vidyalaya and to college at Queen Mary’s College for intermediate and advanced to
Presidency College. Upon her graduation she worked at Queen Mary’s College for ten years,
after which she returned to Bengaluru to do her Masters and Doctorate programme in Bio-
chemistry The Tata Institute of Science, now the Indian Science Institute. In 1957 she at-
tended The University of Hawaii in Honolulu on a scholarship, to work as a Post Doctorate,
then at University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
In early 1961 Prema-akka chose to return to Bengaluru and joined as a Fellow at the
Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR run by the Indian Central Govern-
ment), where she performed research in Protein Synthesis related to DNA, now known as
Molecular Biology. After two years she returned to Philadelphia on yet another scholarship
to do research a the Fox Chase Cancer Centre and at Temple University. The laboratory
where she worked closed down in 1973 and moved en masse to the University of Toronto,
right here in our city! The U of T was extremely privileged to gain such a highly qualified
and experienced individual in their esteemed Department of Pathology in Cancer Research.
She was appointed Assistant Professor there, and worked conscientiously until her retire-
ment in 1993. However she continued to work in an Honorary capacity there to assist
students to complete their research right up until 2006, which is just eleven years ago!
The small Konkani community in Toronto at the time were also very honoured to wel-come such an astounding yet modest person in their midst.
As you can see for yourself, Prema-akka is a very unassuming and modest person, despite
leading such a distinguished academic life and a career involving tremendous responsibil-
ity, a rare accomplishment which is almost unheard of in a woman from India in the
1950’s!! She has been independent all her life and continues to do so today, driving occa-
sionally, cooking for herself and maintaining her condo in North York, Toronto. I sincerely
hope that our young members of OKA hold her as a model of inspiration to continue to
achieve their ambitions and overcome challenges that come their way!
Premakka got a well deserved standing ovation as our Presidents Divya and Ravi Nayak
presented her with a bouquet of flowers on behalf of the Ontario Konkani Association!
Nandini Bhat
PREMA MANJESHWAR RAO
Our Sponsors:
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