Before I answer this question, first of all I have to introduce the city of Dahlonega, as many of the readers of this blog may not know anything about this city. Dahlonega is about 55 miles north of Atlanta. This city has a population of around 7,000 and it is famous for the Gold rush that started in 1829. The Gold Rush Museum is located in the downtown, also known as the Square with a number of antique shops, great restaurants and wine tasting shops.
After teaching for more than sixteen years in the University of North Georgia, a Military College, located in Dahlonega, I retired due to some personal reasons. During my teaching career, I attended a number of computer conferences, and some of the attendees used to ask me after my presentation or brief introduction, as to “why did I choose this North Georgia College & State University at Dahlonega, out of over 4,000 universities/colleges in USA, to start my teaching career in USA”. Depending on the time available at that informal chat, which was either during short break or during lunch break, I had to tell them as brief or as long as possible how I made that choice. To save myself from repeating this, I decided to publish it in a local newspaper. I submitted my story, or the answer to that question to the Editor of The Nugget, a weekly newspaper of Dahlonega. The editor asked me to either trim it to around the 500 word limit or make it as a three column serial. I made that story into three columns. Here is the first column that was published in the first week of September, 2024 in The Nugget, had a sub-title Why Computer Science?
After completing my undergraduate degree in 1973, from University of Karachi, Karachi (Pakistan) I worked as a Service Engineer in Siemens Engineering, who had established a branch in Pakistan, to provide X-ray machines and other medical equipment to hospitals in the country. After one year I left Siemens Engineering and started working as a Seismic Engineer with a USA based company that provided me with an opportunity to work in many different countries in Asia and Africa, doing seismic survey for big oil companies like Chevron, British Petroleum. I worked for more than eight years for this company and had the opportunity to work in Sudan, Ethiopia, Central African Republic, Tunisia, Turkey and Pakistan.
I got married in 1980, while I was still working in Sudan. In 1981 my last contract ended. Returning to Pakistan, I started working in Karachi, as a Maintenance Engineer for a plastic molding factory, where I worked for one year, before starting my own workshop to provide maintenance service to factories in Karachi. Due to lack of capital and not enough experience, I could not earn enough to provide food on the table and take care of my own family. While I was struggling with my own business, I went back to college to get an MBA. While I was studying for the MBA, my wife suggested that I should complete this degree from USA. I started applying for admission in universities in USA and University of Evansville offered my admission in the MBA. After getting student visa I came to Evansville, Indiana in 1986 to start the graduate studies.
As I had not taken any computer classes in Pakistan, I was required to complete an introductory computer science course and also take a Business Law course as a pre-requisite for the MBA program. University of Eansville gave me credit for more than half of the courses completed in Pakistan. I liked computers so much that within a month, I changed my major to Computer Information System (CIS). That was 1986, and I never regretted my decision. CS department helped me with financial resources in the form of student-work to continue my MS. For MBA program no student-work was available. Changing my major to CS not only enabled me to graduate but also to succeed as a CS professional.
Rambler's Corner 