“Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life’s coming attractions.”
– Albert Einstein
Written By: Ruban S.
When was the last time someone asked you to imagine for a purpose? How did your imagination inspire you and others? As you ponder upon these questions, let us take this opportunity to tell you about an instance when we were asked to not just imagine, but rather to imagine how we would do our part to build our homeland, our mother nation Tamileelam.
We are ‘Cholan Constructions’ from Ottawa, and we came across a project called ‘ImagiNATION- Tamileelam Forward’ which was held by the Tamil Nation Development (TND) council of Canadian Tamil Youth Alliance (CTYA). The purpose of the project was to encourage youth and professionals who had different skill sets to work on projects that can be used to build and enhance areas that are in need of development when implementation in
Tamileelam is possible. In other words, the purpose of the project was to archive proposals for future developmental initiatives in Tamileelam and other war torn nations.
Our team ‘Cholan Constructions’ is composed of young professionals and university students from second to fourth year. Our initial thought when embracing this project was to contribute and do something good for our nation. This thought alone had motivated us enough to take the effort to partake in this project. ’ImagiNATION- Tamileelam Forward’ provided us with an opportunity to give back to our homeland. It allowed us to work together to showcase our passion for our nation and to share our thoughts on how our nation should be built so that our people can get the most benefits. It’s fair to say that the TND council’s ’ImagiNATION- Tamileelam Forward’ project provided us with personal satisfaction as we worked on the project, and we are certain that when others take part in similar initiatives, it would provide the same type of satisfaction to them.
We had spent a few days trying to brainstorm possible project ideas and we eventually came to an ultimate conclusion to work on a project that would address the nation’s infrastructure, which will assist to build back and grow our nation’s economy. Our project was titled ‘A Sustainable Transportation System and Economic Development of Tamileelam’. In this project, we explored different means of transportation such as Air, Land, Marine, and Railway transportation, and we discussed various ways on how we could make such means of transportation sustainable within our nation. Each method of transportation was analyzed and a brief implementation plan was also included. Economical developments and opportunities were also discussed in terms of the Gross Domestic Product of the nation, and comparisons to other nations with similar demographics as Tamileelam were also looked at. The potential growth of our nation was discussed if the infrastructure was implemented strategically utilizing global demands to design our economy. Moreover, Tamileelam’s land terrain and geographical location was also briefly discussed and it was a significant part in designing the transportation system and making it sustainable. In essence, the many benefits of such transportation systems to the advancement of our nation were discussed.
Overall, the project provided us with a great opportunity to look into new fields and topics that we do not come across in our day-to-day life. Some of us had the opportunity to learn about new fields, which has ignited us to take a look into fields such as architecture, city development, and more as potential future career paths. When researching into such new topics, it gave us the chance to build and improve our personal knowledge about various topics. We believe that this concept of self-growth and realization is the ‘bread and butter’ of this project. It truly gave us an opportunity to step out of our circle and discover new topics. This empowers us in multiple ways. It builds our self-confidence and levels of self-efficacy as we are developing our knowledge base, building networks, and recognizing the many opportunities that are available to us in terms of subjects that we may want to pursue in the future, academically or even as a career. In light of all this, a Tamil proverb that comes to mind is “Katrathu Kai Mann Alavu, Kallaathathu Ulagalavu” which translates “What we have learnt is only a handful; what we do not know is the size of the world”. ’ImagiNATION- Tamileelam Forward’ project gave us an opportunity to understand this Tamil proverb and we are more mindful that we must make an effort to continuously educate ourselves.
In closing, ‘Cholan Constructions’ learned a lot from this project. We learned about the demographics of our nation, some of the challenges we will face upon our independence, different ways on how we can design our transportation system, how to design new cities, and overall, how Tamileelam will fit into the global economy. All of us will take the experience from this project and apply it to our school or work life. We all gained valuable knowledge because of this project and this experience has really made us become more conscious about our responsibilities as young nation builders. We will definitely continue to participate in projects such as these in the future so that we could become better equipped to build Tamileelam.
To all the youth or future leaders, we strongly encourage everyone to participate in such projects and show your passion for our nation and bring out new and bright ideas to build our nation. Whether the idea is minor or major, the key component is that we must think about the chance that our ideas could bring to our people and our nation. So, we’d like for you to join us and imagine for our nation; Imagination is endless, limitless. The creativity of our minds to form mental images and concepts is infinite. So, let us ask you this again, when was the last time someone asked you to imagine for a purpose? How did your imagination inspire you and others? Perhaps you could join us at the next conference held by the Tamil Nation Development Council of CTYA and share your thoughts with us. Together, we can build our nation – Tamileelam.
Tags: ImagiNATION, ImagiNATION- Tamileelam Forward, Speak Out, Tamil Nation Development Council, Tamileelam
