Shown below is Nilotpal Chakravarti who was one of my earlier Ph.D. students. He started his academic career at IIT-Calcutta and then came to Waterloo to do his doctorate with me. Then he returned to India and began consulting in Operations Research. Now he lives in Singapore with his wife Rita.
In 1984, the Chinese government invited me to visit China and lecture in Beijing, Wuhan and Shanghai. This was not long after the doors had been opened and for me, it was a wonderful opportunity to see China. When I was in Beijing, a young Master's student, Ruo Tan, was assigned to show me around Beijing. We visited the Summer Palace (below, left) and the Dragon Wall (below right). At that time, Tiananmen street (in front of Tiananmen Square) had 17 lanes; 16 for bicycles and the middle for militarty vehicles. I was so impressed with Ruo, that I invited him to study for his doctorate with me at UW. He did and subsequently went into finance where he is a major success in his adopted country, Canada.
