Biography

I was born in New York in the city of Queens on September 8, 1987.  
As a toddler I was fluent in my parent's native language, Bengali.
Around the age of three I began speaking very little English.  In
kindergarten, I would mix my sentences with both languages.
Consequently, my parents began to converse with me in more English,
thus enabling more activity in school socially and academically.

Since the beginning, my parents have supported me in everything that 
I wanted to excel in. For instance, one of my biggest hobbies is to
dance.  I have been doing classical Indian dancing, called Bharat
Natyam, for ten years now.  At first, I did not want to do it because
I thought it would be too difficult and I did not think I was the
dancing type, but after seven years, I became one of the top best
Bharat Natyam dancers in America.

One week every Summer, at a selected state, there is a organization
called the North American Bengali Conference that unites Bengalis, and
others that want to come, from all over the world to join in
fun-filled programs and performances.  About 10,000 people go to these
events every year.  Last winter, my dance group and I were asked to
perform for the opening of the ceremony at Madison Square Garden in
New York City.  Six months later we performed our dance in front of
thousands of people there.  This is one of my most memorable,
blissful, and honored achievements.  I mean, who does not want to be
admired on one of the famous stages in the world??  This was the
ultimate experience in my life thus far.

Besides, dance, I other hobbies I enjoy, originally, is shopping,
talking on the phone, going on the computer, and spending time with
friends and family.  This year, my family built a new temple.  Every
weekend I go to help organize and decorate for the many religious
ceremonies we have there.  Most of my favorite movies in Hindi, but
American ones are Wedding Crashers, Titanic, King Kong, and some more.
I also love to travel, for example, take cruises to warm countries and
fly to India.  Also, I played the violin for eight years.

Academically, I always enjoyed doing math.  As unlikely as that may
sound, I like facing challenging math problems.  I feel like they
exercise my brain.  They are actually fun for me to figure out.

Through my strong math and physics background, my parents, who are
both engineers, thought I would be a very good mechanical engineer.
My mother said Stony Brook University is one of the best places to
pursue that goal.  So here I am today, learning more about engineering
in the Women in Science and Engineering program at Stony.

Sriya Adhya 
February 2006