Past 6 months..

I was held up with a lot of things and my blogging had literally gone for a toss in the past 6 months. Nevertheless, to keep it short and sweet, I year of MBA had come to a closure by first week of April 2011.

Prior to all of that, there were a lot of interesting things that happened at campus. I used to work for Online Branding and Marketing Cell in academic year 2010-11. And this was very close to me since I enjoyed branding all college initiatives using digital platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, etc.

One such flagship event was Fest O Comm which aims at converging all colleges in our 3 days cultural fest. (Happened on February 4th, 5th, 6th 2011). My contribution to this particular event included documentation work and following up with various departments and holding meetings prior to the fest. During the fest, I had to brand all the events on various digital platforms and I am overwhelmed even now that I was part of this event and I could learn a lot. My colleague, also a very good friend of mine, Rashida Kachwala, and our entire OBMC team worked a lot towards this. It definitely was a great achievement for our team. (Will miss this team - lot of passion for digital marketing came from this cell)

Then, came the Student Council selection process (Mid February 2011-March 2011).  I had personal commitment at home during this period (between February and May) and thought I must keep away from Council initiatives. However, my batch-mates and some of my seniors (specially Ashwini Dayal, Subadra, Mansi) urged me to take up 'Student Academic Forum'. And our Director, Prof Chandan Chatterjee with a lot of faculty recommendations was also instrumental in getting me into this cell. After a lot of thinking, rethinking, and much more thoughts into this, I decided to take it up then.

I still remember how adamant I was about not to take any council posts then. But now, I guess, its a wise decision that I took. Things are better at my personal sphere too. And there are definitely no regrets. And yeah, I am heading this cell for the current academic year 2011-12 for my batch as well as the incoming batch 2013.

I had my internship work between Mid April and Mid June with Hanmer MS&L and thus the past 6 months have been a roller coaster ride with absolutely no time to breathe.

I look forward to the coming year which begins in a week from now (June 20th 2011). Officially, I am already in SIMC mode and this time with a vision that I can constructively contribute to my college with whatever I can.

As of now, my personal ambition is to see SIMC Pune as one of the sought after colleges for Media Education in India and raise the standards of Academia in SIMC, Pune by constantly addressing to both faculty and students about what is expected from both ends.

P.S: Internship Experience and rest coming up soon.

Cheers,
2years, 2months, 2 weeks, 2 days

NEW YEAR IN HOSTEL

A decade is gone by. 2011 is here in few more hours. And I am sitting in my hostel room and blogging about my new year experience at hostel. Calm, quiet, silence, or whatever you call it. Its very much like the way I want. None of my friends are here though. Still, I connected myself with music today. Practiced singing for a while and then slept like a log with my teddy bear :D and spoke to few of my relatives and friends wishing them in advance.

About 2011: 2011 is going to be a crucial year for me.

• 1st year of my course will come to an end here @SIMC, Lavale, Pune. 
• Summer Internship will take place between Mid April and Mid June, which can be serve as a passport to my dream company if et al the company gives PPO :D

Have lots to achieve in this year. 365 days is going to be very challenging. Also, look forward to the coming batch 2011-2013 at SIMC this year. Hopefully by 2011, I should also get placed :D [Exactly in a year!]

And yeah!
A VERY HAPPY AND BEAUTIFUL YEAR OF HAPPINESS AND SUCCESS TO ALL OF YOU :)

Cheers,
2years, 2months, 2 weeks, 2 days

ACT II - SEMESTER II

I am back in Pune-Hostel-Lavale-SIMC Campus. Came on 19th November 2010. Train journey all by myself was quite an interesting one. And managed to reach the hostel. Must admit that the hostel was quite dead without my batch 2012 and many of our seniors (batch 2011) too. All is well by now. Its 22nd November 2010 and Semester 2 has kick started. Wish that its an eventful semester with more learning and more experience in my expertise and also an easy one =D

Cheers,
2years, 2months, 2 weeks, 2 days

ACT II - SRP EXPERIENCE

 Me with fellow interns from National Institute of Singapore ( L to R: Wensu, Odelia, Myself)

THE BANYAN - An organization with a vision to help the mentally ill women has deceived my perceptions about NGOs and the development communication sector in general. I went to the office in Chetpet and to my surprise the office’s outlook was very corporate. Getting introduced to my mentor Mr. David Nash has been the best things that happened to me during my internship. David is a person who is highly knowledgeable and imparted useful skills that are pre-requisite for a Public Relations practitioner.

First day at work, I learnt the NGO’s history, mission, vision, past projects done, present on-going projects, the various fund-raiser events conducted by the organization and all communication related work done in the NGO. Thereafter, I analyzed what was lacking in the communication strategies adopted by The Banyan and prepared a detailed analysis of what needs to be implemented with immediate effect for improving the plan of action in various projects of this NGO.

The remaining days of my work at The Banyan included:

1.      Creating a unified identity for the organization using all possible communication tools – brochures, letterheads, posters, in-house magazine, etc.

2.     Fund-raise for Diwali Celebrations and ideating for sponsorships. 

3.     Handled online communications for The Banyan using social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Blogger. 

4.     Conducted fun activities like singing, dancing, etc. aimed at group motivation for the rescued mentally ill women on project site Kovalam. This was personally my favorite since it was heart-warming to see these psychologically affected women opening up and expressing themselves.

People who made my experience much more memorable were:

1.      David Nash – CEO of The Banyan who is one of my role models and a very friendly person who led us in the right direction during my internship.

2.     Niranjan R – My colleague from SIMC, Pune whose constant encouragement and work skills inspired me to give my best output.

3.     Tanya, Avinaash, Sarmishta – Representatives of the communication department that came into force at my later internship period. They always supported my ideas and involved me in their formal discussions.

4.     Odelia, Wensu, Giulia – Fellow interns at The Banyan who shared their knowledge in the fields of Psychology and Sociology.

Finally, at the end of my internship, the outlook towards NGO has changed completely and for better. And definitely look forward to work in this sector to bring about a change that we all seek for. 

ACT I coming to an end..

Three act structure of my life at SIMC is an interesting one. Act I  of this story seemed to have ended quickly as it is supposed to. Act I broadly covered what SIMC is all about, how I decided to join this place, how my surrounding has been by far, and by describing all of that, I turn back to those previous posts just to realize that Act I has been very gripping and quick enough to come to an end now.

Act I saw Semester I coming to an end. It introduced me to new people, new surrounding, new place, new culture, new curriculum, and was definitely worth learning.

The end of Act I is my Social Responsibilty Project in The Banyan, Chennai. Act II will kick start with my experience at The Banyan and the beginning of Semester II back at Lavale.

Cheers,
2years, 2months, 2 weeks, 2 days

WHAT HOSTEL LIFE IS ALL ABOUT?

We all crib at the beginning, but hate to leave this place at the end. Yes, its Hostel. This experience is new to me. An experience to reminisce about in the future. You become a different personality altogether. You learn more managerial skills here. You understand psychology here. You learn various languages here. You become a philosopher at times. The best of directors are born here. Writers, bloggers, poets, artists, musicians, innovators, inventors, leaders and all those endless novelty takes its beginning or refining process here.

I am sure anybody who have had hostel life experiences can relate to me. I recollect my journey into hostel life and the 4 months I have stayed here now. My parents came along with almost 12 baggages to leave me behind this beautiful life. Today, I miss my parents a lot. Nevertheless, I would miss hostel more.

Before coming to hostel, people told -

1. "Oh! You are going to hostel? Hmmm... Then, you may find it difficult to adjust since its your 1st time.." 
2. "Hostel life? Hah! How much I miss those days.. Don't worry, you will have fun.. You would make the best out of it you know?"
3. "Its yet another thing in your life.. Nothing so special... Just go there! Study well and come back.."
4. "Is it coed or..."

 After coming to hostel, I say -

1. If you don't go to a residential campus / have a hostel experience in your life even once, then you are missing the best thing in your life. Especially when you come to a place like Lavale, you would just want to be here. 
2. Just go for it. Don't think for some 10 years to decide on going/coming to hostel. 
3. As mentioned earlier, one learns a lot of things in hostel. Observation, listening, communication, planning, managing time, managing self, crisis management, handling conflicts, and many alike are skills you develop here without even realizing. 

In a hostel, you can walk into anybody and say a 'hi'. Most of them are far away from home and that 'hi' can mean a lot to them in terms of love, care, affection. You network the most in hostel. You adopt mentors in hostel. Most of these networked people are the ones who become business partners in future or sometime life partners too. 

I am leaving today for home. I was quite emotionless until today. But, I know am going to miss hostel and my room for another month and a half. Hopefully, I should be back :)

Cheers,
2years, 2months, 2 weeks, 2 days

SEMESTER EXAMS - PART 1

Our 1st semester exams are happening now. 11 subjects spread over 6 days. Now is the time, I think time flies. Feels like I just came to Pune. Its 4 months already.

Well, now the scene in the hostel is extremely interesting during these times. People are more of their natural selves, meaning, you see the true qualities of people during examination times. Its kinda psychological but yeah. Selflessness in teaching others, group studies, sleepless nights, non-stop alarm rings, and few trying to be cunning to score those 0.00005 marks than others, and some being blunt to their room-mates to shut up and study, and the rest expressing fear, agony, pain, sharing the common ideology as to "Who on earth found the concept of examinations? Especially at PG level?" and so on so forth.

Here even, we see Social Media playing a huge role. Either the students are stuck to Facebook, twitter, and busy giving their minute to minute updates about how a particular subject can kill you, how exams are boring, how rest of the mutiny things in world interests you during exams such as this (as posted by my friend Aabeer) - "Staring at the blank walls of the room has never been so interesting.. Thank you exams..!!". 

Also, examination times had seen the various facets of food one craves for. This is the time, you feel like eating anything and everything in the world. You go on to experiment with recipes to buying all junk, to spending your quality study time in thinking about food, etc.

About my examination preparation. It has not changed much after coming to hostel. I study if I feel like. Some of my colleagues did get amused looking at my being cool. I had been sleeping all day long. I study whatever I like studying. And I believe that I study not to get marks, but to learn new things. But, I agree that its important to get marks and then prove it your way that marks really don't matter. 

Now, all said and done, I guess, I need to sit and start studying right away.

Cheers,
2years, 2months, 2 weeks, 2 days