Day 245 - 29th March 2011

Palaash is quite empty now. A lot of people have been leaving over the past couple of days. Maushi and Rajat also left today. Realised today that I need to start packing! Have just kept on postponing it. Went to Bopal to get the bile back from servicing, incidentally it completed 6 years last week :-)

In the night there was impromptu plan made to go to barbeque nation for dinner. We really are living it up for our last couple of days here. Seniors will be leaving from the 1st onwards, many of them keep coming Palaash to relive the memories that are associated with this place. Wont be surprised if I do the same thing in a years time. Also realised today that IM and EB assignments are due on the 31st of this month, with the India Pakistan semi final lined up tomorrow (which will be screened in the audi) dont see anyone starting work until 30th late night :P

Day 226 - 9th March 2011

After a very long time had a day in which classes got over before lunch. Had EB,ME and RM. ME was about the financial aspect of media firms. Post lunch started watching inception, have been wanting to see it since quite a long time. Saw some part of it before dozing off for a while. Had some MCSA work that kept me busy through the evening.

Decided to go to the gym after a long time today. Just as I was coming out of the gym got to know that a couple of friends had met with an accident on their way back to college, had to go to the hospital for that. Luckily they are fine and nothing serious happened. Came back with them to campus by around 1030.

Have only 2 lectures tomorrow, the schedule for classes is quite light now, but have loads of assignments to submit and end terms coming up in another 8 days!

Day 217 - 27th February 2011

One of the speakers from TEDx gave a talk to our class today as a part of the IMC course. He has a new product to be launched in the market soon and our group project is to come up with an IMC plan for the same. Its a really interesting product, you can find out more about his company here.

Had an IMC lecture after that which was on experiential marketing. Once again the prof. gave some really good examples that he had worked on to give us an idea how things really work in the industry. There was also an interesting discussion branded spaces (Niketown, Disneyland etc.)
Spent the rest of the afternoon watching the India England World Cup game. Was an absolute treat watching Sachin score a century. Before the world cup began he promised that he would be more aggressive, today he showed signs of what he meant. His innings was brilliantly paced, it took him sometime to get into his groove but once he was set we got to see some vintage Tendulkar strokes. My favourite was the cover drive of Collingwood for six, the shot had no follow through and still it traveled the distance. That was followed by 3 attacking slog sweeps between the mid on and midwicket area. After the foundation that he laid 350 looked like a par score, but some good bowling from the English bowlers ensured that we were wrapped up for less than that with a ball to spare and how crucial did that turn out to be! I caught up with the last 10 overs of the English chase. At that point of time it seemed that it was pretty much in the bag for them but then strange things happen in cricket, especially when the batting team decides to take the batting powerplay! Good bowling from Zaheer and the batsmen caving in under pressure brought the match alive and it went down to the last over. The end result was a tie which I felt was a fair result. Both teams deserved to win. Kudos to Andrew Strauss for the innings that he played, if ever there was a captain's knock we saw one today.

After the match started working on the EB group presentation for tomorrow (yes, we have our priorities in life sorted ;-) ) That went on for a couple of hours and was interspersed with the 5 a side football tournament in the Palaash courtyard. Each wing of both floors formed teams and played in a knockout format, was good fun to watch :-P Back to the routine of classes from tomorrow, need to get some sleep now!

Day 197 - 7th February 2011

A long and hectic day today! Had a full day of classes from 9 to 5. Had our first lecture on Integrated Marketing Communications IMC which is being taken by an excellent professor and I am the course co-ordinator (CoCo) for the subject. The lecture was really interesting though some of the concepts may have been a little repetitive, the examples that were given especially in the Indian context were really good. Apart from that had MDA, EB and SDM before lunch. Post lunch had RM in the audi, had to devise a research proposal for a company that wanted to develop a game development center in the country. Some interesting aspects came out of it. Finally got done by around 540!

Inaugurated the new shoes and music player by going to Bopal for a run/jog. After coming back had to sort out all the assignments that needed to be done. Had dinner with the IMC prof. to discuss the course outline and structure of the assignments. Post dinner completed the CSMM pre read for tomorrows class which was followed by an ARC meeting. Got done with that and headed straight to the Micavaani studio to record for tomorrow's show. Finally got done with everything at around 2 and I am dead tired now. Have another full day of classes lined up tomorrow. Need to catch up on some sleep, over and out!

Day 193 - 2nd February 2011

Slept for 10 hours last night!! :D Woke up at 9 in the morning, only to realise that the first class was at 1030, made the most of waking up early by having breakfast at the mess. Had only one lecture today, EB continued discussions on whether advertising is ethical or not. Post lunch had a CSMM tutorial, have another 9 tutorials lined up all of which will be case based. Since the tutorial got done by 6 couldn't go to Bopal so played a little basketball. 15 minutes of basketball can be pretty tiring!

Dinner in the mess was biryani - which ensured that not too many people would have had dinner at Chota :P After dinner had to work on this competition with Cheryl which required us to come with a b plan for an eco tourism project. The deadline was at midnight and we submitted the plan at around 1 in the night, hope they accept it. In the middle scripted content for Micavaani on India Pakistan world cup matches, which was really good fun! A 1000 word assignment takes days but a 700 word article took me 15 mins :D Have been doing random tp since then. Will try and catch some shut eye now, don't want to continue my trend of waking up late for the 915 class.

Day 187 - 27th January 2011

What a day! I always wanted to create a facebook group for the DCP cup but I never got myself to do it. Don't know what came over me in the RM class where while I was working on SPSS I created the page, added members and posted player profiles based on their DCP style. Here are some examples -

Shail Stephens : Rahul Dravid. The wall. Classical stance. Poetry in motion.

Varun Kore: Chris Gayle. Unorthodox stance. Brutal but ugly hitting.

Jayati Somani: Ricky Ponting. Aggressive player but will never become number 1.

Abhinav Shukla : VVS Laxman. Responds only to Ponting. They have had some epic duels.

Introduced 20 odd players like that and many others pitched in. Within hours the page became a roaring success in the page. We even got a photo of 'Sir' to bless the page. You see eventually everything boils down to Sir! The other highlight of the day was when Sir played a doubles match in the badi tournament. A huge crowd had gathered to see him play and as one would expect, he had a huge fan following. After Sir won the match, he was lifted like a war hero returning back victorious all the way to Palaash. :-D

In the morning we had our 3rd day of the CS workshop. Today's topics were the culture of consumption and obesity. The class was divided into groups of 10 and each group had to perform a skit based on any TV show with the aim of analyzing what is trying to be communicated. The exchange student from NTU Singapore, when as a part of Dance India Dance he put up a brilliant performance to Urvashi. Was good fun. Had an EB lecture after lunch, the lectures now are general discussions on the latest happenings in the industry and what are some of the ethical issues faced in the corporate world.

After class had to go to CG road to collect the accreditation forms for the World Cup. Need to fill them up and submit them by 30th. Got back to campus by around 830 and had to work on the response paper for the CS workshop that needs to be submitted tomorrow. Did that alongwith random tp. Once that was done, went to Chota with Geeko for chai and frankie, meals at 2 in the night are always good fun :D It's 3 right now, but am not feeling that sleepy, will try to get some shut soon though, need to keep score for the DCP cup tomorrow ;-)

Day 184 - 24th January 2011

Quite a loong day. Had the cultural studies workshop from 9 to 2. This course is being taken by a Danish professor. Today's session was about the evolution of culture through the ages. Got to know that there was a human fair at Paris in 1889 where 400 'rare and exotic' humans were on display!Based on today's class we had to submit a 'reflection paper', which is an assimilation of our thoughts on the session. This needs to be done for all sessions! Had EB and SDM lectures after that. Today was the first day of 9 to 5 classes and it seemed to take its toll on a lot of people. Hopefully, we'll get used to it though.

The highlight of today though was completely non academic. During the term break I had come to know about a company that was looking for people to cover World Cup matches in different cities, so I applied for the matches in Ahmedabad - 2 group games and a quarter final. After 2-3 rounds of phone calls and another 2-3 rounds of emails I finally got the offer from them to cover the games in Ahmedabad! :-) Now the only problem was that the quarter final clashed with one of our end term exams, so had to talk to the college admin today regarding the situation and what needed to be done. They were extremely supportive and ensured that I would be given the chance to give the examination later or earlier. Something to look forward to :-) Need to set the ball rolling with regards to the accreditation for the World Cup.

In the evening we celebrated Apu's birthday with the traditional dunk,cake smashing and gifts. This was followed by the start of the annual badminton tournament organized by SCAM. The main match was the battle of the communists - two bongs v/s two mallus. The build up to the match was exceptional, in fact it would make a brilliant case study for sports marketers ;-) E-mails were sent to the entire batch informing them about the epic encounter and slogans like 'be red or be dead' were floated to generate buzz :-P The baddy court was packed by the time was about to start and we had arranged for a music system to be setup courtside to keep the atmosphere as lively as possible. The mallus entered to 'I am a Malayalee' and the bongs entered to 'Korbo Lorbo Jeetbore' :-D Even the MCL never generated this much buzz :D The match lived up to its expectations and went right down to the wire, with the bongs winning by a whisker. But at the end of the day, Communism won and the comrades prevailed ;-)

After the heady excitement of the politburo badminton game had to get down to working on the cultural studies workshop assignment. Have been doing that for the past hour or so. Will call it a day now, another long day ahead!

Days 176 to 183 - 17th to 23rd January 2011

Back after a looong break. Wasn't exactly a break though. Placement week for the seniors was on the whole of last week, so we didn't have classes and some of us volunteered for the process. I was in charge of batch handling, had to make sure that all the seniors were there in the designated classrooms before the process for any company started. That involved spending long periods of time in the class with them and sending people for GD's and interviews. It was a case study in human behaviour - how people handle stress, how do they react when their friends get job offers and they dont make the cut, especially if your boyfriend/girlfriend gets a job and you are still jobless. Essentially this was the week for which they took the CAT and MICAT two years back. It all boiled down to how well they did in the GD's, also there is no denying the element of luck that is involved. It's an emotional roller coaster ride for most of the people and people from my batch ahve already begun dreading our placement week next year. Volunteering took up most of my time last week. Though I did get time to go to the McDonalds at Bopal for a midnight snack (it's open till 1 in the night) and also to the coffee shop at Mariott for a late night coffee.

The past 2 days have been pretty action packed. Had to go to CEPT, which is an architecture college in Ahmedabad, to play a cricket match against their team. Their ground is huge!! Only two boundaries in the entire match and I got run out because I had never run so many runs in my life :P We ended up winning the match though, so it was all worth it :-) Today (23rd) there was a PGP1 v/s PGP2 match which we lost by 10 runs. By the end of it I realised that my legs still hadn't recovered from yesterday!

Apart from that on the academics front, we had a BM assignment to be submitted. The assignment was about tracking the brand communication of any product through various stages of its life cycle. I chose to work on Cinthol and while researching realised that we have an amazing collection of ads in the online library and that is just one part of the library. Need to start using the library more often! ;-) Also have a pre read for tomorrow's EB class which I started reading in the night and dozed off :D Will try reading it in sometime. Right now need to work on some content for Micavaani, they are doing a biweekly cricket show. Will get down to working on that and then come back to EB. It's back to the grind tomorrow, 9 to 5 classes for the first time - hope we make it to the other side!

Day 171 - 12th January 2011

Had 2 lectures of BM today which were about brand personality and how brands like Nike and Adidas have competed over the past couple of decades. Pretty interesting, how they took different approaches to reach where they are now. EB was again filled with real life examples, especially about Ahmedabad based textile companies. At one point of time there were about 110 companies but now only one big name has survived and one of the prime reasons for that is it never adopted any unethical practices. The last lecture was MDA which covered the theory aspects of linear regression, tomorrow we have a practical session on the same concept, it'll make more sense then.

In the afternoon was again caught up with some ARC work. That went on till around 5 in the evening, so now that makes it 2 days in a row where I have been deprived of my much valued siesta :P In the evening had to start working on the OD assignment, this is something that needs to be looked into, we have 4 assignments from last term to be subjected this week! Apart from OD there is CR, CB and QT. Anyways it pays to have the same project group for most of the assignments, so we've split up the assignments amongst ourselves, parallel processing ;-) In the night extebned family went out with Rajat and Samyuktha for dinner to Ikobo sizzlers. I was quite surprised that I was able to eat a complete sizzler, maybe skipping snacks in the evening was one of the reasons. Got back to campus by 1030 for a placecomm meet, we were given our duties for next week. Continued working on the OD assignment after that, have produced nearly 2000 words before passing on the baton to the next person :P Shall call it a day now.

Day 169 - 10th January 2011

The last term of the first term begins, how time flies! 6 months back when I was coming to this place I did not know what to expect, and today when I came back to Palaash it felt like I was back home. It's also going to be my last 3 months in Palaash, and now I know why all the seniors and alumni have such a special bond with this place. Lots to look forward to in this term, placements for seniors, committee elections for our batch, new hostel allocations and of course the 2011 Cricket World Cup :D

Back to today, reached campus at around 745 in the morning. Was amongst the first few people to get back on campus. People slowly started trickling into campus before the first lecture. Had 2 lectures of Brand Management (BM) and one each in Ethics in Business (EB) and Mutivariate Data Analysis (MDA). All were taken by visiting faculty. The EB prof. is pretty experienced he is a Harvard MBA pass out and was one of the founding members of IIM-A alongwith Dr. Sarabhai. He was also on the panel that interviewed CK Prahlad! He had a lot of examples to share on ethics and it was really interesting hearing him out. BM is being taken by a relatively young prof. who is from the advertising industry, he had a very structured approach in today's class, hope he continues the same way for other classes as well. MDA is basically QT III , just had an overview of the subject and what to expect over the next 3 months.

After lectures and lunch went to the office to pay off the term fees. Came back to the room and slept for a while. In the evening Maushi and I went to Gulmohar Mall to buy a gift for Jayati who is turning 21 tomorrow. Also went to TGB to buy cakes, yes we always buy 2 cakes, one to smear on the face and the other to eat :D Got back to campus by around 830 and I started off setting my room in order. That took about an hour so. Coming to campus after such a long break means there a lot of goodies brought from home. Since afternoon have been feasting on Gajar Halwa, Sandesh, Chocolates and many other goodies. Am pretty stuffed now!!