Day 239 - 23rd March 2011

Today's paper was pretty decent. SM was only half an hour long with one subjective question and 20 objective questions. It felt more like an OB paper. DM was good though it wasnt as challenging as the prof has promised it to be, only straightforward theory was asked. In the afternoon had to go to the stadium to get some clearance for tomorrow's QF between India and Australia. Spent about an hour at the stadium and in the process got to see the entire Indian team including Sachin up close in the pavilion. They had arrived for practice just as we were about to leave. That makes it 3 encounters with God now, just hope that there are more lined up and those end with me being rendered speechless :P Got back to campus by around 5 in the evening and slept for an hour or so. Studied SCM which I have day after tomorrow (wont be able to study at all tomorrow). Spent sometime going through the IMC slides after that. Will call it a day in a bit. Have a looong day ahead tomorrow!

P.S The anticipation and anxiety levels for tomorrow's match are quite high. Its very difficult to imagine that end term exams are going on :P FB is flooded with videos of Sachin's blockbuster innings against the Aussies, hope to see one more tomorrow!

Day 238 - 22nd March 2011

Was woken up earlier than normal today as one of my batchmates wasn't keeping well. She had been throwing up since last night. Got her some fruits and medicines before going for the exam. The paper was pretty straightforward, standard theory questions. Slept for a while in the afternoon before making a trip to the hospital, her condition still hadn't improved. At the hospital she was given IV and blood tests were also done. Luckily everything turned out to be normal, must have been a reaction to outside food. Got back to campus by around 730. Started studying for tomorrow's paper after that. We have SDM tomorrow with half an hour for sales management and one and a half hours for distribution management. DM is pretty interesting but really no clue as to what to study for sales. Went through a few slides but I dont know how much of it really will be retained.

Day 213 - 23rd February 2011

Have been feeling extremely tired for the past couple of days. Woke up with great difficulty in the morning to make it to the 915 class. IMC was pretty interesting, today's lecture was on Personal Marketing. Its surprising that 3 terms down we still hadn't been taught about the history of marketing and that was dealt with today. There was a chronological listing of all the inventions/discoveries from the late 1870's to the mid 1900's which shaped marketing. The second set of lectures was IM in which we discussed social media marketing and how ROI could be calculated for that medium.

Managed to get a 1 hour siesta after which had to start working on assignments - media economics, CSMM and then SDM. Got done with most of it and its almost 4 in the morning now, cant do anymore of it! Shall call it a day now and hope that I am able to wake up on time for tomorrows class :P

Day 198 - 8th February 2011

These 9 to 5 days are really energy sapping. In the 4 lectures before lunch we had MDA, IMC, SDM and CSMM. The first one was all about number crunching, the second about how to make an IMC strategy and then implement it, the third one on different types of salesforce categorizations and the last one on Corporate Social Responsibility. Post lunch had RM which was about how a research is formulated and then the data is organized. Couldn't fight the impending stupor in the evening so ended up sleeping for about an hour. Went to the gym after that, didnt have the time to go to Bopal in the evening since the ARC and MCSA had a meeting with the director in the evening. The meeting was quite productive and hopefully some positive changes should be implemented soon.

Post dinner have been in the library going through the pre reads for tomorrow and also started working on the Culture studies assignment. Will wrap up now and try catching up on some sleep.

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 192 - 1st February 2011

Had a full day of lectures today. IM was pretty interesting, today's discussion was about google analytics and how companies use search engine optimisation. Ended up missing the SDM lecture cos I never realised how time flew at Chota. Was having this discussion about how things are changing in college and whether its for better or worse. After that had our first lecture on contemporary strategic marketing management (CSMM) in the audi which was taken by the director. Discussed how the strategies of some global companies that worked and some that didn't/

In the afternoon we finally had the last game of the league stages of the MCL. Indian Kings took on Smokin Joes. If Indian Kings won then they would do Navy Sqaure Cut a huge favour and send them through to the next round with 2 points however if Smokin Joes won then they would go through to the next round. Unfortunately for the Joes, Aashish Dua chose this match to justify his tag as the most expensive player of the MCL. He scores an unbeaten 72 of 50 deliveries and took the Kings to a score of 119. Chasing at 6 an over from the beginning of the innings is never an easy task on this ground. The Joes were never really in the chase and kept losing wickets at regular intervals. Eventually the Kings pulled off what could be termed as an upset victory.

After the match went to Bopal for a jog/run. Looks like 2 days of going to Bopal has taken its toll on me, after that had dinner and then never realised when I went off to sleep :P

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!

Day 172 - 13th January 2011

Today's MDA class was completely based on a software called SPSS which we use for Market Research. The prof. explained it really well and we pretty much got the hang of it. Now an assignment awaits to be done which will be on live customer data. Had our first class on Sales and Distribution Management (SDM), which was mostly about sales force management. College had arranged a special Sankranti lunch, Gujarati menu with Puri and Undiyo taking the cake (pun intended). In the afternoon started reading a book on how brand Arsenal (the English football team) was built. I am not into football so it'll be interesting to see whether this book keeps me engrossed. Had a little PlaceComm volunteering work in the evening which went on till around 630. Geeko and I went out for a walk/jog/run after that (all 3 in descending order of duration of time).

Continued reading the book in the night, and before I could realise it I had dozed off which meant I missed the Lohri celebrations CulComm had organized. Woke up at around 330 in the morning courtesy a Palaash party that was going on next door, in fact there were multiple parties going on, the essence of each party could be judged by the type of music being played ;-) It's 5 in the morning now and I am not feeling too sleepy, tomorrow is a holiday but we need to work on th CB assignment which requires a 10 minute video and a 4000 word assignment. Will need to find ways to keep myself occupied till I fall asleep again!