23/07/2015

23/07/2015; 03:46:

Tuesday rolled by rather quickly, with a few classes in the morning session and a rumoured quiz (that never materialized) in the afternoon session. At 6:30 p.m., we headed to the Old Auditorium, to attend a guest lecture- Mahindra was all set to launch the latest season of Mahindra War Room. Season 8 promises to be new, more competitive than ever before- of course, the innovation depends largely on the participants.
We received an official e-mail stating that the IPM SAC had been officially handed over to the junior batch i.e. the 2013-18 batch now that all paper-work & documentation was complete.
Later in the night, at 10:30 to be precise, Mercur-I (the marketing club) held a guest lecture on Marketing- the first in its series of ‘MasterClass’. Prof. ATP Ramani. Spoke about the fundamentals of read world marketing.It was both interesting and informative.
Mercur-I also announced 'Branded'- the most awaited event for all PGP-1's. It shall take place on the night of 24th July.
Wednesday aka 22nd July was spent mostly discussing and watching other people discuss their ideas for Section Wars- we’re trying to decide on a tagline, some dance & music performances and some marketing strategies to ‘promote’ our section. We’re planning to have a flag, a mascot and even a logo!
Tomorrow, there shall be a Section Photograph- the most popular section photo wins!

Late in the night, Voyage Capital (the investment club) held ‘Stock Mania 2015’ to crown the King of Financial Markets, here at Planet - I.

Colloquium, the Annual Business Conclave shall be held from 25th-27th July- the theme for this year is E-Commere- ‘From bricks to clicks’. A bunch of events are already underway, including ‘Elevator Pitch’ where you can pitch an idea to a panel of judges in literally the duration of an elevator ride- 2 minutes is all you have to get your idea across; the PayU case study challenge is open too; a workshop on Big Data Analytics and a Business Quiz along with a series of guest lectures and a panel discussion are in order. A lot of big names in the E-commerce space shall be on campus; hoping to pick up some valuable insight into the ever-expanding enterprise that is e-commerce.

21/07/2015

21/07/15; 03:20:

Just when I thought campus life couldn’t get any more busy aka happening, the 2-year MBA happened to me!
It’s been just 24-hours since I was last on my laptop, writing, but, it really feels like atleast 3 days have gone by!
The morning began with 2 classes- Microeconomics followed by Critical Thinking. After lunch, we had some free time and since the weather’s continued to be beautiful, we headed out on a long walk. We headed out of gate 2, walking the perimeter of the campus on the outside and drinking copious amounts of chai on our nearly 4-hour long undertaking!
Once back on campus, we got ourselves ice-cream from the mess, pakodas from JAM and yet more chai from Poha Point!
Close to 5 p.m., we received an e-mail that of course we’d been expecting- the next task in the series of tasks that are lined up to select the JPC. The task seemed simple (just the way a lot of rather complicated things in life appear at first glance, or even a second perhaps!) We were to draft a ‘pitch mail’, inviting recruiters on campus, under different scenarios- IIM-Indore alumni work at the company/ the company’s been a past recruiter/ the head of the company’s been on campus for a well-received guest lecture/ we’d like them to visit campus.
We began thinking about the letter as we made our way to NC-2 for an IPM 2012 Batch meet, with the Director, the PGP Chair, the IPM Chair and the Chair, Placements. The meeting was about an hour long, and was mainly aimed at letting us know that we’re now grown up and things in PGP ought to work differently from the way they did in the last 3 years.
Right after, I got down to writing the aforementioned ‘Pitch Letter’; at 10 p.m., we headed to the Old Auditorium to participate in ‘Grey Matterz’, the rather fun Quiz conducted by the Consulting Club. It had three rounds- the first had a mixed bag of strategy/consultancy-related questions, the second had us classifying companies into categories based on the Delta model, the last round was a guesstimation- we were to make logical assumptions and come up with the closest estimate of the number of phone calls made in India, each day. The event was very enjoyable; it was a learning experience that I’ll definitely remember! Post the event, the Consulting Club members gave us a brief insight into what the consulting domain entails- it seems so fascinating; I ought to explore more!
Some Thums Up and a cake-cutting later, we were in NLT-12, as part of the JPC selection process. The main purpose of this was to get to eliminating people who hadn’t made the cut, as per the scores of the last few tasks gone by. Out of the original nearly 150 applicants, only 70 had stayed put, duly submitting in all the tasks. By 1:30 a.m., I was no longer part of the JPC hopefuls and headed to the Night Mess to get myself some food.
Meanwhile, the hunt for the JPC continues; perhaps the team will be selected by the end of this week.
The announcement for Section Wars was made today; the final event shall happen on the 2nd of August- each section will put together a bunch of dance/music/drama/stand-up comedy acts; of course, the best one wins bragging rights for the next 2 years! In the run up to the actual event, each section shall be up & about, promoting their section, replete with a tagline, posters, flash mobs and more!
It’s going to be an exciting two weeks!

20/07/2015

20/07/2015; 03:51:

It’s the middle of the night and I can hear the rain relentlessly pounding against the ground, outside, just like it’s been, all day long. It has been over 2 weeks since I got back to Indore and only now do we finally have rain! And, it’s beautiful- the smell, the sounds, the sights, the sensation!

Let’s pick up right where we left off- the intro session for the JPC applicants at 6 p.m. was held in the Old Auditorium. The main purpose of this meet was to encourage all the applicants to give the selection process their 100% since it is optimal to have the best people of the batch working on the Placement team.
At around 8 p.m., Task 2 for the selection of the JPC was thrown open- each applicant was allotted a sector ranging from IT & Construction to Consumer Durables & Consulting. One had to scour (mostly online) resources for details of & likely contacts in companies that fell under his allocated sector.
At 9:45 p.m., Quriosity, The Freshers’ Quiz was held in the Old Audi, courtesy the Quiz Club- the participants were quizzed on TV Series, movies, current affairs, sports and more, all until one team emerged victorious. Right after, a batch meet had been called for by the I5 Summit coordinator- to serve the dual purpose of getting the PGP-I Batch in the know about the details of the event (and the details of Hack-a-thon- the event promising a shot at a wild card entry to Venture-I) and getting us all enthused enough to sign up to be on the organizing team for the event that’s set to happen on the 22nd & 23rd of August. Preparations are in full swing- a bunch of big names, including Mr.Ronnie Screwala of UTV are on board, as are a sizeable number of well-known angel investors/venture capitalists. Venture-I is to be the ‘pitch you idea event’- it’s open to start-ups that are less than 2 years old; a total of 15 teams from across the country will be shortlisted and will get 15 minutes to pitch their idea to a host of venture capitalists/ angel investors- $25000 of funding is on offer! Another interesting event is the ‘Walk with the Entrepreneurs’ where participants get an opportunity to interact informally, one-on-one with successful, young entrepreneurs. A host of Key Note speeches, a discussion on ‘The 360° view on funding’ and an ‘I5 Summit Prize’ that’s up for grabs for the audience members all promise to make this the hub of entrepreneurial thought & action.

On 18th July, the Raymond outlet continued to remain open for a second day, allowing those who dared to brave the rain and make their way to the FPM block to select themselves fabric for a suit that’ll be stitched to order. By late morning on Saturday morning (i.e. 18th), the last task for the JPC selection had been sent in. Close to 3p.m., the next task was sent out- this was to be a group task- we were to identify news relevant to placements. For this, we could scour whatever resources we wished to and find & identify news pieces published in the two weeks gone by. We had until 11:30 p.m. the same evening to get this done. At 11:00 p.m., Currenc-I, the economics club, held the online round of Clued- The Treasure Hunt. Results and further rounds shall follow soon.
A little after mid-night, we headed to the night mess to get ourselves some tea – I think I drink a little too much tea- the night mess guys spot me from a mile away and begin to pour out a cup of tea, smiling, even before I’ve actually asked for some. This was followed by us attending an interaction session for all JPC applicants in the Old Audi, at half-past might-night. They warned us that the details of our next task would find their way to our inboxes in the next two hours. And sure enough, a little before 5 a.m., we received an e-mail that had a list of groups and an industrial sector assigned to each group. We were to prepare an Industry Analysis Presentation on our allotted sector, which again ranged from FMCG to Automobiles & Logistics. Seeing as this was to be sent in by 8 p.m. of 19th July, most of us fell into a fitful sleep, promising to be up soon & get working. And, that we did.
At 1:15 p.m., an interaction session was scheduled with some IIM-Indore alums who’ve been actively working in the areas of sales & marketing- they spent over an hour sharing their experiences and fielding questions from an enthusiastic bunch of new people.
By 2:30 p.m., all the JPC applicants had received e-mails that contained details for a Group Discussion that was to be held early in the evening. Group Discussions done, the final presentation for the Industry Analysis was compiled and sent in by the stipulated deadline.
At 9:30 p.m., all the groups assembled in NLT-7 in order to actually present the presentations they’d prepared- to an eager audience in the senior team & a slew of questions.
Our presentation was rather well-received and we headed back to our rooms via the night mess, stopping for over an hour to savour lots of tea.
The Media Committee has meanwhile announced a writing competition- all of PGP-I has been invited to document their 1st week, here at IIM-Indore. The best write-up gets to feature on insideiim and of course, he/she gets bragging rights!

A rather interesting case is to be read for the Critical Thinking Skills session, tomorrow- here’s looking forward to an exciting class discussion!

17/07/2015

17/07/15; 15:20:

And, it’s been over a week here already- it doesn’t really feel that way though! It’s Friday and we’ve had a whole week of classes!
7th July aka Tuesday remained pretty uneventful, except a small number of new PGP students pouring in. We walked around campus, trying to meet all the people that we could. Most of 8th July was spent around the PiShop, where all the new guys were picking up ‘IIM-Indore Survival Kits’ as christened by the Pi Shop guys themselves. It was essentially a bunch of essentials that most people would need on campus- a bucket, which would then be filled with notebooks, cloth clips, stationery, rope, a LAN cable, bed sheets and even a towel and stapler!
9th July was D-day- registration day. The new PGP guys were to head to an assigned NLT classroom in slots, with their documents in tow. We headed to NLT-09, for we only had to fill out the registration form and hand in photographs. The Placement Committee had also turned up at the registration, with an excel sheet that demanded filling- grades and achievements. This process began in the morning and ended only by 3 p.m. Post this, we collected reading material from H-102 for our new subjects Organizational Behaviour, Quantitative Techniques & Operations Management. The MediClaim guys were also in the next room, talking everyone into picking up a medical insurance policy under some special group scheme that they run exclusively for IIM-Indore. Wow, we were officially a part of the PG part of the course now- registration done, spiral bound reading material collected and new batchmates seen.
And, the mad-scram, the packed time-table, the crazy schedule that we’d been warned of began right from the evening of 9th July. Now that everyone was registered and officially a part of the PGP course at IIM-Indore, there was nothing to stop the influx of deadlines and sleepless activity. It began with everyone being divided into groups and being handed an assignment. Now since the official e-mail ID’s hadn’t been handed out to the new guys yet, the Mess 1 notice board had a chance to display its full potential- of course, it could only exercise this control until the e-mail system was up and running- post that, the poor board will have to go back to its perpetual state of ignorance and being ignored. Of course, I’m sure it has gotten used to this treatment in the last 15-17 years that it has been around. The list detailing the groups as well as the assignment were duly put up on the notice board. Further, a 1-credit Yoga course was announced. Once the assignments had been looked, a batch meet was in order, at 10 p.m. The main purpose of this batch-meet of course was to give people an idea of what a batch meet at IIM-Indore, with our new batch-mates would look like. This was followed by a bunch of classes- Microeconomics, Strategic Management and Marketing, as per the allocated sections. Class began by 11 p.m. and ran for about an hour. And of course, the introduction to the IIM system of classes would’ve been incomplete without a surprise quiz- and there it was- just as class ended, a set of questions made their debut appearance in the PGP 2015-17 Batch class. This was followed by everyone returning to finish the assignments- each group had been assigned a mentor from the senior batch- to dole out advice and to collect the completed assignments.
Some people managed to catch a few hours (or minutes) of sleep and everyone was unceremoniously woken up for the Yoga session at 4:30 a.m. Now, Yoga is all good, what with June 21 being celebrated World over, but, nothing feels too great at 4:30 a.m. and most definitely not when you’ve been up and relentlessly working! By the end of the Yoga session, I felt happy- perhaps it was the endorphins stemming from exercise, perhaps it was the morning weather, perhaps it was the happy people or perhaps it was just the prospect of a warm shower. Soon after, an early morning (read 7 a.m.) class on Strategic Management was held. The highlight of course was the breakfast soon after!

10th July began with the Director’s address at 10:30, welcoming in the new PGP batch! He spoke of a few changes in the PGP curriculum, which include mainly an increased focus on communication-related courses and the introduction of elective courses in the first year of the PGP itself (as opposed to elective courses being made available only in the second year as was the norm). It was nice to see the new auditorium fully occupied- by excited new students and some parents! This was then followed by an hour-long commencement address by Mr. Madan Padaki, Co-founder, CEO & Managing Director, Head Held High Services and Co-founder & Director, Sylvant Advisors. The faculty introduction followed- most of the faculty members spoke a line or two about themselves and their department. It was all very exciting- the start of a new journey always is! Post lunch, a book launch was followed by an address by the PGP Chair; a talk on gender sensitivity drew the day’s programme to a close. 5 p.m. onwards, student interaction with their respective mentors was in order. Each group of 6-7 students have been assigned a faculty mentor- to guide them through the course of the 2-years here, at IIM-Indore.

A couple more assignments and a second batch-meet went on late into the night. 11th morning began with a tree plantation drive- what better way to begin a new phase in your life than by furthering another! We were then back at the New Auditorium for a session on the perils of ragging & plagiarism and a briefing about how the facilities on campus including the internet/intranet and the library work. The campus has been working on being more disabled-friendly. An enlightening session by V-shesh led us to realise that we’d probably been viewing disability wrongly and how we could better ourselves. A guest lecture by Mr. Giri Giridhar, Senior Director Finance, MSD Pharmaceuticals Ltd. drew the Induction/Orientation programme to a close. Everyone then moved to the Academic Block for a session on the Case Study method of teaching- this was held as per our respective sections and it was of course the first time everyone settled into a classroom along with their new section-mates. Strong bonds must exist among everyone who’s in the same section, for this will be put to test during the Section Wars which should happen sometime in August.

12th morning began with a Zumba session again at 4:30 a.m. The day closed with the freshers’ party in SR-10, replete with a video and taking of the oath, wherein everyone pledged to uphold the integrity and pride of the institute.

And, 13th morning began with a slew of classes which was of course going to be the norm for the rest of the 2 years. Oh, I’m in Section E- our term began with a Microeconomics class, followed by the first class of the Critical Thinking workshop. It’s a rather interesting concept that aims to allow us to explore the need for, the way to and the barriers to critical thinking- for critical thinking is essential to evaluate a problem as objectively as possible and come up with the most feasible solution- a skill that is a must for a decision-making manager. Later in the day i.e. at 4 p.m., there was a quiz on the preparatory course on Probability & Statistics that we ought to have completed. Right after, there was more reading material to be picked up for the courses on Financial Accounting & Marketing. Log-in ID details were also shared, right after the quiz- everyone was now equipped to handle the slew of e-mails that the next two years will see! I find the endless array of e-mails very pleasant, to be honest- it’s awesome to be informed about the details of every little activity that goes on, on campus!
At 10:30 p.m., a batch meet was scheduled- the agenda of this meet was to disseminate information about all the clubs and committees on campus- part of the reason was to allow us to make an informed choice when applying to be a member of any of these.

Right after the meeting, the Academic Committee sent out an e-mail explaining, in detail exactly how we are expected to dress, when a dress code is specified- Smart Casuals mean a collared T-shirt/Shirt with jeans is good, while Business Formals need you to go all out- blazer included. Soon after, applications for the Academic Committee were thrown open. There shall be 8 candidates- one from each section- who shall be selected. Their role includes, in addition to being the interface between faculty and students, analyzing course structures & suggesting new courses, being the Class Representative for their respective sections.
14th morning began with classes too – well, that is how the week ought to be! Later in the day, one of my section-mates sent out an e-mail suggesting that we form a section WhatsApp group. This was soon followed by someone else sending out a Google Sheet wherein everyone was asked to key in their phone numbers to facilitate the process- we were finally aboard the WhatsApp-Group train- the other sections had up-and-running groups even before classes really began. The book vendor was on campus, as he had been on 12th & 13th too- most people picked up all the recommended books (9 in total, for the 1st year) while I concluded that I since really would never get around to reading them, I’m better off without them.
At 6:30 p.m., I headed to the IPM SAC Office to complete the official ‘handing-over’ process. New coordinators had been selected before we left for the break and it was now time to hand over the clubs/committees! Making a ceremony out of it just added some glamour to an otherwise routine process. Documents were signed, handshakes traded, e-mail ID passwords shared, wishes & advice doled out!
The Pi-Shop announced a Calculator bulk deal and Voyage Capital (the Investment Club) announced the first event of the year- Stock Mania 2015!
On 15th July, there was a new addition to our classes- the seating arrangement! My seat is just perfect- second row, centre! The selection process for the Academic Committee took off in the evening!
Later in the evening, my new laptop- the one I’d ordered as part of the deal the Infrastructure Committee had offered- arrived. It looks rather nice; I’m yet to get around to working on the new machine though.
At 11:30 p.m., we had our first batch meet with the Placement Committee- those guys work really hard, tirelessly, round the year to get a lot of great work done! They gave us an insight into the composition of the batch, an overview of the work we need to put into building our résumés and a brief about the working of the Committee. Soon after, they sent out a form, inviting application for the Junior Placement Committee team.
Trois- the new start-up on campus- announced their new offerings- business suits- which as the Placement Committee informed us shall be a necessary part of our wardrobe over the next 2 years.
16th July saw classes too. The Pi Shop too announced a bulk deal for business suits- the new batch now has multiple business suit options within campus! A separate portal on the intranet is being used for the JPC selection process. All applicants were required to upload sample word/ppt/excel files onto the portal to familiarize themselves with the portal.
The first task for the JPC Selection was sent a little after mid-night.
After class on 17th July i.e. today, I sat down to compose an SOP for the JPC selection and quickly uploaded that and my résumé onto the portal. A talk about the i-Bus in Indore which now runs routes upto Rau Circle (which is pretty close to campus) was held in the Old Auditorium at 3 p.m. The IPM Office sent out an e-mail with our consolidated CGPA for the last three years- this shall be necessary when we draw up our résumés
The SAC Fund payment has been made online to make the process easier for everyone involved. An intro session for all JPC applicants is scheduled at 6 p.m., today. Looking forward to that!

06/07/2015

06/07/15; 20:26:

And, it’s great to be back on campus after a long hiatus, the longest in fact, since the day I stepped into this place. There’s just something about this place- no, it won’t leave you longing when you’re away, no, it won’t have you reminiscing on a u warm, windy day; and no, it will not pull you back when you’re leaving- that’s not what it is. It is that feeling, once you’re back- you just feel like you never left; it just lets you pick up from the exact moment you left; an instant frozen in time, untouched by the fast-paced glory of what we call the 21st century; and, it is yours to have, without ever letting you feel the need to lay claim.

I got here early in the evening, yesterday. A warm dinner seeped in paneer and conversation. I was up at 7 this morning, watching the world go by, or not. I walked slowly but surely to the HRC (Hostel Reception Centre)- the room allotment list was made available and I wrapped my fingers around a light blue, almost hazy keychain that read SR12-307. I had to wait a little before I could settle in- the room had managed to get itself locked on the inside- it took three men, a ladder and a long pipe to get the door finally undone, after pulling out the glass pane on the ventilator over the door. We then headed to ER-2 to pick up the belongings that we’d hurriedly wrapped and stashed away in the cloak room for safe-keeping- transport had been arranged and nearly 90 minutes later, our belongings were lazing about in their new surroundings. Hot momos at JAM was then followed by a trip to the Pi-Shop and cold coffee at Mess2. It’s always the little things that matter- whatever be the larger picture!

The junior batch was back on campus a little earlier i.e. on the 1st of this month. The lists for the IPM2015-20 batch were drawn up in the last week of June post which I spent time trying to answer queries- for information is necessary to make a decision and this is one rather major decision. Earlier this afternoon, I met a quiet, curious kid who’d made his way to campus, to look around and speak to people before he took the plunge. Talking to new people (and their parents) always gives you a new perspective to things!

We’re now looking forward to the 9th of July which is when the registration for PGP-1 is scheduled. It’s a funny feeling- anxiety, excitement and the idea that you’ve grown up, all at once!

Here’s looking forward to an eventful year and beautiful batch-mates!

30/06/2015

27/06/15; 23:39:

And, I’m now down to documenting my last week in Banglore; just like every other week that I spent in Banglore, this last one was beyond beautiful! Somewhere along the course of the last two months, I fell in love with Banglore- I could state the reasons out here, or as I go along; perhaps, I’ll do it at the end of the post!

15th i.e. Monday morning was spent working of getting all the data I had collected up to date on the website. Later in the day, I headed to pick up resource bags that’d be needed for the blood donation drives through the week. I spent the evening out with a couple of my batch-mates, mostly eating tandoori chicken.

On Tuesday, I walked down to Silk Board in the morning and we were soon at the Microchip office in Whitefield. Of all the companies I’d visited, through the summer, the security at this one was least shocked to see us- now, all security is informed in advance that there is a donation drive happening and a certain number of people and some material (heck, they have a detailed list of the names and an exact count down to the number of needles!) will be turning up. Yet, more often than not, we’re looked at like we’re definitely a new species and they’ve never heard of a blood donation camp. So, here, we were instantly recognized, it felt like they were expecting us and that was good!
The venue for the blood donation camp was a large conference hall, adjacent to the cafeteria, on the top floor. It was a fairly large area and about a third of it was left unused. There was a solid cement wall dividing the area roughly into half; pre-donation was arranged on the side closer to the door and post-donation was set-up on the other side of the wall. We must’ve crossed over from one side to the other, right over the wall, at least a dozen times through the day. The donation camp was good; however, the turnout was a tad bit lesser than we’d anticipated, based on our estimates drawn up from past camps at the same location. This was pinned down to less aggressive publicity and improper optimization when fixing the camp date.

On Wednesday, I was to head to the Wipro campus at Sarjapur. I’d just about gotten myself on a bus when Rashtrotthana Blood Bank’s ambulance pulled up in the adjacent lane at the red light. As I waved back at all the staff, I got off and essentially shifted from one bus to the other. We were at the Wipro gate a little after 9 a.m. We then spent a whole hour trying to past the security at the main gate- it took multiple calls to the company contact, the lady at the reception going over the list of names she had on e-mail and an escort walking down to the gate and standing around for a long time- finally, we made it to the venue, which was a Banquet Hall on the fourth floor of one of the many buildings in the rather large campus.. It was a good thing that Sir was around to deal with the much-higher-than-needed level of security- for even though I’d probably have managed to get things sorted, I’d have definitely credited only myself with the delay- when in fact it was nobody’s fault.Sir dealt with everything awesomely; further, it was a delight to watch him work- his level of passion is definitely unmatched! Despite having had to wait at the gate for nearly an hour, the blood bank team was up and ready by around 10:30 and soon, the camp was in full swing. There was a fairly decent donor flow which held up through the day- till camp closed close to 6 p.m. The second blood bank team was again held up at the gate and could set up camp only post 12 p.m. They’d arranged for tea & coffee dispensers- the tea had no sugar and the coffee had too much; and I was somehow supposed to buy that they were both made by the same person, at the same place (and the same time too!)! We’d been told to expect about 500 donors and accordingly, the 176 unit collection was a tad bit disappointing. Once we shut camp, it again took an hour for us to be able to safely leave the campus. I went back the same way that I’d come.

30/06/2015; 4:05:

On Thursday, there was a donation drive at Syngene, on Bommasandra-Jigani Link Road; we got there around 8:30, for the camp was to start at 9:30- this was to be the first donation camp at the location and we’d been told to expect a good turnout since a lot of effort had gone into the publicity. We were escorted to the camp location- the health centre on campus. The blood bank team managed to get lost on its way to the Syngene campus and at around 9:30, I along with a member from the HR team headed out to go find them, while my boss stayed and got the camp location sorted and ready. And, we did manage to find them alright, pulled over to the side of the link road, looking thoroughly confused (a certain right turn had to be taken to find the company gate and ascertaining exactly which right turn to take was not an easy task). We were eventually at the camp location and, there were greeted by about 50 donors already at the entrance to the place- registration had been set up outside, with the medical examination to be right by the door and the bleeding to happen in the inside room which had about 6 beds, post-donation was set-up right by the entrance to this inside room. By 11 a.m., over a 100 donors had showed up, filled in forms or better still, turned up with electronic forms that they’d filled up online- major part of my job that day was to successfully indulge in crow management. I gathered up the forms, letting people know that they could either wait, come back in a bit, or that we’d give them a call when beds were free- a lot of this of course could have been avoided if we had larger space and hence a larger number of beds to work with, but, environmental constraints are just part of the work-day. Post-lunch, we had to simply turn people away and promise an alternative- before the end of the camp on the 18th, another camp had been fixed for the 25th of June i.e. the following week! It certainly felt like a long day, a very happy one at that! On the way back, I joined the blood bank in their bus-turned ambulance; we stopped to pick up blood that had already been collected by Rashtrotthana’s other team at Deutsche Bank where another camp was in progress- on 18th June, all government blood banks had been required to set up camp at Vidhan Saudha and we’d had to rely solely on the other blood banks in tow. I was home in time for dinner and was dropped off right next to my place too! Dinner was rather interesting! After having been in Banglore for over a month, I finally headed out to the Khau Gali in V.V Puram with a local friend. Of course, I was promptly informed that it isn’t referred to as the Khau Gali around there, but that the correct term is ‘Food Street’. Thus, Thursday night was spent trying out a bunch of local food- akki rotti (which is well, rice roti – it tasted nothing like I’d imagined and I could not really find a past equivalent to peg it against!), curd kodbale (I’d like to think of those was larger, softer chakli), idlis and sweet stuff (I think I forget what it was called but, well, it was almost rabdi). Wow, I felt the need to explain the food in brackets- I’ll be honest, the food was awesome and it’s mainly for my own reference (to ensure successful allusion in the future that’ll ensure that I get the awesome food in the future too!)

Friday was technically my last day at work- and very honestly, I did not feel like leaving, not one bit. I headed out to JK Tech at Sarjapur; the camp was to begin at 2 p.m. in the cafeteria- it was a large area which was open on one side, to a small terrace; it was all right there, with the elements- we even had to shift the donation set-up after attempting to bleed the first donor for there was just too much wind to be working by! There was a good donor turnout (of course, everything is relative- compared to the number of donations we’d been told to expect; but then, an information session had been held at the company- all that effort had certainly not gone in vain). We got a lot of support from the company- the company contact was one of the first persons to donate blood; he was later back at the venue about half-way through the drive and took over the task of writing out certificates! We also got help with the pre-donation and some limited crowd management. Employees from another company in the same building also turned up to participate in the drive- it seemed to turn into a contest at some point too! The drive wrapped close to 6 p.m. and we’d collected 65 units of blood- we’d probably have hit a 100, but, for some unbeknownst reason, nearly 20 to-be donors were deferred due to high blood pressure! I very nearly managed to lose the cover to the standee that I’d eagerly carried; luckily, just when I’d given up looking for it, I did manage to chance upon it! I headed back home with the blood bank team in their bus-turned-ambulance. There was this point when there was a large amount of traffic on the road- the ambulance driver very conveniently pulled into the lane for oncoming traffic (which was rather deserted) and continued to drive as if nothing different had ever transpired- the conversation inside then shifted to the perks of getting around in an ambulance! Not soon after though, we did run out of luck- the ambulance (now back on the right side of the road) suddenly stopped dead in its tracks- eventually, it was figured out that it’d run out of petrol. Some encouragement and best wishes later, I was on my merry way, walking home while the team continued to wait for the now-discovered problem to be fixed! We had excellent food at the Coconut Grove- all authentic Kerala-style!

Early on Saturday morning i.e. the morning of 20th June i.e. the morning of my very last day in Banglore, I headed to the home-turned-office of the place I’d spent a brilliant 6 weeks with! We spent a decent amount of time discussing odds and ends; I was handed my evaluation form (which must be submitted to the IPM Office as soon as I get to campus), a Letter of Recommendation and a cheque (my stipend). At this point, my boss happened to wonder what had transpired with my last cheque, for I hadn’t encashed it then- I grinned sheepishly while muttering something about having lost the cheque- my boss graciously wrote me another- both continue to lie in my suitcase to this day- I should probably get them to the bank! As I turned to leave, on a rather positive note, I felt rather happy at having spent my six weeks well. A large part of me didn’t want to leave- both the NGO and Banglore city- all it took was a few days and I was in love with both, already planning my return before I’d even left!
The guy I’d been working with over the past 6 weeks turned up and we went out for lunch- the only time I saw him outside of work! Evening was spent meeting people and exchanging good-byes; the evening ended with me spending time with the lady I’d been sharing a room with, over dinner, at the very same place where we’d spent out first-ever night in Banglore!

One of the times in this last week, I also encountered my first sexist comment at work- as I stood working, at pre-donation, a gentleman politely informed me that the task I was doing was not something I could manage and that I should 'really call a guy to help'. Trying my best not to react to or give in to the comment - for I had no real prior experience dealing with any precedents- I managed to hold an unaltered face. I then masked the gentleman if he'd like to take over or help me with the task at hand, since he was, of course, a specimen of the male species. He broke eye contact and gently scuttled away, much to a couple of bystanders' amusement!

We were up early on 21st morning and were en route to the airport by 5 a.m. As I took in the buildings, the trees, the flyovers and the often undecipherable billboards going past, I knew that this trip was really at a close. It was a great feeling of getting on ahead to interesting and more amusing things! After nearly an hour spent shuffling around and leaving behind stuff at the check-in counter, we were finally on an aeroplane, on our way out!

25/06/2015

22/06/15; 02:23:

I really need to note down the two weeks gone by, before they are all but a hazy memory. I’ll have to admit that the last two weeks did indeed go by in a blur.

Monday morning, on the 8th of June began with a trip to the office of the NGO I’m working with; of course, the home of one of the volunteers doubles up as the office and it’s a rather warm place to be, but, that’s perhaps a story for another time. I picked up a bunch of posters that were to be dropped off at Wipro’s Koramangla campus- in keeping with the blood donation drive to be held there later in the week. I also returned the resource bag and camp paperwork that had been with me. A 40-page document detailing guidelines for assessing the suitability of donors for blood donation was to be handed over to the senior doctor at the blood bank at NIMHANS (National Institute for Mental Health and Neuro Sciences). Having picked up whatever was needed for the day, I prepared to head out when Ma’am added that something else was to be handed to me. I was then handed an envelope which I figured had a letter or further documents that I would need through the day- I was however promptly informed that this was my stipend for the month and proven terribly wrong. I hadn’t really realised that I would be receiving a stipend, much less expect to be suddenly handed a cheque halfway through my internship. En route to NIMHANS, I called up my parents, trying to figure out what was to be done with the cheque- eventually it made sense to just keep it around.
Once at NIMHANS, I managed to locate the blood bank after a lot of asking around and managed to meet the senior doctor after even more asking around. I was then given access to a large pile of donor forms arranged month-wise in giant files. I sat around sifting through them and completing all the missing data.
On my way out, I noticed the Brain Museum that I’d been earlier told about- I made a mental note to make sure I come back and visit- unfortunately, I never did get around to making that visit. I was soon on my way to the Wipro campus- once there, I spent an unreasonably large amount of time trying to get the security to accept the posters and/or get them to the concerned person in the Admin team. Eventually, fortunately, I managed to succeed and both the posters and I were on our own merry way.

I picked up cold coffee on my way home; on Tuesday i.e. 9th June there was a blood donation drive at the Wipro, Bellandur campus- we headed to Pritech Park in EcoSpace, which was also one of the first locations I’d ever been at, in Banglore- the feeling of having been around long enough to be going back over things, a second time! The security at the entrance decided that the banner that we were carrying looked suspicious enough to merit its own entry record. The venue for the donation drive was the Wipro cafeteria on the 9th floor. We got ourselves breakfast as we waited on the blood bank. The camp initially saw a less enthusiastic response than we’d anticipated; accordingly, we went around the cafeteria at lunch time, handing out pamphlets and information detailing the need for and the ease of blood donation- it takes only about 20 minutes and each unit of blood can go into saving upto 3 lives. The talk did probably help the turnout.

On Wednesday, I was to make my last blood bank visit for the purpose of completing the donor reaction data. I headed out to Bowring Hospital in Shivajinagar. The lady I’m staying with has been off from work, owing to a minor bike accident, sometime in the first week of June (on her birthday to be precise); she decided to accompany me. There was a lot of traffic and it took us quite a while to get there even though it was mostly a single straight road from home to Bowring. Once there, I got help with filling in the data and was done soon enough. Both Church Street & Brigade Road were close-by and we headed there- once there, it was like a Zomato page, right on the road- an array of great eating places, on both sides of the road; we eventually decided on one and had a nice evening. Right from there we headed to have good coffee this place called Coffee on Canvas, close to Sony signal; some coffee later, we were at Legends of Rock for they had a Karaoke Night running. A late night long drive later, we were fast asleep.

23/06/215; 14:44:

I was all set to get to Wipro’s Koramangla campus on Thursday. Once there, we had a little issue trying to get past the security at the gate; they recognized me very well from the posters I’d tried to deliver a few days earlier. Eventually, we got ourselves inside and the camp started a little earlier than scheduled. The camp was set up in the basement; we had a decent number of people show up to donate blood. The guy I work with had stuff to attend to and was gone after lunch-time. The camp was rather efficient, thanks to the enthusiastic blood bank team! The camp wrapped up close to 5 p.m. post which I was on my way home.

There was to be a camp on Friday i.e. 12th June which was cancelled at the last minute; I was to work on getting donor quotes (we encourage donors to share their experience/feedback post-donation, in a book maintained expressly for the purpose) up on the website; I tried but failed- the system doesn’t quite like me too much.

On Saturday, I continued working on entering the now nearly complete donor reaction data (courtesy the blood bank visits). In the evening, we headed out to meet a couple of our friends from IIT-Indore who’re also doing their internships in Banglore.

25/06/15; 12:27:

14th June aka Sunday- more importantly, World Blood Donors’ Day was spent at an event held at Victoria Hospital, to celebrate the gift of donated blood. There was an almost three-hour long function, where different personalities, including head doctors and the local director of NACO spoke about the progress and the pressing need to further blood donation. A lot of the function was conducted in Kannada and I had to make do with picking up on the tone of things. The NGO I work with was one of those that was felicitated at the function, for their work in the field of voluntary blood donation. I spent all of Sunday afternoon and evening out with a friend; ending with picking up apples and enjoying some street food in Banglore.

15/06/2015

12/06/15; 18:13:

Ah, I’ve missed writing! I’m just going to attempt to sum up two weeks, in two separate posts, of course, in keeping with what I last closed with.

It’s been 4 weeks- that’s a month, yes; very honestly, it does not feel nearly like a month, time just flew!

Let’s start right at the beginning of this month- 1st June i.e. Monday began with a long set of tasks to be completed- I actually remember thinking to myself about how Monday had, has and will continue to have only 24 hours, whether I like it or not! I’d previously tried my hand at updating the feedback for the two camps that I’d managed alone and had missed out on mentioning quite a few things- with help, I soon had that figured out and updated previous data accordingly, hopefully, satisfactorily. All donor reaction data was consolidated with plans for me to visit a couple of blood banks and procure the missing data, as the month progresses.

On Tuesday, I headed out to the Blood Bank at Victoria hospital. Once on the Victoria Hospital premises, it took a little while for me to find the Blood Bank- of course the signage helped. I then managed to find relevant persons who then helped me fill in all the missing data. It took about an hour and a half to get all the missing data filled in-donor forms needed to be pulled out for certain data that wasn’t down in the register; luckily, I had help from the nice lady at the blood bank. I then proceeded to walk back home, taking in a new part of the city as I went my merry way. I passed Lalbagh Botanical Garden on my way; I spent a large part of the journey he wondering where the fort was, for the road seemed to be called Lalbagh Fort road; I made a few enquiries later and did manage to figure out that I was indeed very close to the fort- a short detour from Victoria hospital would’ve landed me there!

Wednesday morning began with an early morning phone call from the guy I work with- explaining where I ought to meet him, instead of the usual Silk Board Junction, since we were heading to a different part of town. We were soon at the CGI campus in Marathalli. We took the Old Airport road to get there, passing HAL and the Aviation Museum on our way. I was very nicely told about the museum, but a detour to visit was refused. Once at the CGI campus, we spent over an hour waiting for the Blood Bank team to arrive- they were stuck in traffic and then managed to turn down the wrong road even though it was a fairly simple route to the CGI campus. The donation camp started an hour off schedule; we had a team of volunteers from CGI who helped out with the registration process and more- of course, there were certain points through the day when we had a large bunch of volunteers hovering around the registration area and no donors! The camp wrapped close to 7 p.m. but we ended up with far fewer units of donated blood than we’d been told to anticipate.

15/06/2015; 01:03:
On Thursday, I was to head out to JLL at UBCity- the office was on the 3rd floor of the Concorde building; the entrance was right through the mall which boasts an array of luxury brand stores. As I stood looking for the entrance, I happened to look around and up, at the United Breweries building- a tall, imposing glass building that just seemed to rise up and out of the earth below- watching, with a slight whiff of arrogance, over the traffic on the road going past; smiling, but not quite at the people that looked up in awe and but annoyed at the few who dared to swing past its vast doorway and step in. I made my way up to the office and subsequently to the drive venue which was a rather small conference room- of course, the organization was a small one and this would suffice- a small meeting room on the right of the farther door of the conference room served as the pre and post donation area. It was rather curious to note that each room in the office had a nameplate- and the theme was the areas of Banglore; so, getting to Whitefield from Koramangla doesn’t take all that much time! The blood bank team got to the venue almost an hour after their scheduled arrival and the camp accordingly started an hour late; they very nicely extended the camp for an hour on the other side, so, that kind of took care of itself. All donor pickings were done by or under the supervision of the senior technician of the team. There were two guys, both of whom experienced slight pain in their arms when donating- we had to discontinue donation for one of them; the other felt pain after donation which I suppose was more psychologically driven than anything else. We explained to them that donor reactions are a very real phenomenon- and occur in 3 to 5 % of the people who donate blood- and are not a cause for concern- also a reaction one time does not in any way imply a reaction in the future- it is perfectly safe for them to continue to donate blood in the future. Both persons were willing to donate blood again, immediately, from their other arm! A couple of donors even came down from JLL’s other campus at Embassy Golf Link. Somehow, we had only a solitary woman donor, through the drive.
During the course of the day, the whole team at one point helped themselves to coffee- I didn’t really feel too keen on the milk and on the HR manager (company contact)’s insistence got myself hot water with a citrus flavoured tea bag- this was the moment when I discovered that I don’t enjoy ‘Indian masala chai’ only for the sweet and the milk but for the actual flavour of the tea! And, that’s a pretty interesting revelation- perhaps I’ll get hold of tea-bags in Indore too!

On Friday, i.e. 5th June, I made my way to Rashtrotthana blood bank in Chamrajpet (not too far from Victoria hospital). Very warm greetings were exchanged, the moment I got there- I was soon rummaging through donor data from the end of 2014 to present. Rashtrotthana collects a very large number of units of blood a year and accordingly, their data ran into register after register- for data dating to before November 2014, we made our way to their storage area where most of the missing data was then found and filled in. They were to hold an organ donation mela, the next day and preparations were in full swing, in the auditorium on the 1st floor. The donor weights were missing for 7-8 donors- this would’ve required sifting through boxes upon boxes of donor forms- the people there are really nice and offered to send in the requisite data as soon as they get around to the task!

Saturday was spent at ESI hospital- I got to their campus pretty okay, taking a bus then sharing an auto to get there- it was once I was on the actual campus that I got lost. I must’ve asked at least 6-7 people before I was finally able to gather that the blood bank was down below, in the basement! Once there, I got the data and was done filling in all the requisite information in lesser time than it took me to find the blood bank! A person had strolled into the blood bank, to attempt to donate blood, while I sat filling in the data- of course, till the doctor got to him, I took it upon myself to ask him a set of questions that are necessary to ascertain that a fixed set of prerequisite conditions are met. I was soon out and on my merry way back. I decided to walk down till Majestic (which is the main bus depot here, right next to the inter-city railway station). A bus, on its way to Majestic passed me by, just as I strolled out of the hospital gate. As I walked along, I chanced upon a rather long, winding chain of traffic which I happily walked past. Soon, I was at Majestic, way ahead of the same bus!

Sunday was spent catching up with a friend from Indore who’s also in Banglore. All he wanted to do was eat pasta- yet, the place we ended up meeting at was one that makes a variety of food- everything other than pasta! And, that’s week 4 in Banglore at a close; I should document out week 5 before week 6 ends too!

03/06/2015

01/06/2015; 11:40:

It’s now the beginning of a fourth week here. And, there’s still a lot to look forward to!
To sum up my third week here- It began with a rather lazy Monday, which of course is in sharp contradiction to everything we’ve ever heard about working on Monday (Monday mornings even more specifically!) which I spent detailing out a report of the week gone by.

The rest of the week was spent at a series of blood donation drives- small and large.

On Tuesday, we headed out to Applied Materials at ITPL, Whitefield- it was at this point that I picked up a lot of information about their involvement with the organization I’m working with- right from blood donation camps to supporting our first Thalessemia care centre. We were there a little after 10, for a camp that was to begin at 11 a.m. The camp location was rather interesting- the corridor leading up to the offices from the reception was used to set up the registration desk and the medical examination tables; a perpendicular arm of the corridor was used to set up the beds- a couple of lights in the corridor weren’t working too well, so, that was due to be a slight problem. The post-donation area seemed like it’d been specially crafted to suit this very purpose- it had a couple of sofas for people to come and sit down on, tables to place the refreshments and our feedback book and dustbins too! The organization just looked like it was rather socially sensitive- what with segregated waste bins- colour-coded for plastics, paper, organic, e-waste and the like! The camp began to a good response and ended with one too! Their cafeteria had been strategically hidden somewhere deep within the caverns of the building- the man at the reception refused to tell me the way there and got someone to escort me instead, with the explanation that I’d definitely get lost- and, after the maze I waded through to get there, I agreed with him! We received some interesting feedback that day, including one donor who asked for TV screens to be made available at the donation area, since this would drive more people to come donate- he was given an alternative for the moment, he could talk to me whilst he was at donating to keep from getting bored- his idea didn’t seem like an entirely bad one; maybe we could air this, next time we’re talking to an organization about the details of the camp venue. The camp wrapped up close to 6 p.m. Before heading home, I headed up to Aegis Telecom, where we were to hold a camp the next day, to set up our banner at their reception.

Wednesday i.e. 27th May began with a series of phone calls- the idea was to follow up with all (or most of) the companies I’d visited the previous week. Most of these follow-up phone calls ended in nothing- with negatives ranging from the phone being disconnected to the fact that everyone there was busy. The most positive response I received was an offer to get back in touch with us, sometime in the near future. At one of the companies, the HR Manager I’d been meaning to meet was on leave when I’d walked in, on the 20th; surprisingly, this time around, I was told that he was on leave, again! This prompted me to check whether he’d managed to quit his job and be gone for good- that wasn’t it; I’ll probably attempt getting in touch with some of these people again, sometime today.
I got on a bus to Whitefield and was at Gate3 around 3 p.m. The donation camp was to start at 4 p.m. - the venue was to be the company cafeteria which continued to function around the donation camp or we continued to run our donation camp around the cafeteria’s working! The first two hours there were spent mostly listening to the guy I work with- stories and bad jokes! A little after 5:30 p.m., the donor traffic picked up. We had to send away a considerable number of people for they’d been smoking (there ought to be a two-hour gap between smoking and blood donation) and, pleasantly, most of them did come back towards the latter part of the camp and donate. The camp ended by 9; but of course since Whitefield is so far away from everything, I got home only by 11!
03/06/2015; 00:29:

I was up early on Thursday morning, visibly excited by the fact that my travel time was almost zero. There was a blood donation camp at the Bosch campus which is just about across the road from where I’m staying. I was at the venue a little before 10; the camp started by around 11 a.m. The new boss was at the camp venue for the most time, helping me, since I was attempting to handle a camp by myself for the very first time. The camp was rather efficiently conducted- a large contributing factor was the efficient doctor and team from the blood bank, the support extended by the company as well as the auto-regulated flow of donors! The camp closed around 6 p.m. post which I skipped my way home.

On Friday, the 29th, I was to be at a camp at Softtek at Bommanhalli which isn’t too far away. I got there a little too early and spent my time reading the Banglore Mirror where I found a rather interesting meme about the Banglore rains! It rains here, about 4 times a week- and somehow, it’s always when you’re least expecting it! The blood bank team was at the venue a little before 3 and the camp began soon after. The level of involvement from the company’s side was very encouraging- their HR managers were there the whole time, motivating people and clicking pictures! The camp venue was the cafeteria; here, we accessed the opportunity to go out into bays and give a short floor-talk about blood donation. The registration area was a workstation right outside the cafeteria with the rest of the set-up inside. The blood bank team was small but great as was everyone from Softtek- their cafeteria people kept trying to make us more food! A couple of people who claimed to be terrified of needles came forward to donate blood, their first time! There was even one guy who clenched my hand really hard even while his haemoglobin was being checked; and yes, he did donate blood!

Saturday was off and was hence mostly spent sleeping; we head out in the evening to get ourselves some pizza though.

Sunday began with an early morning walk to Silk Board; I didn’t catch any breakfast since I figured the guy I work with would be waiting on me- he didn’t get any breakfast for he figured that I’d be waiting on him! So much for miscommunication! We were at Concorde Manhattan Apartments at around 9 a.m. The blood bank team was there shortly after and the camp began as planned- we had a rather large party hall on the second floor of the community clubhouse as our venue. The camp began with a trickle of donors which was soon a steady flow and then an almost non-existent dribble; the camp closed right after a sudden deluge- the surge had been brought on by door-to-door campaigning by a team of dedicated volunteers! The camp ended close to 4 p.m. by which time it had begun raining. I got myself on the first bus I saw; as luck would have it, it was going right to where I needed to be! I got home close to 6 p.m.

I’m tempted to fill in Monday and Tuesday, right here, but, I ought to keep the weekly roster system undisturbed and as it is!

26/05/2015

25/05/15; 01:00:

And, a second eventful week in Banglore is about to draw to a close. This week has perhaps been better than the last; if this keeps up, my last week here will be beyond beautiful!

I was last writing on Monday evening; perhaps we can pick up from there.

I went into work on Tuesday morning, working on matching data for 2015, on the same donor reactions. I then drew up a summary of all the missing data; the next task is to try and procure most of this missing data, by getting in touch with the blood banks involved.

I was woken up early on Wednesday morning with a new task at hand- arranging meetings with blood banks at a short notice was rather impossible; a list of probable target companies had been drawn up and I was to visit them and talk to their HR people about the possibility of us conducting a blood donation drive at their organization. A large part of the voluntary blood collected comes from college students and during this time of the year, most colleges are either closed or conducting exams- this of course leads to a deficit in blood supply. Add to this the fact that many surgeries are scheduled at this time of the year and the dengue cases and we have a situation where a shortage of blood is faced- desperate calls for even common blood groups like O+ve and B+ve become an unwanted reality. Our best effort to try and cull this is to try to meet some of this deficit through upping our donation drives in corporate offices (mainly IT companies).

I walked around some part of Banglore, visiting or more accurately attempting to visit the HR people in different organizations. I encountered a variety of responses- from asking me to come back on Friday to telling me how the activity for the quarter (in this case, a visit to an orphanage) had already been undertaken. I tasted delightfully sweet success too- the best response was at the very last company that onI visited- their HR manager took time out to hear me talk about Our organization, asked me questions and shall most probably get in touch with us rather soon! During the course of my visits, I also found that one of the companies had nicely shut shop and moved their office elsewhere; two offices were untraceable (though I had a successful telephonic conversation with one of them!) and I also had a job offer from one of the companies that I visited!

I got back home and updated the results of my curious wandering on the portal. We headed out to a place which had a karaoke night that evening; we later met an old friend before heading back.

I was up early on Thursday morning, to head to Wipro’s campus in Electronic City. There’s an awesome flyover, which I hear is almost 10 k.m. long that we took to get there- the Wipro campus is rather big and has some 12 different entry gates- the BMTC even runs a multitude of bus routes to Wipro Gate 3 and back!
It was to be a large blood donation camp, with two blood banks in tow- ESI & NIMHANS. I got myself masala dosa from their cafeteria- much to my disappointment, it wasn’t very good; a couple of employees I spoke to concurred with me. We collected nearly 250 units of blood that day. I also met a nervous donor who’s now a good friend- it’s simple protocol to be talking to & distracting a nervous/ first-time donor; following protocol was never this good!

On Friday, I was at the Bosch campus in Bommanhalli which isn’t too far from Koramangla- it’s about a third of the way to where I’d been the previous day( i.e. Electronic City). The blood bank this time around was Bowring; I’d been informed that they are very efficient, and, they definitely were! The drive was conducted in a conference room- replete with a large immovable table in the centre! It kind of let the whole process- pre-donation, bleeding and post-donation have a cyclical feel to it. Just like last week, when we were at the Bosch campus at Marathalli, we collected exactly 147 units of blood- this was almost one-and-a-half times what we’d been told to expect (and, this was after we’d had to refuse people and send them away due to paucity of time and blood bags!)- the response was very overwhelming!
At one point, we ran out of the ‘Thank You’ cards that we hand out to the donors, post-donation- these have a couple of precautions and our Blood Helpline Number listed on them. Hence, I was to spell out the precautions orally and get people to save the helpline number on their phones instead. It was at this point that I realised that most people just watch me speak, without listening to what I have to say! I’m not sure why this is the case, but, well, it is. After I’d tell people to save the number, they’d just nod; with some people, repeating myself and asking them to pull out their phones worked; with a few, that failed too! They’d just smile and nod at me!

Friday evening was rather interesting- nice dinner followed by a look-around at Banglore city, by night!

Saturday morning began late; my parents had decided to drop by and say hello while on their tour of South India. Post-lunch, I was at People Tree Hospital, Yeshwantpur- The organization I work with was celebrating their 12th anniversary! The event consisted of a series of talks by a lot of people who have been associated with them over the last 12 years and specifically over the last 2 years. The event was very motivational- the things we’ve been doing, the things that we are doing and the things that we will be doing! All the people associated with them are wonderful and it was a nice setting to be in!

Sunday began with a nice lunch and a lazy afternoon; this was followed by late-evening coffee and an animated dinner! It ended with watching the IPL Final that Mumbai very deservingly won!! Huh, that sounds like an awesome Sunday!

26/05/15; 00:31:

Today was spent mostly in writing out a report about my second week at work! That and I should probably get to sleep!

18/05/2015

18/05/15; 20:51:

It’s been an eventful first week in Banglore! I walked down to my new workplace on Saturday morning (9th May). I got an introduction to the organization- how it all began, how it functions, their goals, beliefs and an insight into my role, working with them, over the summer. It’s a really small organization (I met most of the team!) in terms of human resource; but, it is very large in terms of the impact that they have and are creating! I will be dealing with collating data for an imminent scientific paper, organizing blood donation drives and creating awareness about the importance & benefits of voluntary blood donation.

After the short introduction, I made my way to M.G Road which is one of the most famous locations in Banglore! We walked down to Indiranagar and got ourselves good food and dessert to match! I walked back some way to where we’ve put up; en route, I made a mental note of the multiple nice-looking food places that I passed by!

Sunday was mostly spent lazing around and eating!

11th May i.e. Monday morning (maybe I’ll just call it Day#1) was my first real day at work! I sat around, tallying data off physical forms with the data on the online database. I also met some more members of the team; I also got a look at the different websites and apps that are in use.
We got ourselves some Andhra-special food from Nagarjuna for dinner! (This followed an attempt at spending time at Dice n’ Dine- the board game cafe; we shall go there again, with more people!)

Tuesday (Day#2) began at about the same time as Monday, around 9:30 a.m. Work that had begun on Monday was wrapped by Tuesday evening; I shall follow up on gathering the missing data early next week.

I was to attend my first blood donation camp in capacity of a member of the organizing team on Wednesday i.e. 13th May at EIC-Telecom at ITPL, Whitefield. I walked down to Silk Road Junction to get myself on a bus to Whitefield (which is about 20 k.m. away). I got there a little after 1, for the camp that was to begin by 2 p.m. i.e. right after lunch. I watched the setup very curiously- there was a pre-donation area where donors were to fill out forms detailing their medical history; then, there was a team of technicians and a doctor, carrying out a general physical examination of the potential donors- including their weight, Blood Pressure, Haemoglobin and Blood group; next was the bleeding area, where the actual blood donation happens- each donor was handed a labelled blood bag and directed to an empty bed. There was, on an average, one phlebotomist (the technician who bleeds the donor) to every two donors.
The last bit of arrangement was the post-donation area- where mandated refreshments- about 200ml juice and a pack of biscuits were handed to the donors, along with a list of precautions that they should follow for the next few hours.
The donors started rolling in almost as soon as the camp began; there is a set of requisite questions that must be asked of each potential donor- related to food, sleep, medication, alcohol and drugs.
The camp wrapped at around 5 p.m.; about 20 units of blood were collected that day!
Later, I accompanied Arpit (the guy at work whom I’ve been shadowing) to a meeting with the HR head at Aegis; in the next building- we’re looking to organize a blood donation camp there, in the near future.
I was back by late evening and headed out to join my new Banglore room-mate (still my batch-mate at IPM!) who was meeting an old friend for dinner!

14th May aka Thursday was spent at a Blood Donation Camp at Robert Bosch at Marathalli. This is also where my new boss works, on the side (So, the NGO I work with is run by a small, enthusiastic team of young people who are software engineers by day and the NGO guys all the time!). This camp was very well organized; I’d made a mental note of how it was the best blood donation camp I’d attended – the events over the next two days verified this!
I got back rather late; we had rasam-chawal for dinner, at the PG and tried to get to sleep early.

After getting to sleep only post-midnight, I was up a little before 4 a.m., and ready to head to Mysore on the 5:40 a.m. train. A cab and Arpit picked me up from my PG; we spent the three hours on the train talking and then sleeping.
Once in Mysore, we had chicken curry and parrotas for breakfast, right outside the Wipro Mysore campus. The Blood donation camp began a little after 10 a.m.; we had a very large number of women donors coming in, here!
A little after 6 p.m., I was on an inter-city bus, back to Bangalore; thanks to the famous Bangalore traffic I only got home by 11 p.m.

Early the next morning, i.e. the morning of Saturday 16th May, I made my way to Ittina Neela Apartments at Electronic City. I managed to get terribly lost on my there (even falling asleep on the bus and missing my stop by a good 10 kilometres!) and got to the venue only by 10:30; the camp began by 11 a.m. We had our expectations set rather high and were disappointed by the donor turnout. I made a new friend in a bubbly 3-year old whose mother donated blood! It began to rain (I think it was most definitely a thunderstorm) around 2 p.m. post which we lost power too. I got back, soaking wet, by 8 p.m.

Most of Sunday was spent sleeping in; I then got myself Masala Dosa for breakfast- I also learnt the right way to eat a Masala Dosa! I then met an old friend for lunch; we spent a lot of hours talking. I got to sleep early, and then proceeded to get up late on Monday morning.

There was a report of my activities of the past week to be compiled, so, I got working on that! I also got my bag fixed; in other happier news, I finally bought an umbrella and fixed the button on my jeans! Looking to a good dinner, now!

09/05/2015

09/05/15; 08:43:

Let’s just pretend that it’s still the 5th and I’m still on campus! So, our last paper for the year, our last ever exclusive paper as the IPM 2012 batch ended close to 11 a.m., on the 5th of May! Everyone hurriedly packed up – packed up their room into cartons to be left behind in the cloak-room while we were out and packed up some essential bits & pieces into suitcases to be carried to our place of internship!

A couple of good-byes later, people began to leave; it began as a trickle of people leaving on early afternoon flights, it almost became a flood around 2 p.m. (that’s close to when the trains to Delhi/Bombay/everywhere else leave Indore station!), turning into a trickle, by the dinner-time! About half the batch managed to leave on the 5th; the other half would probably repeat this setup on 6th!
We got on a 10:45 (p.m.!) bus to Bombay (It was supposed to be a 9:15 bus, but, well, technical difficulties got in the way)

We got to Bombay, by around 10 a.m., on the 6th. We spent the day wandering around parts of Mumbai, eating; We then made our way to Bangalore- it took us nearly 24 hours to get there!

I stepped foot in Bangalore, on the afternoon of 8th May! We then made our way to some predetermined accommodation, close to Forum Mall.

I’m not really sure if the details of what happens in Bangalore ought to form part of the ‘Life @ IPM, IIM-I’; but then, it is as part of my social internship which of course is part of the course curriculum.

Anyway, I’ll go visit my soon to-be workplace at around 10:30. I’d tried going in earlier and failed; I’m currently sitting around, waiting, thinking!