Category: Khushali Ketan Chaliawala

The world Culture festival 2016 was a celebration of the Art of Living’s 35 years of service, humanity, spirituality and human values. It took place on March 11-13, 2016 in New Delhi, India. The festival celebrated the diversity in cultures from across the world while simultaneously highlighting its unity as a human family.

“We are inspired to continue with more enthusiasm and greater speed to realize the dream, where life becomes a celebration and the world will become one family. The World Culture Festival is a celebration of achievements and a vision to do better” says Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar. Ravi Shankar sermonises on controlling one’s feelings and emotions in addition to being a staunch supporter of inter-religious harmony.

I participated in this remarkable fest. The experience was incredible as I got to perform on such a grand platform. This opportunity not only helped me overcome my stage fear, but also helped me develop my confidence. I developed new dance skills while preparing for this event. To prevent any mistakes, the rehearsals for this fest began quite a few time ago, since November 2015.

The garba classes that I participated in helped me develop new skills very quickly. Managing school with these rehearsals was challenging, but I learnt to adapt it to in sometime. I realises commitment towards these rehearsals was very important, as I had to perform my best on the stage in front of millions of people.

The most incredible moment was it rained heavily, and people from different countries, from  various cultures came together and danced as one unit. It was an unbelievable moment for all the participants. The happiness and positive vibes created during that time made me feel impeccable. I realised that at the end of the day, all of us were humans who enjoyed thoroughly without letting different race, culture changing their minds.

Countries such as Mexico, Rome, Spain, Namibia, Czech Republic, Sri Lanka, Russia, Brazil, Lithuania, Belarus, Philippines, China, Hungary, Argentina and many more participated in the event and portrayed different dance cultures of their countries. It was a beautiful sight to learn about difference dances, even Indian dances, such as Bharatnatyam, Odissi, Assamese Bihu, Punjabi Bhangra and such like.

It was one of the most breathtaking journeys I’ve experienced till now. It was a moment of sheer joy and merriment.

Below is one of the practice videos that happened in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. I’m in the first column, 3rd row, wearing a Pink and Yellow Kurti.

Arts Fest, that was held on the 22nd and 23rd August 2015 at Fountainhead School, is a combination of events that are included in Art. There were multiple sub-events that happened in categories like Music, Dance, Visual Arts and Drama.

Dance events: Stomp, Folk Contemporary, Western, Classical, Fusion and Classical Ballet

Music events: Vocals (Solo), Group Singing (Sugam Sangeet), Instrumental (Solo-Rhythmic), Instrumental (Solo-Melodic), Live Band.

Drama events: Mime, Street play, Musical, General Drama, Monologue, Skit, Puppetry, Script writing, elocution and improvisation, Stand up comedy.

Visual Arts: Live drawing (Still life), Mehendi, Rangoli, Thali/Pot decoration, Best out of Waste, Bouquet making, Salad decoration, Photography, Quelling, Toy making (clay), Calligraphy, Big Picture, Drawing and Painting, Short Film.

I, Event Organiser, was given the responsibility to manage all the events of Dance and Visual Arts. Tiruja, my co-partner was given the responsibility of Music and Drama.

My aims for the event were:

• Learn how to plan, organize and conduct an event
• Learn to prioritise work
• Develop Time-Management skills
• Synergize effectively with Segment Coordinators

During that time, I was ill. I was infected with viral, and due to constant fever, I wasn’t feeling my very best. However, I learned how to give my best no matter however the circumstances are. Another challenging task was to make the schedule of how the events will be scheduled, and what is the tentative time that each sub-event will take considering the number of participants in that particular sub-event. Another challenge was to have meeting with all the co-ordinators, as all the students have different class timings because of different grades. Often times, only half of the people showed up in the meeting. IT was disappointing as well as difficult to then convey the decisions to the members who couldn’t attend the meeting. Therefore, I can say that I have had the courage to accept new challenges and face them proactively.

I would like to evaluate myself. I can say that I have identified my own strengths. I’ve had the opportunity to organise an event for the first time in grade 11. This opportunity generated a positive energy in me towards organising more events. I’ve learned how much imperative it is to plan the event effectively, and how much determination, team work, collaboration with every team member, fairness, optimism and commitment is needed to make such a huge activity successful. Being fair to each volunteer is very important otherwise the event may fail. By keeping my ethics in mind, I patiently listened to all volunteers and paid attention to their work calmly.

To sum up, I would like to say that it was a remarkable event that helped me learn lessons that will help me all my life.

Appreciation on behalf of Pankti Chauhan (Teacher)

My CAS advisors shaped you in a way by giving you opportunities to perform and show your skills. The difficulty you faced were you weren’t confident enough or you weren’t convinced enough to show your skills but with the help of stage and CAS advisors I overcame this. I would also like to take this forward in helping others and contributing in making my society a better place.

Arts Special is a group of different arts such as drama, guitar, keyboard, drums, vocals, visual arts and such like.  I chose visual arts because I had keen interest in learning and executing different forms of visual arts. I developed this interest during my 9th grade, when I chose Art and Design as a subject in the IGCSE. One of my goals for this activity was to perform all the tasks with enthusiasm. I chose visual arts in the 1st and 2nd year of my DP. The visual arts slot came once in 7 days.

I learned many new forms of visual arts.

Art Skill	Reflection
Clay moulding	I came across lots of new techniques such as slab moulding. These new techniques helped me gain further insight about how clay structures/statues are sculpted. It was difficult to mould clay at first, however I took it as a challenge and practiced harder.
Woodcut Print	I found this the most interesting. It required a lot of determination and hard work to clean and polish woods and then carve using interesting tools like U-tool and V-tool and knife. It took lots of days to carve it perfectly. I carved dainty flowers and leaves on the squared wood slab. The most difficult yet fascinating part was applying ink colours on the glass slab, and attach it with the wood for printing. The whole process required rigorous practice, and I made at least 5 copies before printing the final one. It was definitely time consuming, however the output was absolutely beautiful. It was tedious yet wonderful.
Painting wood	Aashna, my classmate and I founded a wooden object in the scrap and we decided to paint it using acrylic colours. It looked like a maze. We used primary colours, white and black to paint it. It was difficult to colour on the edges but that helped me polish my painting skills. The output was simplistic yet fantastic. It looked like a very confusing, beautiful puzzle. We painting little foot steps to make it more interesting.
Diary	Throughout the 1st year of DP our teacher, Rahul Sir told us to maintain a dairy in which we could draw whatever we wished to. Maintaining a dairy helped me improve my imaginative and drawing skills. It was difficult to manage time for dairy in between academic submissions.
Portrait of my choice	The 2nd year of DP with VA started with making a portrait of our choice.
Skirt	After making the portrait, Aashna and I decided to team co-ordinate and design a skirt, and colour the fabric using acrylic colours. It was a difficult task to do because it was new for us, and also time consuming. We decided to draw dainty flowers on the bottom of the box skirt. The colouring process took a lot of time. Our another teacher, Virendra Sir helped us with arranging the fabric and mannequin on which we would display the skirt. It was a lot of fun.

Overall, I learned something exquisite styles and techniques which I’ll definitely implement in my future.

The SUO, Surat Ultimate Open, is a Frisbee tournament our school organizes every year. This year it was on the 5th and 6th of December, 2015. The school gave the students the opportunity to lead, collaborate and organize this event on a large scale. Our heads, Khushi and Pranjal, divided us into different departments, according to our strengths. I chose to opt as a volunteer for the Registration department where I was, originally, assigned the duty to make announcements, check all the arrangements, distribute some gifts, collect score cards, and help people in case of any queries regarding the schedule of the event from all over India. There were 4 fields and two people were assigned to photography on each field. One day, prior to the tournament, I felt like I had no work except learn the rules of the game, since my job was to handle all the tasks on the present day. However, I had no clue that how hectic my schedule was going to be on the 5th and 6th of December.

5th December

We, Aashna and I reached the event venue, KG Farm at around 6 in the morning. It was chilly and foggy. We discovered that the tables for registration desk and food were dirty. I was disappointed. However, we knew that we couldn’t keep them dirty because it would only spoil our schools reputation. So, with full spirit, we started cleaning the table. This was something new that I had done. It was a last minute crisis. After clearing everything, we discovered that the prints of schedules weren’t giving to us. The participating teams asked us various questions regarding their match times. We had no answers for those questions. After making multiple calls to Khushi and Pranjal (who were the leaders and participants of the FS SUO Girls team), we answered all the queries. It was challenging, but that is what we learn. I learned that on the present day, I have to stay mentally and physically prepared for such chaos. We gathered all the registration dept. members and delegated work to each one of them, calmly. People were coming and going, inquiring about the matches. The desk was very busy. I made announcements regularly, about the information about the matches and about lunch. I soon realised that everything was a mess because everything was organised and categorized properly. We were given some folders. We decided to divide all the folders into categories such as spirit forms (filled), spirit forms (unfilled), score sheets (filled), score sheets (unfilled) and such like. Allocating it efficiently made our task much easier. This gave me the confidence to tackle all the problems that would come further ahead.

6th December

The next day was equally busy for me. This was a changing experience as I have never talked to so many people, let alone make announcements on the mic about the upcoming matches. Directing people to the places that they were required to be, sending the score keepers to the match and answering people’s queries were in my job description, and I wanted to give my 100% efforts. I met new people, from different cities, from different countries. One participant was from Texas, and we interacted with her about differences and similarities of her studies and our studies. It was a different experience altogether.

We were a large team. The main ingredients for making an event successful were working like one unit, and helping everyone do their work properly. If the volunteers under us would stop working properly, the event would become more chaotic. Many a times, we had to argue with the volunteers under us so that they could function properly. Shouting and screaming gave me the feeling of working like a head. In the end, I realised that I had to change my behaviour from an arrogant person to confident, optimistic person. Probably, this change in behaviour and attitude towards volunteers will help me immensly, as a leader in the future during organising different types of events.

Therefore, I was content with my contribution as I was able to successfully work in a large group. I was also able to manage the inflow and outflow of players and the allotment of score-keepers on KG Farm ground.

I had never indulged in tree plantation activities before. This was the first time I was contributing to the environment, and I must say, it was indeed fun.  It changed my perspective about nature.

I enjoyed visiting serene places and enjoy its pleasant air and nature, however this opportunity of tree plantation made me realize my responsibility as a citizen of the place I live in. This CAS activity gave me the opportunity to give my little contribution in making the world a better, green place, for which I would like to thank Nature Club for taking us to Kendriya Vidyalay School in Piplod on the 4th of July, 2016.

Initially, I wasn’t going to take part in the activity because of my mindset, but the whole experience of planting trees was much more than that.  The thought of taking a step towards making environment an ideal place encoruaged me.

When I was about to reach to the place early morning, it started raining, and my little excitement for the activity was vanishing. I knew I couldn’t let this rain be an excuse of my absence. I thought it was destiny who wanted me to realize the importance of tree planting. The greenery of the place made me realize that the world was becoming a place of concrete buildings instead of lush green trees. I could instantly connect with the changes happen in the society around me, and how it was unethical to make jungles barren for our purposes and seize their beauty.

I could say that even though the rain made it worst for us to plant trees, every bit of hard work was worth it. As soon as I started transplanting the plants into pits and then filling them with mud, I could feel the sense of responsibility of making a very little, but significant change to the society, with respect to an issue of global significance.

Other than being a responsible person, I learned the art of planting and fixing the mud with a shovel and spade.

At the end of the day, I was glad that I was able to contribute to nature’s beauty.

Amongst the heights of the Himalayan tops and lush greenery with toppings of snow, there lies the village called the Naggar Village. This calm and beautiful village is around 26 kms from main town Kullu and just 12kms from Manali. We stayed at the famous Naggar Castle for four days. The beautiful Naggar castle (now a Himachal Tourism hotel and restaurant) is the legacy of its status as the old capital of the former Kullu Kingdom about 500 years ago. The castle commands an incredible view of the river far below and the villages that litter the opposite bank, with the distant snow peaks beyond the Rohtang La Pass visible on a clear day.

View from Naggar Castle

As the castle was built years ago, it was like a cultural heritage. I got to learn from the culture of Himachal Pradesh from the castle itself. The walls were made of wood and stones that never broke, and the castle has rooms in the name of the king and his family when this castle was made. The castle had a temple too. I gained knowledge about the significance of that temple. We also ate local food which was something new, interesting and delicious.

List of activities:

• Treks and walks in and around Naggar.
• Visit to different temples
• Drive and visit Manali and Solang valley.
• Skiing
• Indoor games

1. Treks and walks in and around Naggar

Treks were the most difficult part. It required lots of endurance and perseverance. The job of being on time, in early morning, for breakfasts, followed by treks is really demanding. However, I was always committed to every activity I participated it. I gave in my 100 % efforts. I was punctual everyday, which gave me a sense of commitment, a sense of responsibility. We went for different treks everyday. When I was in grade 10, I went to a Jayalgarh, Uttarakhand in December. I won the best adventurous award and a medal. Since then, I have been always curious in adventurous activities like treks. I wanted to develop my stamina more and more, so that I could walk at a steady rate, but faster. I explored things by walking fast. Trekking fast is my strength. Climbing slopes is always difficult, but the energy inside me never dies. I take it up as a challenge, accept it, and stay happy. It excites me, and makes me want to trek more.

While trekking, I saw various new things, such as the apple orchid. We came across beautiful sites where Bollywood movies have been shot such as Jab We Met.

2. Visit to different temples

The visit to different temples was quite wonderful. History says that even an earthquake couldn’t break a temple. the village of Naggar follows Buddhism, however temples of Shri Krishna and different God were also present. That made me realise about the diversity of culture in a small village itself.

Another thing that I discovered about was the splendid artist, Nicholas Roerich. We visited a museum that displayed his painting, and a bungalow close to the museum where he stayed. His paintings represent the beauty and ambiance of Naggar. I got knowledge about the life of the artist.

3. Drive and visit Manali and Solang valley

In Manali, we did street shopping. I was impressed by the art and culture of Naggar. I bought a diary that represents their art so that it stays as a memory.

Out of the four days, one day was a visit to Manali and Solang valley. We saw a valley that was full of snow. We did tube sliding with partners. It was very steep, dangerous, but so much fun. I was so exultant to do it.

4. Skiing

Skiing was a dream come true. I had always wanted to learn skiing. I did skiing for the first time. We were taken to a safe path of snow. They instructed us, and we followed them. I fell down once, however, I picked myself up. At first I was disappointed that I wasn’t able to balance, however, I’ve learnt that ‘try and try until you succeed’. The ability to never lose up compelled me to stand up and ski again. It was one of the most wonderful experiences of my life.

5. Indoor activities (Games, and yoga)

It was risky to go for treks after evening, so we stayed at the castle and played some games that rejuvenated us. We played games such as snatching the partner, and zip-zap-boing. They cheered my mood.

Yoga was something that I disliked. However, I realised that after doing surya namaskar, one feels flexible, and light.

I am the one wearing black track pants, blue nike shoes, and peach jacket.

During these 5 days, I have realised how important maintaining a group is. While trekking, no one was in a race. everybody walked on their own pace, but made sure to always be together. The whole grade, developed as a great team and didn’t give any opportunities of complains to the guides of the trip. It was one of the best things that our grade has achieved till now. From playing cards together, to playing team games, to sharing different stories at night with the full grade was a new accomplishment.

The highlight of this trip was when I skied and learned about the art and culture of Naggar. Overall, it was a trip full of adventure, knowledge, amazing experiences and life learning  lessons.

I volunteered for the second edition of Fountainhead School Model United Nations, India that took place in Fountainhead School on the 28th and 29th November 2.0 as a graphic designer which includes making ID cards for the participants as well as organizing team, designing posters for each committee, creating certificates for all categories.

This was the first time that I had volunteered for something new. I hoped to learn new skills in order to develop my personality, and contribute fairly towards this 2-day event.

For the best outcome, I had gone through the documents of the first edition of FSMUN. Going through past year’s certificates, ID cards, posters, I had a clear idea about my areas of concern for the event. It benefitted me in such a way that I could do my work effectively i.e. quality work, in minimum time.

As it was a new task for me, I had minimal idea about the applications to use. I researched, consulted my friends, and concluded that the best application was Microsoft publisher. I learned using various new tools.  I had to admit, that in the beginning it was difficult and challenging for me, however, I got the hang of it gradually. It was really challenging to find new templates, and then match different textures and designs using the new technology. I am grateful to all the people who helped me overcome this fear of not doing well. Additionally, this event gave me the wonderful opportunity to develop my research skills. I gained knowledge about  different parts of the world while making posters representing agendas and an image related to the issue. I was able to connect with the issues of the world, and even though I wasn’t participating in the conference, I could think about the best possible solutions of the issues with global significance. It enabled me to get a deeper understanding about the conflicts and problems of various nations.

I, truly wanted to participate as a delegate and indulge in the conferences, however, due to some problems, I couldn’t participate.

I had to struggle between my studies and  taking out time to design posters. Therefore, time management is something that I got to learn from the event. For the print of ID cards and certificates, and various posters, I also had to collaborate with the team of utilities frequently. Keeping the dimensions of all documents as accurate as possible was very important, for which I had consulted the Director General of the event, Maharsh Benday, and the Secretary General, Aashna Jain often.

I made sure that the documents, folders, ID cards, certificates were available at least 4 days before the 28th of November, thereby maintaining my devotion and responsibility towards the event. I had also printed extra documents, so that they are useful in last minute crisis.

According to my ethics, I was very crisp and clean with my work. I made sure not to mix any documents or photographs. I made sure that I do not create any loop holes. I didn’t copy any information from the internet. They were my own pure, creative ideas. While taking images as reference, I maintained academic honesty by citing the reference. I didn’t give the organisers the chance to complain about any of the work I had done.

To conclude, I am really grateful that I got the opportunity to learn something new. I can’t wait for the third edition of FSMUN.