Category: Manan Sanjay Shah

As a part of our school’s winter trip we went to the Northern side of India, in the Mystical state of Himachal Pradesh. In Himachal the cities we explored were Manali, Kullu and Nagar. Initially I was not so excited for this trip as treks are challenging in the cold weather with cold breezes. It wasn’t as tiring as I thought it would be, but it was definitely physical exertion and challenging. However the view while trekking was breathtaking and it mesmerized me by its elegance.We were provided with the freedom to sit back and relax when the other went for trekking however I wanted to make the most out of the trip so I pioneered each and every trek. On the second trek I was so motivated that i ended up being the first one to reach the site. After that all the treks I embarked I showed perseverance to complete it and reach the site first, it was challenging as i tested my physical limits. I also learnt the new skill of skiing and it was a great experience.

From the 16 psychological type I was proved to be an introvert however this trip gave me the opportunity to make new friends and open up. Me and my new friends worked collaboratively while trekking and staying together in the rooms.We helped each other while difficult times during trekking, we even divided the work in the room so we were more productive. It was a great collaborative effort and we forged great bonds between me and my friends which would never break! We learnt about the art and culture unique to the villages near Naggar by visiting the Roerich Art Gallery and the homes in the Rumsu village. It was awesome to learn about the villagers lifestyle. We also learnt how the quality of apple farming deteriorated due to rise in temperature. We learnt about how we need to protect nature from the garbage and the littering done and how we need to be careful about our activities as they have a major impact on nature. We also learned that we should preserve such natural beauties for the future generations. This was an ethical concern that we had to take into consideration and also an issue of global significance. This trip was one of the best trips of my life and I hadn’t been on this trip I would have regretted missing it.

 

Book club is an initiative of our school, Fountainhead. Book club is an activity where a student has to read a number of books in a year. Its aim is to promote the good habit of reading. Initially I never liked reading books, I used to loathe reading books but this year I participated in the book club and aimed to read at least five books of my choice. When I was about to start with my first book, my english teacher asked me “are you up for a challenge ?”, I asked “what is the challenge about” she replied that “this year you should read 10 books of your choice” I thought about it, it was a new challenge as I had to read 10 books with the burden of IAs and other school work. However this was an opportunity to step out of my comfort zone and do something which is challenging, so I said “Yes”. With this I read the my choice of books. In the initial stages I read my books on daily bases as I had a lot of free time and I wanted to use it productively, While reading I used to sit with my phone in which I used the dictionary to understand the book as much as possible. I was committed doing this until I had my karate tournament, and that time I had a lot of burden upon me so I wasn’t able to continue the determination after that. Some of the books I read were hard such as “A game of thrones” and some of them were light reads such as “Paper Towns”. To provide an evidence that we actually read the book I had to write book tweets which were like reflections about the book or have a viva with my teacher where she asked me about the book. So this year’s book club was an amazing experience where I explored how reading is my new strength also explored different genres and author’s books and it was also a big achievement coming from a non reader background. However I was not able complete 10 books because I also had my Karate national tournament even though I managed to complete five books and ma’am approved it for book club criteria.