CAS Blog - December 2010

As the end of the year approaches, more and more work needs to be done (think Extended Essay) as a result, the activities which I performed in December seem to be lacking severely. In addition to this, there were only 11 days of school in December hindering any major progression with and CAS activity before everyone left the country.
One notable activity was the creation of a presentation that summed up the whole first half of the sports-wise in the form of SAISA awards night. Here, C-Squared accumulated all the photos and videos taken over the past 6 months and condensed them into one slideshow. Believe me when I say that this took an immense amount of effort to accomplish but the experience left me more capable of doing similar projects in the future since I can learn from my mistakes and capitalize on the efficient techniques I picked up on. In retrospect, it will serve me well as I can expect to do a lot more presentations of this scope in the following half year.

CAS Blog - November 2010

The month of November had a lot of surprises in store. First of all, we (the C-Squared team) got to personally meet the visiting author, Taylor Mali after he performed for the whole school and the whole world thanks to the powers of internet technology and our dedicated team of videographers. We used a tool known as Ustream to broadcast a video feed to viewers worldwide.
Secondly, the DISA invitational boys basketball and the DISA invitational girls soccer provided our little team with double the photography workload.
Like October, November had a lot of free days and with the lack of school days came a lack of extra curricular activities. This month was mostly dedicated to the academics.

CAS Blog - October 2010

WOW! October has been a particularly odd month where we have a lot of things going on, especially event-wise. First of all, the month began with a class colors night on the 7th which served as an excellent opportunity for me to peruse my hobby of photography as well as aid the yearbook in obtaining a bevy of pictures.
Similarly, UN day also provided me with another opportunity to complete a couple photography jobs for Ms Kozara as she felt that it was still early in the year and her new yearbook staff still needed to become familiar with all the ropes of the production process and asked me to help out. I gladly obliged.
After a week-long break we returned to Dhaka only to begin preparations for the Halloween Carnival that was about to happen, all the service groups I was involved in had a booth: Habitat for Humanity, The Green Team, French Honor Society but I also worked at the senior class booth and continued with the 6 year old tradition of being a photographer at the carnival.
The hectic month ended with preparations for the visiting author, Taylor Mali, who C-Squared was assigned to record and broadcast.

CAS Blog - September 2010

With my senior year starting, I have a slew of new CAS activities to choose from.
I ended up picking the following as the activities that I wish to participate in for the 2010 - 2011 school year:

SAISA Badminton - Action

Badminton Club - Action

Habitat for Humanity (aka H4H)- Service

Computer Club (aka C-Squared / C2) - Creativity/Service

French Honor Society - Creativity/Service

Both my required action slots have been filled last year but I enjoyed playing in Badminton Club and SAISA Badminton that I decided that I should try to better myself by continuing both activities.
I have similar reasoning for continuing Habitat for Humanity (H4H) as I will be working with same group of people and hopefully attending the same builds with them as well. I remember it was hard to incorporate myself into the work ecosystem that was present when I joined H4H last year, I do not wish to experience similar discomfort when switching to a different club. I feel that a continuation of an activity will always lead to some sort of specialization, hopefully I will end up as a distinct member of H4H.
Once again, like last year, i'll be continuing my participation in French Honor Society (FHS) and C2 but believe it's more of a personal obligation that's encouraging me to stay in these clubs. As a senior, it is my responsibility to guide my peers with my experience. First of all, as a French student for over 6 years, I have absorbed a lot of francophone culture that can be passed on through this club. Secondly, with a natural affinity for computers and technology, I have become a valuable asset for C2 that was unfortunately not fully tapped to it's maximum potential last year. This was primarily because of my newcomer status, but that's behind me this year. I hope to lead a couple projects and ramp up the productivity to compensate for the lower membership.

Till now, I've attended two badminton clubs meetings, two Habitat for Humanity meetings, two Computer Club meetings and one FHS movie night.

CAS Blog - April

Over the past month, a dozen students and I have been training hard in an attempt to become the athletes who will represent AISD at the SAISA Badminton Tournament. I was consistently fourth seed on the ladders and had good prospects. Unfortunately, on the last day of practice, i was defeated, loosing my fourth place and also my spot on the team. I think that i lacked the confidence to win and also the sleep to be fully energized, several times i felt more tired than usual and because of that, did much worse. Next time i participate in a SAISA sport, i hope to be able to manage my time more efficiently and get my homework done in a manner that it does not interfere with my game.

Also, April was the month of AISD Idol. Although I did not try out as a participant, me and the members of C-Squared did a fantastic job of recording and presenting the performances on the spot. I think that our organization and preparation could have been slightly improved as a lot of the things we did were very last minute and it quickly became hectic.

CAS Blog - March

March marks the beginning of the first ever SAISA badminton season. Naturally, being part of badminton club for two years, I tried out for the team. The first couple practices were not challenging at all, we began learning the basic strokes (which i had already mastered). But when the intense training began, I went home every night with a sore shoulder and an aching hand. I sought advice from our captain, Pranav, who recommended I buy my own racket as the ones provided by the school are inferior in quality. When I found one that suited my style, I found playing much easier. Also, using the same equipment every time ensures that you can acclimatize and then optimize your technique. After slightly adjusting my hitting style, I no longer had the same shoulder problems as before.
Unfortunately, devoting so much of my time towards SAISA badminton meant that i could no longer fully participate in C-Squared or attend all the talent show practices. In the weeks following spring break, i need compromise by missing a practice or two so i can still keep my other activities going.

CAS Blog - February

Over the month of February, I took on the role of a freelancing photographer as a creative service to the understaffed yearbook team. This compromised of taking photos of two DISA events, boys soccer and girls basketball. Having a lot of experience in the sport of soccer and good weather conditions, I was able to take fantastic photos of the players in their best moments. Unfortunately, I had difficulty attempting to capture images of the girls playing basketball because of the terrible and mediocre lighting available in gyms C and A, respectively. The only way to circumvent the darkness of the photos was to set the ISO higher, although this produced brighter images, they were freckled with noise and odd colors. Thankfully, modern image editing software can patch up and remove such noise, it will be some extra work for the yearbook staff. I hope to be prepared next time and arrive with a flash in hand.

Badminton club was not as successful as before, the dwindling number of members has caused me to play the same opponents over and over again. Without the diversity of players previously available, the club has become less enjoyable and active. This, on the other hand, also has an upside: the limited amount of court space was no longer saturated with doubles teams. For the first time in months, I was able to play one-on-one matches in order to test my true capabilities in Badminton. I proved to be a powerful player with others complementing me on my quick reflexes. With this knowledge in hand, I can confidently say that I succeed during the upcoming SAISA Badminton season. This will be the first Badminton tournament held by the SAISA organisation. Although it will be a honor to take part, there are a lot of aspects of the game which light needs to be shed on, there will always be difficulties the first time but I hope nothing too big goes awry.

CAS Blog - January

Over the past month I have engaged myself in badminton club once again as well as another habitat build.

Badminton began a week late and I opted to go to football club for that week, the change in pace was welcome and I hope to go there more often as it's time doesn't conflict with that of badminton. (but homework will still come first, i'll only go when i have free time) The the schedule during the weeks after that continued as usual. On the other hand, my usual badminton partner, Prakash, had more pressing issues to attend to and forced me to play with Sanchit who was on a different level than I. Although this change was unforeseen, I still managed to make the most out of it by learning a different playing style that was presented me and, in turn, helping and giving tips to Sanchit.

During my second habitat build, with new peers helping out as well as a new advisor, i felt that it was much easier. I had come with a prepared-ness that was absent during my first build which aided in my understanding of what needed to be done and the purpose of the whole shebang. I think being with a different group of people also helped bring a positive attitude, this time girls came along (rather than all boys last time) and set the pace a bit slower but brought a lot more meaning into community service. When all the boys complained that the work was hard last time, the advisor would just force us to work harder. This time, when we did the same thing, we were just spurred on by encouragement such as: "dont give up, you're doing a good thing." I enjoyed this build a lot more, it had more spirit, a bigger group and more meaning.

In addition to the physical activities, C-squared began a new short term project, the filming of AIS/D Idol. As a person enthusiastic about all sorts of media, this was more a recreational activity and an opportunity instead of a chore that other people perceive it to be. The project has just begun and so I cannot comment much but i hope that my presence (with a scary looking video camera) wont intimidate the auditioners too much!