Journal 2020 September-December

Hobbies, activities, experiences, pandemic, lockdown, journaling, food between Sept and Dec of 2020. Online classes, exams, webinars, etc.

Hey everyone, as usual, this is part of my journal series which I do every four months. Before I move ahead, I would like to wish you all a Happy and Prosperous New Year. Hope you will enjoy this year, even more than the last year, 2020.

Let me keep aside my niche-based writeups and discuss what all made up my last four months. I share my experience as I believe it might help anyone and also to give a usual shoutout to those who have helped me and been part of my last four months. Please do stick on till last so that you will understand the chronology of the documentation.

The last time I stopped the journal was in April-August 2020.

It has been quite some since I have been documenting my life here on medium and I have to say that it feels really good. This is not a show-off, this is what we bloggers do online. Just like we post our pics on Instagram and Facebook, this area is for writing, for journalling and getting our voice heard.

September

Onam, the main festival of Kerala was in last week of August, but since the holidays were split-up between both August and September, everyone was in a lazy mood. For Onam two days, I was in my ancestral home. I productively used the holidays time to design and plan for my Secularism article. Even though I had planned for a short article, it turned out to be a 17 Min long read and was accepted by a popular publication- Dialogue and Discourse. That publish gave me immense happiness because I was confident in what I had written and it was something which I wanted to say always.

Read the article here

Soon after the Onam holidays, the covid-19 cases in Kerala skyrocketed. At a time it reached up to a peak of 11,000 cases per day but later on came down by December.

Exactly a week later, I saw how the Indian govt had banned PubG and various apps in the first week of September. It made me think about why the Internet is now getting politicised, so I planned and decided to write about it on Blogspot.

In mid-September, the controversial farm laws were passed and our legal expert Barath Arjun wrote a brilliant article on that in Munner’s daily.

After much waiting, the Kochi metro was finally opened to the public after the pandemic season.

I made a feedback form for my podcast, of which I had discussed in the last journal article. Link to form.

On Sept 20, I got the opportunity to publish my Syria article on MUNner’s daily. The article I had written was based on a long timeline and also the research was immense. That weekend I was at my Grandparents home.

There was an IEEE Insight Webinar on 26th and 27th on the topic of AI. September was overall a lazy month, nothing much notable happened. The online classes were back in full swing after Onam. I enrolled in two NPTEL courses for my honours degree- Python and Social Networks.

Abhishek Premnath had approached me to give a review of his start-up’s new mobile app for personality development. So I downloaded the app, tried its features and wrote an article on the same.

The Coursera bundle provided by my college ended on 30th September, so I had to enrol their maximum before it expires. The most controversial case- the Babri Masjid Demolition verdict came out on the 30th. I watched multiple news analyses, social media views of people etc. on the issue.

October

This was indeed an eventful month. On the 1st of October, I had an hour of the Payoneer seminar. Payoneer, as you know, is a popular International payment company especially useful for freelancers. They were mostly introducing us to their platform, its features, different client and a lot more. I also was able to participate in the ICS seminar which was conducted in collaboration with ThePrint Youtube channel. On October 2nd it is a national holiday and my family planned for a local pilgrimage.

Next week I had my first series exam. The exam was held online, but there was total confusion, the timetable was improperly designed. Most papers were lengthy and a lot of other problems were also there.

I participated in the IEEE Cruyptics Quiz and also secured the third prize.

Semrush is a popularly sought after blogging tool, they have made a short course on SEO and I enrolled in it. Along with that IETE MEC SF had organised really good and informative webinars. Since it was also the time of Bihar elections 2020, I was into watching The Lallantop Youtube Channel’s Chunav. It's perhaps the only Youtube channel in India that made onground reports so much and also got the pulse of the election. Bihar was the main political story of India in 2020.

Harinarayanan Shaji was the campus ambassador for Hult Prize MEC, he invited me to become the content curator for the same.

The most headline seeking International story was on France’s blasphemy and the new law on Islam. I have covered in detail about that story.

The MEC MUNSOC conducted CovingSus for the lovers of Among Us, the trending mobile game and it also formally started its Discord channel. MUNSOC also celebrated UN day on the 24th. IEEE GECB had also conducted the 12Parsecs Quiz which was based on the Space theme. Also meanwhile the preparations for the TIQ quiz in November was in full swing. Sujith Bhakthan my favourite Malayalam language vlogger, started his Leh-Ladakh expedition road trip as well. I was excited about his vlogs every day.

Rest of the time I was busy watching the US Presidential debates, election updates, Bihar elections etc.

I am so excited to announce that I had finished watching the most-watched American Sitcom- The Big Bang Theory within three months on Amazon Prime. The show was splendid with comedy, science humour, jokes, reflecting our lives, the American lifestyle, Science, Engineering etc. The best thing which I loved about this show was its connection with Science and Engineering. To compensate the same, I and my brother started to watch Young Sheldon.

November

This was the much-awaited month. On 3rd November when the election was scheduled, I had published an article on what all we should know about the US elections. I mostly covered on the system, the electoral college, the two parties, knowing candidates etc.

Day and night I was hooked to television to eagerly wait for the results. CBS, ABC, NBC, NYT, etc. where my most sought for the same. At a moment on 3rd Nov, it was also felt that the result will go anyway and Biden will lose. It was really worthwhile to spend CNN Intl cable tv channel for 50 p/month. The Intl community was overwhelmed with Biden victory with western world anticipating US’s comeback and liberal world order. I also started watching the shows of award-winning satirists- Stephen Colbert and Seth Meyers. 15 minutes of watching their show are equivalent to listening to one hour of news.

But unlike how it happens usually the result came up only on 7th November. That day I was a panellist on the same topic at Demic club meeting.

November 8th was not only a big day for me as the TIQ chairman but also for the College and the legacy of TIQ as well. We had important All India Level Quiz that day. It was also my pleasure to host Captain Chandrakath Nair, top quiz master in India for the same. We had 130+ registrations and 200+ participants. It was held fully online via Zoom. It was also live-streamed online on Facebook. I thank Noel Joe John, Shilpa Shyama, Anuvinda Krishnan and fathima niloufer for their constant support as fellow core members and doing their part. A lot of people’s hand has also gone behind this event.

The same day was also special as it was my paternal Uncle and Aunt’s 25th Wedding Anniversary. That night they gave us a special dinner on that occasion.

Post the US election I published a detailed analysis article on the US elections, post the Race was called by the Associated Press. I also had a brief podcast with Roshan Antony and Ashwin Saji on the election results. ASWIN SHANIL looked after audio editing and posters. The article went haywire with 700+ views, 100+ fans and 3k claps.

November 10th was the D day of Bihar elections and throughout the day I was glued to the TV. 13th was my father’s birthday and the very next day was Diwali, which is a famous Hindu festival in India.

As per the request of Amith Tony, I registered for IEEE PIE Vfiesta which is Managerial fest. They had a digital marketing workshop, best manager contest, online business conference, hackathon altogether only for just INR 150, ie $2. The Digital Marketing Workshop was splendid. The topics covered were general stuff, Instagram, LinkedIn, Youtube and Content Marking. Best Managerial event was a unique one and I was able to reach till the final round.

On November 22nd it was the TedxCircles event hosted by MITS Kochi Tedx team. Fathima Althaf and Megha Mary Biju had invited me there. MITS is special for me because it was the first college I had gone as the MUN EB member.

On 26th it was the closing day of Vfiesta event and I must say it was a wonderful event. The same week we had the Core handover of MEC MUNSOC to the juniors and me stepping down as the Secretary and MUNner’s daily editor. I know that juniors- Niranjana, Adil Rafeek, Sangeeth S, Aswathy S, Denil Daise, Malavika Rajesh Vikraman, Alan Antony and Sandra Sam will make up a great team and take the club to greater heights. It was wonderful sharing MUNSOC with its founders and other office-bearers. It will be the best time I wish to remember in college after I leave.

IEEE MEC SB published my technical article on the topic- Distributed Energy Resources.

December

It was expected that Second series exams would take place online, but surprisingly, they postponed the dates. There were speculations that the college might start soon and the exams would be held offline. But it also happened that Kerala Local Body (LSG) elections were also to be held next week and the college was a polling booth as well as a counting station. Hyderabad election results were declared on 8th and BJP made massive inroads to South India.

The election campaign in Kerala was reaching to a high decibel level, but my locality was relatively calm. I wrote an article urging the eligible voters to go ahead and vote, at the same time helping them understand how they should vote. My vote was on 10th.

Surprisingly, the series exam was postponed to 13th. The result of Kerala elections came on 16th and as per the widespread request, I made an analysis article on the election results. Please do infer the same-

The NPTEL exam was scheduled to be held on 19th since it had overlapped with my Series exam, it hard managing both. The exam was held Offline at Keezhmad, Aluva, just 6 km away from my home. Sebastianjames Mec, Athul Kurian, Harikrishnan had accompanied me for the exam. I had also met many people from MEC, as well as my schoolmate Karthik M Pai at the exam hall. Finally, I can take a sigh of relief from a hectic exam schedule. Although the state govt had decided to open up colleges for practical exams from January made me uncomfortable.

The exam was held following Covid-19 protocol and also under the full supervision of staff. My subjects were Python and Social Networks. Both exams went fine.

Considering a lot of fake news and propaganda spreading on the Indian farmer’s protests, I decided to write on that topic to spread awareness. The Frame of Reference accepted the article.

On 23rd, my friend ASWIN SHANIL visited me at hometown. We went to PizzaHut and ordered a Veg Meal for 4 for lunch. After lunch, we visited Salman K K’s house at Uliyanoor, and also clicked pics facing the Periyar river. We also had a Skype call with Sagar Suresh Kumar who was in the UK.

On 25th, the day when the entire world celebrates Christmas, we had our grand family PVRKK Meet held online via Zoom. A mere family event turned out to be global meet as members across various countries like the US, Canada, Japan etc. turned out for the meet. The meet was very well hosted organised.

On 26th we visited grandparents as part of our usual holiday plans. In the evening we had the much-awaited TedXMEC event held via Youtube. On 27th Nebu Titus Thomas, Kavith Viswanath and ASWIN SHANIL visited me at Willingdon Island. We went to the Island museum, went for a drive near the port and also clicked pics. Many of my friends and relatives were travelling to different places, resorts etc. This was the main point of conversation at home. I am still busy arguing with my family members how safe public transport, Metro, restaurants etc. are.

On 29th I published my 2020 concluding article on blogging and how this year had helped me in blogging. Got published my first article in Illumination.

The new year eve, as usual, was a lazy one. Happy 2021 :)

Conclusion

These four months were quite different compared to the previous four months. The lockdown has started to ease. The classes started, exams took place, there was less time for doing things which I wanted to do, but was fine. With this year ending hope for an eventful 2021.

About 2020 in brief

Filled with mixed feelings, new experiences in 2020 was different. But it brought the best out of us. Just like how it benefitted me in blogging, it helped me in many ways. I got the opportunity to enrol myself in a lot of courses, upskill myself. From an amateur a year transformed to a good cook. Now I am able to manage a lot of different dishes by myself. This year gave us a lot of webinars, workshops, training, even if you are tired of them and you hate them. I got to experience e MUN, online classes etc. even if I don’t enjoy them or encourage them. Anyway, it was a totally new experience but it didn’t change my life much as it might have for others :D.

Also read

I have started a Telegram Channel which will contain the record of all my articles. Follow my personal blog for behind the scenes and informative content.