Looking back 2014

[Created on 3rd February 2015 at home in Agia]

2014 was incredible from many angles. I started the year in a setup which was completely different from the way I ended the year. Here are some events (spanning couple of days) that made the year memorable and worth for what it had been imagined.

1. Started the year with Alvaro’s visit- again thankful to be out of IT. Particularly the discussion between Alvaro and Manuj—thank you God I am no more in IT. 
2. My learning- I developed my writing with the BSG blogs- I have confident on my writing now. The preparation for the summative assignments convinced me that I have not yet given up the book-worm character. Yeah, my public speaking has also improved and credit goes to the Oxford setup, the numerous discussions and training amidst a set of brilliant public speakers. I have started thinking public speaking is an art with drama, emotion, role-play etc. Also, I have learnt to slow down myself in speaking, decision-making, excitement. I also learnt what critical thinking and intellectual discussions are.
3. Meeting new people- this reminds me of Radheshyam khura’s pride to know famous people. Being from Agia and not knowing a single ‘big’ people, whenever I set to meet a famous personality, my self confidence used to go low. But 2014 witnessed me talking, convincing and impressing many personalities such as Maneka pp bora, Manisha Nair, Wahid da, Parthajeet da, Joseph Nye, Yoginder Choudhry, Anshuman Rajkhowa, Sunil Deodhar. I believe I have developed that art more or less. 

   

   Posing after successfully running 8K with Erica and Felipe

4. Attending various activities such as learning Spanish, part-time money making by psychology tests or giving interviews, running 8K without preparation with Erica and Felipe, mafia playing, punting, Roaming with Intan in Amsterdam, Visiting Ghent, using the ‘navigate’ feature of the McKinsey Blackberry, attending Gay Bride parade, visiting Aachen(a German diary !), visiting Brussels,  meeting Priya and Bhagat Da in their land, getting associated with Sukrya Da for Sal tree festival , attending the NGO coordination workshop at DC office made some great memories for 2014.
5. News addiction- this was troubling many a times, particularly when I had assignments or exam along with a fast internet connection. After following Delhi election and AAP’s rise, my desire to be a politician reached the peak. I spent hours after hours, thinking how I would give a political interview, how I would galvanize the voters in West Goalpara assembly constituency etc etc. The Modi fever and BJP’s spectacular victory in national election also consumed huge portion of my time and energy. 
6. Koyel and Geetashri dominated my thought process during the last year. But 2014 witnessed both of them slowly vanishing from my thoughts. Both got married in the year. Geetashri really helped me in UK, starting from the very first day. I met Koyel in November when I visited Aizawl. She has changed, the world has moved on. But the interesting fact is that there is not a single woman that dominated my thought process in this whole year. 
7. Taking Maa to Oxford is one of the biggest things I did in the last year, in fact, in my whole life. For an aspiring middle-class educated woman, visiting a foreign country is a strong core dream. I thank God that I could manage her travel and stay, of course with help from Geetashri (the travel partner) and Dada (the Visa interviews etc). 
8.  The decision to be part of the BSG book preparation was a great one. I am mentioning this specially because it taught me how not to get frustrated, how to nudge, how to follow-up, how to do pre-mortem, how to rejuvenate the energy and lastly, how a small group of people can make a world better led, served and governed. Aaron is an absolute master piece, happy to get associated with him.
9. “Happiness with food” has always been a concept I didn’t want to digest. But during Oxford days, after eating the English food all day, after getting exhausted in the lessons and assignments, the daal, potato fry and rice that I cooked in the evenings, made me awesomely happy. Even the poundlane shopping for the snacks gave me so much energy to study, read and reflect. During the Amsterdam days, watching Atanu Bhuyan’s Manthan and cooking was the happiest thing I used to do in the whole day.
10. 2014 will be remembered as Airline disaster year. Some dangerous crashes such as shooting down the Malaysian aircraft near Ukraine(just after the day I booked my return ticket in a Russian aircraft), the shocking MH370, which could not be traced until today are worth mentioning. I took amazingly huge interest in all these incidents. I remember my day started with searching information for MH370 and ended with the same. The NG series dramatizing the old Air crash investigations took lot of my time as well. 
11. Taking exam after many days- it reminded me of HSLC days, the AIEEE preparation –oh my God! This was indeed a big event of the year. And, I did fairly well (per my standard). The exam tradition at Oxford made the event even more memorable. But I realized I have matured a bit to handle the ‘exam pressure’ compared to the old days. Nevertheless, I still get the pressure and have not been able to become 100% pressure-proofs. I also remember the sadness I had after finishing the final assignments on 31^st August. Alex had been awesome to take printouts and submit all the assignments. The final result card came on 3^rd October. This probably first time when the result did not really matter much. Then after much deliberation (mainly for not getting any post-MPP engagement), I decided to opt for “degree in absentia”. 
12.  Crowd funding for “One Last Question” , convincing people to become producer, giving the interview to oxford Wall of faces for the movie, dubbing the dialogues with Prathamesh’s second Assam visit are a few interesting incidents of the year related to the movie. When first time I saw the rough cut, it has been a matter of happiness and satisfaction that I dared to make the movie when Prathamesh first offered. 
13. Professor Paul Collier’s lecture on norm, identity and narrative influenced my thought process. In fact, his teaching style was so unique and interesting that I often miss his charming words. The concept of ‘belief system of society’, ‘how to become a developed nation from a underdeveloped nation’-I used a lot in later part of the year. First time in life, I have found some awesomely interesting teachers – Tom, Maya, Monica, Adam, Clare, Ivan, Peter, Atif are some of the brilliant and skilful teachers that anybody might dream to have. 
14. The mad mad days just before leaving Oxford and first days in Amsterdam- the YPP application, UNDP application, two assignments, numerous dinners, saying Goodbye to people, packing up, losing the diary for 2 weeks, storing the memories- OMG, how did I manage?
15. The momentum for coming back India was complete in Amsterdam days. My daily lifestyle, type of work completely convinced me that I should go back. I spent hours after hours pondering all the options of staying back as I had the option of informing McKinsey about a permanent employment. I remember spending time near canals alone, eating chips & ice cream and trying to persuade me for a foreign stay. Finally I bought the return ticket on 16^th July. So, the decision to come back India was not an emotional one, but a very thoughtful one. The diary pages for Amsterdam days are good testimonies for that. I must mention the uncertainty regarding employment after coming to India did bother me a lot. 
16. The UNDP job and my efforts- this is one of the biggest failures plus learning of 2014. It started in Oxford time with Linda, Ngaire, Anne etc, continued in Amsterdam via Wahid da and ended in my Delhi visit – huh! Wahid da has been a crucial player who took the struggle to a completely different level by bringing in Madan Bezbarua and many others. I even contacted Helen Clark and managed to get her reply as well. Satyakam’s contact Yoginder Chaudhry gave some hope in between, but later became unsuccessful. I attended quite a few interviews in 2014 including the World Bank one and then by McKinsey. The later part of the year witnessed a few more such as CFBI and Twitter where I was interviewed by their global VP. But more than interviews, the lobbying for jobs (for example the UNDP one) that I will remember when I would recollect 2014. 



Home shifting

17. Home construction, the chaos, the money management, the learning, researching about grill and glass, the measurements with Jamal and Yousuf, the decisions not to proceed (say the front grill construction, no carpet) and finally shifting to the new house on 24^th September - I was glad I were able to witness this experience. Sending money from outside is a different game and actually managing the stuff on the ground is entirely different.. Constructing a house is indeed one of the biggest deliverables (!) of human life. 
18. The September Delhi trip was vividly memorable for my time management, meeting many people, putting an end to UNDP dream- read the diary pages- I have written down in details. The routine changed just the day after reaching back Assam- the September 23 flood. What a turn of events and my focus area! 
19. Visiting Aizawl again for receiving the Xomidhan e-Northeast award has been a cheerful and nostalgic event of 2014. After meeting all the old people, visiting different places of memory, I felt the warmth and love for me by the people. Hot news such as Sawma’s job in Mizoram Rural bank, Koyel’s indifferent attitude, Saikia da’s kisses are worth remembering. 
20. Getting associated with Purbanchal Social Circle post the September flood and undertaking the Joint Livelihood project are most significant event that completely consumed my time and energy in the last two months of 2014. I took that as an opportunity to contribute to the people devastated after flood, save my agony and redirect my energy, as well as to understand the problems of ‘my people’ from very close.  I thoroughly enjoyed the whole experience; even I spent the whole day of 31^st December by doing house-to-house survey of the second phase.

         Thus. the year came to an end. 

Moments to remember: 

•  27^th February: Moina’s result- the supreme worrisome and the most important factor for last 3 years. Aha- what a relief!
• 8^th March: the 5 hour long chat at Intan’s place, after which I made some amazing friends –Alex, James, Intan and Quingling. 
• 18^th March: after answering the question on software profession’s bandwidth in the Major Program Management module, Bent asked, ‘would you like to work with me?’  
• 8^th May: Moina got into IRMA, shooting for oxford wall and starting day of crowd funding. 
• 6^th May: BJP’s spectacular win in India's national election. 
• 21^st June: Closing dinner in Oxford, Wishberry campaign reaching the target. 
• 8^th July: Visiting Anne Frank’s house; anybody who writes diary regularly, it is a moment to reflect upon. 
• 10^th July: Jaw dropping experience after visiting Sex museum and red light district with Intan.
•  8^th Sept: The homeward journey from Amsterdam.
• 17^th Sept: Getting inside the Suzuki  manufacturing plant illegally with Kailash and was almost got caught. 
• 30^th Sept: Going in search of Kakoli with Pranjal & Munmi and finally seeing her. 
• 14^th Oct: First time, audio dubbing experience in a studio for ‘One Last Question’. 
• 1^st Dec: Attending Agru’s marriage and meeting Paule, Mirani, Salil, Topi--- it was such a different setup, I took time to adjust. 
• 10^th December: Finding Aziza Hasina on Facebook; she is mother of a kid today.

Let me end this by the following lines that I wrote while coming back at Amsterdam airport:

I was one of the millions of expats who migrate for better education and comfortable life when I left India a year ago. If Oxford education has taught me one thing, that is to shift from ‘comfortable’ to ‘meaningful’. As I am closing an interesting chapter of my live biography, I wonder how difficult it has been to nurture this new perspective being from a middle class Indian family. Today my homeward journey starts with a quest for meaning; the uncertainty and the smell of motherland are only adding flavours to the reverberation of my newly acquired optimism.