It’s only halfway through term 2 but it’s beginning to feel close to the Easter holidays already. Deadlines are being brought up and coursework presentations are underway. This week is my final week as an exec member on any society and with that in mind this week’s topic will be a nostalgic cast back on RocSoc, which I hope will give you an idea of what being a part of a society can do for your university experience.

I joined RocSoc in first year, initially just as a member, with the hope of making some new friends with similar interests to me. Not only was I instantly welcomed by the community there but it gave me something consistent to look forward to every Monday night. Towards the end of first year I ran for Treasurer and took my first exec position on a society, got my first exec t-shirt and the RocSoc treasury which felt like a strange personal accessory to go with a toy.

Since then I have dedicated every Monday and Wednesday night, as well as a few Saturdays, to RocSoc and I don’t regret a minute of it. Not only have I met some of the best people I know there, but I have heard some great bands and learned a lot along the way. Together we’ve put on events, trips and given our members and locals a regular spot to listen to music as well as play some of their own. I was also able to develop my own pricing strategy which brought the society back into profit and work on my confidence in various roles that required me to push myself and be more sociable.

There were moments of sadness when all the third years, that had made me so welcome when I came in a trembling fresher, took their leave. It was strange to see many of them leaving to become ‘proper adults’, tying back their long hair and wearing suits, especially having seen them near enough living in band shirts and prancing about on stage. But with the new era came a new wave of fresher’s to change things up again as well as a new exec with different ideas for the society altogether. RocSoc evolved again and started holding more specialised events such as guitar hero socials or jam nights. With new people the music tastes diversified and we started hearing more Japanese metal and pop punk, whilst not always appreciated it was good to have the range.

Sadly, due to the floods, this final term was not everything we hoped it would be. Our venue was flooded, we had to cancel events and we could not put on our final trip as a goodbye from the current exec. Tonight we host the elections and hope that whoever takes our place hits the ground running to keep RocSoc alive and well. Joining the exec of a society you care about can be the best thing about university, not only in terms of making friends but in experience. It will give you the chance to do things you never thought you would and to be part of something that really feels worthwhile.

Hello!

Last week we told you about our experiences in Visthar, the NGO in India. This week, we thought we’d talk about our 5 weeks of Independent travel after this from South to North.

When we actually arrived in India, we had not booked any transport or accommodation for our 5 weeks of travelling, we simply had a list of places we wanted to see. At Visthar, we told them where we wanted to go and they helped us plan and book our journey.

When we left Visthar, the first stop was Auroville: a sustainable community in a previous French colonial area, located in the state Tamil Nadu. Our first experience of traveling solo was interesting to say the at least! We came out of the train station with an address in our hands trying to communicate with non-English speaking Rickshaw drivers. We ended up getting a rickshaw for forty minutes down a dirt track before arriving at the wrong hostel. We soon sorted the misunderstanding and arrived at a house/hostel. This journey was a bit of a culture shock but definitely prepared us for the next 5 weeks India had in store for us.

From Auroville, we got the train to Kochin in the state Keral which was about a seventeen hour journey. Fortunately we managed to sleep for a large amount of this. We travelled through Keral for a week, and then got the train to Goa for a couple of nights.

After Goa, we went to the nearby area called Ratnagiri- beautiful beach setting where we took a week to relax and read lots of books!

From there, we went to Mumbai for a few days, and then flew to Delhi. These were a massive change from Ratnagiri and they were some of the most chaotic places we’ve ever been.

We of course intended to travel to Agra to see the Taj Mahal, but on the way there we had a big problem so had to turn around which meant that we never got to see the Taj (although we don’t mind because that is only a tiny tiny fraction of Indian culture and life). When we were back in Delhi we got the train to Jaipur for a few days then went back to Delhi. From Delhi we went to Haridwar (the most holy pilgrimage site for Hindus) and then went to Rishikesh for a few days. Both Haridwar and Rishikesh are situated in the Himalayas and being surrounded by mountains was so beautiful. We stayed in an ashram which added to the ‘chilled vibes’ of the area.

We then returned back to Delhi and flew to London.

Next week we will be writing more about our experiences and what we learnt and saw but we can honestly say that these eight weeks were the most amazing and educationally stimulating weeks of our lives. We miss it so much and could actually talk about it forever.

Becky and Katie x