Each day I attended the college in my first year, it felt no less than entering a lifeless edifice with the sole thought of spending time with buddies and getting ragged with those cute senior girls. It was that one good day when the college came out with the proposal of a College Magazine. Hell Yeah!! - I thought, a feeling as if I won the KBC2 show. The next thing I did as soon as the the circular passed my classroom was to go ask Mrs.Anuradha (our ex-English faculty) if I could be a part of the magazine. But I never thought of "what" in it. In that moment of dumbstruck memsmerism, all I could say was.. "Mam, Can I help you in designing the coverpage of the magazine?". "Oh! Sure..." she said. "...but I guess I should confirm it with Mr.Mahesh." It was all a yes later and it was that very first time I felt there was some purpose coming to the college.
Everything was in its infancy. The management didn't know how to start about with it. The Chief Editor didn't know how to start off with the magazine. The Editorial Board couldnt decide on anything. And yours truly, the designing department, didn't know what the hell he was doing in there. People even fought over deciding the name of the magzine. But slowly, the peices started coming together. After a zillion non working meetings, plans were slowly chalked out. "Musings" was its name . Each meeting had one definite question for me... "Whats your progress?" and I said "Well...Same as yours!". It took sometime when two others joined me for the designing work. We bunked many classes, spent many hours literally screwing our brains and finally caught the word "Theme". After drafting close to some 15 designs, we finally came out with the design we wished, a little bit amateurishly raw though. End of the day, the magazine came out and its was a heavy downpour of criticism. People just accepted it, because they had to accept it. They said "My school magazine is back!!!!!!"
The saga continued for another year. Many more people added... Less work... Even Less thought work. No innovation. Politics. Lousy design. The editorial board itself wrote almost all the articles. The quality of the content obviosuly increased, but the overall essence of a College Magazine was beaten to death. I heard people say "I dreamt of the coverpage last night. I was scared to death...".
Another year and people started buzzing about Musings '05. Well, I thought, time to work. Many people who were a part of the Musings '04 dropped out. That was good for some reasons and bad for nothing. Apparently, the new team was more than sufficient to handle the job in hand. Being the senior most member of the board, I had the privilege of getting things done in a way I wished. Not for the bad of it though. I realised that the first step I had to take was to cut down the number of people from the board. But the road of fate is not always smooth. The very next day, the humanities department came out with 12 talented first years who were supposedly capable of doing the work. The irony here is that they are the toppers of their respective sections. These guys were even afraid to get into classes and publicize the magazine. As days progressed, some were eliminated and some dropped voluntarily. None from the first years remained in the board. Now the board was refined. Apart from me, it was Kalpana, Siddarth, Ramnath, Abhijnan, Akshay, Varsha and Anisha. Only the second and third years. Though the amount of work done by everyone was significantly partial, I was confident that it would turn into something sensible and appreciable. We worked. Worked hard. There were days when we even waited till 6 in the college.
2nd March. Unfortunately it was at this time when my class planned for a tour to Kerala. It was a tough decision for me. As for designing, the magazine would be handicapped. At the same time, the energy bomb in me was forcing for Kerala. I gave up. Had time of my life in Kerala, came back on 8th and started slogging for a non stop 60 hours. Mr.Srinivas, our English faculty and I spent the 9th and 10th entirely at the printing press.
Apparently, every bit of Musings 2005 turned out to be a unique experience. Some awesome and many awful. Some mind blowing while many explosive. Some excitingly new while some were tedious and old. The management tries to bring out a classical magazine, while we strive for an offbeat magazine, much accepted by the students.
12th March. The day came when it was finally out. The entire Editoral Board sat in a row and we applauded as loud as we could when Musings '05 was released. The chief guests flipped through the pages. I remember one of the members flipping the book upside down. WOAH!! did it blow his mind?? Later, the day continued with the remaining programs.
I should say that the management was really impressed with the magazine. Not only was its wrap up changed, the overall look turned out to be a classy one. It felt smooth and good to hold the magazine. (Thats because of a matt finish which added a tiny 400 bucks to the bill). Later I was invited by Mr.Raji Reddy to join him for a lunch along with the Board of Directors. No, I thought. Definitely out of place for me. But Mr.FickleMinded in me woke up with a loud buzz. Point One - It felt good when I was invited by the staff honcho. Point Two - A lunch with the BoD would be an amazing thing to boast about. Point Three - More than anything, I was hungry, especially for some luscious food. I joined them and man!! it was a good one.
For me, the rest of the day went in praising myself and looking at Musings. The pain that went in bringing it out was all gone when I felt it for the first time. The separators inside were a visual treat. I never thought they would all turn out so well.
Post Musings, cribbing started, as usual. Overall it was a positive feedback but some said the coverpage was screwed up, some said that the articles weren't of a good quality, some said it was no good than the previous issues and many said many more things.
Balls to destructive criticism. We care a damn!!
And on this day I cannot believe that its been close to an year since Musings '05 is released. Time for work again. Musings '06 has got to be an off the hook edition. We want it to be as fat as it was in its first edition, as creative as it was in its second and as sexy as it looked in its third edition. As for the members from the last years board, I shouldn't forget to mention the name of our "Creative Shocker" Siddarth. This boys got it all this time!! Abstract Arena, 55 Word Contest, Blog for Musings (and many more to come... ) are his brainchilds. Kalpana, as solid, matured and dedicated as ever. Also, there are a bunch of new comers. Aditya Narayanan, Spurthi, Triveni, Chetan and Shiva Aditya. We have huge expectations this time too. And I see that its all taking an excellent shape. But shape is all not that matters ;). So keep your fingers crossed and wait until I update this blog with a review of Musings '06.
Till then... Happy reading and Happy Blogging!!
Ciao
Ravi!!
