Posted on by aditimarshan

The Press Perks

by kimaya mehta

“You’re in press? Oh my god I’m so jealous of you! You don’t have to do anything!” Here’s something any press reporter hears EVERY YEAR – and smugly takes in their stride, because completely unbiasedly, being a part of press doesn’t feel like work at all. 

Delegates, no matter how enthusiastic, are faced with the possibility of a boring committee, annoying co-del, or just a very boring topic (don’t worry chairs, you guys always pick great topics). Reporters, on the other hand, having applied to get where they are, can walk around with an air of righteousness. We have the power to leave a boring committee whenever we choose, spice up a boring committee report and dramatize the events, and intimidate the life out of a delegate to the point of them wetting their pants. Even the chairs barely have authority over us – we’re untouchable.

Our press heads are always sure to remind us of our greatness, and this year, they gave us another reason to love our jobs – they orchestrated an exciting treasure hunt for us, to help bring out the journalist in us. Meanwhile, committees were filled with exasperated chairs and droning delegates

The first member of each team was taken to the chemistry lab and given the following clue:

A quick eureka moment for each person caused them all to run to the nearest periodic table, and correspond the numbers to elements with that atomic mass, spelling out the word Li-Br-Ar-Y. The reporters then had to come up with their own clue for the next delegate in their team to figure out the same, and then made to wait in the library. As soon as their teammate dashed up the stairs, having figured it out, they were handed the next cryptic piece of information:

Each pair really went at it, scavenging for the mentioned books. Having found the colours written as the corresponding words, it was a brainstorm session for where these colours could be found. Then a lightbulb went off above each head and each team had to quickly devise their own hint. A quick dash across the landing to the art room followed soon, to wait for the next teammate to crack the clue. 

 As soon as the third person joined them, they were told the next wacky task. One person had to draw the head of something, fold it so their teammates couldn’t see, then pass it to the next person, who had to sketch a random torso, fold it and give it to the last person, who had to complete it with legs. Then, having unfolded it, each group was able to see their eccentric character, and was told to name it something innovative enough for the press heads to accept. Subsequently, the reporters were told that the next room was the physics lab, and they had to compose another indication for the fourth team member. 

Here are some of their bizarre creations:

Once the reporters made their way to the physics lab, and were eventually joined by the fourth peer, they entered the room and were directed to the whiteboard, to see this written:

3  8 1  18 7 5      4 1 6 6 1 9  18 5 19

It was quickly decoded to spell Charge d’Affaires, pointing to none other than Suchi Jatia, the one who made this whole event possible. Sprinting upstairs, the groups were handed their last and final chit of paper:

(You can travel to the North, South, East or West

But when you put them all together, it spells home…)

N,S,E,W – what does that spell? NEWS! A large smile on each face, the reporters made their way down to the press room, where they were greeted with the beaming face of press head Aditi Marshan, letting them know they had cracked it, and the winning team was promised extra doughnuts at the end of UNiS.

Every reporter finished with an ear-to-ear grin, indicating the amount of excitement this game incited. A huge thank you to our relentlessly enthusiastic press heads, Aditi, Aria, Tanisha and Bhakti, for making our experience with UNiS the opposite of dismal and boring. You guys are the reason press is everyone’s favourite part of these two days! (Sorry chairs, it’s true.)

Posted on by aditimarshan

What does your favourite Old-BIS room say about you?

Everyone had their favourites – that one corner in the library where you made your first friend, the glue-covered tables in the art room where Miss Pinky yelled at you, or maybe the AV room, where you sat tracing the grooves in the fake wooden flooring instead of singing along with Miss Anita. Whatever your favourite room was before the school changed forever, whichever room it is you miss the most, we’re united in our mourning. That being said, let’s find out just how loser-y YOUR nostalgia is.

The Library

Everyone loved the library. It was where you went if you had free time, where you could read book after book, where you could gossip endlessly with your friends. It was home. If this was your favourite spot, you’re not alone. Chances are you have a tight-knit group of incredible friends, and you’d convene here at lunch everyday. Even so, it’s likely you sometimes needed a break from all the chatting, and even then the library was your refuge. Its dark corners and tall shelving allowed you to disappear into some fantasy world for a while, and emerge only when you absolutely had to.

The Art Room

Now, this one’s complicated. BIS OGs will remember Miss Pinky’s room up on the 4th floor with its sink to wash brushes in and Sunita Didi fiercely guarding the gold and white paint bottles. But the OG-OG BISites will remember Miss Pathak’s old art room on the 2nd floor, where we rolled long, thin ropes of clay to turn into snakes and bowls and houses, where we cut little shapes out of folded paper to make snowflakes, and where we scraped crayon off of other crayon – creating black magic. If either of these rooms is what you miss most, you’re probably a hippie peace, love and flowers sort of person, wearing tie-die shirts and listening to jazz. You enjoy sipping herbal tea while talking in hushed tones about the melancholic life of Van Gogh and exactly how his name is really pronounced.

The AV Room

If this place was your favourite, you have more suppressed energy than you can handle. The ground isn’t free, so these are the walls that get assaulted by your sponge balls, and these are the floors that get pounded by your feet as you try to escape it. Every day at 10:40 you had your snack-box out and ready for you to run all the way up to the 4th floor to call first dibs on the room so you and your friends could play some version of a game involving a ball and running. If you miss the AV room more than anything else, I can say with some confidence that your dream job would be in sports.

The Comp Lab

Yes, newbies, that’s what it was called originally. Not the IT Lab, and most definitely not the IT Hub. Rows of computers lined up so everyone’s backs face each other, and yet every class that passed through this room found a way to talk so much we disrupted the teacher’s plan. If this was your favourite spot in school, you likely yearn for the simpler days of MS Paint and IXL Math and even further back, when computers classes meant playing Art Attack games for an hour and comparing the paintings you and your friends came up with. How nice that little barrel of virtual glitter looked, swinging across the page on that log elastic rope. What you wouldn’t give to be there now, waltzing across a canvas, inadvertently creating some sort of masterpiece… And instead here you are, burdened by reality and responsibilities. Oh, well, at least you know it only gets worse!

The Hall and Kitchen

Trust me, you are not alone. Those tiles may be gone, but they will never be forgotten. Funnily enough, as many OG-BISites will remember, those tiles were a change from the OG-OG tiles we had. Even so, those multi-coloured floors, that painting of the last supper, and so, so many meals built most of the memories we have grown up on. If this was your favourite room, you’re a people-person. You love being around the people you love, even if you can barely hear each other over the din of every other set of friends that’s just as close to each other. Seems like you’d get on just fine in the clubs of Mumbai! You’re brave, outgoing, and you have a lot of opinions – on life and on lunch. But most of all, you have grown up in a place that has allowed you to be all that you are, and you’ll hate to leave it.

Posted on by aditimarshan

At The Tip of Your Tongue – Deliberations on Presque Vu

The naming of the Press issue for each year of UNiS undergoes much debate. Suggestions in the past have included “The MUNday Blues”, “The PRESSentation” and “Pressed Into Action”… some questionable, some utterly brilliant, but who’s to say which is which.

That being said, the Press Corps at UNiS has had some fantastic titles in the past. 2016’s “The Quill and Ink” added a touch of Harry Potter-esque ethereality to the whole affair. “Pressing Matters” from 2017 highlighted the importance of matters discussed in the issues, and last year’s “The UNiS Express” promised fast-spreading breaking news as the Press debuted its digital format.

In the past, we the Press Corps have promised a variety of things, from magic to importance to speed. But this year, we wanted to introduce an idea, a feeling, a moment. This is a moment so universally experienced, so utterly relatable, that you’ll be just as surprised as we were to realise we had no idea there was a word for it.

It’s a feeling that’s rather hard to describe, when you’re SO close to remembering that one word, but all your years of mugging science notes and multiplication tables and Shakespearean quotes collapse into a useless heap before you? The moment of utter frustration in which no suggestion seems sufficient because you cannot for the life of you seem to recall the EXACT adjective to describe your incredulity toward the remodelled-BIS? We can all relate – but if we ask you to explain what it feels like, it’s likely you’re struggling to find the befitting words. That ‘almost seen’ sensation of being on the brink of an epiphany is itself, to most, a seemingly undefinable state of being. But we’re here to define it for you: presque vu. Yes, there’s actually a word you can struggle to find to express the feeling of struggling to find a word!

And so, the Press Corps 2019 are beyond ecstatic to introduce Press-que Vu, your one stop platform to conquer that mind-block! Read articles explaining feelings beyond description, explore perspectives you’ve never before considered, and flood your mind with new thoughts, concepts and art. Keep reading, and soon you’ll have vanquished presque vu yourself.

– Aria Panchal and Aditi Marshan