Events

We are holding BarCamp Kerala 8 on 28^th 2010f March(2010)! Finally its here to refresh the minds with technical beverages – its Barcamp time.

Think barcamp is about lawyers? Or about alcoholics? Think again…

BarCamp is an ad-hoc gathering born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment. It is an intense event with discussions, demos and interaction from participants who are the main actors of the event

Venue

BarCamp Kerala 8 will be held at MACFAST, Thiruvala. For more details, go here

Registeration

You can register for the event in the BarCamp Kerala Site. So far we have 55 attendees.

Sessions

As of yet we have 5 sessions. If you want to handle a sessions , you can add yourself in the sessions page.

BarCamp Kerala So Far…

If you are still unconfident about coming to BarCamp Kerala, checkout these reports about the previous ones…

• BarCamp Kerala 6 – A Personal Account
• BarCamp Kerala edition – 2
• BarCamp Kerala on May 3
• BarCamp Kerala 2
• BarCamp Time for Kerala

Handing Over in progress

The handing over ceremony  of the students executive committee of St.Johns medical college was conducted on the Wednesday February 10^th 2009 in the cardinal gracias hall in the college premises. The chief guest for the occasion was Padmashri Dr. Gopinath , renowned surgical oncologist. The  other dignitaries were the director of the institution Rev Fr. Lawrence dsouza along with the associate director college Fr. Matthew Kattiyangal and additional vice dean of the college Dr.karuna ramesh kuamr. The Cultural secretary of the  new committee Mr.Nitin yashas introduced the chief

guest  and  thanked him profusely for accepting to be a part of the occasion and invited him to address the audience.

The chief guest  advised the new committee to be not just individuals of excellence but rather institutions of excellence and asked them to always

Padmashree Dr. Gopinath

remember the responsibility with which they have to discharge their duties as representatives of the student committee.

Following which the handing over of the files took place which symbolized the taking over by the new committee. Dr. Karuna Ramesh Kumar administered the oath of office for the new committee.

The director  of St.Johns National academy of health sciences Fr. Lawrence D’souza blessed the new committee and thanked the outgoing committee for their work over the past 1 year following which certificates were handed over to the outgoing committee.

Dr. george Felicitated

The newly elected president of the students committee Jino Joy addressed the gathering following which mementoes were handed over to the outgoing committee. There was felicitation of the chief guest Padmashri Dr.Gopinath by Fr.Lawrence on behalf of the students executive committee. Dr. George K John who was recently awarded the Rhodes scholarship was also felicitated. The outgoing president Manu Abraham proposed the vote of thanks which was followed by the college anthem to mark the end of the solemn occasion.

The new Comm. with the Guests

The New Office bearers

President: Jino Joy

Vice President:Ravikanth Reddy

General Secretary: Avian Chang

Cultural Secretary:Nitin Yashas Murthy

Sports Secretary: Dhilip Andrew and Davis John

Mess  inc harge: Roshan Valentine and Joseph Eugene

Magazine Secretary: Swathi.s

Social service secretary : Henry

Students welfare Secretary: Chris Zacharia

Campus Bloggers Meetup is scheduled to be conducted on Jan. 26, 2010 at Cochin. Many informative Session and robotics demo arranged. Every one is invited for the event. Limited seats available.!!!

Wow…in retrospect, I could just about say I’m speechless…just like the WAY-MORE-THAN capacity crowd inside the St.John’s Auditorium on the evening of 11th December, who marveled at the mere decorative brilliance of the venue dressed in all its fantabulous Christmassy attire (I’ll elaborate later); but I mean, being speechless would do everything but justice to writing a report of one of the biggest events on the Johnite Calendar, JINGLE ROCK 2009 which is henceforth known as CHRISTMAS CELEBRATIONS
With the University Exams in mid-December, we, the Batch of 2008, knew that we’d have to work double hard to make up for the dearth of support, experience and talent of our seniors; and when you’re stepping into the shoes of people like Dwayne, Jarvis, Binston and Co. from the Batch of 2005 who’ve pioneered the event, mind you, these are HUGE shoes you’re stepping into.
A week of November had elapsed when the choir started practice. As is the case every year, we had to initially deal with a mélange of lame/preposterous/incredulous excuses of people coming late for practices for reasons ranging from “I had to buy a Greeting Card!” to “I was playing Carom in the Mess!!!” This year, practices were shifted to the Food Court until the start of December, so we worked tirelessly from 5pm to 8pm every evening, as the November twilight and the accompanying chilly weather descended on us.
But even with the horizon of exams looming closer with every passing minute, our seniors showed us their true Johnite spirit. Everyday a few of them (either from Batch ’05, ’06 or ’07) walked in to help us out, giving us inputs on how to improve the choir, personally helping the juniors learn their parts and also teaching us how to handle inefficiency, etc. A huge THANK YOU (and a Big Hug) to all of them. With post-dinner practices from the 1st of December, we had our hands tied trying to co-ordinate the choir and band, each trying to drown out the other.
We formed separate committees as is tradition for Artwork & Decoration, Band, and Choir and so on. I took charge of the Choir, and Aubrey (Batch ’08) took charge of the band. Lisa, Santhi, Victor and Co.(all from Batch ’08) took responsibility for regulating the decorations, and Ann Sarah (Batch ’08) took charge of handling just about everything else from settling Accounts to printing Posters to tying up every loose end possible. Our Artwork committee went into overdrive towards the end of November. With ideas pouring in, literally in frenzy, but a way smaller budget to work with, we set out to work. Tirelessly we worked every evening, trying to balance music and artwork to meet our deadline. I remember people from both the Batch of 2008 and the Batch of 2006 staying up until 5am on the final day to setup the auditorium. We needed Nikhil Dhanpal’s car and about 25 others on foot to finally transport the artwork from the college foyer to the Auditorium. Rahul Fernandez (Batch of ‘06) with his electrical genius and unbelievable energy walked on the rods above the stage to suspend the decorations and complete the circuits. The result: was a breath-taking backdrop painting of Joseph, Mary and Jesus, lit by halogen lamps, into glowing life…Life size Bells in gold and red suspended from the ceiling…Small to gigantic candles (lit by flickering bulbs to mimic flame)…large holly…and massive hanging stars (forming the Stage alone). The foyer at the entrance of the Audi was a sight to behold. On one side, amidst a landscape of cotton-snow stood a 12-foot Snowman, which the little kids could not take their eyes off, and the little ones were crawling into the snow while eager parents clicked photos of them. On the other side stood the cutest looking reindeer I’ve seen, crafted to perfection, full with a red-nose and everything. Whew! I give up! I cannot quite describe the effort that went into the decorations. Hats off to the team!

The nursing college and the non teaching staff did their bit on stage to set things rolling in motion. one cannot forget a little on dressed as an angel jumping on stage waving the wand , posing for photos clicked by fr. matthew and running with full of energy on stage. it defintely was not part of the script but then again the innocence of the child had the entire auditorium in rapturous applause and laughter. Mr.jayasheelan from the estate department amazed everyone by playing popular carols like silent night, jingle bells on the mouth organ.

The director Rev.Fr.Lawrence d’Souza gave a very valubale and relevant message by means of a story and drawing an analogy about how St.Johns is rendering service and giving hope, life nd answers.

Every single person came in and contributed and we’re very proud of it. The MC for the evening Karthik Shyam gave a bit of trivia about each carol.
As for the Band and Choir, we had a blast on stage. I guess it’s fair to say that we gave it the best shot we could with the sound system available. Hours of tuning, adjusting, and sound-checking, finally just about paid off. The Baby Juniors from the Batch ‘09 were great to work with, and together with the rest of the choir and band, gave the audience a fabulous show.

Not to forget the staff  Dr.Arvind Kasthuri,Dr. Kiron Verghese, Dr. Mary Verghese, Dr.Maria Lewin who enthralled the crowd with their singing particulary dr.kasthuri and dr. kiron with their booming bass voices.

Christmas is incomplete without Santa Clause.  As Dr.Kasthuri called them Santae(plural fr santa), the 5  Santae ran among the crowds much to the children’s delight and then dance on stage. they also coordinated handing over the gifts in the amphitheatre.

The PG’s then thrilled the audience with a series of carols reminding us of the sheer impeccable musical talent with which Jingle Rock had begun in John’s. With Feliz Navidad, we threw up our caps, overjoyed at the sheer relief and exhilaration of having done it! Finally…after a month of toil, we had finally made it work!!

The icing on the cake was when Binston on request especially from his babies decided to sing Holy night impromptu which led to the band members coming back on stage.  And as is the case for the last 3 years, the audience were left spellbound by his performance. a perfect way to end the night.
Finally, when Ann walked onto stage to give the Vote of Thanks on behalf of our batch, she meant every word of it, as did we. Every person who was involved did his/her bit to make that evening wonderful.
Looking back as we cleared up the auditorium, we waved away the nostalgia that hit us, the little incidents that made us smile or guffaw, the disappointment of stupid errors and the contrasting joy of tiny successes. Through it all, the Staff Society stood by us, and Fr. Matthew, our Associate Director, graciously granted us permission for almost everything we asked of him; and the Student’s Executive Committee was our Rock, till the very end. Without them, Jingle Rock 2009 would’ve been only a distant dream.
It took until 11pm and beyond for the party lights to fade away that night, but for us, “Jingle Rock 2009” is our Baby, and it’s thoughts will obviously, never fade away from our minds…

The Blue Gold Rhapsody was released to a crowd of Johnites on 1st July, 2009, at the College Foyer. The function was presided over by Rev. Fr. Lawrence D’Souza, Director of SJNAHS. Rev. Fr. Mathew Kattiyangal, Associate Director of College, Rev. Fr. Prakash Sagili, Joint Associate Director of Hospital, Dr. Binu Joy, Associate Professor, Radiodiagnosis (also, Advisor to the BGR), and Dr. Mary Varghese, Associate Professor in Ophthalmology were present on the occasion.

The Blue Gold Rhapsody, on paper.

Our Director addressing the gathering before the release.

Sherwin Desouza receiving his copy of the magazine and the certificate from Fr. Mathew

Nitin Yashas recieving the same from Fr. Prakash

Dr. Binu Joy addressing the gathering

Dr. Danny George, Editor-in-Chief, addressing the gathering

Post your comments and feedback on the Blue Gold Rhapsody here at Johnknight.in

It was a sad realization for me when it came to my attention that the annual inter class culturals was going to be held only on a single weekend. I thought to myself that I would probably have to cut down on a few events to get it done in time but I guess we struck a goldmine when our staff mentors were able to get us a holiday on Friday the 29th .It was still a setback compared to previous years where 4 whole days were allotted for the iccs but we’ve still got to be thankful for small mercies.
For all those who didn’t know the iccs were actually scheduled for 22nd of may but the St.John’s all India UG entrance exam was scheduled for 24th so college would not have been available for use, so I had to get it shifted to the 29th . I was a little skeptical about doing so because the previous date had been chosen so that the baby juniors could participate in everything, but there was no other go.It was sad that I could not announce the winners and individual names at campus dinner due to time constraints but I will try to make up for it here.
I deicided to finish with all the small classroom events earlier like painting sketching and cartooning earlier so that the full holidays could be utilized for all the main stage events. So in effect iccs started on 26th when poetry, sketching and cartooning was conducted. From what I’ve observed except a select handful none of us ever participate in things like poetry , creative writing and sketching, so I decided on giving a single participation point to each person who took part in poetry ,sketching and cartooning.
Overwhelmed would be a mild word to describe the response to this and a total of 75 participants took part in poetry!
Winners
1st-Avian Chang-07
2nd-Ashwini -06
3rd-tie
Jyotin-05
Murtuza -05

Sketching
Ist-Santhi Ann-08
2nd-Tilak Pinto-07
3rd- Alex Fonseca-05

Cartooning
1st-Praveen -07
2nd-Chetan-05
3rd-Sr.Christine -06

I had offered early bird points to the first 3 arrivals for marked events but didn’t seem to work as well as I thought it would.

The second day was the 27th with events painting, collage, creative writing.
Painting
1)water color
1stShruti-05
2nd-Sri Kiran-05

Acrylic painting
1)Anna Jose-07
2)Santhi Ann-08
3)Lisa jerry-08

Collage
1st- anne,Chris,Krupa-07
2nd-tie
Snehaj,thanuj,Swathi-07
Jino Joy, Nitin , Pranit-07
3rd- Joel, joemon,Prudhvi -08

Creative writing
1st-jeffry-07
2nd-Natasha-05
3rd Chtristine mary-05

3rd day was gaming…. a new event I thought I’d introduce just for the sake of having fun and I think it was quite a lot of fun though tough to organize cos the rec room tv gave out which was not expected so tv hunting had to be done. The 2 games were tekken and burnout played on the ps2.
Tekken winner-Steven Pinto-08
Burnout winner- Maulik 05

4th day was a holiday the whole day and to our good luck the auditorium was available and given to us …. So we started off with Indian music in the morning after an invocation and a small address by the director…the 2 judges were- Mr.Sanjay from F.M. Rainbow (external judge)and Dr. Mary Varghese (internal judge). Both of whom have extensive experience . All teams put up their best and it was an impressive performance altogether leaving the audience mesmerized and the judges thoroughly impressed. But a winners can be only 3 so
1st place- 2005
2nd place-2006
3rd place -2008
individual prizes
best group 2005
male solo-binston-05
female solo-Amrita -05
duet- Jarvis and binston
instrumental-05

Remarkably the event did actually get over in time and theatre could start almost on time
The judges for theater wre- Mr. Harris Becker(external) Dr.Anil Abraham (internal) Dr.Atheya(internal)
The audience turnout was pathetic but I guess that theatre enthusiasts in Johns are a handful only….
1ST PLACE-06
2ND PLACE-05
3RD PLACE-07
Individual prizes
1)Best actor-Sherwin-06
2)Best actress-Natasha-05

Choreography followed the play and sadly only 3 batches took part .Judges were Ms.Sapna, MS.Shilpa and Ms. Liminy (all external). I decided not to get internal judges because all the competent internal judges were part of groups that could give rise to bias….The judges are part of the group MOKSHA that has performed all over India.
The batch of 2007 but up a brilliant performance that took everyone by surprise by its ingenuity and innovativeness and an encore was requested by the audience…. There were no guesses to the results here as it was pretty obvious from the start
1st place-07
2nd place-06
3rd place -05

individual prizes
best male dancer-omkar-07
best female dancer-steffy-06

Mad Ads followed the dance and was held in the main Audi cos shifting the equipment just for the sake of one event would be too laborious… The judges were Danny and Paul new to no one both internal because frankly I don’t see any external judges better at judging than the MAD MED MEN….
1st place-05
2nd place -07
3rd place-06

individual prizes

best actors –Jino Joy -07 and binston-05
best narrator Alex fonseca -05

JAM was the last event of the day though scheduled for earlier, had to be postponed to allow more participants to take part . With Paul as the JAM master rest assured it was a hoot. Prelims were held on the 4th day and finals on the next due to time constraints.
1st place-nithin-07
2nd place-Gopal-05
3rd place-jarin-05
Thence concluded the whole day at 11:15 PM on insistence of the security.

The 5th day was May 30th and was completely jam packed with a cluster of events which absolutely anyone could participate in so time was running short.

A little too much delay in starting the days events with sangeeth…. The solo singing event.. open only to those who have not done a solo in the Indian music to broaden the competition …. Was judged by Mrs.Sudha (external) Dr.Anuradha (internal) both experts in classical music both Carnatic and Hindustani…. Were impressed by the participation and talent but remarked on the fact that out of all the participants 4 sang hindi and every single remaining persons sang in malyalam ….. not new to us but I think people should try to broaden their spectra even if its not their mother tongue…
Ist place- Anoopa -06
2nd place Joe Jose-05
3rd- tie
Roshan-06
Jarvis-05

The treasure hunt is a completely new event that I felt would be fun and it proved to be. If clues were placed outside campus it would have been too tedious for everyone to travel,spend and just not worth the effort…. So all the clues were placed only inside St.John’s. A little change in plans due to time constraints so the e mail part had to be skipped and there was no one exactly near the clue manning it which led to confusion but I think it turned out ok in the end cos the teams were already at the last point when the problem was discovered.
A funny incident I must share coz its been etched in my mind since that day… the clue to the emus began with “she hails from down under” and one team actually went to the stores in the basement of college and stared at the sister there …! I found it completely hilarious.
1st place-06
Jose
Rahul
Abin

2nd place-07
Nithin Yahas
Jino Joy
Rohan V

3rd plce
Steffy
Varun Reddy
Donna

Personality / Mr/Ms St.Johns followed the treasure hunt…. I had a fun time thinking up the questionnaire and kept it short …. It was conducted and judged by Mr.Ashwin(external) and Dr.Anil Abraham(internal). Hilarious and funfilled but the audience was not satisfying at all…
1st place-Jarin-05
2nd place-steve Joys-06
3rd place-tie
Regan -06
Murtuza -05

Yo Sista completely different from Last years it gave a chance for more number of sisters to participate and crawl out of their shells . Conducted by Dr.Mary Varghese (internal) Mr.Richard (external)

1st place-07
2nd place -05
3rd place -06

Antaksahri was conducted by my dad Dr.Dilip Dhanpal who is an oldie enthusiast… he felt that antakshari was more of a test of singing than knowledge and was totally reluctant on having a written prelim but then time constraints prevent one from doing as one wants so I had to convince him to make a written prelim. It was the first time him and me were conducting antakshari and probably new so I don’t know how well it was received..
1st place-05
Rachna
Meenakshi BA

2nd place-06
roshan
rahul

3rd place-05
Maulik
Alex Fonseca

Debate did not start on time and was postponed for a really long time and the turnout was very poor with hardly any teams as compared to last year and an audience of 2 members guess the sisters rapping kept everyone away… Was planned differently but The moderator and judge Dr. Ravi Nayar decided to change it many times later on …
1st place-05
murtuza
Dwayne

2nd place-07
Jino Joy
Nithin

3rd place-08
Jose Ausitin
Victor

Best speaker Dwayne-05

Mock Rock….after a brief Gap in the evening was in the foyer an amazingly entertaining event I decided to revive because it was pure unadulterated fun on stage…. I felt it gives more freedom of expression and ideas than a mime… I tweaked the rules a bit compared to the previous years and added hindi and regional as it makes it more interesting for the audience than watching the songs of the some band… Was judged by Gomez and Praveen who have in their time put up some hilarious mock rock performances…
1st place-05
2nd tie
06
07

Best Actor – Jino Joy 07

Day concluded with the final session of JAM. At 11 30…… a tiring day…

Day 6 the last and final day usually with a small number of events but changed again this year coz of time and added events I had planned to start early but then as usual delayed by an hour ….. started off with face painting and creative cooking…
They were both judged by Dr.Mary Varghese and My mom Dr.Radhika Dhanpal as they are both amateur painters and have taken part in many but never judged a cooking competition before but it satisfied our level….
Creative cooking is an event I introduced cos I remember the fun I had in school when a team of us had participated. Cooking is a skill that needs to please more number of senses than any other form of art it needs to look good, smell good ,taste good ,and satisfy hunger any glitch in making could make it unpalatable .
There were teams from 05 and 06 but none from 07 and 08 surprisingly…. Effort was put in by 06 but 05 outclassed them by leaps and bounds given that they had started later it’s a remarkable job…
1st place-05-Romina and team
2nd place Sr.Anju and team
3rd place- Natasha and team

face painting
1st place- Shruti and kiran
2nd place – Santhi Ann
3rd place-Romina and meenakshi BA

Quiz was conducted by Dr. Binu Joy from Radiology and had a decent no of participants
1st place-07-nithin
Ryan
sheldon

2nd place- amrit
jyotin
John savooji

3rd place-06-manu
William
trinity

Pot Pourri was conducted by Aditya from 02 and only 6 teams showed up so there wasn’t even a need for prelims which was actually a boon coz western music was supposed to start at 130… loads of fun and it finished soon
1st place jarin, Gopal,murtuza
2nd regan rahul Robert
3rd 2007

western music started pretty early and was a pleasure to listen to with all the batches participating in good numbers … it was judged by the band synapse and a few others .. the pgs also put up a good show at the end….
1st place-2005
2nd place-2006
3rd place-2007

Individual prizes-
Best male solo-sharan-08
Best female solo-Janya -06
Best group-05
Best Vocalist-Jarvis
Best Band -05
Best duet-Dwayne Jarvis-05

Photography was judged then by Danny though the topic had been announced on Wednesday. The topic was reflections and there wre quite a few participants with a lot of imagination going into the thoughts…
1st place- Anusha 07
2nd place – Jino Joy 07
3rd place- Suyash Agarwal 05 and Atanu Roy 05

Fashion show was an event I thought of with an intention of pure fun but what I saw on stage amazed me… I thought it would be a bunch of guys going up and doing some crazy stuff but it was pretty sane and a good job… so it gives us that initiative to take part in fashioin shows outside coz invariably it’s a mainstage event and will carry a lot of points.. It was judged by Dr.Nanda who has been a contestant in many national and international shows and Dr.Kuttappa who won the hospital day fashion show this year and the last…
1st place-05
2nd place-06
3rd place-07
thus came an end to ICCS with campus dinner before which I’m sorry I couldn’t call out the winners but we wre pressed for time..
dinner was unremarkable and the dics was quite short but I had loads of fun I hope everyone else did…keep up the johnite spirit and cultivate the cul cult .