In October of 2019, I was lucky enough to be able to go to my home state of Kerala, India for about a week, which is known for its beautiful coastline and dependence on marine ecosystems and environments due to its geographical locations. I think that this trip made a huge impact on me in a lot of different ways; compared to the other outdoor activities that I had done, this one hit a lot closer to home because it is where most of my family is situated and where my father has grown up. To understand how important the environment there was to them while they were growing up, and how activities like house-boating were so influential in how they perceived the environment and their habits in terms of taking care of the ecosystems in the region felt like a real eye opener for myself because it showed me that while we may have followed different paths in life, the environment can contribute to all of our lives in some way. I was able to go on a houseboat tour which was accompanied with an instructional tour guide that taught us about some of the different types of marine ecosystems in the area and how the fishermen depended on the seasonal changes in order to determine which fish would be around the area and in how much quantity. We also understood how by supporting the local houseboat tourism industry we were funding the livelihoods of a lot of the fishermen, who actually caught fish that was used as food for the guests on the houseboats. It was interesting to see how interconnected all the systems within that specific environment were, and how supporting one endeavour would prop the other up. What was also interesting was that we were able to stop at a rural community along the way and interact with some of the residents of the village that we had stopped at. Being able to see how dependent these communities were on the water source that was the river flowing through the village was contradicted by the large levels of plastic that we saw in the ocean which was rather disconcerting. To be able to see the huge contradiction of understanding how important the water source was to the village, and then to see the high levels of plastic in the water compounded with severe water pollution that already troubles the region really opened my eyes to the efforts that we have to take in order to understand the responsible disposal of waste and the positive outcomes it can have in the lives of those that are so heavily dependent on the marine environment for their survival and wellbeing.

In December of 2019, I was lucky enough to be able to visit Canada for the winter and go on a few wilderness trips as well. The most interesting of these trips was when my family and I spent a day at the Niagara Falls, an environment that is so different to the one that I have grown up in for all its geographical and meteorological differences that do not resemble Singapore in many ways. We were able to go on a zip-lining trip that encompassed a full excursion of some of the most prominent waterfalls in the region, while also learning a bit about the ecosystem and the biodiversity that inhabited the region. We were also able to understand some of the downsides of the development that had been going on in the region for infrastructural upgrades, being so close to the USA’s border as well. For example, beaver dams and habitats in some of the surrounding water bodies had been torn down as a result of urban development to accommodate increasing numbers of tourists as well as the redirection of river routes to create some roads as well. This was detrimental to local beaver populations who have had to relocate their habitats to deeper within the woods surrounding the falls as well. Being able to zip-line above the line of the waterfalls gave me a bird’s eye view of the area and I was able to notice several construction sites along the route as well that had been clearing out some of the woods for urban development projects. It was really good to get this view because I was able to visually understand the extent to which a prioritisation of urban development has encompassed conservation efforts in the region. Understanding this as a problem, I was able to go back to my hotel that day and really do some extensive research to see how Niagara Falls has coped with increasing tourist numbers and the kind of effect that has had on rural communities but also some of the flora and fauna in the region. To be able to visit a region of the world that is so intrinsically different from the region I have grown up in really highlighted to me that the importance of environmental conservation and consideration is something that is universal and not specific to a certain group or region, showing its further importance in our societies.

I was able to join a new service and I chose to join Music Therapy with Apex Harmony Lodge. What the service does, is to find songs from the 1950s and onwards that were popular in Singapore and then present them in a certain way to some of the dementia patients that they converse with at the Lodge in hopes of stimulating some sort of memory or cognitive response to the music. Being a part of this service, I have felt as though my skills of conversation have been heavily improved and I have understood how different people may require different forms of communication in order to exchange ideas and messages. From going to helping out in a day care, to a cerebral palsy centre, to an old age home, and now to a dementia home, I have been able to understand how when we converse with different people the manners and methods of our communication change and adapt in the necessary manner in order to ensure that we fit in with the environment we are in as smoothly as possible and I think this is an extremely important skill.

The biggest challenge for me this year, was that I had never experienced communicating with someone who unfortunately suffers from dementia. What made it even harder was that we were online due to the pandemic, and it was quite hard at some instances to keep the concentration of the client with us. Saying this, however, our adaptability was tested and we were able to come up with some interesting solutions to the problem posed to us. For example, if the client was not responding to the song we were playing, I would pick up a guitar and then start to sing and play along. This elicited a much more active response from the client and it showed that there was space for adaptability and change in our plans, and that sometimes spontaneity can be the best solution. It also showed me that there is always a possible solution in the face of challenge, and that to persevere through a challenge to find a solution is a crucial character to have, something very transferrable across my life.

When I joined this service, the one thought I had in my mind was that initiatives like this were crucial in reducing inequalities that our world still faces. I feel as though certain groups of people, especially those who may be underprivileged or suffering from illnesses/old age, are susceptible to certain forms of discrimination and stigma and have witnessed this myself in our society and in other societies. Being able to take part in such an initiative means that I can do my best to try and bridge the generational gap experienced between the two generations and understand that the first step to defeating social inequalities is by taking the effort to communicate and connect with those of different backgrounds.

The last 3 months have been spent in the gym doing some weight training workouts while also continuing my running regimen. Under Coach Sul, who supervises me at the gym, I have been able to direct my workouts to a standard required of those undertaking National Service and have attempted to condition my fitness in the most appropriate way possible for this as well. Furthermore, the improvements that I have made this month have really helped with progress I have made in my runs, for example. I was able to complete a 10km run, while also hitting a personal best on a 5km run. I feel like some of the effects of training in the gym have allowed me to maintain a consistent exercise schedule and find inspiration in setting goals for myself that I really strive to achieve with hard work and dedication, something that the course of this award and the healthy living component have really cemented in me.

Being able to go back to the gym in this period of my fitness development was something really important and valuable to me, because it meant that I would have access to a lot more resources and information that I did not really have when I was exercising by myself. This was shown by my intent to sign up for weights training in school, and I did so knowing full well that I could learn a lot about my own fitness regimes and add potential exercises to my regime with the help of the coach and just have a bigger base of information with which to make decisions regarding the direction in which I wanted my physical conditioning to go.

It was a big change for me, because it was a hugely different environment than to the one of solitary exercising that had been experienced during the circuit breaker and post-circuit breaker period. While I was able to really improve on activities that I felt I had a strong cementing in such as running and such, being able to go back to the gym in school during these 3 months was something that was extremely necessary in order for me to be more aware of my surroundings within the gym.

This month, school was back in session and this meant that my exercise schedule took a bit of a toll with me needing to find a proper balance between my fitness schedule and my workout schedule once more. This month was also spent continuing my running programme and trying to clock longer distances, in the hopeful pursuit of finishing a 10km sometime in the next few months. I think that overall my cardiovascular fitness has really improved with the progress that I have made with running, and that a 10km might be quite attainable in the next few months. I hope to also be starting weight training in the future at school in the new semester, which is why I think that it was important for me to practice better cardiovascular exercises during this time that I had a break.

This month, there came an easing on some of the restrictions; this meant that public facilities such as the pool and gym were now open for use, and I was able to start going out for runs although they were just in my condo. This month was really just being focused on consistency and the ability to space out the kind of exercises I do and what parts of my body I wanted to target in specific. Running helped with cardiovascular fitness, which to me felt like an overall workout of pretty much the whole body. In the gym though, I was helped by my dad who has a lot of experience with gym equipment, being an avid gym goer over the years, and was able to understand how certain exercises with certain equipment can impact certain parts of the body as well.

I think that it was clear to see the progress that I was making with my running time; with consistent exercise and practice, I found the times decreasing over the space of the month and I saw how repeated targeting of a certain exercise meant that over time it would be much easier to do. It definitely also helps in that it is a stamina booster for exercises in the gym, which are more of an anaerobic exercise requiring short bursts of energy. As per my goal of learning about targeting certain muscles with certain exercises, I think my time in the gym really helped me with doing this. It was clear to see that I was making progress over the month, and it is a skill that will be extremely useful for the future.

These 3 months were once more characterised by the advent of the COVID-19 pandemic, which made it quite hard for us to go back to our normal sports such as tennis and badminton, due to continuation of restrictions. Therefore, it was up to adapting our exercise routines once more to fit in different ways of exercising both from home and from outside when the restrictions eased up a little bit as well.

I think that the biggest difference these 3 months have made have been in the advent of consistency and consistent, balanced exercise; from practicing home cardio workouts with online YouTube videos, which was easy enough due to being used to it from the April itself, I was able to diversify my exercise schedule to include parts of yoga as well, and ended it with gymming and running too. I think that over time, the stamina and endurance I have built up as a result of meeting my goal of a consistent exercise schedule has helped me learn what muscles to target when, and what muscles to give a break when it is required. This time in quarantine has given me a chance to be more aware about how such fitness routines can impact my body, and I hope to use these lessons of recovery, stamina and perseverance when I am back on the tennis and badminton court hopefully soon as well.

The next section of this community project for me would be learning how to use the software that I would use to record my piece, as well as actually learning the song to the best of my capabilities. I think that the best way for me to show my involvement and perseverance, as well as dedication to this project would be to really show that I was dedicated to learn and grow as a musician myself through this process because I feel like I have an easier time playing certain styles of music as compared to what we had chosen to do for this project.

The best way for me to learn how to play the song would be by, of course, listening to it, but also finding a lot of tabs online to use which I helped communicate to the other guitarists everytime I found one that I thought was easy enough to read and learn from. It was important for us to stay in tandem with one another in terms of how we are going to approach this, because it is important for a band to have good cooperation to make sure that the different parts flow together, but also since there were people dancing to the music we were playing it was important that we actually had uniformity in the music so that it would not be hard for the dancers to follow along. It was a huge team effort in the end, and I think that making sure I could communicate the way in which I was approaching the song to the rest of the band and making sure that we were all on the same page about something was really important and key in the final product.

After actually figuring out how to play the song, the next best way in which I would help the most through this musical element would be through an efficient recording that would help the editors as much as possible, so they could spend more time on the bulk of the video editing for the dancers. Saying this, I had to learn a bit about the Logic Pro software, and did so through YouTube before recording. I was able to learn about all sorts of effects that I could use to amplify the sound in certain sections which made the final product sound extremely good and of a well recorded quality.

The last part of this process, was in fact to get the recording done and sent into the Kolkata GC. I think that the hardest part was having to use a lot of takes due to making mistakes at certain parts, this being a completely new process to me, but I think that I was able to overcome my difficulties and actually produce something of good quality. I was able to get this done and send it in to the GC, where they would then put it together with the other tracks and make the video. The recording process took some time as a result of me not being completely aware of the different features of the software, as well as making some mistakes occasionally, due to not being completely comfortable with the song yet. However, I got it done and the last part was all but to record the video in tandem with the recorded audio track; this was easy enough and did not take much time. Then, all I had to do was essentially put my video and audio in the Drive folder as requested.

My final task was to actually spread the publicity and get the links for the GoFundMe as well as the Voice of World FB page to spread around through my different contacts so that I will actively be contributing to raising awareness for some of the problems that they are facing as a result of the cyclone. I think that the easiest way to do this was to share the link to the Voice for World website through WhatsApp, and I also was able to get help through my parents in the form of them also forwarding the donation link and website link to their friends. I think this was one of, if not the most important ways in which I contributed to this project, as I was able to get the message across to quite a few contacts who did not have any idea about this organisation as well as the Kolkata GC, so it was good that I was able to spread publicity and awareness to try and collect donations in some form, if not actual monetary donation then I think awareness of the issue and contemplation about what one can do to help is a stepping stone in itself.

Here is the link to the Voice of World website, and here is the link for the final version of the video.

For my community project, I was requested to record some bass parts for a cover of a Bollywood song that would be danced along to by some of the dancers who took part in the Kahaani programme in school earlier this year, and would be put together by those part of the Kolkata GC in our school and then posted on the Voice for World NGO’s Facebook page, to help raise awareness and potentially fundraise following the destruction of their shelter in Bengal after a terrible cyclone hit.

The Voice for World NGO specialises in care for underprivileged, differently-abled children and adults in West Bengal, India, and has been doing so since 1992. Every year, one of the Global Concern groups in our school, the Kolkata GC, organises a dance and music show called Kahaani, where all ticket purchases directly go to fundraising for the Voice for World NGO. This year, I was glad to be a part of the show, as I played bass guitar for one of the singing performances in the show as well as took part in the finale dance.

For the first part of this project, it was mainly focused on us going through some team briefing through the form of regular contact on WhatsApp, as well as organising Google Meet calls where we could actually come together and discuss the sort of idea we wanted to have for the music and how it would sound, as well as the ways in which we would actually record our parts in time for the deadline that was being communicated to us by the NGO from India.

This was a really effective way to stay in touch with one another, with the COVID-19 pandemic rendering us unable to meet in person, so it was a good way to stay in touch with Shawronna who acted as the middle man between the House Band and the NGO, and communicated to us some specifics that we would have to adhere to as well the direction in which we should be working, herself also being a part of the Kolkata GC and an integral member of the Kahaani committee.

Following all the team briefing, the next part for me was to really start to learn the song and get prepared to record my parts, because Bollywood music is not something that I am really used to playing and listening to, which meant that I would need to learn how to play the piece requried for the video in order to record my parts, making up the next section of the process.

Below are some extracts from our WhatsApp group, just to provide an example of the way in which we stayed connected online during the COVID-19 pandemic and were able to receive updates from Shawronna regularly, which helped for time management.