Chicago

Hi everyone, it feels good to be back to blogging. Now that school is over, I hope to show up around here more often. Today, I want to talk about my recent trip to Chicago. This trip was one for the record books!! My single and most chaotic and fun trip to date 😊 What was meant to be a simple trip with my school for a National conference turned out to be much more. I will attempt to share the craziness of it all.

Some quick background information, I am part of an organization called the Future Business Leaders of America organization or FBLA for short. In FBLA, students can compete in different types of business events at the regional, state, and national levels, FBLA also enables further education in the business world and helps in networking with people across the nation. During this past school year, I was lucky enough to qualify, along with 45 other students from my school for the National Conference in Chicago. I was so excited to attend the event. While I was thrilled to be competing at a national level, this trip was also my first step to adulthood and independence. This was going to be my first solo trip without my parents. I was excited and have to admit a tad bit nervous about what was to come. Little did I know how interesting it would be.

After a long flight and a super eventful subway ride to get to our hotel in the wee hours of the morning, my roommates and I crashed in our hotel room at 4 AM. I could just picture my mom at home pacing up and down trying to figure out why a train ride that was to take an hour took several hours😜 Let’s just say some trains did not show up and the others ran late!! Also trying to get 45 people to one destination proved to be an event in itself! 

So my roommates and I were super exhausted and slept the entire morning. As a result, we missed our field trip to Six Flags. When we woke up we decided to get groceries and study for the upcoming tests to qualify for our event. My teammate, Arav, and I were nervous that we would not get past the test and onto the presentation. We studied for hours. After way too many hours of studying, Arav and I were feeling relatively confident! Arav, Chendur, Nikhil, Kim, Sasi, (a few of my friends and roommates), and I then went to scout out the conference center where the event was to be held. The conference center was a beautiful building. It had a sky bridge that went across a highway to connect to the various buildings. It had a clean modern look with tall ceilings that gave it a grand feeling. It was a magnificent place for a National Conference.

Taking the test the next day was stressful, to say the least. While there were some questions where our studying did pay off, I did not feel that great. After our event, we spent the day attending some workshops. The first one was called Speed Dating Interviews. It was a workshop where one learned interview tips through quick 1 minute conversations with random people. No actual speed dating was involved for obvious reasons :). While the workshop was a tad bit helpful, I personally didn’t find it as interesting. I felt like I already knew a lot of the stuff. However, the next workshop was significantly better. 

This next workshop was called Quick Pitch. The premise was to give a 1-minute pitch on a topic that the organizer chose. It was like a shorter version of Shark Tank. Additionally, there was a cash prize for the best team. Nikhil, Chendur, and I formed one team and we waited for the topic to be given. Our topic was “What is the best beverage? As a joke, my team chose Ginger Ale. and pitched that Ginger Ale makes you rich, protects you from cancer, and helps one “get shredded and bench 135” (obviously all a joke). As you can see, we were very professional :). My other friends similarly pitched the idea that only “sigma males” drink sparkling water as their pitch. We all went up expecting nothing except a good time. Yet when they read out the finalists, we heard our names being called! Our nonchalance looked like confidence to the judges as we moved on to the next round! It was a wild and fun experience that I will never forget. Nikhil, Chendur, and I went on to win the finalist round, which was about the best pizza restaurant. Our slogan was “MOD Out Pizzas The Hut”.  It was truly a special workshop.

Later, we got even more great news. Arav and I had qualified for the finalists round! We were among the Top 15 teams in the nation. We were so excited and felt we had a great chance at placing high. I have to say that we were much more confident in our presentation skills than our testing skills. We decided not to waste any more time in workshops or the expo hall. We spent our time studying from then on out. When the time came for our presentation, we were both extremely nervous. I could feel the eyes of the judges staring back at us. During the awards session, they kept listing out which state the top 10 teams were from. I remember counting on my fingers how many teams they called. With each finger that went up, we began losing hope. 5, 6, 7, 8, and still no “Washington”. The wait between the 8th team and the 9th team felt like it would go on forever. When I heard California for 9 and 10, we were crushed. This was my one shot at placing at Nationals. We were so close to being on stage and celebrating. However, maybe we let the pressure get to us and stumbled. 

I was devastated for the rest of that day and I still am a bit today. However, I take solace in the fact that I got to be in Chicago and meet so many cool people and spend time with my friends. I got to see my school have immense success with 15 students up on stage and 3 students becoming champions of the world. I explored a new city and 2 new colleges. I got the opportunity to become more independent and learn more about myself without my parents around. I spent time with my friends and had a lot of fun. In the end, these memories are what will matter. Thanks for reading. Catch you next time on Pranay’s Seattle Departures!