The DCUBS Crew – First Row: Niall, Theo, Sean, Graham / Second Row: Philip, Seán, Carlos, Corinna, Mimi / Third Row: Steven, Ieva, Mick, Claire
Namaste readers! My name is Carlos Quinn and I’m a full time student of the Masters in Digital Marketing at Dublin City University. I’ll be contributing to this blog with my classmate Mimi Bunting to talk about a trip we made with DCU Business School to Bangalore, India in January. Our group consisted of 13 people —mostly a mix of students, lecturers and researchers from the Irish Centre of Cloud Computing and Commerce (IC4). For the duration of our trip, we were hosted by the India Institute of Management, India’s top business management school. We explored Indian culture and attended meetings with Edelman, IBM and digital marketing professionals from the area. It was a welcome break from the academic grind in DCU, and the chilly weather in Ireland at the time.
An Early Start…
Our trip commenced in Dublin airport at 5.50am on a Saturday. We were excited but bleary-eyed —I don’t think many of us slept. Though most of us had seen each other in class, the divide between full-time and part-time students meant that some of us had not been introduced to each other. Furthermore, none of the students had met the researchers from IC4. We made our introductions as best we could, given our sleep-deprived condition. Many of us were seeing each other for the first time outside of the natural, hard-working environment of DCU’s Business School. I remember feeling a bit worried at time, that the trip might be slightly awkward and overly formal. Little did I know how wrong I would be, and how well we would gel as a group throughout the trip.
Soon after checking in our bags, we darted to the nearest coffee shop for a much needed beverage. Our flight was slightly delayed, but it wasn’t long before we were on the first leg of the flight. I had an entire row to myself, but I couldn’t sleep no matter how hard I tried. I wasn’t too keen on the movie selection either, so I forked over $20 for the on-board Wi-Fi and got to work on some college assignments…ok, that’s a lie. I tried to work on college assignments but my limited mental capacity at the time meant that my efforts were short lived. It was an enjoyable flight overall, and towards the end a few of us congregated at the back of the plane for some wine and a lengthy chat. We talked about the state of the digital marketing industry in Ireland, and how we ended up deciding to do a masters at DCU.
An enthusiastic Mimi gets ready for take-off
Layover at Abu Dhabi
Our flight transfer was at Abu Dhabi, a city renowned for its wealth and opulence. Accordingly, I was expecting the airport to have epic cutting-edge architecture. Instead, our terminal was surprisingly cramped and unremarkable. On arrival we were shooed through a security check that was operated like an Aldi checkout. If you didn’t move fast enough, trays would rapidly pile up and cause a mess. As well as the haphazard vibe, the price of food was astronomical—a stale slice of pizza set me back a whopping 10 euro. Needless to say, I was glad to get out of there.
The second leg of the journey from Abu Dhabi to Bangalore went smoothly and I sat next to my lecturer Graham for the flight. We had a interesting chat about travelling, discussing places we had gone to, placed we wanted to go etc. I’ve found that my lecturers in DCU are generally quite approachable and easy to talk to, but there usually isn’t much time to talk about anything but the work. It was good to talk about something other than regressions and excel formulas!
Arrival at Bangalore
We arrived in Bangalore early in the morning, which meant we had both departed in the morning and arrived around the same time the next day. The spacious and elegant airport I was expecting in Abu Dhabi made a surprise appearance in Bangalore. Soothing jazz music played softly in the background as we moved through security and a pop-up Ebola station. As we exited the airport, we decided to stop by an ATM and stock up on water. A few of us were unable to withdraw money, and this would unfortunately be a recurring issue. We exited the airport to a warmth that was most unusual to the average Irishman in January. As we boarded our bus, our course coordinator Theo proudly debuted his new selfie-stick. As a recent purchaser of a selfie-stick, I can’t help but be thankful for Theo’s commitment to openly using this device. He’s paving the way for the rest of us, so we no longer have to live in shame.
The bus ride was a jerky, crazy introduction to the madness of Indian roads. I was no stranger to this insanity, having previously spent three months in Delhi. However, many of my classmates were absolutely horrified as the vehicle swerved around cows, families and oncoming traffic. The average Indian driver appears to have outstanding reflexes. As we sputtered around the roads of Bangalore, the daylight started emerging and that awful all-nighter feeling started to sink in. When we eventually reached our new home for the week, we were so exhausted that I don’t think many of paid attention to how beautiful the university campus was. It was clean, spacious and full of greenery. We would become better acquainted with these wonderful surroundings throughout the week. I made my way to my room and reluctantly set my alarm for brunch, face-planting onto my bed for a 3 hour snooze.
A drowsy arrival at the “Executive Block” in IIMB
DCU Business School India Trip 2015 