In detail!
In order to increase
the opportunities to meet as a small or large local group as well as to
remain connected to the national organization, we have created seventeen
HAA chapters over the years. Under each chapter, every two years HAA
gives opportunities to all Havyakas, to lead the regional community
activities as VPs. The new office bearers’ responsibilities include
communicating, bringing the Havyaka community together, organizing
events and providing a platform for building a stronger HAA of distantly
related Havyakas in the Americas. To bring our youth to the forefront in
our community activities, in 2003 Youth Co-leader positions were created
under each chapter. Chapter VPs can be the mentors to the Youth leaders
while organizing various community events.
Since the
Youth-Leader positions under each of the seventeen chapters is new to
HAA, many have requested for guidance on the roles they can play as we
move forward to 2004 and beyond. Accordingly, to help our energetic
Youth Co-leaders and the enthusiastic VPs in coordinating the
activities, a “Guideline to Co-ordinate HAA Chapter Activities”
is compiled and presented. It was put together by incorporating the
traditional operation and mission of HAA. The mission is to enhance the
awareness of the core value of our culture to youth and to have good
interaction between youth and adults. It also provides opportunities to
bring the creative ideas of our youth and new VPs into HAA. Therefore,
the guideline is very descriptive and covers various aspects of present
and future activities that can be adapted depending on the size of
different chapters. That means that each VP and Youth Leader may need to
customize the guidelines so that it is practical and meaningful to serve
the local community while maintaining some degree of uniformity between
our 17 chapters.
To
some extent, many aspects of the following recommendations have been in
practice during all these years. As we move forward, every chapter
VP/Youth-Leader is welcome to customize the following activities
according to his/her circumstances to enhance interaction and strengthen
our HAA community. The
descriptive guideline is put forward to all havyakas so that every one
can pro-actively support the efforts of the organizing VPs and
Youth-Leaders.
(A)
Youth
-Leader/Co-leaders:
Aim:
To give opportunities to our youth Havyakas to participate in our
community
activities with leadership roles under each HAA chapter.
Depending
on the number of Havyaka families in the area, select one or more youth
at different age levels e.g. high school/ college/just started a career
(if there are no youth at these levels in your area,
consider middle school students who have an interest in learning some
leadership skills)
For
example, in West Coast Chapter (Northern CA) there are many (> 50)
havyaka families and hence we have identified FOUR youth/young havyaka
co-leaders (at different age levels).
(B)
IMPORTANT: During each meeting
or even earlier by e-mail, ask every one to sign up for
“Havyaka Group” havyaka@yahoogroups.com
by following the instructions in HAA web page www.havyak.com.
It is important as we move forward with full-fledged electronic
communications. All future HAA activity announcements will be through
Yahoo Group/ Web page. It may be good to have an informal demo of
the redesigned web-page (if people are not familiar with it). (Youth
can help in this since they are experts) Since the e-mail addresses
can change often, this aspect needs to be emphasized probably during
every meeting/ communications.
(C)
During each meeting encourage Youth and all attendees to
contribute to the Journal of HAA (JHAA). We want to present the creative
thoughts/ talents/ accomplishments of all havyakas so that it will
inspire the younger generation. (If
needed, have one printed copy of the first/latest issue of the Journal
of HAA (JHAA) for circulation among the attendees to inform them about
the content/ format -if they are yet to receive it).
(D)
Have some
copies of HAA membership forms printed out in advance of the get
together (printable MS-Word version from the redesigned web page www.havyak.com)
and request every one to become a member preferably life member
(E)
Obtain the updated e-mail list of havyakas in your region from the
previous office bearer and update it during every meeting with the help
of Youth Co-leaders
(F)
To plan for future get together:
Mark
the calendar with the festival dates for 2004 and beyond as available.
For
example: March 14,
2004: Ugadi;
April 14, 2004: Vishu
Sept 6, 2004: Krishnashtami,
Sept 18, 2004: Ganesha Chauthi
Oct 23, 2004: Vijayadashami,
Nov 12,2004: Deepawali
Regarding
setting up the year 2004 & 2005 meetings, it is basically up to the
convenience of VP and the respective youth-co-leaders.
(In Snow Belt regions, due to unpredictable winter weather the year
starts with Ugadi function, then summer picnic Chauthi, and end
with Deepavali/Navarathri)
(1) Select
two dates near the festival time and check with the chapter
co-leaders.
(2)
Selecting a mutually acceptable and preferably different
weekends for the entire year is better! It will
give opportunity to plan, attend and meet more often in your region. Inform
all havyaks in your area about the date & time for the year.
(3)
Request
for volunteers to host the event(s) on those dates. If they can host,
finalize the date and ask every one to mark the calendar. If the
gathering is large that can not be accommodated in a house setting,
please plan in advance to rent a convenient facility. To cover the
rental fee, (i) request for any one who could sponsor the event
completely or partially or (ii) attendees to donate funds. If additional
funds are needed to cover the rental fee, please contact the
President/General Secretary/Treasurer of HAA to explore the possibility
of getting support from the common HAA fund/ reserve.
(4)
Up-load
the date/location/activity of the chapter in the “Calendar/Events
Calendar” section of the redesigned HAA web page www.havyak.com.
This will be informative to the havyakas who are newly arrived in the
area or from neighboring/ other chapters, about the opportunity to meet
havyakas of another region. If needed, send the information to the
Webmaster/ post to havyaka@yahoogroups.com
.
(5)
Preferably,
one month before the meeting date, send a notice of invitation to all
havyakas in the area along with the menu so that attendees can reply
with their choice of food to bring for the occasion (if not catered). If
catered, the attendees should be in a position to cover the expenses.
May need to send a reminder one week prior too!!
6)
Youth Involvement: The following aspects will help the Youth and
every havyaka
to interact and get involved.
a)
Updating the Photo-Directory, E-mail address,
Talents/Accomplishments, Genealogy
(i) In advance, the youth leaders can have a meeting-attendee
booklet/ preferably a floppy disk with the Photo-Directory template,
Showcase & Genealogy (attached). During
the meeting, it can be their responsibility to collect and enter address
and other details into the template. If possible, (when the guests
arrive or right after the lunch), the youth leaders can have the
directory template file open in their /host computer through floppy
disk/e-mail file. The youth leaders can take the guests one by
one/family to the computer and request the guests to enter their
address & other info into the Directory template. Or they can
confirm the old information in the directory.
(ii)
During the meeting itself, youth leaders can take the responsibility of
getting e-photos of the attendees as family/ individual youth.
If time permits the photos can be put into the template at the end of
the meeting with the help of any other attendee.
(iii)
After every meeting and updating the Photo-Directory, please send copies
to General Secretary, Treasurer & President of HAA so that they can
do the same at the national level on regular basis.
(b)
Youth and adult talent presentations/ discussions of current national/
international issues/ sports/ music/ information on any local
performances e.g Kannada Koota, Music/ dance group, Youth opportunities,
special upcoming regional/ national Youth Academic/other competition
dates etc.
(c)
Youth can plan/ lead some team building fun games
(indoor/outdoor) so that all/most attendees can participate. (eg.
Anthakshari )
(d)
Meeting Minutes: Youth co-leaders can take minutes
during the meeting. At the end of the meeting or later they
can write short meeting minutes along with the list of attendees.
Once it is approved by VP, please send it to all in your chapter members
by e-mail and also to the President, General Secretary, Treasurer, yahoo
groups (havyaka@yahoogroups.com)
and Web master of www.havyak.com.
If time permits, the minutes can be written before the end of
the meeting collectively!
(e)
Event Photos: Youth or other attendees can take few digital
photos of the event and upload them as Photo Album in the HAA web page,
under YahooGroup’s Photo section. If so, it is best to create a
“Chapter Name -Photo Album” and upload the photos.
It will be informative to add the event, names of havyakas in the
picture and any interesting captions.
(f)
Youth to lead the Summer/ Annual picnic:
(i)
Since picnics foster more social interactions between attendees, it will
be good to have two summer time picnics (may be early and late
summer) so that there will be more out door activities for
youngsters and adults! This will create more opportunities
for the youngsters to organize such activities.. During the picnic,
one can have cricket or other group sports/team building
activities/informal talent shows etc.
(ii)
If possible, make one of the two picnics as a joint-picnic by combining
two or three neighboring chapters of HAA, to extend the interaction once
in a year.
(iii)
If possible they can include a campfire event (everyone enjoyed that,
especially the youth, during the 10th HAA convention)
(iv)
The most Important aspect is to find a suitable
location for such activities early in the year. Then
to fix it for next year also so that one should not have to
spend much time in finding the location and other logistics associated
with it!!
Plans
to have more get-togethers are essential because every one will not be
able to attend each event. For some reason if the (VPs) could not
attend, inform
the youth-leaders or any others to take charge of the event!
(7)
Try to discuss about potential service/charity projects that can
be done by attendees in future, to help the community we live in, as
well as the community we came from. Emphasize the efforts of our Guru-Matta
Shree Swamijis and explore how we all can help. If someone has recently
visited India/ Matta/ Shree Swamiji, ask them to describe few words
about their experiences. Inquire whether any one can come forward as the
long term (3-4 years or beyond) regional representative to
promote/ facilitate Guru-Matha/ Shree Swamiji initiated services/
spiritual activities.
(8)
Try to emphasize about having long-term representative/ volunteers
interested in promoting “Guru-Matta Samhiti of HAA” , the importance
& benefit of spirituality to the youngsters. Request the
representative to give guidance in conducting activities such as Pooja,
Prayer, Bhajans, Devotional /Classical Music, Meditation or Yoga during
such meeting and in our day-to-day life. It may be best to organize the
Pooja such that most part of the Pooja time (it can be a short pooja
too) all attendees are involved in the Pooja with chanting Sholkas,
verses from Bhagavathgeetha and preferably by conveying the
meaning in English for youngsters. Or it could be a few minutes of “Bhajan”.
The spiritual involvement of every attendee is beneficial during the
Pooja/ Prayer (even if it is just for five-ten minutes). For this, it is
helpful to have few copies of the Sholka/Mantra along with the meaning
in English to distribute among the attendees so that they can read and
chant as a group. Highlight the current/future events at any local
temple, Chinmaya mission or such Hindu Spiritual centers.
(9)
Plan/ confirm the next get together place, time and delicious
Havyaka Bhojana items to bring!
These
are just some thoughts to consider and to customize according to
the convenience / suggestions from the group.
Input from Youth co-leaders
on activities/ topics of their interest for discussion are essential. It
can enhance the creativity and outcome of our future contribution
as a community of distantly related Havyakas!
Two
decades of effort is behind us and many decades of effort is ahead of
us. Please participate in all activities pro-actively. Strengthen
our network for the benefit of Youth and all involved.
