I’m Rashedul Hasan, a student of the Department of Software Engineering at Daffodil International University. CommTECH Camp Insight 2019 was a short program offered by the International Affairs of Daffodil International University. When I heard it is in Indonesia at Sepuluh Nopember Institute of Technology (ITS) with scholarship opportunity I applied for the program. The program was in the city of Surabaya. As it was a community camp it was a new experience for me. It was like a one big family getting along for a very short time but enjoying and cherishing every single moment with joy together.

My Journey to Indonesia was quite good. I got a window seat, so I experienced the majestic views of the clouds playing over the horizon, while I was flying over the ASEAN. From Bangladesh it takes about 6 hours to go to Indonesia. I actually met a friend from Vietnam named Trang in Malaysian Airport, I knew her through CommTECH Facebook Group. We came to Indonesia together. At the Airport CommTECH Committee members were already waiting for us to pick up and take us to the hotel. 22 January was the day when participants were coming all day. Finally it was 63 participants from 13 different countries.

The first day was a sunny one! We were taken to the Office of the Rector for the opening ceremony. I met a student named Dennis from China. He actually knew about Bangladesh. He was from SIAS International University of China and came to DIU for the Winter Camp of 2017. I was really glad because during the program I had to tell everyone “ I am Rashed , I am from Bangladesh and It is beside India”. After rectors speech we had a tour on the university departments, workshop and libraries.

The second day was very Interesting. We had a session on Indonesian language. I learned a lot of things. Actually their language is quite similar to ours in some way. “Terima Kasih” means Thank You. Also like “Selamat Pagi” , “Selamat Siang” Good Morning , Good Evening etc. After that we had traditional games and competitive games. The Most interesting was the rope pulling. We had to play it three times to settle the winner. There was a really strong guy from Azerbaijan named Ilgar. He literally pulled of his shirt to win the game still we managed to win that one. The games were very exciting for me because I was the team leader during the games and got 1^st position twice and 3^rd position for three times.

The third day was quite like a regular one. We started our classes at ITS. I was granted full scholarship for the sub-course “Designing and modelling an energy efficient car”. So our classes started at the Department of Mechanical Engineering. We also visited a mosque and Friday Market that day. The night was really exciting. We had a grand dinner and welcoming by the Surabaya city Mayor. Everybody had to wear traditional cloths. Specially participants from Thailand, Vietnam, Bhutan, Malaysia had their traditional cloths. I was also wearing a Panjabi for this event. It was really memorable because I sang the national anthem of Bangladesh at this event, as I was the only one from Bangladesh. Everyone stood to show respect for our anthem yet they did not understand my language. It was more like party that night. Nobody knew each other but everybody was so crazy about it. That was really a fun night.

The next two days we visited “TuguPahlwan” , “House of Samporna” , A Dutch Bank, “Kampungs” and Art museums at the city of Surabaya. We had the privilege to meet local people and visit Indonesia SME’s. We were able to know their experiences and how they were conducting business as Indonesia is a developing country they are open market. They welcome investors to do business in their country.

The sixth day morning was different from the other ones. We visited a private school named “the Nation Star Academy”. It was really a very well disciplined school. The students actually gave us traditional music and dance lessons that day. A very clean atmosphere and teaching environment they had as along with Indonesian English and Mandarin was also emphasized. The next day we visited a traditional market at Surabaya where we found some relics and historical stuffs. As also traditional cloths and Jewellery. I saw some interesting stuffs like fossilized show pieces. During my time at ITS, I met quite a lot of amazing people. Specially few friends from Thailand, China and Taiwan. I met a guy named Jimmy who was a Taiwanese Masters student. He was a civil engineering student but he was actually interested in hacking and computer security stuffs. He told me they have to serve in their Military for at least three months after they graduate. This was really an interesting fact I got to know.

The most interesting part of CommTECH was visit to Mount Bromo. It is in eastern part of Java. The mountain is an active Lava Mountain and the crater was open. The journey was amazing we started off from our hotel and had a Jeep journey of 12 hours to Bromo. After we finally reached there it was really amazing. Most of us climbed way to the top riding horse to see the creator. After visiting the mountain we had our breakfast and went for another adventure which was The Rafting! We had around four hours journey by Bus to a village where we suited up with life jacket and helmet to be ready for rafting. Well it was my first time so I was bit nervous. However I was with few awesome Chinese bunch expert in marine safety and lifesaving stuffs. It was a fun experience and a challenging one, as the tides are really strong while we rafted. It was quite about an hour we had the experience.

All good things come to an end don’t they! The final two days of the program were project presentation and project exhibition. The name of our project was IZ RaeDor 1.0 which is a energy efficient vehicle. We developed the model with Autodesk Inventor and simulated with Ansys. We had to give a poster presentation of the project. Also we had presentation about our universities at ITS departments. My presentation was at the department of Electrical Engineering where I talked about Bangladesh and Daffodil international University.

The closing ceremony was really heart-breaking. The committee members cried at the event. It was only 14 days for such a big family. Prize giving ceremony and lunch was held at the event and of course participants had their last official photo session. The camp was more like a family of 14 days. We laughed, sang, cried and had fun together. So If someone asks me what did you bring from Surabaya? I would say I brought memories and friendship to be cherished for lifetime!