On the weekend of October 9th - 10th the Hindu Yuva, Florida held their 1st Vibhag YuvaSangam. The camp was held in Camp Owaissa Bauer, FL from Saturday 12 pm – Sunday 12 pm. Total 17 participants from 4 universities (Nova University, Florida International University, Florida Atlantic University and University of Miami) including first and second generation students and young working professionals. One student each from the Florida International University, University of Florida, Florida Atlantic University and Nova University along with the local HSS Pracharak Ramprasad Kraleti started the planning 1.5 months before and there were weekly conference phone calls for regular updates regarding sampark and session planning.

The camp started with registration followed by welcome message and expectations by Ramprasad. We had a lunch of chhole and puri. This was followed by an innovative introduction session organized by Ramprasad. Then there was icebreakers and khels conducted by Advait and Ramprasad. The games were enjoyed by all the participants. After that we had varg geet ‘Hum yuva hai hum kare mushkilon se saamna’ followed by two interactive group discussion sessions, one was on "Situations & challenges faced by Hindu Youth in USA, how we usually respond and how we should respond" moderated by Karan, and a video discussion on ‘Threat to Hindu society from evangelization and the need for re-conversions’ moderated by Kumpal. Then there was a tea break for about half an hour followed by a vigorous Shakha where all had fun enjoying games and Yoga exercises. This was followed by a Bhajan and Aarti session where Saumil, Ramprasad and Balmatie participated with the Bhajans they regularly sing. After this, we had dinner which included two sabjis, one a mixture of okra and potatoes and the other of pav bhaji with salad and gulab jamun. Before bedtime, there were two more activities, one a Jeopardy game anchored by Karan which was a quiz game with questions based on the Mahabharata, Ramayana, Puranas, Indian History and the Sangh. The other was a campfire where we played a card game called Mafia, conducted by Karan followed by singing songs around the campfire.

The next day we began at 6:30 am and after having tea, had the morning prayers and did an interesting Pranayama session where we learnt the anuloma–viloma and kapal bhati pranayama conducted by Ramprasad. Next we had shakha where after Dhvajarohan we had some games and a session of niyuddha in which Ramprasad taught us tactics from the Kalaripayattu school of martial arts, which was basically the originator of many of today’s Karate tactics. These physical activities were enough to tire us to the bone. Following this, we had a presentation by Advait on ‘How to start and sustain a Hindu Yuva chapter on campus’ where he also discussed some of his experiences at the University of Cincinnati. Later we also organized a workshop conducted by Kumpal, where we split the whole group into two parts, one which included students from University campuses and the other which included Young Professionals. The attempt here was to give the groups some time, the student group to organize Poster presentation regarding the achievements of Hindu culture (31-posters Hindu Exhibition) on their campus and the young professional’s group to organize Youth activities in areas of their immediate vicinities. The presentations each group came up with and the feedbacks that they generated were quite positive and each group seemed likely to go ahead and organize something of the sort that was discussed by them in the workshop. We finally ended the camp after a closing speech by Advait and lunch.

It is hoped that the physical activities that we practiced at the shakha would percolate into our lives and it will be immensely beneficial for people who are health conscious. The bauddhik activities will fill our lives with a sense of urgency that is required to save Hindu culture. We also made several close friendships and all of us would look forward to similar activities in the near future. On the whole, the camp was a great success in bringing together people from various backgrounds and gave us an introduction to Sangh activities.