Announcing "Cambrian Cares" for the victims of the Nepal Earthquake

As all of you are aware of, the country of Nepal and parts of India were rocked by a significant earthquake on the 25th of April, 2015. The earthquake and its aftershocks have devastated the country of Nepal and taken the lives of 2500 people and counting. As Nepal's neighbor, India has responded swiftly with support. As Indians living in the Cambrian community, we believe we can do more. And that is what led us to launching "Cambrian Cares". For more on Cambrian Cares, please read the FAQs at the bottom of this article. 

Cambrian Cares for Nepal Earthquake Relief Efforts

We would like to request you to contribute as little as $1 or to your hearts fill. Send the money to our Paypal account set up for this purpose -  cambriancares@gmail.com. If you want your name acknowledged in this website, let us know in the message portion of the Paypal "Send Money" portion or you can choose to stay anonymous.

Every dollar contributed will be passed on to the following charity which has been identified by Charity Navigator as one of the better ones in terms of their donation to administration ratio. 

RedCross

Details on RedCross efforts to help the Nepal Earthquake

RedCross rating on CharityNavigator 

Please try to send in your contributions by Sunday, May 2nd and we will immediately make the collected contribution to the Nepal Earthquake Relief Fund from RedCross.

If you have any additional questions please reach out to us via email or talk to one of your CIC Board members and we will be happy to answer any and all questions. 

Thanks in advance for your generosity.

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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) on Cambrian Cares

1. What is Cambrian Cares?

Cambrian Cares is a means for members of the community to offer support for humanitarian disasters across the world. 

2. How does Cambrian Cares work?

When there is a large scale humanitarian disaster, members of the community can request the CIC to run a campaign (like this one) to collect funds for the charity. We only request some advance notice to vet the organization where the funds are being funneled to.

3. Can I contribute on my own for tax purposes?

Very much so. The CIC does not get any tangible benefit in running Cambrian Cares. We do it simply because the collective power of all of us is better than one. That said, if you have a large donation amount in mind and would like to make use of tax deductions for the amount, by all means, please do. If more people benefit from your generosity, why not?

4. What it is in it for CIC?

Nothing. Absolutely nothing. This is our community working for the global community. No more. No less.

5. How do I know if my contribution reaches the right place?

We do our best to pick charities with low overhead and a good reputation. We try our best to keep out of religious charities (in some scenarios, it might be unavoidable). We will be transparent with amount collected and share the confirmation email with the group so everyone is comfortable with the process.

6. Is Cambrian Cares, its own entity?

Nope. Cambrian Cares is the name for the effort from our community to support disaster relief efforts across the world. This is similar to Cambrian Seva, our outreach and volunteer effort to help local communities. For logistics reasons, we are keeping Cambrian Cares and Cambrian Seva as separate efforts for different purposes.

If you have any additional questions please reach out to us via email or talk to one of your CIC Board members and we will be happy to answer any and all questions. 

Announcing our first event for 2015: Discover India 2015 sponsored by BB Travel Experts

We are excited to announce the very first event of this year, Discover India 2015, sponsored by the wonderful folks at BB Travel Experts. There is a lot to talk about this event. In this post, we will go over the broad outline of the event and describe what it is all about. We will communicate the specifics, rules and such, a week before the event.  For now, we request that you please add the event to your calendar. There is a calendar invite setup in the Upcoming Events page. Here is the participant signup sheet. 

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Name of the Event: Discover India 2015

When: 1 pm - 5 pm, Sunday, March 8th, 2015.

Where: Vineland Public Library, 1450 Blossom Hill Road, San Jose, CA 95118

Sign up: Click here to sign up

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What is Discover India?

Discover India is our very own quiz and trivia event. This is the first of what we hope will become an annual affair. This is an opportunity for all the smart folks of Cambrian to match their wits against one another. Worry not, this is not a hardcore quiz. It is a trivia event and has something for everyone. There will be prizes for the winning team and runner up. Sign up here. 

There will be rounds of jeopardy style questions, a few rounds of audio and video questions from movies and stuff, dedicated cricket question rounds in keeping with the World Cup, pictionary, 20 questions, dumb charades and more. Most importantly, all questions will be about India or Indians. So it will be an awesome opportunity to learn more about your country. I can assure you that you will walk away learning something new about India. 

This is a team event. Each team will be composed of 3-5 members. Anyone who is interested can be part of a team. If you cant form a team in advance, worry not. We will get you into a team at the venue. Families can participate together as teams or join hands with friends. We'll provide a detailed FAQ about the mechanics of the event a week before the event. 

If you want to warm up here are some audio quizzes I(Prabhu) did recently. 

Links:

Hindi Movie Dialogues Quiz

Republic Day Patriotic Quiz

Indian TV ads Quiz - Part 1, Part 2

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Who is our generous sponsor for the event?

We are excited to announce that BB Travel Experts (BBTES) will be the exclusive sponsor for the event. BB Travel Experts is a full service travel agency offering airline, cruise, train, rental car and hotel reservations. Often times we have friends and family traveling on vacations within and outside the US. BB Travel Experts offer a full suite of services to support all your needs. You can reach them in the following ways:

Website: http://www.bbtes.com

Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/bbtes

Phone: 408-264-4395 / 408-390-0750

CIC Events 101

CIC - The spirit of community

Recently, we put out a request calling for inputs on events for 2015. We had a bunch of people ask us in private, what we were looking for. Here is a simple primer on CIC events and how you can be a part of it.

What is a CIC Event?

The Cambrian Indian Community organizes a set of events throughout the year for the local community. Some of these are regulars like Diwali and Mehendi night. Others are flexible- we have them for a few years and then based on interest and availability of a crew, skip them in favor of others. 

How can I participate?

There are multiple ways you can participate in a CIC Event. Here are a few simple ones.

1. I like to just attend and enjoy.

Here, you would look out for dates on our events, sign up in the designated manner and show up to enjoy the event and the company of friends in the community. This is a great way to get to know whats going on in the community and some of the folks behind the events. This is also a great introduction and a ringside view of what CIC is all about.

2. I like to participate but not organize.

Some parents prefer this approach for their kids who get to participate in CIC events like Raamnavami (music and dance), Diwali (Arts and cultural), Easter Egg Hunt, and so on. Parents themselves participate in some of the events but that is the extent of participation. This approach offers  way to know a few folks who are part of the same participating team, very well. This is a good way to see how CIC events come together from a 5000 ft view.

3. I like to volunteer, coordinate and maybe, organize an event.

This is the real deal. I say this because this is the shortest path approach to making a ton of friends in the community. Every CIC event is put together with a ridiculous amount of attention to detail and care for every attendee. It is an experience onto itself to be a volunteer, a coordinator or an event organizer. All it takes is enthusiasm to be a part of building and executing an event to perfection. It is a ton of fun and you make friends for life along the way. You can volunteer to help on event day or help coordinate one specific part of the event or well, organize it.

4. I am an ideas person.

Your ideas as very important to us. There is more about this in the following paragraphs. If you have a suggestion for an event, please speak up anytime.

I have ideas but I am not sure what to do with them. 

Every great event starts with the germ of an idea. Once you have an idea, speak up. Tell us about it on Facebook or by messaging one of the CIC board members or emailing us. Let us know if you just want to give us the idea or help make it a reality. Remember, we are all started as rookies at some point of time or the other. There are experts in every aspect of event management within CIC who can work with you in flushing the idea out and figuring out a way to make it happen. 

One thing to remember- as much as we can help execute the event, sometimes, you, the inventor has the original and the purest form of the vision. You might be the best person to do it. But let that not deter you from sharing your ideas. If you cant make it happen due to whatever reason, we can figure out ways around that.

What constitutes an idea? Give me an example.

Ideas can be one liners like - I want to have an event for Holi. 

Ideas can be a few sentences - I would like to do something for Holi. It could be an event with folks in Indian attire at the local park. We can play with colors and have a snack afterwards.

Or, if you are the detail oriented type, a one pager with everything you have in your head, poured out. You could also record it if you hate typing and email it to us. Or let us know you want to talk and one of us will sit down with you to work through it. 

You tell us what and we can work together in everything else. Really!

I want to organize but don't have experience putting an event together. 

Most if not, all of us had never done events for a community before. There is always a first time to everything. So don't let lack of experience deter you from pitching an idea or wanting to make it happen. 

Still hesitant. I have a job. Kids to take care of. I think it will be a time sink.

We understand completely. Guess what, we are all on the same boat. And that is exactly why, we want you to talk to us. Let us discuss and figure out something where your idea gets the right forum. And we can make it happen. Together as a team. You do not have to do all the heavy lifting. The sheer thrill of seeing your vision come true is well worth the effort of atleast pitching it to us. You never know :)

What do I get out of it?

For starters, you make a lot of friends. You earn a lot of goodwill. And all of that is worth a lot. From talking to folks who have done this- many have gotten the opportunity to learn so much about event organization, time management, people management, and hands-on experience doing things like decorations and what not. The amount of learning here in terms of life skills is a lot. You will be a better person for going through one such experience.

Mmmmm..

No more excuses. Jump in. There is a ton of fun to be had and a lot of friends to be made. Let the community participate in your wonderful ideas. Kindly include us in your grand visions.