One Future Post #23: On the things we discover 🗺️
In this special edition of One Future Post, we celebrate, reflect, and thank you for your interest and participation in Khoj: A Mumbai City Treasure Hunt
Hello from Vandita 💌
Let me start this edition by thanking you, dear reader. Khoj was our attempt to make social justice a living breathing concept for the people of Mumbai. We got 140 people together to seek, celebrate and learn about social justice, making it a lens they see the city and their lives through every single day after Khoj has been an incredible honour. Welcome to this edition of One Future Post - let me walk you through the day.
P.S. If you attended Khoj, do consider sharing some feedback!
Love,
Vandita Morarka
Founder and CEO
About Khoj: A Mumbai City Treasure Hunt
You’ve heard the brief before, but nothing beats the day itself:
Khoj brought 140 participants from across Mumbai together bright and early, starting at 8:15 AM on a Saturday, in parks, street corners, and cafe exteriors on their way to 4 experiences across Churchgate, Dadar, and Byculla. Flagged off at 9:00 AM, our teams in pairs, trios, and gangs of four - many meeting for the first time - spent the next 2.5 hours getting their steps in and grappling with a set of pun-riddled clues to finish 26 main missions, and a side quest or two (or three!).
Their objective? Find and explore the history of some oft-forgotten (and other more popular) landmarks that represent the community movements and resistance that shaped the city.
Once they were done, teams and guests were welcomed to an afterparty at antiSOCIAL, Lower Parel. This was one fun gathering - sense-making from a morning of excitement, celebrating social justice, moving to some fun beats, and grabbing some well-deserved grub. We ended the afternoon by bringing on our prize winners, who won a combined total of 75,000 INR in prizes!
But Khoj didn’t begin (or end) on February 28. Keep reading for the full scoop!
Field notes from the hunt ✏️
Here’s what we found comparing notes from after the hunt - from successes to reflections.
Beyond the numbers, Khoj had one key outcome: it engaged an audience that may not be beneficiaries of development work or otherwise engaged in social justice discourse and helped them work with strangers and friends to challenge their mental models of the city by re-politicising and contextualising its history as a seat of many community-led moments of action for social justice.
We shared learnings in public accountability, safeguarding, accessibility, and collective sense-making - more on this in an upcoming impact report!
Khoj was featured by multiple media outlets: you can read about us on Homegrown, Caleidoscope, Mumbai Mirror, The Logical Indian, and more!
Our social media awareness campaign exploring Mumbai’s histories of resistance using a pop-culture lens, messaging that ushered in the event as a flagship experience, reached nearly 600,000 people across platforms.
Hearing from you ✍🏾
Here’s what participants had to say about the experience:
“I enjoyed rediscovering the city all over again.”
“I enjoyed discovering these meanings of the lanes and statues of Bombay.”
“I think we had to think differently - think out of the box for this!”
Do you have thoughts, too? We need you to tell us - what worked, what didn’t? How can we design a better Khoj?
Celebrating our winners 🎉
Even though we’re all winners of Khoj in some way, some of us may have won more than others. We’re excited to announce the winners from across our four main quests. Here’s to the heroes who cracked the codes faster than the rest, and what they won (other than some fun Khoj swag, of course):
🥉Second Runners up: Four teams - Sakshi, Niyati, Saee, and Pooja | Mrinalini, Kuntesh, Haider, Sahej, and Rahul | Roshnii, Riya, Ansh, and Mihika | Mohsin and Tarini with a prize of 10,000 INR each.
🥈First Runners up: Ishan, Anjali, Tvara, Taj, and Vishwadev, with a prize of 15,000 INR.
🥇Winner: Sinjini, Dhanshree, Rohit, and Anushka, with a prize of 20,000 INR.
Apart from our main quest, we also awarded Khoj goodies to the most creative of our side quest entries - head to our Instagram to check them out!
Search for yourself 🔎
We’ve had some incredible moments of curiosity, discovery, and excitement with Khoj - we may even have captured some of yours! Check out our selection of photographs from the day and spot yourself (or a friend you made on the day).
With gratitude 🌻
Khoj came to life through the energy and commitment of our incredible partners. We are grateful for their contributions and for the generosity with which they shared their love for the city with us. In no particular order, we’d like to thank:
🎟️ Urbanaut, our ticketing partner
📚 Our knowledge partners, whose deep insight and passion for the city were crucial in guiding the treasure hunt’s design: Nakshatra, Locavore, The Bombay Poetry Crawl, and Khana Chahiye Foundation.
🎶 The incredibly energetic performers whose music welcomed us back from an adventure on the roads, MannKey from Manzil Mystics, Maanuni, and Krantinaari
🎤 Our anchors, who brought the room together with some brilliant energy, Yukado and Disha Choudhuri
📷 The folks behind the camera lens, our photography team, led by Apurva Jadhav
⭐ ️ Our volunteer and full-time team, who put in weeks of work to make this experience just right for you.
What’s next for Khoj? 👀
Khoj is a flagship experiential project by One Future Collective to honour the World Day of Social Justice. We are excited by the endless possibilities in its future.
Maybe we will Khoj-ify another city?
Maybe we will return to more parts of Mumbai next year?
Or maybe - just maybe - the treasure hunt from Khoj Mumbai will become available online for more people than ever to access it on their own terms?
The only way to find out is to follow our next move on Instagram or LinkedIn.
Stay on in the OFC-verse 🧩
If you’ve come so far, don’t leave yet! There are many more social justice conversations to be had and community to be built.
Gear up with more fun learning tools: Our Toolbox consists of 100+ open-access resources about social justice, technological justice, human rights, etc. From podcasts, games, activities and poetry collections, to courses, policy drafts and manuals, there’s something for everyone. Find something you’ve always wanted to know more about and get exploring!
Become a Sanskaari reader: The Sanskaari Girls Book Club is a global community for curious feminist literary criticism (and fun!) with writing from South Asia. Join today and get your hands on our current read, My Dear Kabul. In a reading rut? Let the Sanskaari Girls Podcast inspire you to get back in the groove.
Thank you for making Khoj possible, and for putting your trust in the OFC-verse - we can’t wait for you to explore it and stay connected :)
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