Kirandevraj R presented his paper titled “Generalized Keyword Spotting using ASR embeddings”. His decision to physically present his paper at the Interspeech conference was a last-minute decision.

The initial plan was to present the paper hybrid but once he got the visa in hand, he made the necessary preparations to travel with all safety measures. It was his first trip outside the country and with the help of his friend Amit Pandey, all arrangements from the ticket, to the stay, and travel plans were done with ease.

“After landing in Seoul, it was a long wait at immigration clearance. Meanwhile, I bumped into a Ph.D. graduate from IIIT-Hyderabad (we had a small talk) and managed to get a sim and travel card during that wait. Since it was my first time in a new country, after reaching my place of stay, I then changed my decision to stay with the friend I met at the airport.” said Kirandevraj.

The day before the conference went on with rehearsal for the presentation and making final notes. At 9 am, the next day the final presentation was submitted at the conference and Kirandevraj’s presentation started at 11:40 at the conference hall in front of 50 to 60 people.

“The first 2 minutes, I tried to get a hold of myself and then I was at ease and able to speak clearly as I knew everything that I wanted to say, and the slides had all the information as well. I streamlined my presentation by speaking slowly. My presentation went on for 15 minutes.” Said Kirandevraj. He was then asked a few questions about his work, to which he was able to reply without hesitation. In the end, a student from Bangalore and Korea also shared their viewpoints on similar work they have been working on.

After his presentation was over, he attended a few other presentations by International students as well. He was able to witness how one could do better presentations and it was a learning experience. His next step was to incorporate these presentation skill sets and animations in his thesis defense. The conference attendees were given a huge reception at the ballroom and Kiran was able to interact with students from various countries. This was followed by Student's reception where they were able to share experiences of their study culture in their respective countries. He also interacted with a few working professionals across the globe and shared their experiences. On the last day of the conference, they were taken on a tour of the country and introduced to the history, culture, and heritage of the place.