Lessons Learned from My First Hackathon

So, it’s been a year since my very first hackathon — HackNITR 5.0 at NIT Rourkela.
It wasn’t just my first offline hackathon, it was also the first time I was traveling somewhere with these folks — Arunava, Harsh, Rohan, and me. And what a beautiful trip it turned out to be.

The Journey Begins… at 4 AM 😴

We took a train from Shalimar to Rourkela and reached the NITR campus at what I would call too much morning — 4 AM. As we stood there half-asleep, wondering if we were about to be abandoned at the gates — boom! A bhaiya from the organizing team appeared and guided us to a big hall.

They handed us our ID cards, schedules, and — most importantly — stickers (honestly, top 3 reasons to attend any hackathon). Then we were led to a common room in the hostel: mattresses on the floor, sleepover style. Not exactly 5-star, but after a night of zero sleep on the train, I wasn’t complaining — I just needed a place to sleep.

Welcome to NIT Rourkela 👀

After freshening up, we headed to the introductory session. And the campus is hugeee, but also super clean and beautiful.

Post some speeches and guest intros, we were told it was an open innovation challenge — build anything great. The hacking would start at 12 noon and last for 24 hours. (Plot twist: no sleep again 😭)

The Struggle Was Real: Finding the Idea 😵‍💫

First tip: Have 3–4 ideas ready before you go. We spent FOUR hours brainstorming. Finally, we decided to build a website for artisans to showcase their work, along with promoting West Bengal’s local tourism.

One problem: we were all new to web dev. Like, really new. We didn’t even know about frameworks. So we hardcoded every single page using HTML, CSS, and JS. 😅

Meanwhile, other teams were doing fancy stuff — exercise tracking using camera, mobile apps, even blockchain!

Mentors, Energy & Learning 🎓⚡

Mentors were amazing. One suggested using tools like Selenium and actual frameworks — but we were too fresh to use them.

Then stepped in MLH Coach Ritvi Mishra (go check her GitHub, she’s awesome). Her energy and communication? Top-tier. I was nervous explaining our project to her, but she was so nice and encouraging.

We also attended some great learning sessions. The GitHub Student Pack -Absolute gold. If you don’t have it yet, go grab it here. Seriously, must-have.

Fun & Painting Breaks 🧠🎨

To keep our brains from turning into pressure cookers, the organizers threw in some fun activities too — and trust me, they were much needed!
During the painting activity, Arunava made a masterpiece. I… attempted something. I’ll let you judge:

Also, we were eyeing one sponsor track: MLH x GoDaddy — Best Domain Name. And the genius trio — Arunava, Rohan, and Harsh — came up with SwagSeSafar. Brilliant, no?

We created a sweet UI but didn’t fully manage hosting or domain linking until the last minute. Fueled by coffee, snacks, and vibes, we hacked on…until we fell asleep at 3 AM — on our desks 🥲.

The Final Push 🏁

Thankfully, the organizers had mercy on us and let us nap in the hostel for 3 hours. We came back at 6 AM, hosted our website on Firebase for the first time (!!), learned to read docs, and finally attached our domain.

We prepped our presentation. The first evaluator liked our UI and domain name. The second focused more on how the idea could help people, which made us reflect on its purpose.

The Results… and the Surprise 🏆

The top 10 teams were announced — great projects all around. We were a bit sad knowing we had a long way to go.

And then…

“The award for Best Domain Name goes to… SwagSeSafar!” — Ritvi

Wait. WHAT?!
WE WON SOMETHING?!
We were SHOOK. Like, actual disbelief. But also so, so happy. We took photos, cheered, and celebrated our tiny, precious win.

P.S. Got more stickers too 😄.

That night, we caught our train back — tired, happy, a little proud, and packed with lifelong memories.

#hackathon #hacknitr | Manik Sheoran

Wrapping up HackNITR Hackathon with a smile! 🎉 Grateful to NITR for hosting us and a big shoutout to all mentors for…

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Final Thoughts 💭

Hackathons? They’re not just about winning.

They’re about learning, building, failing, trying again, and finding amazing people to share it all with. Even if you’re just starting your tech journey — go for it.

You never know what you’ll end up building, who you’ll cross paths with, or how you’ll walk away — slightly sleep-deprived, a little more inspired, and definitely a better version of yourself.

Lessons:

• Bring backup ideas

• Learn the basics of version control & hosting

• Talk to mentors — they’re awesome

• Never underestimate the power of a cool domain name 😎

• Sleep is a myth