My schedule kind of fell apart on Thursday, which was the first day of workshops, as I had appointments elsewhere to attend to (and upcoming work on Friday as well). I went to my 9am appointment, then picked up my video equipment and pack, and walked up to TCV – walking is nearly a fast as catching a 3-wheeled taxi, costing me only about 5 extra minutes, and I always like the hiking.
 |
| Comfort Kazanka – Nigeria |
I rejoined the workshop groups at the zone of peace for lunch and had a chance to shoot many photos of attendees. All of the luncheons had been catered by Milap’s restauranteurs, and a surprisingly broad variety of food had been presented over the course of the event. I was looking forward to lunch each day! [Read more…]
By Tuesday, I had discovered that I could not both blog and really have quality time at the summit. So now that I’m posting this, the three day summit is over and the workshops have begun.
Eric Brewer of the University of California, Berkeley, gave an interesting keynote presentation this morning, discussing wireless technology and a project supporting eye clinics that perform cataract operations in remote locations for approximately $10 per patient. The details will be available elsewhere online. One of the things Eric has done is to stretch the range of wi-fi greatly – currently tested to 60km, but they’re going to test at a range of 280km and there is no reason it shouldn’t work. This would be particularly important in India, where almost all people in the country reside within at least 80km of a network connection point – so if this could be bridged by wireless, it could be a big improvem ent in availability of access. 
Today was the anniversary celebration for the Tibetan Children’s Villages – founded 46 years ago, at the request of His Holiness the XIV Dalai Lama, to take care of Tibetan refugee children coming over the mountains to India, following China’s assertion of control over the Tibetan plateau. As I arrived on foot, His Holiness the Dalai Lama was speaking to the assembled crowd of many hundreds on the playing field at Upper TCV. In Tibetan, of course. I listened for a short while, and looked at the children arrayed across the playing field in colorful costumes, and then pressed on to the AirJaldi auditorium. Nawang Dorjee, education director of TCV was the first official speaker at AirJaldi and introduced us to the background of TCV (photo). 
Of course I’m exaggerating! We did not trek the entire Himalayas – only the foothills near McLeod Ganj to see a few antennas. In fact it was quite civilized except for the appearance of rain showers and a few lightning strikes during the afternoon. We began from TCV, the site of all AirJaldi activites, and hiked up above the TCV and across an upper trail where we had great views of McLeod Ganj below and the entire valley way below us at times. Most of trekking was on narrow trails that follow water pipes. Water is extracted high on the hills and piped down to where it is used thus creating a natural pressure. It’s enough pressure to be perfectly usable.