Poverty Conference at JNU

The JNU campus is a wooded oasis in the suburbs of New Dehli. Still the sky is extremely hazy, and the campus is in the flight path of the domestic airport. The various panelists have been presenting a lot of case studies of programs such as those that involve domestic violence, the affect of women working overseas in Sri Lanka, different sorts of court systems - official and informal - to solve local disputes. Good presentations. Meeting lots of people, some old friends. Stimulating conversation.

Joan is also busy with people from the conference.

Lots of wonderful food, hospitality. Great birds all around - peacocks wandering the campus. Even got to run yesterday morning. There's really little traffic and there is a large sports field that people walk and jog around in the early morning. India is feeling much more comfortable.

We got out to Qutab Minar (google it, don't have the pics off the camera yet). It's amazing the things we don't know exist here. This is on the world historical treasures list and we spent several hours wandering around the grounds.

There's a strike (Bandh) going on downtown. The police were shutting down illegal shops and the traders (shop keepers) are on strike. So all the shops are shut down and schools have been shut down. We know this from the tv. On campus here we are totally isolated.