Hello friends! I’m very excited to say that it’s good to be back in the ‘Wad.
When I first returned, I was a little overwhelmed to find that I had about a week of travels planned for me as I attended two back-to-back conferences in Pune and Hubli, but in the end, of course, they were both interesting experiences and I was really glad I went.
The first, in Pune, was a microfinance conference (called ‘Conference in Microfinance’—very clever) aimed at bringing together the practitioners of microfinance and the academics who study their impact, methods, philosophy, etc. Among the speakers were some big names from Harvard, MIT and NYU, including the directors of the Poverty Action Lab and many Indian bigwigs. Although it took me awhile to get out of my jet-lagged stupor, I met some really friendly people during the networking breaks and finally had some snazzy business cards to distribute—yay! It’s amazing how handy they are.
A Bank holiday immediately followed, which allowed me to stay in Pune for a couple days, hang with my fell
ow fellows (see picture) and do some shopping. Patiala pants, which are the biggest, fluffiest Indian pants you can find, are my new love, and luckily I was in need of some replacement pants after an unfortunate shrinking laundry incident, so I hit Lakshmi road up and reconnected with the Indian market scene. It felt good. To extend my time in Pune, I had decided to take a night bus to Hubli just in time for the second conference (always cuttin’ it close) so I had the unfortunate experience of tossing and turning at a 45 degree from 11:00 pm to 6:00 am on the Indian equivalent of a Greyhound. I’ll never do it again.
In Hubli, I attended the three-day Development Dialogue Conference hosted by the Deshpande Foundation, which is a family foundation run out of Boston but benefiting the Hubli-Dharwad community in Northern Karnataka (the state below Maharashtra, which is where I live). The conference was pretty big (about 250 people) and touched on basically every sector of development in India with panels of practitioners speaking about their personal experiences. I was really excited to sit in on an agricultural session, and made some really useful connections with other organizations that I’m hoping to collaborate with on a project. I also got to meet up with fellow fellow Menaka for dinner, which was nice!
What else….now back in the ‘Wad, the excitement continues. We have a new intern on the premises, Claudia, and because of her arrival we had a really constructive meeting with Chetna (my boss) about the division of projects. I had roughly outlined an agenda for the meeting after reflecting on things while in the U.S., and luckily it served as a pretty good guide for the discussion and I’m very excited about how I’ll be spending my time during the final 5 months. I’ll be helping with the community radio project (licensing, procuring a building and equipment, designing on-air programs, etc.), creating an action plan for a potential sustainable agriculture curriculum for the business school (!), and hopefully encouraging greater cohesion in the office and for the interns by authoring and designing organizational materials that make sense of this madness. Some of my greatest frustrations with the Bank stem from the fact that things don’t feel connected, systemized, organized, or intentional. I’ve never seen a mission statement, a 5 year growth plan, etc. That’s not to say they don’t exist, but just that you have to trip over things sometimes to realize they exist (which is really problematic). I’m hoping to spend time with the staff over the next few months, fleshing out these things and writing them/publishing them in a form that can be easily used for interns, potential donors, in grant applications, for clients, etc. And of course, the financial literacy—I’m hoping I can hand this off to another intern when they start to arrive in the spring, but in the meantime, I’m continuing to work on the curriculum. I’m starting to feel overwhelmed with how much I’m working on, not to mention the continuous flow of grant applications we’re always working on, but….it’s only 5 more months, so I’d like to get as much done as possible. Go big or go home.
When I first returned, I was a little overwhelmed to find that I had about a week of travels planned for me as I attended two back-to-back conferences in Pune and Hubli, but in the end, of course, they were both interesting experiences and I was really glad I went.
The first, in Pune, was a microfinance conference (called ‘Conference in Microfinance’—very clever) aimed at bringing together the practitioners of microfinance and the academics who study their impact, methods, philosophy, etc. Among the speakers were some big names from Harvard, MIT and NYU, including the directors of the Poverty Action Lab and many Indian bigwigs. Although it took me awhile to get out of my jet-lagged stupor, I met some really friendly people during the networking breaks and finally had some snazzy business cards to distribute—yay! It’s amazing how handy they are.
A Bank holiday immediately followed, which allowed me to stay in Pune for a couple days, hang with my fell
ow fellows (see picture) and do some shopping. Patiala pants, which are the biggest, fluffiest Indian pants you can find, are my new love, and luckily I was in need of some replacement pants after an unfortunate shrinking laundry incident, so I hit Lakshmi road up and reconnected with the Indian market scene. It felt good. To extend my time in Pune, I had decided to take a night bus to Hubli just in time for the second conference (always cuttin’ it close) so I had the unfortunate experience of tossing and turning at a 45 degree from 11:00 pm to 6:00 am on the Indian equivalent of a Greyhound. I’ll never do it again.In Hubli, I attended the three-day Development Dialogue Conference hosted by the Deshpande Foundation, which is a family foundation run out of Boston but benefiting the Hubli-Dharwad community in Northern Karnataka (the state below Maharashtra, which is where I live). The conference was pretty big (about 250 people) and touched on basically every sector of development in India with panels of practitioners speaking about their personal experiences. I was really excited to sit in on an agricultural session, and made some really useful connections with other organizations that I’m hoping to collaborate with on a project. I also got to meet up with fellow fellow Menaka for dinner, which was nice!
What else….now back in the ‘Wad, the excitement continues. We have a new intern on the premises, Claudia, and because of her arrival we had a really constructive meeting with Chetna (my boss) about the division of projects. I had roughly outlined an agenda for the meeting after reflecting on things while in the U.S., and luckily it served as a pretty good guide for the discussion and I’m very excited about how I’ll be spending my time during the final 5 months. I’ll be helping with the community radio project (licensing, procuring a building and equipment, designing on-air programs, etc.), creating an action plan for a potential sustainable agriculture curriculum for the business school (!), and hopefully encouraging greater cohesion in the office and for the interns by authoring and designing organizational materials that make sense of this madness. Some of my greatest frustrations with the Bank stem from the fact that things don’t feel connected, systemized, organized, or intentional. I’ve never seen a mission statement, a 5 year growth plan, etc. That’s not to say they don’t exist, but just that you have to trip over things sometimes to realize they exist (which is really problematic). I’m hoping to spend time with the staff over the next few months, fleshing out these things and writing them/publishing them in a form that can be easily used for interns, potential donors, in grant applications, for clients, etc. And of course, the financial literacy—I’m hoping I can hand this off to another intern when they start to arrive in the spring, but in the meantime, I’m continuing to work on the curriculum. I’m starting to feel overwhelmed with how much I’m working on, not to mention the continuous flow of grant applications we’re always working on, but….it’s only 5 more months, so I’d like to get as much done as possible. Go big or go home.
To add to the insanity, I’ve been staying with Chetna and her family since getting back to India because my host family is out of town. Women simply do not stay alone in these parts, so I’ve been sleeping in their “middle room,” (what Americans could call a HALLWAY, reference picture please) liv
ing out a bag and rewashing the same three outfits every few days. Chetna’s house, which after some adjustment definitely has some perks, is a bit of a madhouse. Her mother-in-law is basically the reason for this. Akka is in her 70s, and basically terrifies me. She sleeps on the floor, not for lack of mattresses but because she’s Akka, and begins to sweep through the house at 6:00 in the morning, banging doors, turning on lights, and growling at people to wake up. One morning, she shoved my face until I woke up so she could yell incoherent things at me in Marathi. I yelled incoherent things back at her in English and turned over. Chetna and her family have this attitude of bemusement concerning her all the time, and luckily for me, I never know what she’s ranting about so I can be bemused by her, too.Fortunately, the Narales are getting back tonight, and I’ll finally regain some personal space when I move back tomorrow. Thursday night, I’m happy to say, I’ll be catching a night train to Goa to meet up with fellows Ann and Diana for a few days on the beach, doing nothing but swimming, eating and relaxing. I cannot WAIT!
That’s all the news that’s fit to post—hope you all are staying warm and healthy! Keep in touch and much love to you all :)
1 comment:
Two things: I've done the same overnight bus but Hubli to Pune...I've never felt so hungover without drinking before! Also, were there any BAIF people at the Hubli conference? Particularly Prakash Bhat who works out of Surshettikoppa in Dharwad. Anyhow, they do good work, are good people, and I'm interested to hear if our circles overlap at all! Hope all is well. Snow in England..brrrr....
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