Tuesday, May 13

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We have had late nights the last couple nights, hence I have not been able to post anything until today.

On Sunday (5/11), we visited the Elephanta Caves in the morning.  The caves are on an island about 1 hour away from the city of Mumbai.  They were great and have a lot of history.  The quick version; built approximately the 6th century, they were “discovered” by the Portuguese in the 15th century and named “Elephanta” because inside the cave was a stone carving of an elephant.  The cave is massive: 15-ft high ceilings, appx. 5,000 square feet area, took 200 years to carve out of the rocky hillside.  More details when I show pictures back in Seattle.

We left our hotel in Colaba (southern end of Mumbai) and journeyed to our new hotel in Pawai, in the northern part of the city.  On our way, we took a quick ride on Mumbai public transportation (luckily it was not jam-packed, as it was a weekend) then visited the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay (IIT-B) and had an academic session.  After the academic session we heard a talk from a faculty at IIT-B then took a tour of the nanotechnology labs.  At this point in the night we were all very tired, so we headed back to the hotel and went straight to bed.

On Monday (5/12), we began the day with another talk at IIT-B about the university’s new Climate Studies program.  We had a quick lunch then heard a couple more talks from guest speakers.  The first spoke about urban sustainability and the second spoke about entrepreneurship in India.  Both were engaging (I have notes that I can share when I return).  Short version of the second talk: it is incredibly difficult and costly to start a business in India.  We finished the day by hearing about from Ph.D. students about the research they are undertaking at IIT-B.  I attended dinner with these Ph.D. students and some others from my class last night after their talks. 

Today (5/13) we had class again in the morning.  I had my most expensive lunch yet at 650 Rupees, equivalent to about $11.  It was a lunch buffet and was the best meal I have had in India.  Unlimited naan.  In the afternoon, we again traveled to IIT-B to hear from some faculty and students in the Civil Engineering department; some members of my trip spoke about Northeastern University as well.


At night we walked around a local mall and I finally found the street food I have been searching for all trip!  Unfortunately I was not too hungry due to my gigantic lunch, but I found room to have a dosa.  A dosa is sort of a crepe/naan-like bread rolled up with stuff on the inside.  They were being cooked on circular hotplates, similar to crepes at restaurants.  I will be eating there again today.  I also bought some lychee from a street vendor after having the dosa.  It was a good day for food and I hope tomorrow will be a repeat.

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