Looking Back and Getting Ready to Leave India

It is just after 6:00 p.m. I've finished packing, completed late check-out, dropped my luggage off which will blessedly be handled by the staff and expediter, and am waiting for the rest of the group to depart for the airport, via a stop for dinner.

I spent the day visiting an incredible school for children on the outskirts of Delhi run by an incredible woman, Indrani Singh--actually, Captain Indrani Singh. Of all the people I have met in India, she and the President of India have most inspired me. She is "the Airbus Woman"--she is a pilot on the big Airbus planes and wants to train to fly the new super size Airbus 380. I predict she will do it. She says flying is her greatest de-stressor. She likes trekking in the mountains with her husband when she is on vacation. She has vision and passion for the education of young people and resembles in a number of ways Greg Mortenson--whose story I am reading now in THREE CUPS OF TEA. I may add pictures before I post this--which will probably occur after I get back--unless I have battery and connectivity at the airport before the flight.

I am looking back now at the schedule for the week and we've done so much in such a short amount of time. Although we didn't land until after midnight last Sunday night and will leave just after midnight tonight--a week later--we have seen another side of the world and so much of the landscape of the new India.

I've written some about the Mumbai day--though I didn't have the pictures I wanted to post. I think I will try to stick them in here if I can retrieve them now. Well, I retrieved the view out my window at the Taj Hotel and Towers--but did not rotate it.....I will try to add another of the Gateway to India. Bombay,now Mumbai is on a peninsula which juts out into the Arabian Sea.

Last night I did get a chance to begin packing--and am returning with a lot more than I anticipated--so much to remember.

Here's an outline of the scheduled events of the week. (The pianist that plays Scott Joplin and a lot of other familiar tunes just sat down at the piano behind me. He is really wonderful.)

Monday, March 26. Delegation Orientation followed by Roundtable with the Mumbai Higher Education Community, then Public Private Partnerships Luncheon with the Business Leaders, followed by a meeting with The Times of India.

Tuesday, March 27. A holiday, blessedly serendipitous, because no meetings could be scheduled and we spent the day getting to, touring, and returning from Agra.

Wednesday, March 28. Team Briefing, Televised Meeting with Students at St Stephens College/Delhi University, lunch with Foreign Secretary Shiv Shanker Menon, hosted by the Government of India at Hyderabad House, and dinner at US Educational Foundation in India at Fulbright House.

Thursday, March 29. Press Roundtable at the Maurya Sheraton where we were staying with 20+ members of local and international press (including Wall ST Journal and Chronicle of Higher Education), a US-India University Leaders Roundtable at India Institute of Technology, lunch at FICCI, the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, a brief afternoon respite and then dinner with the Ambassador at Roosevelt House.

Friday, March 30. A day of "Cultural Engagement" during which we made tow separate trips to see and acquire the products of cottage industries and craftsmen and craftswomen from each of the states in India.

Saturday, March 31. A day of touring as mentioned earlier with Wadhwa family and friends.

I have to go now so am going to close this and post.

Saturday in India

All of the official meetings of the delegation are over. Last night our panel with the students at St Stephens College was telecast on NDTV 24/7 in a prime time slot watched by 60 million people. It was fun for all of us to see our hour and one half interchange edited with a great deal of skill down to 25 minutes. The best of the student questions were included in the edit and it I am glad that the State Dept. is going to send us a dvd for ourselves.

This morning I am going to the school that has been supported by Jody Wadhwa, the Chair of our Board of Trustees. This afternoon, I will have a chance to visit with his brother and nephew.

I have uploaded all of the pictures I have taken on this trip and will post the links in the appropriate places in the blog once I have a chance to caption them briefly. I wish I had had more time to do chronicle my experiences as I had them, but I intend to go back and remember them--something to do on the 15+hour direct flight from Delhi to Chicago tonight--really later tomorrow morning. We leave at 12:15 a.m. Sunday and arrive at 5:15 a.m. Sunday--what an extraordinarilly long day--but imagine the speed at which travel is now possible.

More later.

More Pictures from Agra: The "Fort" and the Palaces

More Pictures from India

Here are some more pictures of roadside sights as we traveled through Agra from the Taj Mahal to the grounds of the Fort. Fort Agra has been more than just a place for the army--though they still occupy much of the site. It was home to the Moghal rulers.

Travel to Agra and Meetings with Day of Meetings with Students, State Lunch with Foreign Secretary, and Meeting with the President of India

Iam going to try to post a couple of pictures and save the rest of the story of the last two days for when I have a little more time. It is now about 10:30 at night on Wednesday and we are scheduled to be in the hotel lobby at 8:55 a.m. for a day that will begin with a meeting with the Press and concluding with a formal dinner at the Ambassador's house.

Yesterday we left the hotel at 5:15 a.m. to catch the 6:30 train to Agra. While the destination was a highlight of the trip for all of us, the journey back and forth was a window on the world that is India. These were typical scenes along the tracks on the train ride to Agra--and there were similar scenes on each side of the highway on the bus ride back to Delhi.

The more I reflect on those sights and sounds, the more I struggle to find words--but I promise to return to that story.

The Taj Mahal is more beautiful than the pictures show. I am going to stop here and add more pictures in the next post.

At London Heathrow/What Day IS It?/post 11p.m. on 26 March

Well, it is 2:00a.m. Chicago time and 8:00 a.m. here. I arrived about 2 hours ago and met up with some of the delegation. Several of us are sitting in Lounge G (United) waiting for the boarding call for Jet Airways flight to Mumbai. Karen Hughes is sitting across from me working on her speech for tomorrow. We are going to be flying in several different groups--9 hours to Mumbai. I think I will pick this up when it is a little less hectic and post it with a little more news and maybe a picture or two.

Hello again, everyone. I am half a world away and can't begin to tell you how much there is to soak up in the multi-cultural, multi-ethnic country that is a world itself--India. Half of our delegation arrived at our hotel in Mumbai (Bombay) around midnight Sun/Mon wee hours--others in the delegation, delayed by airline woes, didn't arrive til 6 a.m. We were scheduled for a briefing on the day's events at 9:30, mercifully moved til 10:00 a.m. I still am a little in disbelief that it is only the first full day of the visit.

The State Department officers and staff have been nothing short of fabulous in their attention to detail and their commitment to the message that we are here for our country to build bridges and welcome students and scholars from India to our country and find pathways for our students and faculty to spend time in this incredibly complex country. While I am going to be more brief than I would like in this posting because we must leave the hotel at 5:15 a.m. on Tuesday to catch a train to Agra, I do want to share a couple of things and, if all goes well, post a picture or two.

This morning, we six presidents (Mark Emmert from U. Washington/Seattle, John Lilley from Baylor, John Bowen from Johnson and Wales, Jim Oblinger from NC State, and Eileen Wilson Oleyaran from Kalamazoo College) met with Karen Hughes and Tom Farrell and wonderful staff together with Michael Owen and Larry Schwartz who are State Dept officials here in India. We were briefed on the meetings of the day--first with an incredible array of college and university officials in a roundtable discussion and then with the Indo-American Chamber of Commerce.

There is such fertile ground for building relationships with the Indian community. I had no idea that 55% of the population in India is under 30 of years of age and the demand for education far exceeds the supply of available places for students. Education is valued so highly in India that parents will skip a meal to save for the possibility of making and/or supporting their children's access. Education is prized second only to food and before clothing and even shelter. We heard about and then from the amazing vice-chancellor from Pune who has overcome the most impossibly adverse of circumstances and risen to be an inspiring spokesman and advocate for education. He was one among many whose passion for access to learning was evident.

The business community in Mumbai, with whom we met before lunch, in front of lots of tv cameras and photographers, is interested in finding ways to invest in higher education--of every kind imaginable. More on this later. The fact that the six presidents who are members of the delegation represent the broad spectrum of American higher education options is important beyond belief. Karen Hughes delivers a consistent and powerful message that we realize the importance of our relationship with India in and for the knowledge-age of the 21st century where education doesn't just drive the economy, it transforms lives. (She refers to community colleges as the institutions that take people from where they are in their lives to where they want to be. All of the presidents understand and prize the diversity of our missions and roles and I know that we will communciate that throughout our visit.)

Our last meeting of the day was at and with the Times of India Group--the largest (I think this is right) media group in the world. They deliver 1000 papers a minute!!! to the vast population throughout India. Those who read newspapers here spend an average of 44 minutes a day devouring the news in print...and unlike the US, newspaper circulation is projected to continue to increase.

After an incredibly visionary presentation on the importance of education and some give and take that could easily have gone on for a much longer time we zipped out to our waiting vans and made our way through traffic the likes of which I have only seen in China--not only are stoplights suggestions rather than directives--there's no such thing as a lane. Our lives were in the capable hands of our drivers, and I saw only one fender bump (a moped into a taxicab). I will try to find the picture and include it....believe me, it doesn't do justice to the "adventure."

Thanks to the "expediters" --and they really are magicians--we arrived at the domestic airport, were handed our boarding passes--our checked baggage had gone on before us--went to a private waiting area, were taken through securities (ladies are "wanded" in a private booth; men go through the usual metal detector stuff), boarded the bus to our plane and took off for our less than 2 hour flight to Delhi. I had the great good fortune to be seated next to a journalist turned tv executive. We talked about everything from education and politics to the values of our families--his son and daughter-in-law live in Cleveland. He was very interested in the mission of community colleges and particularly interested in the fact that the chairman of our board of trustees is from India. I told him Jody's story and that I would be visiting with Jody's nephew and brother on Saturday and traveling to the school in which Jody has been so instrumental in supporting.

Ok--I just looked at the clock. I am going to take one stab at the pictures....but they may happen on the next post--post-Agra.

Beginning to Blog/On the Eve of Departure for India

Hello everyone,

I am just beginning to learn how to blog and I am trying to hurry up with my learning so that I can share with you my trip to India with the State Department delegation of presidents. I will be traveling with five other college and university presidents from the US. We will accompany Karen Hughes, Under Secretary of State, and Tom Farrell, Deputy Assistant Secretary (among others from the Department of State)on a bridge-building visit with higher education leaders, government officials, business leaders, students and scholars in Mumbai and Delhi. I will be leaving on Saturday, March 24 when I travel to London/Heathrow to meet my fellow travelers. From there, we will board a 9 hour flight to Mumbai. By then it will be very late at night on Sunday, March 25. After a full day of meetings in Mumbai, we will fly to Delhi that evening. More on the itinerary to come.

It is after 6 p.m. on Friday and I have many things to do before I leave. I will miss being on campus to welcome our Skyway and Regional basketball champions back on Monday. I am so proud of all that they have accomplished this year as athletes and as students. They have modeled teamwork for all of us in so many ways--caring for and about each other on and off the basketball court. For the first time in Oakton's history, the men's basketball team competed in the community college version of March Madness. You can see the picture that is currently on the Athletics Home Page at Oakton. It was snapped after the Raiders' 109-85 trouncing of the College of Lake County on March 1, 2007. From left to right, Arnie Oudenhoven (Associate VP for Human Resources); Jerrod Tucker--a great power forward and Joi Smith's mentee; yours truly; and Steve Evans, a great defensive and offensive player as well as an excellent student and my mentee.

I am going to post this message just before leaving the office to go home and figure out what is goes into the suitcase and computer bag. I will try to keep up with this as I travel.