पुणे

This is my entry about my trip to IISER Pune (http://www.iiserpune.ac.in/).  It continues from when I got off the train from Mumbai.

I wasn't sure where to find the driver who would take me to Pune, but I took my luggage and hurried along with the other passengers wherever they were going.  Very quickly a man approached me and showed me my name on a piece of paper.   He led to me the car and we were off.  As we were on the road, I remarked that I must have been easy to find.  He said nothing, so we quietly made our way to the Guest House.  The smog was quite strong, even from inside the car with the windows up.  Blech.  It didn't seem to bother the dozens of motorcyclists we passed by without as much as a handkerchief on their faces.  Nor did it bother passengers sitting casually on the rear wheels of those motorcycles, usually at right angles to the driver, and certainly without seatbelts.   At one point we turned and went up a shaky dirt road.  We went through another guarded gate and I was at the Guest House.

The Guest House was quite new and modern.  Certainly moreso than my apartment in Mumbai.  There was an overzealous waitstaff who prepared three meals a day, and personally came to our rooms inviting us to each meal... Over dinner I met the wife of one of the new statistics professors at IISER, who is studying English literature.  She was able to understand my accent more than anyone else, so we chatted.  I worked a little on my talk, and settled down for the night.  Unfortunately I was kept up by a couple evasive mosquitos; talk of malaria has me paranoid of the little creeps.  The next morning I woke up as usual with the sun (still no alarm clock), had their breakfast, and went with some other folks to the Institute.

The Institute was renting another modern building.  It was more like a corporation building; the offices had large glass windows, presumably so that they can watch each other work.  The internet was heavily censored, for example I could not visit any social networking sites, or comic sites to kill time.  They are planning to move out.

Soon enough, I found the director Shashi and my friend Raghuram from Oklahoma, who will later be the math director.  We chatted a little bit, for instance about an earlier policy to make all undergraduate students at IISER write genuine research papers.  Then I sat in the visitor room while members of the department were encouraged to come in to meet me.  I met another number theorist, an analyst in PDEs who was a friend of Acushla's, a topologist, a mathematical biologist, and a cryptographer. It's a young department, only a few years old, and with nascent faculty.  I also met Sujatha, an older established mathematician who acts as their mentor, and drops by occasionally to set them straight.  She had just arrived in Pune that morning; my visit was to coincide with hers.

Later we went to the newer campus for lunch.  It's being built right now; here is a picture of the math building under construction:

If we build it, they will come.

I met some more folks then, including the three brave new students who were spearheading the PhD program, another director, and Sreekar.  Sreekar is notable historically, because he was one of an audience of six for the first math seminar I'd ever been invited to give, back in 2004 in Michigan.  I also met Avinash Khare, whose son Apoorva I knew from grad school.  In fact Avinash was also staying at the Guest House, in the same suite no less.  It was a fun lunch, it seemed like the whole department came out.  (Not just for me; I think it was to bring in the new semester and welcome Sujatha...)

Afterwards I gave my talk, on my "Oklahoma project".  I had rehearsed it enough, and there were several questions, so it was fun.  I then killed some time using the boring version of the internet.  Afterwards I talked to Shashi for a bit.  They were interested!  The main obstacle, it seems, is pushing the paperwork through the government, since I'm a foreigner.  I suggested a five-year-plan which made sense to him as well.  So, things are on track.  By the way, there weren't any formal interview questions during the whole process, even though I had some formal interview answers in mind.

Later I went back to the Guest House and had dinner and later breakfast with some IISER folks, as it turns out.  Here are pictures of us having breakfast.

Aren't math people fun?

A Spanish mathematician wanted to take my photo too.

To me left is the English literature student, and the other woman is Sujatha.  Sujatha is sitting between her grad student Somatha and Avinash.

The next morning I got a ride back from the same driver as before.  We didn't speak, but he gave me a "good morning" nod, and I gave him a "goodbye" nod when he dropped me off at the station.

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