Last summer, before our time in Woods Hole, where my boss Jitu and me gave a workshop about in vitro systems at the Physiology course of the Marine Biology Lab (MBL) summer programs, I discussed with Jitu a crazy idea: Why not organizing a workshop about ways to mechanically manipulate cells and tissues including a lot of "hands-on" time, so that the participants learn how to set up the systems. Fortunately, Jitu was very supportive and liked the idea. In addition, every other scientist I was talking to about this project, became excited so that it was clear in October that I we will do it. After some discussion with other faculties at NCBS, we decided to combine the workshop with a conference to have reason to invite many speakers. Thanks to the support of Jitu, John and Madan at NCBS, and Shivashankar at MBI in Singapore, we could win many internationally renowned scientists form the US, the EU, Israel, Singapore and India for the program and to win fundamental financial support of the International Centre for Theoretical Sciences (ICTS).
It was a lot of work and super interesting, to coordinate the different work-groups, the program, the catering, the visas, the stay for the invited speakers, and so on and so on. Fortunately, NCBS has an experienced conference office which gave support in many of the procedures. But still was my activities in the last two weeks before the start of the program governed by making things running!
The result of this, were two amazing weeks, which pushed me to the limit of my capacities. But the joy and excitement of the participants and the speakers, and the amount of good feed back that we received, were more than enough as compensation.
Here are some impressions about the event
And here is the official website
A few more detailed descriptions might follow in the next days.
Wednesday, May 1, 2013
After a long break, I find some time to write about some experiences which lie a couple of months back
Let's start with the time around new year's eve. I went to Mumbai (former Bombay) together with some colleagues to be present at Anup and Anupama's reception (they married after Christmas in Kallikut) and to celebrate the new year. Until now, Mumbai is for me the only real city that I have seen in India. The old center is beautiful with its Victorian streets, the archway s to walk protected from sun or rain. The variety of shops is stunning and even though, it is a huge city, its residents are very friendly.
to see the whole photo album, please click here
During the two and a half days, we managed to see some iconic buildings like Shah run Khan's house (ahem) , Haji Ali Dargah, some parks, the national gallery of modern arts.
I loved to just wander through the streets and take in the spirit of this buzzing city, the dense crowds at the train stations (and in the trains, I took also a ride!), the food shops with so delicious snacks like pav bahji (anyhow, I had the impression that everything is eaten together with pav - a small bread roll- in Mumbai), the red double deck buses, and as the cherry on the cake, the city is directly at the sea!
At New year's eve, we first went out for a small gathering, where people were protesting for the rights of gay couples. It was announced as a protest dance event, but turned out to be a very tiny sit in with some guitar music and candle light. Well, I thought there would be more support for this cause in such a big city...
After this, we headed to Marine drive to be there at midnight. we had to split up in two cabs, and the one with me, did unfortunately a kind of race driving and sped away, so that we lost track of the others. Anyhow, it was very nice to see people of all age out on the streets celebrating the (western) new year, which is not the new year for Hindus actually. as soon, as people saw a TV camera, they started screaming like crazy, holding kids into the camera and doing all kind of funny things. Others lit up small lantern like hot-air balloons and let them rise into the sky-this created a beautiful small fleet of lighting colors into the night sky. Firework was quite little and even though, cafe's and bars were open until 4 am, I was too tired to stay up and went home early. I wanted to explore the city on my own the next day.
During the two and a half days, we managed to see some iconic buildings like Shah run Khan's house (ahem) , Haji Ali Dargah, some parks, the national gallery of modern arts.
I loved to just wander through the streets and take in the spirit of this buzzing city, the dense crowds at the train stations (and in the trains, I took also a ride!), the food shops with so delicious snacks like pav bahji (anyhow, I had the impression that everything is eaten together with pav - a small bread roll- in Mumbai), the red double deck buses, and as the cherry on the cake, the city is directly at the sea!
At New year's eve, we first went out for a small gathering, where people were protesting for the rights of gay couples. It was announced as a protest dance event, but turned out to be a very tiny sit in with some guitar music and candle light. Well, I thought there would be more support for this cause in such a big city...
After this, we headed to Marine drive to be there at midnight. we had to split up in two cabs, and the one with me, did unfortunately a kind of race driving and sped away, so that we lost track of the others. Anyhow, it was very nice to see people of all age out on the streets celebrating the (western) new year, which is not the new year for Hindus actually. as soon, as people saw a TV camera, they started screaming like crazy, holding kids into the camera and doing all kind of funny things. Others lit up small lantern like hot-air balloons and let them rise into the sky-this created a beautiful small fleet of lighting colors into the night sky. Firework was quite little and even though, cafe's and bars were open until 4 am, I was too tired to stay up and went home early. I wanted to explore the city on my own the next day.
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