I've been quiet on my blog this week because I've been working so hard. After a weekend of birthday and farewell celebrations for Louise, I had to kick into high gear. And everyone at home keeps asking what I'm doing here, so now I'm going to give you all of the exciting and not-so-exciting details.
On Monday, I had an informative meeting with Drishtee, an Indian organization that seeks to facilitate entrepreneurship that will enable social and economic growth in rural India. Drishtee also happens to be featured in the latest edition of Time Magazine: Time - Linking to Rural India which they informed me of as soon as I walked in the door.
Drishtee accomplishes its missions by identifying men and women in rural villages and helping them to set up their own businesses, in the form of kiosks. The kiosks sell necessities (like batteries, reading glasses and mobile recharge coupons) and also provide access to information that is critical in a rural society. These include access to government records, agricultural data, life insurance, commodity rates, and educational courses. In addition to providing access to this information, these kiosks also decrease the amount of time it takes for someone to complete a simple task such as applying for a birth certificate, which otherwise would require significant travel and possibly the loss of a day's wages. Drishtee is interested in working with the GSM Association and the various mobile operators in India to use wireless technologies to further achieve its goals.
On Tuesday, I got up early and traveled to Meerut, a town in the Uttar Pradesh (UP) state where Airtel is piloting their Shared Access to Voice project. It took nearly 2 hours to travel there, but it was a very successful day. All of the involved parties gathered in a local Airtel office to conducting testing of the SIM software that is to be deployed. The testing had to be done there, because India doesn't have nationwide mobile service, a concept that is completely foreign to me! In any case, our accomplishments made the long day well worth it.
I spent Wednesday in the Hutch office because I'm picking up this project after Louise's departure. Her pilot launched last week in Yamunanagar, a town in the Haryana state, and is sure to be very successful. From now on, I'll be spending 1-2 days a week working with Hutch to monitoring the initial pilot and continue the rollout.
And that brings me to Thursday. I went to the Accenture office this morning so I could participate in a conference call with my counterparts in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Since we are all working independently but on similar projects, either Shared Access to Voice or Shared Access to Data, we have started these calls to discuss our projects and share our experience.
So, as you see, I've been very busy this week and in a different work location each day. Fortunately for me, I'm off on vacation again. This evening I'm taking a 16 hour train to Mumbai, where I will spend the weekend. After Mumbai and a stop in Pune, I'll head to Goa once again for a week of sun and relaxation!
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