India - U.S. Higher Education Dialogue: My Five Minutes With John

This picture and a press release were sent to ALL of Honeywell India! The same photo and a similar press release is located on the front page of UOP's internal website homepage too! 

Wow. I'm sitting here in my bed still trying to comprehend everything that happened to me this week...because honestly I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around it. What kind of amazing opportunity have I stumbled into?

India Gate

Last Tuesday's awesomeness all started with an email. JP Das from the US Embassy in India emailed myself, Marisa, and Melanie informing us that the US Secretary of State was coming to India and had 'a keen interest in meeting the Passport to India Interns.' It's not every day you get an email basically telling you that the US Secretary of State wants to meet you. The three of us were floored. We had no idea what was happening, and at the time didn't fully understand why he wanted to meet us.

As it turns out, John Kerry along with Hilary Clinton basically created the whole Passport to India program. It was their brain child if you will. For those who don't know, Passport to India is a program endorsed by the US Department of State. The premise is to send American students to India for internships completely through the private sector. Myself, Marisa, and Melanie are all in the Passport to India program but are being completely funded through Honeywell. Why India you ask? Over 100,000 Indian students come to the US every year to study and work compared to the 4,000 American students who come to Indian to study and work. Normalizing these numbers based on differences in population between the two countries, India sends 6.5 times as many students to the US than the US sends to India. The Passport to India program hopes to lessen this gap, so that the percentage of American students being exchanged with India becomes equal.

Official Name Badge!

Secretary Kerry was coming to India for the fourth annual India-US Strategic Dialogue. This dialogue is composed of several parts. At the strategic dialogue, the overall arching themes of all these parts are presented and discussed. Each part then has its own separate dialogue. The only dialogue that takes place at the same time as the overall strategic dialogue is the India-US Higher Education Dialogue which is what the three of us attended.

The night before we met with many employees from the Department of State who organized the program in order to get a run down of what was to occur the next day. We also met three other Passport to India interns! Three students from Columbia University who are working in Mumbai were also attending the dialogue as representatives of the Passport to India program. At the meeting we heard the disappointing news that only two Passport to India interns would get to meet John Kerry while those whom did not meet John Kerry would be expected to speak for 1-2 minutes during one of the dialogue's break out sessions about their experiences in India. Myself and Ben Harris (Columbia Passport to India intern) were chosen to meet John Kerry.

It's blocked off so this is the closest we
could get to it!

After the meeting, the Columbia interns and the three Honeywell interns headed off to get some dinner at good ol' Bikanervala, a very popular Indian food chain that we've eaten at quite a bit. On the way we did a small bit of sight seeing! We stopped by the India Gate. It was so great to talk with other Americans and share our experiences. Mumbai and Delhi are VERY different cities, so it was interesting to hear each other's stories. We offered for them to come back to Delhi for a weekend and stay with us so they could sight see some more! They also offered to house us in Mumbai. We are actually taking them up on that offer this weekend =) Which is super super exciting!

Marisa, David, Melanie, Myself, Doreen, and Ben at
the India Gate!

Tuesday Marisa, Melanie, and I headed to the ITC Maurya Hotel in New Delhi to participate in the India-US Higher Education Dialogue. Words can't even begin to describe this crazy amazing day, but I'm going to go ahead and give it a shot. We arrived at the hotel and took the elevator to the top floor where the dialogue would be held. We had to stop and get some good pictures next to the fancy sign. In my last blog post I mentioned how the three of us went shopping for Indian suits. The three of us wore them at this awesome event! So comfortable and so pretty! I absolutely love the clothes Indian women wear.

Full Suit!

I loved the detailing at the top!

New Friends! So excited to see them in Mumbai
this weekend!

While we 'clicked' pictures (no one ever says snap a picture here. They always use the term 'click.') the largest man I have ever seen in my life (seriously, this guy was body builder status) came out of the elevator with a dog. It was a bomb dog! The dog went through all the rooms Secretary Kerry would be in to make sure the coast was clear. I had never seen anything like that before. I wanted to take a picture of the huge man with his dog, but I figured that might look a little fishy. The other Passport to India interns soon arrived so we again clicked some pictures. Ben and I were pulled aside and given official instructions on how our meeting with the Secretary would proceed.

Hanging out with Under Secretary Kanter!

While we waited for the event to officially start, we all did a lot of mingling. There were refreshments and many people entering the dialogue room (including press from all over India and the US). It was during this mingling that I was introduced to the Under Secretary of Education Martha Kanter. She was a very short lively woman whom I grew to admire throughout the course of the day as I got to know her and her history. She's absolutely hilarious and knows when and where to crack a joke. She acted very mom like to all of the Passport interns. When the Under Secretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs, Tara Sonenshine, walked in the room she got very excited and immediately ushered the Passport interns over to her for an introduction. She even whipped out her iPhone and insisted we all group together with Tara for a photo (I haven't yet received this photo, but I'll be sure to post it when I do!). We discussed with the Under Secretaries about our schooling and work experiences thus far in India. Shortly after this, everyone was ushered to their seats while Ben and I were held back.

Tara Sonenshine speaking during the dialogue
sessions. This was her last diplomatic meeting
ever! 

My first thought when I saw Secretary Kerry was 'Whoah. He is so tall!' He walked out of the Humble House restaurant in the ITC Maurya with the India's Minister of Human Resource Development, Dr. M. Mangapati Pallam Raju (he goes by Pallam Raju for short) where the two had been discussing the upcoming higher education dialogue and the India-US Strategic Dialogue from the day before. His first words were
"Anyone know the score of the Bruins game?"
Staff Member: "They uh.."
Another Staff Member: "Um, they, uh...lost sir."
 "WHAT?! Last I checked they were up 2-1! Oh no..oh no!" exclaimed the extremely disappointed Secretary as he waved his hands and hung his head. After a brief moment of mourning, he let out a sigh and looked straight at me as if slightly amused by my native attire. He scanned myself, Ben, and two other students from India who came to the US to study through the Community College exchange program. He started to walk towards us and say hello, but his publicist quickly ushered him away to the fancy sign (the same one the above pictures are in front of) for an official photo shoot with university and college presidents from both the US and India who had signed MoU's (memorandum of understanding) for their partnerships with one another. After a few pictures were clicked, the four students (including me!) were ushered over to Secretary Kerry and Minister Raju. I was right next to Secretary Kerry for the picture. His publicist kept waving me to get closer and closer to him. We all flashed our pearly whites and stood. A man began to speak to Secretary Kerry and explained that the Passport to India interns were on his left. In the middle of the pictures he looked down at me. I felt really awkward and wasn't quite sure what to do. The cameras were still flashing! Eventually I looked back up at him and said "Hi! I'm Sequoia Murray." He replied with, "Hello Sequoia, I'm John Kerry." 

Funny Introduction with John Kerry

Speaking with the Community College exchange
students. I'm peaking in the background per usual.
This photo was in several Indian newspapers!

He then slide right in front of Ben and I and began asking us questions. Where were we from? Where do we go to school? What are our majors and why? Why did we choose to participate in Passport to India? Who do we work for and what do we do? Do we enjoy what we are doing? He was so friendly and sincere; he was genuinely interested and cared about what we had to say. He even quoted Ben in his opening remarks! After speaking with us, the Secretary conversed with the Community College exchange program interns, joked with Minister Raju, and then entered into the dialogue room for his opening remarks. We were suppose to leave and enter before the Secretary and Minister did, but that didn't go exactly as planned.  I sort of got the feeling that during most of these planned photo ops the Secretary sor t of just did whatever he  wanted regardless of the 'plan.' That's how his speeches are too! Almost all of this opening remarks were done extemporaneously. In case you are curious about what he had to say, here is  a link to what he said! http://www.state.gov/secretary/remarks/2013/06/211118.htm

US Secretary of State John Kerry giving opening remarks at the India-US Higher Education Dialogue.

 After the opening remarks, there were three breakout sessions on student exchange programs and research collaborations, community colleges, and technology enabled education. At the first session, Marisa and Melanie each got to speak for approximately a minute and a half regarding their experiences here in India. Ideas were thrown around about what is needed to increase the amount of American students who study/work abroad in India. In the second session prestigious community colleges in the US were represented and spoke about how their schools are successful. Currently India has a huge need for educating their middle class and not enough schools to do it. India is working on modeling a community college system in order to fill this need. The US is helping construct this model since community colleges have been successful in our country for over 100 years. The third session really focused on making education as available as possible through technology. Students from all over the world could take classes in different countries and participate in 'online' study abroad programs where the majority of the class is taken online with a short portion of the class taking place in the actual country being studied. The idea is to make education as available as possible to as many people as possible while keeping costs at a minimum.

In between each breakout session there were breaks where people would get refreshments and mingle with one another. These time periods were just as interesting as the breakout sessions! I met so many amazing people and had so many fascinating conversations with various presidents from Indian and American universities and community colleges. I met many people from the US Embassy in India, as well as from the US Departments of State and Education.

I spoke pretty extensively with Minister Raju during one of the breakout sessions.

Minister Raju and Myself

I also had the pleasure of conversing with the Indian Ambassador to the United States, Nirupama Rao. She invited Ben and I to the Indian Embassy in the United States when we returned! She was so great to speak with and even Tweeted a photo of her, the Passport to India interns, and Under Secretary Martha Kanter!

https://twitter.com/NMenonRao/status/349382080272146432/photo/1

We got a good one! It took a lot of attempts.

Laughing with Martha! She is seriously hilarious.

And now we are focused! 

Hanging out after the dialogue

Overall the day was really incredible. After a late lunch Undersecretary Kanter informed us that there might be an opportunity to meet with Vice President Joe Biden if his schedule allows when he visits in July. Words cannot describe how awesome it was to meet all of these people and discuss a topic so important to our nations and the entire world. Education is so powerful!

Us with the Community College Exchange Program Students!

I'm getting really behind on these blog posts. I'll try to have one up about this past weekend ASAP!

Love, 

Sequoia

P.S. A ton of pictures were clicked of me while I was with John Kerry. There are a lot floating around on the internet here in India because of the heavy newspaper coverage that was done for the dialogue. This link has a few more photos: http://www.flickr.com/photos/usembassynewdelhi/9139498665/in/photostream/

The US Embassy is suppose to contact me and deliver me an official picture. I'll let you guys know when that comes!