Attending Conference at Pune

I am writing from my room from Yashada conference center in Pune. I am attending the 32nd All India Cell Biology Conference at Pune which is close to Mumbai- 4hr train journey. It took me 26hrs to reach this place from Chennai and I had noisy teenage boys in my compartment.So I was completely tired by the time the train chugged into Pune station at 2.25 am in the morning. As the train neared Sholapur station - railway police got into the compartment and asked us to down our shutters - after the recent bomb blast in Mumbai all kinds of precautions are taking place. I imagine the average citizen will be inconvenienced in many ways while the real perpetators will go undetected. That's life. Colaba where the gun battle took place was where we lived when I was in Std6. After that we moved to Dadar a crowded surburb of Mumbai and lived there for 17years - thankfully Dadar was spared.
Anyway the conference was quite good - though there were diverse topics ranging from hydra and drosophila to human studies. I find I am more comfortable in a cancer biology conference than a pure basic sciences conference. There were some excellent poster presentation on angiogenesis ( creation of new blood vessels) and DNA repair which is connected with cancer biology so I did find my niche in the plethora of information.
The food was Maharashtrian ( as Pune is located in the state of Maharashtra) - so there was "sabudana " (sago ) pudding and typical Maharashtrian dal with sugar in it and stuffed parathas and chicken masala and fried fish among others.
I leave for Chennai early morning at the odd hour of 3.30am tomorrow and am waiting to get back home to be with my mentally and physically challenged sister . God has been gracious and kept her in good spirits through my absence. I was quite apprehensive on whether I should go as she started crying nonstop when she saw my packed bags. But Mariamma and Shiela have looked after her well and she was quite cheerful when I spoke to her over the phone. Not to mention my dear brother who had lunch with her. Everything worked out well - may God be praised.