So I was in Pune over the last weekend, and I had a good time there.

I gave a talk on the Business of Open Source, which will hopefully have drilled into the SCIT students that there is real money to be made in this field, and that it isn’t only about freedom. I showed them a few successful Open Source business models, and also spent time explaining how they work and who is using them.

The next day (Sunday) I participated in a panel discussion about India v/s China in terms of IT and related stuff. This was fun – I got to talk about some of my pet peeves about people being more worried about competitors than about their own prowess and abilities. The “what if the Chinese learn English?” bogey surfaced several times, and my “so what? live and let live!” response got less applause than my comment about us struglling for 200 years to gain freedom from the British, only to make their language our USP! Ah well….

The event was remarkably well arranged – completely by students. Everything ran smooth as silk – the travel, the accommodation, the talks. Very impressive. I hope I get called again.

However, the highlight, for me was spending time with my brother, Arun, who is a writer in Pune. We get to see each other rarely, and this particular trip, unsullied by family pressures or interference, gave us a chance to sit down and talk about all sorts of things that we otherwise never have time (or inclination) for.

It was good to spend time with him, and I am really impressed how he has managed to leave all his problems behind him, and his sanguine way of going about things these days. When we parted at the airport, it was like the brothers we are, rather than two people from different worlds.

I look forward to doing this more often.