daily accounts- | by Saugat Datta - revised January 29, 2004 |

Day four: activists were definitely tired of protesting in front each other. Few gave in to shop for family and friends or head towards traveling exotic India. Medha Patkar decided to sit in front of the ministry with 200 aboriginal families of Narmada Valley. Same faces, same street, same signs, same voices, none of them helped my sinking expectations for our media exchange agenda (yes, we had lots). In an effort to do something about the situation the crew uploaded our first HTML pages. Still no massive crossing over of activist ideas and methodology happened nor a unified direction was generated out of such a confluence.

The presence of police was disturbing; probably not for the city bred or Firangis but for the simple villagers the presence of khaki has always been sign of government control and intimidation. Few Firangis and Arundhuti decided to go and shut down the corporate offices of Monsanto in Mumbai and others decided for a change to go around counter-clockwise inside NESCO grounds.

At least WSF movie halls were getting packed audiences by now. People from the internet news organizations looked tired in the same clothes, delegates endlessly searching for shade and to squat, eyes contemplating their decision to come to WSF and what message would they carry back to their respective villages who sponsored them to get hope?