Second International Workshop and Conference in Commutative Algebra (SIWCCA)
Tribhuvan University, Kathmandu, Nepal
October 17 - 28, 2016
Getting to Kathmandu. The Tribhuvan International Airport, KTM, in Kathmandu, is your destination. At the airport, you will obtain a tourist visa, and for that you will need a passport-size photo (bring 2 to play safe) and a photocopy of your passport. The cost is US $30 for a 15-day visa, and $2 per day for additional days. While some border crossings require payment in US dollars, at KTM you can pay with any major currency. Also, there are places at the airport where you can change money. (Children under age 10 need visas, but there is no charge for them.) As of September 4, the exchange rate for Nepali Rupees (NR) is about 107.5 NR per dollar, and 119 NR per Euro. Most shops will give you a good rate for US dollars, and for some purposes, e.g., flights to the mountains, US dollars are required. Someone from Tribhuvan University will meet you at the airport and escort you to your accommodations. (If you don't see him/her in the terminal, look outside.)
Getting to the Workshop/Conference. The SIWCCA will be held at the Central Department of Mathematics of Tribhuvan University and will begin on Monday, October 17. The Registration Desk will open about 8:30 am, The Opening Ceremony will begin at 9:00 am, and talks will begin about 10:00 am (details to follow, under "Program"). We expect to have maps at the Kirtipur Hillside Hotel by Sunday, October 16, to help you find these buildings. Also, you can ask the hotel staff to point the way. The walk takes 10 - 15 minutes. Just in case, here are vague directions from the Hotel to the Math Department: Walk out the gate of the hotel and turn right. Go down lots of steps (about a 30-meter descent) to a road, which you follow briefly to the right. Just before a big arch, either climb over the wall or go left along a dirt road for a little bit to a break in the wall. Follow an assortment of dirt paths generally down and left (northeast), till you start to encounter campus buildings. Continue northeast past the red brick building with a clock tower on top. The math building (with prominent solar collectors on the roof) is nearly at the northeast corner of the campus.
Fees. Participants will pay the $200 fee (in US$ or NR) at the Registration Desk, including the fee for accompanying persons ($40 if staying for at least a week and $20 if less than a week). Part of the fee, for non-Nepali participants, is to help subsidize travel, lodging and meals for Nepali students and young faculty participating in the SIWCCA. The fees for accompanying persons will cover airport transportation, any lunches or teas they wish to attend, as well as two planned excursions to the mountains. In addition to the registration fee, non-Nepali participants and accompanying persons are responsible for the cost of their lodging, dinners and breakfasts at the Kirtipur Hillside Hotel and Resort. (The cost, including lodging, dinner, and breakfast, will be about $25 per day per person for a single room, and about $20 per day per person for a shared (double) room. We encourage people to double up, since it will not be possible to fit all participants into single rooms.) Basic needs --- food, drink, sightseeing, shopping, math, mountain hikes, will be within walking distance of the hotel.
Lectures. Most participants will give two 50-minute talks --- a preparatory talk and a research/expository talk on the same subject (but at a somewhat higher level). Ample whiteboards will be available in the lecture hall. There will be equipment also for computer/slide/Beamer talks. Board talks, while they put more of a burden on the presenter, are usually more understandable to the audience. If you choose to use technology, please do not go too fast. If you plan to spend at least three minutes on each slide, and if each slide is not too dense, your pacing will probably be OK. Recall that much of your audience will consist of Nepali students and faculty with very little training in commutative algebra. Preparatory talks should be accessible to beginning graduate students and faculty not specializing in algebra. Research/expository talks should also be aimed mostly at the local audience, but with a few tidbits thrown in to keep the experts amused. To get some idea of what the appropriate level might be, take a look at the notes from the preparatory talks "Hilbert's legacy" and "Local rings", and the research/expository talk "Silly direct-sum decompositions". You will find these and many other notes from the April 2015 Workshop and Conference, under "Notes from FIWCCA".