BRICS Summit diary: Xiamen might be a washout

Glass walls…
* After Modi went to his room, top officials were seen having dinner in a glass-walled restaurant on the ground floor of the Wyndham. National security advisor Ajit Doval, foreign secretary S Jaishankar, Indian ambassador Vijay Gokhle, joint secretary in the PMO Gopal Baglay, MEA’s official spokesperson Raveesh Kumar had dinner, as onlookers peeped in.

Also read | Xi sets stage for talks with PM Modi tomorrow; Need peace, not conflict

… but no firewall
* All delegates, officials and journalists allowed to be at the event have been granted rare and unrestricted access to WiFi networks at the BRICS venues and hotels. Hitherto inaccessible websites such as Google, Gmail, and Facebook no longer require the services of a Virtual Private Network (VPN). This is a shift in policy from the Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation in Beijing earlier this year.

Then, the Great Firewall of China was in place.

College force
* At the airport, bus stands, taxi stands, hotels and conference centres, one sight was common: college students in all-white. Faced with the task of ferrying so many delegates, the Fujian provincial government turned to students for help. One volunteer, who preferred anonymity, said: “I had to learn about food, translating the name of the dish from Chinese to English and also about the culture of people from BRICS countries.”