Wednesday, October 3
Its been awhile since I updated everyone. I've finally gotten busy. Nothing here seems to work on an advance schedule so I spend a lot of time rescheduling activities I'm trying to plan. One day last week, between my language teacher and I, we rescheduled our lesson for that day 4 times.
A couple of weeks ago, I went to a strategic planning workshop w/ Caritas and the members of 6 villages they work with. The villages all have community groups and the purpose of the seminar was to give them some help w/ recruiting volunteers, fund-raising and strategic planning.
It was held at Sevan Lake, the biggest lake in Armenia, sometimes called its "blue eye". The blue eye is beautiful but since raw sewage flows into it, I wouldn't go swimming there w/ a gun to my head.
Here is a pic of the camp where we stayed. The small building near the lake is the room where I stayed w/ 3 other women.
Here is a pic of the conf room itself.
It was very small for the 25 people at the workshop, but unlike American attendees, the villagers did not complain a bit about the tight quarters or the fact that most of them were in rooms without bathrooms so had to use the camp's outhouse. Caritas wanted to save on expenses so the September rental was off season. The rent for the week from Tuesday morning through Saturday morning w/' three full (and delicious) meals a day cost about $22 a person. Not $22 a day. $22 for the whole week.
I was curious about how a group of very unsophisticated villagers would take to a fairly high level planning session led my two women (my counterpart here and her boss, who frequently conducted her sessions holding her 4 mo old daughter). I can report they listened, took it seriously and worked as hard as any group of executives I have ever facilitated. Their clothes weren't as nice, they didn't complain and they had more gold teeth, otherwise just like an American corporate group.
One assignment I have taken on is teaching conversational English to a group of computer programmer trainees. These are all university graduates who are in this special two year program, market-driven, that will result in full time employment by one of 4 software companies who have set up branch offices in Gyumri. This is an amazing program as jobs are so scare in this country, especially for professionals. While the students may have had years of English training in school, it was mostly academic in nature – learn grammar, memorize, and their ability to actually speak in English or to understand what an English speaker says is extremely limited. The course is even more challenging because the director of the school wants me to introduce western business values. So things like coming to class on time, listening, participating, willingness to make a mistake are all new to these students and hard for them to absorb.
Yesterday, I spent the afternoon in 3 different villages watching some local consultants work w/ a few participants per village on business development. All the participants have identified a possible business and are in various stages of financial analysis and business plan development. There is very little advertising here and the basic concepts of marketing are foreign to most people. When asked to whom they will sell their products (meat, wool, honey, milk, etc), they just look perplexed. 70 years of a closed market system where whatever was produced was shipped somewhere, without regard to quality, price, service or anything else. And all the workers got paid. So the change required is radical. Next time I go out there, I'll try to get some pics so you can see a glimpse of what life is like for these villagers.
The above was written several days ago. Today is Sunday, October 07, 2007. It is Gyumri day and I have just finished watching the fireworks at the end of an afternoon and evening of local entertainment at one of the main squares. Several thousand people must have sauntered down to the square because it was jam packed by 7 pm. Not at 4 when the show started. The first two acts were children from what is probably a local dance studio. The first group did a routine to rap music, dressed appropriately. Then, 4 cute little girls danced to cotton eyed joe. On the sound track, someone had inserted "vonts es" (how ya doin) at appropriate points. Most enjoyable.
The square is called church square colloquially because there are big churches on opposite sides. One is in use. The other was seriously damaged in the earthquake and is currently being restored with diaspora money. In front of the working church is a little kiddie car ride, about the size of a whirl-a-gig if anyone remembers those. The ride is powered by an ancient man pedaling a stationery bicycle. A long rubber belt connects the cycle to the ride. Today is the first time I've seen it working. Another photo op missed!
When people get married in Gyumri, it is customary for the entire wedding party to ride around one of the main squares (church square or peace circle, ok its not a square but its not exactly round either) 3 times honking their horns frantically the whole time. This is a Yerevan tradition also, most annoying when one is sitting at the Yerevan Marriott in their lovely outdoor café, sipping fizzy water and being blasted by yet another barrage of stretch limos and ordinary cars going thru their routine. I mention it here because it was happening this afternoon at church square when I was hanging around watching the crowd build.
On a completely different subject, I had a root canal on Friday. And yes, it is preferable to the boot camp that PST was (my colleagues and I debated frequently about PST vs. root canal). The tooth started acting up on Wednesday and I had it fixed on Friday in Yerevan. Fortunately, I anticipated tooth problems here and brought two Rxs of antibiotics so I was able to keep it from getting too painful before the scheduled appointment. A PC doctor came with me and stayed in the office the whole time. As far as I can tell, the dentist did a good job, drilled right thru the crown on the hurt tooth, thru the gold filling to the root, took x rays before and after to be sure he got everything and finished off making a very smooth bite surface on the refilled tooth that fit perfectly. And of course, plenty of Novocain. The PC paid about $90 for the procedure- it was considered expensive because of the difficulty w/ drilling thru the crown. I would have paid at least 10 X that in the US --- and with my own money.
Ok this is enough for this episode. Please let me know what you would like to hear about and what pics you would like to see.
Thanks, Elizabeth Lynne
