I’ve been feeling pretty UN-y lately. That’s United Nations-y. I’ve mentioned that this summer the US ambassador visited our boys’ summer camp, ABLE (as well as the girls’ GLOW camp), but since then I’ve had several other ambassadorial run-ins. In a way, spotting and meetings ambassadors is kind of like celebrity spotting or Pokemon catching here. Gotta catch ‘em all! Six down, 48 to go!
Here in Ismayilli, there’s a new vocational school, at which my sitemate and I have worked off and on with English teachers, that trains students to be hotel staff, chefs, waiters and (soon) tourism workers. For about six months, a group of expats, lead onsite by a Dutch man named Alexander, has been helping the school in the development of their curriculum. Recently, their contract ran out, and they prepared to depart, making as many preparations to ensure that the work they had implemented would be sustained after their departure. In the midst of all this, it was decided by the powers that be that they would also conduct a conference to showcase the new curriculum and progress the school has made. They had a week to organize this. This is not abnormal for Azerbaijan.
At the conference, many local education leaders were present, as well as the ambassador from the European Union delegation to Azerbaijan, Roland Kobia. The conference seemed to be a success, and was assisted by the fact that they had a man instantly translating via earphones. After the conference, there was naturally a tea session, and I had a chance to speak briefly with the ambassador. Most amusingly, after I explained my work and the goals of Peace Corps, he noted how he wished France had more programs like that to spread the French language around the world. (Interestingly, French is a common language being taught in schools here and my school’s French teacher was actually disappointed I had studied Spanish instead of French in school.)
The ambassador encounters didn't stop there. Every year, before school begins, the rayon holds a large education celebration, honoring the best teachers and students of the rayon. My counterpart was in the past honored as one of the best teachers, a huge honor, one for which some teachers becomes an obsession. At this ceremony, which seemed to be attended by all of Ismayilli, packing the entire central park area, and watched over by a statue of Heydar Aliyev, the Japanese, Turkish, Russian, Belarussian, and Latvian ambassadors all gave speeches, mostly in Russian, clearly just to thwart my understanding (and not, you know, because that’s their native language and is widely understood here). Most amusingly, while they called up the winning students, who each received a new flat-screen TV, a new telephone, and what may have been a DVD player (almost made me want to be a student), fanfare-style sound clips were played on the sound system, almost always stolen from US television or the Olympics, and often playing over the speakers. On a related note, the Pirates of the Caribbean movie theme music is the theme song for one of the news programs here.
After the announcements, a singer from Baku emerged on stage through the haze of several smoke machines. This, apparently, is one of the best singers in all of Azerbaijan, Nazperi Dostaliyera. An oboe/keyboard/accordion/drum group accompanied her. Their blaring solos (the only acceptable volume for live music is “feel-it-in-the-very-core-of-your-soul loud”) reminded why I am not an oboe fan (sorry to all my oboe-loving readers). Meanwhile, a brilliant laser show danced across the square, while kids danced and ran around. Even though the ambassadors had long since disappeared, it was one of those perfect end-of-summer nights.
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