Presenting in Monterrey, Mexico

This week I was two days in Monterrey (plus two full days of travel up & down from Bogota via Mexico City). The purpose was to give two presentations at a conference on higher education in the Americas. The invitation to speak came from colleagues of DFATD, the Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs, Trade & Development (in which the former CIDA - Canadian International Development Agency - has been merged as of this year).

The conference is in its third year and was spearheaded by Canada who hosted the first conference in Calgary in 2010. The second conference was hosted in Brazil in early 2012. About 600 participants from all countries of North, Central and South America & the Caribbean were present.

Canada is very active in promoting academic exchanges and joint research activities between all countries and the "Imagine Canada" booth had a good showing at the conference.

The first presentation was on scholarship programs available in Canada. Our DFATD Trade Commissioner colleague gave an overview of the programs available and afterwards two examples were presented for use at Canadian universities and Canadian colleges.

My colleague from a university in Quebec City gave an overview of the many exchange students and researchers they have at their campuses thanks to a variety of Canadian scholarship programs for both Canadian and international students. Afterwards I gave an overview of what Niagara College has done in this field during the past 10 years (promoting our "Be World Ready" campaign).

The second presentation was on development projects in the educational & training sector sponsored by the Canadian government. After overviews by two DFATD colleagues I explained what we are doing in Colombia with our EFE - Education for Employment - program.

After all the serious work - and being in Mexico - the hosts treated us on some excellent Mexican music and folklore. So the remaining photos just to give you an impression of one of the evenings in Monterrey, Mexico. Too short a visit really, but that is how it goes....

 

 

Another Sunday in Bogota

After flying back on Tuesday last week from Cartagena to Bogota, the week here has been uneventful with work and meetings. This weekend is a long weekend, so I am enjoying a couple of long walks in the city in which I have now lived already again more than 9 months.

This morning I started with a coffee and the newspaper, which had a full section on the fact that the Colombian men's soccer team has qualified for the World Cup tournament in Brazil in June 2014. They missed the last 3 tournaments (which takes place once every four years). In that section there was an announcement of the Colombian team going to play two friendly games in Belgium (Nov 15) and Holland (Nov 19). That will be the first time ever the Colombian and Dutch teams play a game against each other. I will be in Ottawa that week, so little chance to see the game, but still...

I met with a colleague of the Colombian Ministry of Tourism for lunch today (I made a few blog posts in July of a visit I made with her to Huila, one of the southern provinces in Colombia). We decided to meet in Usaquen (see some of my blog posts of that place from January). On the way there (a walk of a good hour) one passes the Canadian Embassy. It is housed here in Bogota in a large office building called the Scotia Bank building....

Across the street is a nice place for lunch, and next to it is the entrance of the Usaquen market area (of which I made in January already a post). We talked for almost 4 hours about ideas on how to promote tourism in Colombia, a country so incredibly rich in tourism potential but of course badly tainted in its reputation over the past 40-50 years. But now that a lasting peace seems to be possible in this country, maybe the potential can be developed during the coming decades.

Colombia has the largest diversity of flora and fauna in one country in the entire world. It has truly magical sceneries, wonderful people, a rich variety of local cultures and good food. What more do you want? Yes, a solid peace and safe country side to travel, and an improved reputation world wide. I will for always be an "Ambassador" for this country, that is for sure...

The coming week I will be at an international education conference in Monterrey, Mexico (presenting on successful exchange programs developed at Niagara College, and also presenting on our "Education for Employment" program in the Andes (Colombia, Peru and Bolivia)). The week following I will be in Lima, Peru for regional meetings on our EFE program. Then one more week work in Bogota and back in Canada for coordination meetings in Ottawa together with the SENA colleague who will take over most of my tasks on the EFE program as of January 2014.

Action packed weeks ahead, so maybe a few less blog posts....

Another day in Cartagena

Today we met with the provincial ministry of education of Bolivar to see how we can streamline our EFE training activities with their programs for adult literacy in our project pilot communities (where an estimated 30 % of adults have had no formal education at all - today's coverage for the youth is much better although still not 100 %).

Afterwards I participated in a long Skype meeting with colleagues in Ottawa about a "results based management" workshop we will attend in Lima during the week of Oct 21 - 25...

Then it was time to one more time enjoy the beautiful sunset scenery here in Cartagena....

A cuppa Juan Valdez coffee while seeing the sun go down under the Atlantic Ocean. Many others were enjoying the same view...

In the background you can see the tourist hotel area where the beaches of Cartagena are. This is turning a bit to the left from the first photo. Turning a bit further to the left, overlooking part of the historic city of Cartagena, the sunset gave a beautiful glow over the clouds there...

You can never get enough of the scenery when walking through the streets of historic Cartagena. Above a photo of one of the nicely renovated streets whereby trees are planted who slowly grow up against the houses. Beautiful especially in the evening with the lights...

Near one of the squares of the historic city there is a bar where they play great coastal music and many Colombians dance. This older couple showed their skills outside of the café...

The reward today was a nice dinner with soup and a delicious "lemonade de coco"..... mmmhhhh

Signing off from Cartagena. Tomorrow back to Bogota.

Workshop on gender mainstreaming

Today was an excellent full day of learning at the workshop on gender topics with our Colombian expert Amanda. She had helped us out in November 2012 and today proved to be a great facilitator with talents to be a "stand-up comedian" while making the participants think and discuss complicated topics based on so much of human history.

We had about 30 participants and they were instructors, social workers, pedagogy experts and regional government representatives. In some of the wild-west gold-rush mining communities we have as targets in our EFE Colombia program, there are no shortage of relevant case studies.

Amanda used a lot of relevant historic information and mixed it with lots of humor on the topic of gender. Those moments are a  real test for my own Spanish knowledge, but I got most of it... :-)

Before lunch Amanda put three groups at work to describe three generations of gender relations: our grand-parents, our parents and our own generation.

The lunch was served in the training kitchen of SENA's local culinary program and the food was so nice (and the company was so good) that I completely forgot to make some photos.....

The setting of this campus is in a beautiful historic building with sensational flora right in the building's patios. The building is located in the historic city - a UNESCO monument - where you can find year-round tourism.

After lunch the groups presented their discussions on the three generations and Amanda did a masterful job intervening and guiding the group's ensuing discussions.

Project activities in Cartagena

Back on the plane today to Cartagena. From the rain in Bogota to the rain in Cartagena.... But when it does not rain that 30 plus degrees temperature in Cartagena is still mighty nice.... :-)
At the Bogota airport I eat lunch in a small "sports bar". Three soccer games of the European League on at the same time. You gotta love the Latin Americans for their passion for "the game"... :-)

 

In one of the training centers of SENA in Cartagena I joined a meeting which had already gone on all day of our EFE project team. The work on the project indicators (on which we will be measured three years from now with respect to the project results) was super lively and engaged....

My role as advisor was to get them here. Now they have to do this work more themselves. It is not an easy process, but a great learning and reflective excercise. On the photo above two of the colleagues work in the HQ of SENA in Bogota, two work in the Bolivar province and one in the Antioquia province. We have to get this work completed in two weeks by the time we go to a regional EFE program workshop in Lima, Peru.

Tomorrow we have a special workshop here in Cartagena on gender for about 40 SENA people plus a few invited project stakeholders. I will make another post about that later.

A colleague from BC send me the photo below. I had given him one of the Niagara College "Be World Ready" campaign T-shirts. That inspired his 6 year old to make a nice drawing....

Rainy season in Bogota

Back in action in Bogota, yesterday I met with my good friend and colleague Javier Mora to visit ICETEX, the Colombian national student loan organization (as a follow up of meetings we had with them in August when two of my ACCC Ottawa colleagues where in Bogota). After a fine lunch together, we had a cuppa Juan Valdez coffee before a productive meeting at ICETEX.

Today during my lunch break, I got back on the "erg", the rowing machine my daughter Hilary sometimes wakes up about in the middle of the night (she spend 3 school years during high school at the darn machines training during the winter for the outdoor rowing season of the spring and summer). I sent her this photo.... :-)

Combining an afternoon meeting with dropping by the TIGO offices, the local cell phone company I am using here. As you can see, I bought for $50,000 on minutes....... well, those are Colombian pesos equaling about Can $ 25. This is the only year in my life I will actually have "millions" in my bank account here in Bogota.... of course also Colombian pesos......

Stepping outside after buying the pre-paid phone minutes, the rain started coming down. Luckily Sandra at SENA has given me a very nice SENA umbrella..... an orange one... gotta love her!

I took "refuge" in one of the fancy shopping malls near the "Zona Rosa", the Centro Andino. This is one of the most expensive areas to live in Bogota, and the mall has pretty fancy stores....

When the rain slowed down, I made my way back to my apartment. The roads were here and there like temporary rivers.... The rainy season in Bogota has started (will last all of October and November normally subject to changes because of the current global warming of course....)

Just checked up with a text message on our son Mark.... and this is what he sent seconds later... studying to try to become an electrical engineer... math, science and more math.... :-)