Back in Bogota

After a good last Ecuadorian coffee in Guayaquil, it was time to check out the coffee in Colombia. Back here after four years! At the airport straight for one of the nice coffee brands....

The next day I noticed this in a coffee shop: "love must be like coffee - sometimes strong and sometimes sweet, sometimes alone and sometimes in company, but never cold". This store also had the famous Dutch "stroopwafels".....

We had a good program at the SENA headquarters in the office building where I worked during 2013 (see the blog posts from that year for those stories). SENA offers applied education and training programs to around 7 million students each year almost everywhere in the country; a truly amazing organization. We are looking at cooperation opportunities these days between SENA and Seneca.

During the afternoon we visited their campus for financial training programs. Unbelievable as it sounds to us, but they train here annually 55,000 students in programs of 18-24 months. We met with the management team delivering these programs at the top floor and enjoyed afterwards some of the nice views over the city of Bogota.

They offer English to all the students in just two language laboratories and because of the high number of students these labs are used seven days in the week (including Saturday and Sunday!) from early in the morning till late in the evening.

SENA organizes many competitions for their students (above one for students in the accountancy programs); lots of project based learning and making use of case studies. Modern teaching techniques used which is great to see. Tomorrow we are going to another training center in Bogota and then we fly to Medellin where we will also visit a few of their campuses.

Python workshop

Don't ask me how I ended having to do a presentation on Python programming language; long story. But at the last moment I was saved by a local expert..... Seneca submitted a proposal for a workshop on this topic at a national conference hosted by UEES.

My colleague from Seneca was last moment not available and it was too late to cancel. But good team work with the UEES team and a local expert was found last moment who delivered the workshop based on the materials put together by the Seneca professor (who is a Brazilian). The world today is such a cool place! On I go tomorrow to Bogota. More posts to follow from there....

Bit more Guayaquil

In the afternoon I hang out for a bit more with our prehistoric friends, the Iguanas. And on a Sunday I was clearly not the only one....

Amazing animals who have been around already for so long. Late afternoon I met up with Jessica who manages the Canada Ecuador Chamber of Commerce and we walked up the 444 stairs. Here are we somewhere half the way (note the numbers on the stairs in the right corner of the photo).

Time for a little rest & relax at a beautiful view point. We made it all the way and I took the photo below as prove. At the top some nice views and a little chapel.

In the back of the last photo is Samborondon, the part of the city where UEES has its campus. Busy there the coming two days before traveling on Wednesday to Bogota in Colombia.

Sunday in Guayaquil

Yesterday I caught up with Eric who leads the environmental NGO "Pro Bosque" which protects and manages a large area of dry tropical forest owned by HOLCIM/LAFARGE just outside of the city of Guayaquil. The area is the home of the almost extinct Great Green Macaw, a bird only found anymore here in Ecuador and in Costa Rica. Eric and I worked during the 1997-2009 period on a few projects between Niagara College, College of the Rockies, UEES and Pro Bosque. I also did some nice work with Eric on eco-lodges in the park financed by Rotary Clubs in Canada. It was great to see Eric again. He is certainly one of my environmental heroes who does not just talk but is full of action. He came 27 years ago from California where he grew up and became a certified forest fire fighter and park ranger. Eric is active around the world in the Society of Eco-System Restoration.

Today (Sunday morning) I went for another nice walk on the riverside "Malecon" boardwalk. In the photo above is the hill I am going to go up later today with another colleague from here (Jessica from the Canada Ecuador Chamber of Commerce). It has 444 steps! Below just a few shots from the scenery here and people going about their way and their work....

Coffee in Ecuador

As a true coffee addict it is always important for me to get a nice "cuppa" wherever I am in the world. This is a brand of coffee made from coffee beans grown here in Ecuador. It is very good and rivals the amazing good Juan Valdez coffee I got hooked on in Colombia during my year there (2013). It gets me going for some hours of work on presentations and reports in my "office away from home" here in the hotel these days......

Last night I had dinner with Jihna with whom I worked many years when she was a member of the international office team at UEES. She started a new venture (owned by a company in the UK) two years ago with four staff members and now she has already more than 40 employees. She is a real go-getter in her mid-thirties also raising three teenager boys. Wow! Well done, Jihna! The office space she designed is hip & hop, colorful and you can just imagine the atmosphere of these folks...

This weekend I will catch up with a few other colleagues from the period 1997 - 2007 here. So a few more posts will follow of the days here in the city of Guayaquil, Ecuador.

Iguanas and the "Malecon"

The famous "liberator" Simon Bolivar has of course also here a statue. After my year in Colombia (2013) I better realize the impact this man had in this region of South America. His statue is located in a small park right across from the small hotel I am staying here in Guayaquil (UNIPARK hotel).

These Iguanas are some of the prehistorical animals who survived thousands and thousands of years in this region which has one of the most incredible rich diversities of ecosystems in the world. They don't worry about nothing and just "hang out" every day in the sun (and in the trees) of this park. Just look at this fellow below (I actually feel a bit like him today.....).

 A few hundred meters from my hotel there is the large river delta which connects the city of Guayaquil with the Pacific coast line. The region is full of huge mangrove areas which little by little get restored again after almost devastating negative impact from the shrimp farming during decades. The mangroves are a very important natural protection and an essential part of the local ecosystem. Along the river the municipality constructed 10-15 years ago a long boardwalk called the "Malecon" and I always love walking over this boardwalk which stretches several kilometers.

The walk this late afternoon was a lovely way to end the day after a series of good work meetings. This weekend catching up with several old colleagues from the previous period of work here, and then on Monday and Tuesday our workshop delivery at the UEES University.