The Academic Enrichment Seminar for Fulbright students that took place in Sofia, Bulgaria at the Hilton was a great success. The Bulgarian-American Commission for Educational Exchange organized the program with the title "Social and Cultural Integration in 21st Century Europe." The two-day seminar was packed with lectures by Bulgarian professors on topics of diversity, Balkan minorities, cosmopolitanism, Bulgarian culture and more. Solomon Passy, the former Minister of Foreign Affairs, gave a lecture titled "Internet: From Cultural Diplomacy to Culture of Democracy" that focused on his metaphor comparing running a government to flying an airplane. His talk was a little odd but entertaining and he's clearly a very intelligent man.
The best part of the trip was meeting the other Fulbrighters and hearing about their research projects in Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Macedonia, Greece, Croatia, Cyprus, Romania, Slovenia, Turkey, and Bulgaria. 14 out of 32 of us presented during the panel discussions on topics ranging from the loss of textile traditions in Macedonia to translating forgotten languages in Slovenia to shifting ideas of masculinity amongst Croatian men. All three of us from Moldova presented and in general were very excited to share a little bit of information about Moldova with everyone else who was present since no one there really knew much about the country. The worst part of the trip was that we all wished we had had the opportunity earlier on since now we all want to visit each other and we're running out of time.
The commission really pulled out the bells and whistles for our stay. The hotel was posh to say the least and you could tell who the Fulbrighters were in the dining room at breakfast by how overwhelmed we all looked by the selection. I don't think any of us are really living in luxury in our host countries so we were easily impressed. They took us out to dinner at a great Bulgarian restaurant on Friday night that had traditional food, dancing, and music and arranged a trip to the city of Plovdiv on Saturday.
It was great for me to be able to go on this trip because I was able to revisit the city I lived in during the summer of 2009 when I interned at the US Embassy in the capital. One of the Bulgarian employees who works in the political section and helped me as a translator when I was interviewing a prosecutor of an organized crime case came to the seminar the second day and was there for my presentation. It was great to catch up with him afterward and he introduced me to one of the new political officers whom I chatted with for a little bit about NGO competition and corruption.
I'll leave you with a photo from the traveling "Buddy Bears" exhibition that is now in Sofia. There is a bear representing each country and Moldova's is obviously the best.
No comments:
Post a Comment