The Sheep From the Goats

Gudauri is Georgia’s preeminent skiing destination. It was also the site of the South Caucasus English Teacher’s Conference this past weekend where Jen was one of the main speakers/presenters. The conference was sponsored by the U.S. Embassy and organized by the regional English language officer (RELO), Thomas, who is stationed in our old stomping grounds, Kyiv, Ukraine. Thomas, along with our Ukrainian friend, Alyonna, came to Georgia for the conference.

The embassy van picked us up on Friday morning for the 2 hour trip up the Georgian Military Highway to Gudauri. There were thirteen of us crammed into the van (everyone with suitcases, of course) for the journey to the 3-day conference. The scenery en route was beautiful, following the Aragvi Rriver into the Caucasus Mountains. Once in the mountains, the van had to stop several times for herds of sheep and goats (along with the occasional donkey or dog) meandering across the road. Finally, we arrived in Gudauri, set amongst the stunning peaks, still covered in deep snow. The hotel was pretty flash (in a reformed Soviet way) and we happily settled into our room, which had spectacular views from the balcony.

The conference was enjoyable, especially since I had no official duties (they had wanted me to present, but I had no time to prepare anything) besides attending presentations and eating at the buffet three times a day. Jen was a star, of course, giving the plenary on Saturday (“Breaking Bad Habits without Breaking Spirits”), followed by a well-received workshop on presentation skills. The attendees were teachers from Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, many of whom had never been out of their own countries, even though these three small nations are geographically intertwined. Armenia and Azerbaijan fought a brutal war in the 90s, and part of the goal of the conference was to get teachers from those countries to work together. I found most of the participants to be delightful.

There were also some Americans present, including several English Language Fellows (ELFs) from the region (Georgia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, and Moldova were represented). Mary Martin, a nice woman from Iowa, is currently holding down Jen’s former Senior ELF position in Ukraine, so we exchanged a few tales with her. We went to a lot of presentations, met a lot of nice people, ate a lot of good food, slept well, and took some good photos. Sunday afternoon, it was back in the van for the trip back to Tbilisi. On the way we stopped at the ancient fortress/church at Ananuri, which was very, very impressive.