Travel chaos

What can I say? Today has (so far) been a complete waste of time. A combination of weather and a comedy of travel errors has diverted my day. Big time.

I set off at 7.20am to catch the 7.57am train to Leeds. It was raining hard and had rained hard all night – but we live in the Pennines, so what? My train was delayed by nine minutes – I had a twelve minutes change over in Leeds: so that’s when my worries started. Thanks to Ron Mitchel and Sharon I was kept fully informed of developments and of alternative routes. My destination had been Nottingham, to attend the CAPITAL (Curriculum and Pedagogy in Technology Assisted Learning) meeting set up by Nick Jeans of SERO.

As it happened, my twelve minute change over didn’t become a problem because a) we arrived in Leeds less than nine minutes late and b) the 8.40am to London (via Newark, where I would meet Ron) never moved in the entire time I was in Leeds. I’d found my seat when an announcement came on to say that because the electrical power system at Leeds was having “some difficulties” and that “this train” was electric – we may be a little delayed. Furthermore, it appeared that overnight, someone had stolen signal cables outside Wakefield, so even when we got started, going would be very slow until after Wakefield. The 09.05am train to London had already been canceled, but this (the 08.40am) was still unsure of its morning’s duties.

So was I!

Because of a derailment near York yesterday [BBC News], the Trans-Pennine routes were in some disarray too. All trains north were disrupted and as a result, many of those to the west were also delayed or canceled. The notice boards were in complete chaos. The guards and assistants were being as helpful as they could be, but things were changing so fast that even they were relying on the boards – which were not helpful. I eventually got back to Huddersfield on a train that (it would appear) had been kidnapped and turned around. I think it had been heading north and I think that the driver was still determined to take it north, but the announcement and the dodgy boards now said it would go back west to Liverpool. Who convinced the driver of this I’m not sure, but it did go back west. As I got off in Huddersfield, there was still some uncertainty about its destination – Manchester Piccadilly or Liverpool Lime Street. I suspect that the problem here was driver-knowledge. If he wasn’t conversant with the ‘road’ he wouldn’t be able to take the train beyond Manchester (more Trans-Pennine trains go to Manchester than to Liverpool, so this is likely).

Anyway, having got to Huddersfield, my problems were not over. I’d missed the local bus (twice a day – once on Wednesdays and knew I had a short walk ahead of me – but hadn’t anticipated the swim. The bottom of my hill was flooded. Whilst it doesn’t look much, it did fill my shoes and I had to walk home with shoes full of shitty water. Then a shower, then blog, then work!

Why can we not prepare for weather?

AmericaniZation

OK – I'm finally irritated enough to comment on this.

I love my MacBook Pro. Everything about it is 'fab' – except its simple refusal to recogniZe English spelling of words. I know that i can add the word in question to my dictionary BUT WHY SHOULD I? Microsoft allow me the luxury of choosing my native language – why can't the (super talented) hippies in San Francisco do the same?

The letter zed (zee????) has no place in realise; itemise; criticise (they even have to change the 'z' to an 's' in criticism!!) and so on.

Get a life chaps and chapettes at Apple – give us our language back!

David

Drafts

This is the first Saturday for many weeks where I’ve had no work to do. At all. But it all starts again tomorrow.

The Advanced e-Guide/PDA programme kicked off last month with the first face to face meetings last week (in the middle of my Leeds-European week). The participants were reminded that (to get the two pronged funding) they should have submitted ‘action plans’ by 20th November. Which sort of gave us two weeks to get draft action plans read and returned before the finals had to be in. The 20th is an important date because if we (Sally, Nigel and me) don’t get them by then the Advanced e-Guide/PDA won’t get their £1,200 bursary or £1,500 capital funding. So – next weekend and Monday, we (I) will be reading action plans and (hopefully) signing them off in time for the money to be released. But this week it’s been one for chasing up drafts, reading drafts and commenting on drafts. This has been appreciated by those that submitted them but that is less than half the group I have to support. So tomorrow and Monday I will have to be chasing up those that haven’t sent in drafts.

There’s still no news of my ‘lost’ camera from the Thistle Hotel in Birmingham. I wonder what I have to do to get a manger to talk to me?

On Thursday all the MoLeNET Mentors met in London as part of this years (round 3) programme. Once again it was great to be there with everyone – all gurus to me and all considered good friends. But I do wonder why we were there in the afternoon. Some of us I understand – because the LSN sales team had to be informed about MoLeNET life and mobile learning generally, but Elaine, James, Mick and I were not involved and were only listening to what we already (mainly) knew. I suspect that if the four of us had been asked to leave and work in a different room for 2 hours, the product of that meeting would have been far more useful that the 2 hours we did spend.

Then Lilian, Ron and I went to Nottingham to join the Becta-supported (delivered by ALT) Sucessful Deployment of networked hand-held devices workshop at the National College for School Leadership. This was a vibrant meeting with lots of different input and cross-sector talk about the pedagogies of mobile learning. We three had been asked to come along and foster discussion by delivering our cool wall idea. I think it took a while for delegates to ‘get it’ but eventually they did (I think). Out point had been to begin the thinking around the use uses (video, photography, text, search, memo, reflection etc) rather than the kit itself – also, what tool might the learner own that could enable these uses?  A great day (Friday) – really enjoyed it.

Got home as quick as I could because Karen and David were coming up for the weekend. Karen is at TechDis today (Saturday) but Dave and I are shortly going to the pub!

Leeds 2

Cold Turkey.

I’m now at the end of a rock and roll week with only one more day to go before I can put my feet up for a short while [I wrote this on Saturday – I’m now on my ‘feet-up’ day]. I’ve booked myself a day off on Monday [today – yippee] but have already committed to make many phone calls and ‘quick’ replies before it starts again in earnest on Tuesday.

Since Saturday last, Sharon and I have been in Leeds working with a large group of adult learners, here to improve their language, understanding of British culture and ICT. Also see http://eduvel.wordpress.com/2009/11/02/leeds-1/ Through Monday to Wednesday, we were joined by Lilian (@xlearn : www.xlearn.co.uk).

Advanced e-Guides and PDAs
Late on Monday afternoon, I had to leave the group and go to London where I worked with other colleagues to deliver the Advanced PDA/e-Guides course. Sally Betts, Nigel Davies and I worked through the day to deliver this course for the first time. We’d spent Monday night having dinner at a place on Tabernacle Street, just behind the hotel on City Road. Apparently, the restaurant was a member’s club but really – you had to be a member to find it. The only recognition that it existed at all was a small plaque above a buzzer, by the side of an innocuous door. Inside it looked great and the food was good – what we could see of it. The light was so dim, we each had to use our mobile phones (or iTouch in my case) to read the menu. We shared the most wonderful and most green bowl of olives I’ve ever seen.  On Tuesday, we repeated the course again in Birmingham but without the excellent food.

And then it was back to the Europeans.

Back again
It sounded like they had had a great time in Bradford on Tuesday, where they had gone to explore the Pakistani culture living within the British culture. For many, this was the first time they had witnessed women wearing the burkha outside of television news and made them stop and think. They also visited a Mosque and were given a talk about Islamic tradition and culture. The National Media Museum also provided them with a two-hour workshop, where they learned the tips and techniques of television. http://www.nationalmediamuseum.org.uk/ Their enjoyment of this day was reflected in their blogs (read on)…

Lilian had introduced blogs on Wednesday, so my plan on Thursday was for them to continue with blogs for a while and to move back onto their Bonfire Night web quest before lunch.  Which is what we did, but there was such a lot of questions about blogging that many neglected the web quest. Although Blogger is remarkably simple to set up and use (and links directly to all the other iGoogle tools) it was not the best choice within the University.

Techie Stuff
Each room we used represented the interface differently. The Thursday room even had different versions of IE – which the techies told me was impossible. But IE 7 has tabs and prior to that there were no tabs: Our room had a mixture of tabbed IE browsers and non-tabbed! Then some machines needed Flash updating, or Java updating or simply updating. WHY oh why can’t this be done automatically? Why do learners have to suffer because the technology is bollocks? On Friday, Internet Explorer simply would not show the normal Blogger interface. Learners could not ‘add’ pictures or videos because the buttons were simply missing. I eventually got most of them onto Firefox – but then Blogger had updated itself since Thursday (it probably hadn’t, and probably has a slightly different interface for Firefox) and the video button was missing until you went to settings and asked it to revert to the ‘older version’ – which caused huge amusement amongst the older participants (all except two were over forty and many fifty plus – one was 21 on Thursday).

Reflection
It has been the most wonderful, entertaining, wet, though-provoking, funny, rewarding and exhausting experience. The group; from Germany, Turkey, Bulgaria, Latvia, Italy and England have worked together well this week and to say that they had not met each other before last Sunday, they have made remarkable progress.

Outcomes include the sharing of experiences and of each other’s cultures. Both of these were addressed in abundance. It became very clear to everyone that when national boundaries and prejudices are set apart – we are all the same. We share the same concerns and the same pleasures. This has been a wonderful week.

The group had said during their first day (last week) that they wanted to be bloggers – let them tell the story:

(Please note the use of videos, pictures they have edited and pictures made into movies too)

Our blog addresses:

http://leedsexp.blogspot.com Roberto

http://unver64.blogspot.com Fahrettin

http://vonweitzel.blogspot.com/ Christoph

http://eduwholearning.blogspot.com Eduardo

http://jnmarin.blogspot.com Javier

http://guntistravel.blogspot.com/ Guntis

http://secretary-fall-secretary.blogspot.com/ Mairita

http://learningwithpeople.blogspot.com Angus

http://mpwbauhuette.blogspot.com/ Edith

http://annavuerich.blogspot.com Anna

http://leedsandbradfordexperience.blogspot.com/ Gabrielle

http://siegfrieddierl.blogspot.com/ Siegfreied

http://vivianapurina.blogspot.com Viviana

http://cristinadelfabbro.blogspot.com/ Cristina

http://atanurcaglayan.blogspot.com/ Atanur

_________________________________________________________________________________

http://xlearn.co.uk/blogger.html Lilian’s blog

http://sharonsugden.blogspot.com Sharon’s blog

Leeds 1

We’re at the end of what really is day two, but is officially day one now. The Improving Language and Culture with ICT course has started well.

On Thursday, we’d heard that there was to be a right-wing English Defence League rally in Leeds on Saturday with the inevitable opposition rally occurring at the same time. Because our visitors were coming to Leeds to witness and learn more about British culture (and given that the postmen and local refuse collectors were striking anyway) we decided that as the Latvians had arrived a day early, we
would ask them to visit York on Saturday instead of Leeds! This turned out to have been a good plan because the two that did go to York had a brilliant time. The third Latvian went to Bradford and enjoyed herself too – the only problem being that we’re spending a day in Bradford this Tuesday. Never mind.

So that was three participants sorted – but the rest were arriving at various times in the day. Only one, from Germany, was affected and then, only because the police had put a ring around the railway station, that prevented taxis from operating out of there. The poor man had to walk all the way to our hotel, with his luggage, not understanding why there were no taxis!

Sharon and I arrived mid-afternoon.

We first went to Leeds Metropolitan University to drop off all the tools and equipment we will need on Monday through until Friday and then to the Novotel in Leeds, where we had our first meeting today. They knew we were coming today, when we called in last week to check and they knew who we were on yesterday when we came along with all our ‘stuff’ for Sunday (today) – but today (Sunday), they had no idea who we were (but that’s another story and one that a stern voice and no nonsense but polite attitude took five minutes to sort out). Then we arrived at the Ibis, where we are to stay for eight (8!!) days.We’d arranged to meet everyone at 7.00pm for dinner at 7.30pm – at the
Ibis. Which was ok, but fairly confusing because no one had met anyone else. Luckily I have a distinctive visage and was able to attract people from all over Europe to our table. There were fourteen of us for dinner and as it was Halloween (another story), a special menu too. So the meal went ok and the group got on well. Four people were still traveling as we went to bed.

Breakfast was nice and relaxed but the weather had changed. Outside it was pouring down. Torrential rain followed by strong winds was the story of the day. Everyone was drenched by the time we got to the Novotel. We’d planned that everyone would introduce themselves first and then tell us a little more about their countries by means of a newspaper collage. But most of them didn’t bring their newspapers to the Novotel. So we moved on to the ‘what do you think England is, what
do you think the English are, what do you think about English culture’ activity. We were investigating preconceptions and asked the group to mix themselves up to reach a common understanding of ‘England’. This turned out to be a brilliant get-to-know-each-other activity that
highlighted some real stereotyping. The idea is that we re-visit the activity again next Saturday and see how things have (or have not – gulp) changed.

We spent the afternoon at The Armouries (after another stern voice and no nonsense but polite attitude with the taxi company). Now we’re preparing to go out into Leeds for a communal dinner – at La Tasca!

What if …

What if (I’m not on a list)?

This week I’ve looked at Twitter’s new (sic) LIST feature. I’ve created lists and I’ve looked for myself on the lists of others. This could eat away at my basic human insecurity. Why?

Well, lists are not new – I’ve had a Jaiku list on Tweetdeck (and Seesmic until I dumped it) for months. The people on that list are all my old chums from the by now terminally dead Jaiku. They are my original CoP. It gave me comfort to have a list with all my regular mates, colleagues and trusted gurus on it. It’s still there – but more and more these days I read my entire Twitter feed. There is such a variety of thoughts, ideas and fun that it has become difficult to choose which list I would read the most.

Now Twitter has given me the opportunity to create more lists.

Straight away I recreated my Jaiku list, then another called ‘ILT-Mates’ and another called ‘Gurus’. This last list was to be populated with people like @hrheingold and the two professors: Cook and Traxler. Then I thought that Steve Wheeler (@timbuckteeth) should be on the list, and James Clay (@jamesclay) – how could I leave out Lilian (@xlearn), Dave (@davefoord) and Ron (@ronm)? And apart from a few names, ‘Gurus’ turned out to be the same list (almost) as ‘ILT-Mates’. Some people were now on all three lists!

But what if Lisa (@notlob) found herself on ‘Jaiku mates’ and neither of the others? What if other friends didn’t feel comfortable with the ‘Guru’ grouping? Would I lose friends or respect? Luckily, I’ve kept my lists ‘Private’ and will probably never use them but what if they were ‘public’? Would they cause upset or anger? @shrifootring has me on her ‘fun to follow’ list and I am pleased and happy that she has done so – thank you Shri. But Lilian has me on her ‘Public’ mlearn’ list and happy as I am to be there, the little monster inside of me says, “Has she got a ‘private’ friends list?  Am I on it? Am I not good enough to be Lilian’s friend? Has she got a ‘Guru’ list? ???”

Of course I’m not that insecure – but others might be!

Is there a point to ‘lists’? I know there could be – but will there be? Will we be able to eat away from the basic divisiveness of lists?

Leeds

Improving language and culture with ICT.

Tomorrow, Sharon and I will meet most of the sixteen people arriving from all over Europe to take part in this course. Some won’t arrive until very late evening, so we’ll meet those people first thing Sunday morning at breakfast.

The course is taking place in Leeds.

This is a city I’ve hated with a real passion ever since I was dragged there twice a year as a cub-capped, short-trousered boy needing summer, then winter clothes from C&A (do you remember C&A?). I used to find it big, noisy and far too full of shops for comfort; the only good thing about it was the train journey from Huddersfield. Yet things change, and whilst it is still big (too big), noisy and far too full of shops for comfort, my preparations for this course have changed my view of Leeds.

The course was conceived by Khawar Iqbal and she’d asked me to help her deliver it if she won the European funding required to run it. Both Sharon and I have been heavily involved in the planning. Basically, Khawar has done the early people-stuff (recruitment, flight and transfer booking, hotel booking etc.) and Sharon has done the later people-stuff (venue planning, food, goodie finding and purchasing, bag packing, David pushing). I have had the leisure of planning the course around Khawar’s original ideas and with Khawar’s support and input.

And the planning has been a real pleasure. I’ve learned more about Leeds than I ever thought existed. I’ve walked the streets with new eyes. Until September this year, Leeds was still the place of boyhood dread; these days even the train journey was (is) to be dreaded (mainly due to the times I generally have to visit Leeds, the trains are overcrowded for about three hours at each end of the day). But researching the history, the culture and the city itself has opened my eyes to it’s (mmm, lost for a word here – not quite beauty …) Well.

So  we start on Sunday with a full-on day and continue through to Saturday with another full day planned (although the afternoon, like Wednesday is fofo).  We will also visit Bradford to look at culture within culture and part of our historical/cultural research will include Bonfire Night! What is it? Why is it? What does it say about us?

Because I have to help deliver Advanced PDA/e-Guide courses in London and Birmingham this week, the lovely Lilian Soon will be working with the group Monday through until Wednesday – so I know they will be in good hands.

Which reminds me – I plan on reading through the Advanced course today (as well as the Leitch 2006 Report, the Digital Britain Report and another big paper I’ve already lost the will to read), so I’d better go.

Gloucestershire

Yesterday I delivered workshops to 22 people over three sessions.

I’d set out to show how the ‘m’ in m-learning could also mean ‘modern’ and not just mobile. Like others I think that the ‘m’ and the ‘e’ before learning needs to disappear – but not just yet. There is still a lot of work to do before we can truly say that ‘learning’ is all encompassing and includes the use of tools and resources appropriate to that learner (those learners) at that time (24/7) and in (or out of) that place.

We did a little texting early on to show how we could engage learners and then tied this activity to Bloom’s Taxonomy. I notice sometimes, when I introduce this, that shoulders sag and wry smiles are glanced at each other. But no matter – I like to think that I deliver it in a palatable way – I was a chef after all. Having fixed Bloom’s in the minds of my groups, I moved on to show how technology need not be a barrier to the delivery of higher order thinking skills. I did this by means of two simple odd-one-out exercises. The first had an easy answer but the second needed thought and discussion before coming to a conclusion. This works well as it allows the groups to become animated, talking to each other and working out (often wrong) answers. They all see/saw the point I’d tried to make and was able, once more, to tie-in the result into Blooms. (For those who’ve seen this: I’ve replaced Bush with Barak!)

We then went back to texting and to an exercise that required the group to evaluate a piece of Shakespeare (the two morning groups had to do the same with a newspaper article). The activity engaged the group at the higher levels of Blooms and I like to think that they understood that once again, the technology was by no means a barrier to the learning that took place. Hopefully they will realise that THEY are the experts in their teaching rooms and that as such it is their job (their skill) to make the learning as valuable and inclusive as possible. Simple thought and preparation are often enough on the one hand, but on the other, an understanding of the available tools is just as essential.

We addressed the current plethora of tools next by looking at various Web 2.0 facilities. The discussion around Web 2.0 (what it is and what it isn’t and what it might do and what it might not) was valuable and I think that each person took a better understanding of blogs/wikis; Web/Web2.0 away with them. They explored the various sites for around 20 minutes. Videojug and MoleTV were favourites of most vocational tutors with builders and hairdressers becoming quite animated at what they found on these sites. MoleTV was a big winner with the practical trades. Others found online Mind Mapping software useful. No one really looked at Flickr or YouTube, although one or two did investigate Delicious.

During two of the three sessions we were able to discuss how these web sites could be made to address our Blooms pyramid and on the third we looked at individual tool types (video camera, MP3 player etc,) and addressed these in the same way. I’m a big believer in going where the learner needs to go at that time and provided it fits my aims to roll with it. The time exploring Web 2.0 sites was very much an example of this. I’d planned a 15-minute session with 10-minute feedback and identification of pedagogical opportunities but the group were so animated and engaged I allowed them the full 25 minutes to explore. They were discussing use across the room anyway!

I thought that the day was a really useful one, with engaged learners throughout. I had prepared too much (as always) and struggled to fit everything in – in fact on two sessions I stopped well short and on the third, we adjusted the session to fit the room. Sadly, the room did not engender group work, which is what I’d planned. But that’s always a difficulty in colleges: computer rooms are for computering and non-computer rooms are designed for ‘stand and deliver’. We need to make more rooms (spaces?) available that offer the opportunity to blend learning activities. Two or three to a computer is not always a bad thing especially if the activity is well planned.

My room was also very very warm – so to the teacher I met at MoLeNET training last year but whose name I have forgotten ) who loaned me his fan – I must say a hearty ‘thank you’. It was a real life saver. Thank you Gloucestershire College.

MALT Conference

It’s surprising, the things that you miss when you’re blogging – especially from a different country. And it’s not only blogging.

This morning I delivered four workshops at the MALT conference near Dobeles, 50km southwest of Riga. It was supposed to be one workshop, delivered four times under the title of ‘Gadgets and Gizmos’. I thought that calling it ‘m-Learning’ might be a step too far but delivering the basics of ‘m’ was my goal.

I’d set out with a basic plan and built upon that as I passed my time here talking to people and trying out the various services I could access. The first casualty was MMS: For whatever reason, T-Mobile’s partner over here refuses to handle my MMS (and my email via Outlook refuses to ‘send’ replies!). I tried each of the three available carriers – to no avail. I’d asked for ‘Internet’ provision in my workshop and therefore tried out my various connections via the hotel WiFi (which only works in the reception area) and these worked a treat. Upload pictures to Flickr via Wifi? – no problem. Stream video live to QIK? – no problem. However, the problem was (during the conference workshops) that there was no WiFi! There was internet, so I wasn’t completely stuffed, but WiFi has become something we’re beginning to take for granted. I miss it now, in my room where I’m writing this in Word (ready for cutting and pasting into Notepad before cutting and pasting into WordPress) because I’d like to visit a map of the region and add a few links to Dobeles. But never mind.

I’d made my mind up to show the Busbi videos, the Gyro Suite and Mobile Phone functions during my half hour sessions. In the end the Busbis went out the window because there just wasn’t time for the groups (approx 25-30 in each) to split up and play with them. I decided to use the Gyro keyboard and mouse to demonstrate basic interactivity with Word and with PPT. I passed the keyboard around and the filled in interactive boxes in PPT – but it was like a hot potato or a ticking bomb, they couldn’t wait to get rid of it. I decided to keep the mouse to myself and to show drag-n-drop techniques in Word. Both pieces of Office software are underused and it was a pleasure to see the participants discussing the potential.

With the Mobile Phone, we discussed texting (I’d tried to get them to text Lilian’s text wall during session one but there was a reluctance by most so I ditched it – just demonstrating the wall and discussing the potential for use), we discussed photos: I took one of each group and printed it on the Pogo Printer, which impressed them greatly. We discussed video and I showed them a QIK video I’d made the day before. We briefly looked at other functions and the opportunities a modern phone allowed for learning opportunities themselves to become mobile – not just the device. During three of the four workshops I’d demonstrated iPadio and the Spinvox function it now employs. I was quite impressed by the ease with which they got the point.

And then the bell rang. I used an online timer to tell me when 25 minutes were up and each time it rang, the queue outside the door had been there 2-3 minutes already. Hey ho. (Final evening and last day later …)

Latvia

So, now it’s Tuesday.

After another morning of boring meetings on Monday, I escaped to the city again. It really is a nice place, full of interesting old buildings, industrious, happy looking people and it’s clean!  I learned that Riga has apparently been chosen as the European city of culture for 2014 – so book your place now.

Whilst here in Latvia I’ve noticed many things and been told many things about the country’s history and some quite personal stories. Many living Latvians will struggle to remember the last time the country was free of occupation of one sort or another and many will have been brought up to adulthood under a Soviet Regime, but enough parents remembered the free time between the wars to help the country back to its feet after independence in 1991.
History sites:
http://www.balticsworldwide.com/tourist/latvia/history.htm
http://timelines.ws/countries/LATVIA.HTML
http://www.li.lv/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=26&Itemid=449
and finally:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/country_profiles/1108059.stm – notice how Latvian history begins in 1918 for the BBC.

Talking to Latvians I’ve met has informed me of  slightly more personal story. Apparently, Lenin recruited Latvians for his ‘Praetorian Guard’ security team (this would need verifying) as they had the purist of socialist motives and beliefs. This can be contracted with the disdain with which ‘Stalinist’ buildings are regarded here. They make a distinction between what we might call ‘Soviet Bloc’ Blocks and Stalinist Buildings. The Soviet type is more worthy of rescue!

What other things have I noticed?

• Taxi drivers are mad. I mean really mad, not just taxi driver mad. Mine wove in and out of traffic at speed as if he was weaving warp and weft together. (link – http://www.wisegeek.com/what-are-warp-and-weft.htm)
• The traffic lights are the only ones I’ve ever seen outside of England that work like ours. Red; Red + Amber; Green; Amber; Red. The ‘Green Man’ though, still works like the American version where drivers can still enter your crossing at 90 degrees and run you over (see Taxi driving above).
• All staircases are dim at night! The hotel staircases have no lighting at night – but this morning, in full daylight – they had!
• I actually found a Gent’s urinal that had headrests! Why?
• Many of the autumn fields have old fashioned hay stacks – like Monet’s painting.
• Most of the country is flat and the highest point is about 300 metres above sea level.

So there you go. Next post will be the conference (I think)

So, now it’s Tuesday. After another morning of boring meetings on Monday, I escaped to the city again. It really is a nice place. I learned that Riga has apparently been chosen as the European city of culture for 2014 – so book your place now.

http://www.bestriga.com/en/page/expanded/gpart/6/type/articlesnews/object/321

Whilst here in Latvia I’ve noticed many things and been told many things about the country’s history, some quite personal stories. Many living Latvians will struggle to remember the last time the country was free of occupation of one sort or another and many will have been brought up to adulthood under a Soviet Regime, but enough parents remembered the free time between the wars to help the country back to its feet after independence in 1991.

History sites:

http://www.balticsworldwide.com/tourist/latvia/history.htm

http://timelines.ws/countries/LATVIA.HTML

http://www.li.lv/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=26&Itemid=449

and finally:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/country_profiles/1108059.stm – notice how Latvian history begins in 1918 for the BBC.

Talking to Latvians tells other, slightly more personal story. Apparently, Lenin recruited Latvians for his ‘Praetorian Guard’ security team (this would need verifying) as they had the purist of socialist motives and beliefs. This can be contracted with the disdain with which ‘Stalinist’ buildings are regarded here. They make a distinction between what we might call ‘Soviet Bloc’ Blocks and Stalinist Buildings. The Soviet type is more worthy of rescue!

What other things have I noticed?

· Taxi drivers are mad. I mean really mad, not just taxi driver mad. Mine wove in and out of traffic at speed as if he was weaving warp and weft together. (link – http://www.wisegeek.com/what-are-warp-and-weft.htm)

· The traffic lights are the only ones I’ve ever seen outside of England that work like ours. Red; Red + Amber; Green; Amber; Red. The ‘Green Man’ though, still works like the American version where drivers can still enter your crossing at 90degrees.

· All staircases are dim at night! The hotel staircases have no lighting at night – but this morning, in full daylight – they had!

· I actually found a Gent’s urinal that had headrests! Why?

· Many of the autumn fields have old fashioned hay stacks – like Monet’s painting. http://www2.bc.edu/~dohertyp/web_site/images/monet-haystack2.jpg

· Most of the country is flat and the highest point is about 300 metres above sea leve.

So there you go.