Off my trolley?

In the coffee break before the final session, I was chatting with a delegate from Estonia about her bother, who is a footballer in England. I didn't realise at the time but her brother is actually Mart Poom the former Derby and Arsenal goalkeeper, who has played over 100 times for his country.

The conference closed with the normal thanking everybody etc. I know it needs to be done but.... Next years conference is in Paris - could be worth a paper?

We were driven back to Riga via Livani and Cesis, both of which were very interesting. I arrived back in Riga at about 11pm and fulfilled a life ambition (well kind of) by travelling on a trolley bus, which seems to be the main form of public transport in Riga.

Dancing Latgalian style

Day three of the conference and there was a very interesting presentation in the e-learning strand by Peter Purg. He talked about time as a resource ans students perception of the workload being dependant on how engaged they were. More to come on this. There was also an interesting presentation by Janis Kaperniks on 'just in time' learning using mobile phones.

The evening meal was very pleasant and then we were told we would be enjoying something typically Latgalian. Largale is a distinct region of Latvia which has had different influences over the years and has quite a distinct local dialect. We were encouraged to move to the next room where a band was set up to play. We were then lined up and spent the rest of the evening doing increasingly complicated Latgalian folk dances. The more complicated they were, the faster the band seemed to play and the more mistakes we made but that was all part of the fun - I think.

E-learning by the people, for the people, of the people

Today was the reason I was at the conference, to present as part of the e-learning strand. E-learning was new to the conference this year and had two sessions with eight paper presented. My topic was "E-learning by the people, for the people, of the people" about developing an e-learning community of practice. There was a fair bit of discussion afterwards and I was surprised that by presenting I had become a member of the Baltic and Black Sea Circle Consortium and formally given my membership card.

The musical entertainment in the evening this time was a very good solo violinist. However, after the meal the Estonian group sang some impromptu Estonian folk songs, which sparked off a number of other groups so we had Finish, Latvian, Lithuanian and Hungarian folk singing. No British signing obviously!

I was invited back to the cabin in the woods again. This time we got completely lost heading straight for those boarder guards. Worryingly, I was the only one who had any idea where to go and was thus made the guide!!

Still alive!

I'm still here - I survived my experience on the Lativian roads. A bit rough in places and a few hairy moments but it was OK. We arrived at the conference just as the keynote was starting. Atis said he'd planned it to avoid wasting time :-) The Conference is a little out my my normal area but as the keynotes progressed I realised that a lot of what we are trying to do at Swansea in building a community of practice and the follow up from the benchmarking, fit well with the concept of making things sustainable - in all senses of the word.

After the keynotes we had dinner followed by a recital by a local opera singer, who also sang some very impressive jazz.

Although I had booked into the conference hotel my colleagues from Riga Technical University told me that they had decided to rent a small house by a lake. The invited me to spend the evening there with them. What they had actually rented was a house in a former complex for Latvia Communist party apparatchiks deep in the woods near the Belarus boarder. Before we left Atis said I should take my passport with me as one wrong turn in the woods and we would come up against Belarusian border guards and that would be something we didn't want to do.
They complex was actually very nice, as you would expect for party bosses although the two rows of fencing each with an imposing set of gates was a little unnerving.

First Day at work!

First day of work. Met some of the team and was given a guided tour of the Distance Education Study Centre. Down in the basement is a recording studio, complete with Cubase, a hardware controller, a Roland piano and some very nice Latvian made valve mics. I wonder if I'll get a chance to have a play? I have a lovely view from where I'm typing this in as in Soviet times there were weapons in the room, so they needed a clear shot.

Travelling to Daugavpils this afternoon for the Conference. According to the Rough Guide, the death toll on Latvian roads is terrible. Will I get to post again?

Hello! This is Riga calling. Here are the votes of the latvian jury....

Arrived after a good flight, came out of departures and looked for Atis, who was meeting me. Hmm... no Atis and I only have his Skype and email but no mobile. OK I'll wait for a bit no panic. 20 minutes later – no Atis. Later still and all the other passengers have now left the building – no Atis. OK what am I going to do. I'll wait another 30 minutes, then catch the bus to the city centre and try and try and find where I'm going to be staying. Success 15 minutes later Atis arrives. Latvia is now part of the Schengen agreement and Atis was waiting at the main terminal. Only visitors from 'dubious' countries get sent to the terminal I was at. As we drove the short drive to the city centre I had very similar feelings to those I had arriving in Warsaw for the first time 10 years ago. There are clearly many differences between Latvia and Poland, not least the language, but the Soviets certainly left a mark on the architecture.

The room is OK basic but OK and about a quarter of the price of the hotel over the road.

It's also very close to the Distance Education Study Centre and a large supermarket.

Got some strange looks as I zigzagged around the supermarket trying to work out what things were. I can't remember any of the Latvian I tried to learn. All that comes into my head is Polish and that's not much help in Riga. It might be more useful in Daugavpils, where there is a sizeable Polish speaking minority. A bit like Slough then :-)