US Ambassador visits CARD

Details

Published Date

CARD was pleased to host Matthew Bryza, the American Ambassador to Azerbaijan on 4th May 2011 as part of his tour of the regions in recognition of PeaceCorps 50th Anniversary.

Vivian McIngvale, CARD's PeaceCorps volunteer showed the Ambassador her Cooking for Business training that she is providing at CARD to SOS mothers.

Above: Vivian (pictured 6th from left), with Matthew Bryza (4th from right), SOS mothers and SOS staff

Vivian and her students were able to show the Ambassador the 'pirosjki' they were cooking, some with traditional Azeri/Russian filling and some with an American influence.

Everyone was in agreement how delicious they tasted and the numerous visitors and film crews as part of the entourage quickly gobbled them up!

Sevil, Vivian, Matthew Bryza & Neil in the Cooking Class

Matthew also had time for a whistlestop tour of CARD's centre with Neil and Sevil, including meeting all the teachers and seeing the classes in operation. Pictures below.

. Matthew Bryza in Gunay's Computer Class with Sevil

Matthew meets with CARD student Shebnem in the English Class

Meeting with Sultan and his students in the Carpentry Class

Meeting with Isa, CARD's Carpet Making teacher

TISA Visits CARD

Details

Published Date

We were delighted to host in Ganja a team of 13 Azerbaijani & international students plus 3 teachers from The International School of Azerbaijan (TISA) in Baku. The visit was the culmination of months of planning and hard work by staff: introducing CARD’s activities to the students, linking our work with the Community & Service student programme at TISA, whilst TISA students prepared for the visit through various fundraising activities, the money raised going towards a much needed new fridge for the Cooking Class and one year high speed internet connection for the Computer Class. In addition students collected over 100 pairs of shoes to donate to the Psychiatric Hospital patients & several packets of baby milk for the Babies Home.

It was wonderful to watch friendships establish between kids from very different backgrounds as they got to know each other.

The weekend began with a Pizza party & get to know each other games lead by the TISA students. CARD students then gave their guests a tour around the Vocational Centre. On Saturday morning the students had a visit to the Babies Home and the Psychiatric Hospital in Ganja, whilst some played with the babies & young children, tidied up the garden & planted some flowers, others participated in a music and dance class at the hospital. After lunch everyone went to the mountains. Armed with rubber gloves and big plastic sacks the students cleaned the picnic site, and collected several bags of rubbish.. After that every one played games, chatted and watched the fire on which large amounts of chicken legs where prepared by our Carpentry Teacher Sultan.

Next day the whole group went to the Olympic complex in Ganja, to play soccer, basketball and several interactive team games until lunchtime when the Baku team had to board the bus, to catch their train home. Everyone had a great time, practicing their English and having the chance to interact with students from a totally different background.  A big thanks to all who came from TISA & helped to make the weekend such a big success. We hope that we can repeat this event in the future.

Creative Writing Olympics

Details

Published Date

CARD was very pleased to have 4 students from Shahnaz’s English Class recently participate in the Peace Corps of Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Armenia’s Creative Writing Olympics. CARD’s own Peace Corps Volunteer, Vivian McIngvale staged the competition at CARD giving all English language students the opportunity to express their creativity through their writing. Essays written included ‘If you could change one thing about the world, what would it be and why?’ and ‘If you could live anywhere else beside your country where would it be?’.

The Peace Corps presented each student pictured right with a certificate for their participation and creative work. Many other students became interested while watching the process and we think that next year more students will take the opportunity to participate.

Read an essay below:

<<essays to follow>>