HOTEL ENKELANA POGRADEC CONFERENCE

13 JUNE 2010 HOTEL ENKELANA POGRADEC CONFERENCE
A very early furgon - minibus - got me to Hotel Enkelana, Pogradec, shortly after 8.00a.m. yesterday morning. The Girl's Leadership Conference had begun at 4.00p.m. on Friday. More than 40 girls, mostly in their final school year and from all over Albania, plus Peace Corps. Volunteers attended.

The morning opened with a talk from a former Supreme Court Justice who is now a University Lecturer; I met her afterwards and she spoke English quite well. Then, Lauren Ready, a Volunteer and I presented a 40 minute 'Rotating Break-Out Session' on Trafficking/Violence. This was very well received and we repeated it three times which took the morning! Following lunch, I was free until 6.00p.m. when we met in the full group for what was listed as Current Women Leaders Panel. There were four of us plus my interpreter. I was placed beside Elena, the woman that has an organisation in Pogradec, called "One Woman" and runs a helpline in relation to domestic violence. Each of us gave a 10-15 minute presentation of our 'organisation'. This was a great opportunity - Good Shepherd structure and geographical spread plus our main focus. Ours was received with great interest and in the question time that followed most of the questions came my way. A question about what we do for the women, opened up the whole area of preventive work with women and the Hands of Hope Project for HIV/AIDS in Thailand. Luckily, I had a few of the silk butterflies and cards with me and they were viewed with much interest later over dinner. I had been invited to stay overnight and got an early furgon back this morning. Our contact with the Peace Corps. will be ongoing.

Now I will prepare for Tirana tomorrow. I have a very early exit from Imelda's for the 6.10a.m. plane to Rome on Tuesday en route to Belfast. I hope to blog a little for a few weeks at least.

Au revoir and God bless!