It has been a pretty busy week….well, a moderately
busy week…..well, not really that busy at all.
On my first trip here in 2010, I trained five days a
week, 6 hours a day. That is normal.
On my second trip in 2011, accompanied by Nancy, I
trained only in the afternoons. That was
great, as it left us time to explore each morning.
On this trip, the bank has long decided that they
cannot afford to pull people out of the branches for training during the
day. So, all training is now done in the
evening, starting at 6:30. And, bank
security has declared that training must end by 8:30 so that all employees are
out of the building by 9:00. So,
effectively, I am reduced to 2 hours of training a day.
Then, there is this thing I call Armenian Time. It is not quite as bad as Hanoi Time, but it
does mean that 6:30 training starts at 6:45.
And the 5-minute break is actually 15 minutes.
This sounds fun and like an easy work gig…but I have
made commitments on what will be covered.
So the sessions are fast-paced, never go according to plan, and leave me
pretty much mentally wrecked by 8:30.
But, the hourly pay is damn good.
I found out yesterday that Bankworld has signed a
new 4-year training agreement with this bank. The bank has also asked me for a
list of courses I can teach, as they want me back. That made me feel really useful and welcome,
and I would be delighted to return to Armenia as often as possible. Hopefully there will be more lead time so
other family members can join me.
So, other than rewriting the training every day, how
have I been spending all of this free time?
Wandering.
Eating. People watching. Enjoying.
I have found several more caches…one in a park where
many noted Armenian writers are buried, one near the main post office, and one
in an abandoned amusement park (more on that in a minute). I have two more to reasonably find…whether or
not I do, they bring me to areas I may not have otherwise seen in detail.
I have revisited places Nancy and I visited when she
accompanied me here in 2011….El Café, Jazzve, the Pixie supermarket, pizza
diavola at the hotel, and many more.
Fond memories, all. Not to ignore
the new places.
One of the deputy chairmen of the bank asked me a
few days ago what I thought of Yerevan since the last visit, and I wasn’t quite
sure. There is much new construction,
mainly of high-rise office buildings but also some apartment complexes. Unfortunately, there is also too much
neglected infrastructure – crumbling concrete walkways, metal roofs too rusted
to be much protection, etc. I also think
I see more beggars in the streets, and more elderly people who spend their days
wandering. The upscale stores have a lot
of traffic but few sales…but the restaurants and informal stores are
packed. It is definitely a dichotomy.
I truly love this city. Even today, rainy and the first bad weather
day since my arrival, it was enjoyable to spend 3 hours wandering the main
open-air market watching people, transactions, and the flow of society on a
weekend.
Anyway, yesterday was a most wonderful day. My hosts (and good friends) took me on a
13-hour drive to Tatev, a famous monastery in the SE portion of the country (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tatev_monastery). My previous post herein gave a link to the
photos from that trip. But, nothing in
the photos can compare to what we actually saw that day. The next time I am here, my friends want to
take me to Ngorno Karabach, the Armenian region that is also claimed by
Azerbaijan and which is a main source of dispute in their 17-year war. They have seen photos of the NC mountains
where we currently live, and say that NK is very similar to that. I very much look forward to that opportunity.
Time to reread the training I have planned for
tomorrow and make possible adjustments.
Thanks for reading and listening to my random thoughts.
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