The Busyness of PST...

Time has been flying by! Last weekend (the 25th) we had our time change so it's now pitch black by 6:30pm. This makes doing anything after our afternoon sessions almost impossible as we need to be home/in our small communities (all of the trainees are in small communities around Sumgayit) by dark. The weather has definitely cooled down during the past couple of weeks – to the point where it's warmer outside in the sun than it is in our school where we have language class. We've still been having language classes every morning from 9am – 1pm, but we've become much busier with CED sessions and projects, which usually take place in the afternoon. A few weeks ago we were divided into groups of two or three and last week we had to present Peer Seminars. This was both a chance for us to learn from each other and for our program manager to observe us (many volunteers will end up doing some sort of training at their permanent site assignment). So each group had to give a 45 minute presentation on topics such as Marketing, Customer Service, Writing a Business Plan, Motivation & Evaluation, etc. My group had been assigned Marketing and it was a pretty straightforward topic. We reviewed the 4 (well, my group made it 5) P's of Marketing and had lots of examples and case studies, so hopefully we made it fun while still trying to relate it to the potential assignments that we may face during our time here in Azerbaijan.

As I mentioned during my last post, we have started our CED Practicum. I, along with two others, am spending some time at a micro-credit organization located in Sumgayit. We've learned about the customers they have (IDP's (internally displaced persons) and those with low-income), how they process loans, how they work with their headquarters office in Baku (they are one of 11 regional offices throughout Azerbaijan), how their customers make payments and a lot more. It's been very interesting and educational as we'll all soon be going out to the regions and become a part of a local organization. So while very few of us will actually be working with a micro-finance/micro-credit organization, it's definitely beneficial to see an Azerbaijani work environment. We still need our translator (one of the LCF's goes with us each time) but as the days go by I'm beginning to understand more and more.

We also had a language test the week before last – okay, I guess it wasn't really a test; the Peace Corps calls it a Language Proficiency Interview. Someone came and interviewed each of us in Azerbaijani and essentially graded our speaking. I had to introduce myself, talk about my family(both here in Azerbaijan and at home in America), say how long I've been in Azerbaijan, what I like about it, what meals and fruits and vegetables I like, etc. I did just fine, although I did learn a few new words in the process. Then we have another one of these at the very end of our training.

Lastly, early last week I had my site placement interview with my program manager. All of the CED trainees had one and it was a chance for our program manager to get to know us a little bit more in a one on one setting – he saw our resumes before we even arrived in the country and has had some time to observe us but not much conversation time about our skills and experiences. So we talked briefly about what I have done and also about any preferences that I have about my work site. Honestly, I don't have any preferences. The only thing that I expressed is that I would like a strong organization who would like me there for the majority of my time – I would prefer that over an organization who only wants me 20 – 30% of my time. And if everything else is equal I would prefer to be in a colder environment, but really it doesn't matter. I'm flexible. I don't have anything specific in mind; he knows the country and organizations much better than me and can probably place me much better than I could myself. As I told one of my friends – I know what I've done successfully in the past, but I don't know what I could be successful at in the future. So I don't want to limit myself, for example, to just the banking industry because I've done that before. I think that by the end of our meeting he had a good idea of where to place me, but nothing's definite until later this week. I think because of my flexibility I'm more likely to be one of the later ones placed. This must be an extremely stressful and busy two weeks for him.

Commencing countdown to November 5th (the day site placements are announced)!