1:48am, Monday, 22 July 2007
Novotel 6 of October, Egypt

Note: While I have quite thoroughly documented the events described below, all evidence is currently trapped on my camera. I forgot the necessary (proprietary, ugh) cable at home. I'll come through later and add them.

iEARN so far...

The trek:
Last Wednesday evening, I began my trip with a nice big seat (seriously) that allowed me to sleep pretty well between Toronto and Manchester. I spent the day exploring the centre of Manchester. I had a huge bag with me, so I didn't venture too far from the train station, but it was pretty neat. Expensive though. Thursday night, I got in to Frankfurt, and spent the night neat near yet another train station. I didn't get a chance to catch up with Franziska, but that will be for the trip back.

Finally, Friday afternoon, I made it to Cairo... only to find out that the iEARN conference isn't in Cairo at all. It's in 6th October City, which isn't yet much of a city. Basically, Mubarak Educational City, the venue, is in the middle of the desert--but will soon be surrounded by what seems like it will be quite a large city. We are relatively near the Giza pyramids, though, which is great! I've seen them several times driving to and from Cairo!

The opening:
The conference got started on Saturday, with speeches from the conference chair, the Egyptian Ministry of Education, a rep from the US Embassy, and the British Ambassador himself. The bulk of the day, though, consisted of catching up with old acquaintances and making new connections--including someone from a great Dutch organization, Kenissnet Ict Op School, which drives innovation in Dutch schools, and an amazing radio host/activist from South Africa. iEARN is an excellent conference when it comes to meeting people who are really passionate about leveraging the power of interaction and cultural exchange to impact peoples' lives. And it is a truly global conference--I think there are more than 60 countries represented, but I could well be making that up.

That evening, I went to Khan el-Khalili, a huge market, with some people from the conference, and found some good deals. Unfortunately, Emily missed the fun of opening day--bad weather in London left her stuck for 24 hours in Madrid.

Sunday/Day Two:
Presentation day!
Today, we ran our workshop. We were a bit surprised by a lack of any for of Internet connectivity, but still had a great session for a number of teachers who got really excited about everything TakingITGlobal does--even one teacher from Kenya who has access only once a week is excited about the possibility TIGed creates for exchanges between his students and others around the world. Our participants were all very excited about the upcoming Understanding the Issues update, and the wikis we'll be including as a part of that.

Presentations, however, are only a small part of the iEARN experience. The conference is small--500 or 600 participants, and there are very few presentations slots--quite a bit of plenary time, and many, many social activities. We've had a chance, during this social time, to meet quite a few teachers who are excited about TIGed, and many who will be inspiring additions to the collections of best practices we've published that will soon be on the web.

Tonight, I went back to the Khan with Emily, so she could experience the bargaining in its full glory. Now it's time for sleep--we have another full day tomorrow, and need to find some time to get ready for our second presentation, on Tuesday, to the Youth Summit.

(As I said--pics to come later!)