proposal how to spend 15-18.11.2007

You joined AIESEc this Autumn?
You dont know what to do between 15th and 18th of November???
Come to Sofia

How far is it to Tallinn?

There is a Russian joke about two Estonians traveling on a train (Privet, Denis!)... I will not tell it here, since it is highly culturally insensitive :), but still what I wanted to start with is that I arrived here with my mindsets of people being slowly, three similar countries, people not too passionate and energetic. And my worldvview was challenged to the maximum.

I am now sitting in the middle of Tallinn in the most beautiful MC office I have ever seen in my life (Sorry, AIESEC Turkey, but your office needs a lot of cleaning :)).

I spent 5 days here on a country visit with people who challenged my perspective about AIESEC and how can AIESEC look like and what AIESEC can be to a full extent. Estonians are people for whom innovation and being the first to do something is extremely important. AIESEC in Estonia is a youth organization who is supported by the government and has an amazing office that even has a sauna right in the middle of the ols town of Tallinn.
On my first night Inna was challenging me with questions - why you don't have a mentor? Mentor is someone different than just a good friend. Mentor is not someone who is necessarily a good friend...

Than Marjam amazed me with what a balanced life she has, how mature and deep person she is, how she can handle even the most frustrating situation... I truly started believing that there is a balance between AIESEC and life.

And than today was my last night with the MC - we had a very spontaneous, but still ver ynice dinner, gossiping and talking about our future, making plans and laughing.

AIESEC Estonia can be a role model country how to stay relevant in a fast changing highly competitive environment. And you know how to do it, girls :).

To all of you out there I wish you could live the experience of discovering new country and new people every week.

Hugs from Tallinn, on the way to Riga,
Ira

Experiencing the Baltics - Live from Energy

After almost getting arrested in Lithuania, 5 days in Latvia I arrived to Tartu - a city in Estonia, to participate in Baltic Energy - a conference that gathers all people from the Baltic region to experience and learn together.

I just wanted to share the energy with you! It is extremely exciting to see all those newies, oldies, OCPs, EBs, MCs...
And this is to share with you the unbelievable energy I found here:


Heading for Tallinn in a few hours and two more country visits to go...

Oh, yes, I had my "panic moment" after yesterday night I realized that the CD with all my materials for the country visits is missing. Thank you Marjam for saving my life :) and two country visits.

It has been an amazing experience so far, that only words can't describe. I just wish you to be waking up each morning and realize what a meaningful job you have.

Hugs from Tartu,
Ira

Ivan's experiences - My first Cyrillic experience, Bulgaria

Your Director's first post to this blog :), so enjoy reading and check his map to see whether he is coming to your country!

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Getting there

Bulgaria was my destination, so it started at 3 something in the AI office in Rotterdam, I left by train to the Schipol airport because at 6:00 p.m. I had to catch a flight to Budapest, where afterwards I had to catch another flight to Sofia, where afterwards I had to catch a cab together with Ivo, president of AIESEC in Bulgaria who went to pick me up at 2 in the morning and afterwards we had to take a minibus to the bus station where I had to take a bus that was taking me to the venue where the EnterCEE conference was held and organized by the LC Vieliko Turnovo, so basically traveling by all this means of transportation took me almost 20 hours and I made it!

EnterCEE Conference

I arrived to the conference where almost 50 AIESECers from CEE where training themselves and committing with their local projects to this regional initiative that can be the biggest and more impactful in the AIESEC network! (no pressure :)). There, on a beautiful hill almost in the middle of this Balkan nation I had the honor to work and share with the conference team, Cebollita, Gulsen, Woytek, Anula (who left before I arrived) Tina, Geri and Vlada, the Chair. These guys really made an awesome job and they had the best support, energetic, open, smart and passionate CEEtizens making the most of the conference.

Then after the conference we went sightseeing a little bit in Troyan just for ½ hour, enough time to see the colourful downtown and took another bus to Sofia, some hours of good sleep and nice conversations and the capital of Bulgaria receive us with a soft rain, then we take some cabs to Studensky (this is the way it sounds in my head) and close another day.

Stay in Sofia and other adventures

Then for the following days I had to accomplish several things: 1. Train my GN board for their country visits. Done! And they already started them, a full day of training and discussions and going trough several documents that we expect are valuable for our countries. 2. Social time with my GN board. Done! Excellent Bulgarian wine and cool conversation about past, present and future. 3. Buy my backpack for country visits. Done! Now it will visit 11 countries with me in the following 2,5 months. 4. Get my Ukrainian visa. DONE!!! Thank you Ira for the translation and all the lobby you had to make. 5. Spend some time with Bulgarian MC and MCP. Done! We went for a good dinner where I tried a kind of cake made of potato and vegetables and then went to “the apartment” great place to visit in Sofia!. Also went with Ivo for a walk/chat over the night, very useful indeed. 6. Deliver the ER training. Done! Feedback to some proposals, revision of budget, pricing, sales practices… nice way to get started.

I also did some sightseeing, I saw the Saint Sofia statue, visited the old university, the Alexander Nevsky cathedral and in general enjoyed the view of the city including girls on skirts, Bulgarians love skirts and I love girls wearing skirts :). Go skirts.

At the end, as always, everything good has an end, so my visit in Bulgaria was over. The Bulgarian MC gave some presents and showed me the hospitality and gratefulness of that AIESEC country that has started the growth path and will beat the historical exchange record this year :) (cool country to look and learn guys), I run out of the office that has one of the most impressing views of any AIESEC office I have seen (right in from of the parlamient), I forgot to take my ticket! So Geri had to catch a cab and take it to the airport but at the end everything was alright, the first of my 11 eleven CEE countries was behind and I was in my way to Rotterdam, to pack and head to Lithuania, the land of the beautiful ladies.

Expanding?!

Yesterday we made presentation for people who can create a new LC - It was amazing eXPerience for few reasons:
1 - Showing movie from IC in Germany - date about AIESEC in this movie - over 80 countries, over 18 000 students
Currently, just 3 years after - over 100 countries, over 30 000 students - great isnt it?
Still what will be the growth our term will contribute to?!
2 - Why there is no AIESEC in Belarus?! Why there are still countries without AIESEC if there are people there willing to be our members...
3 - Contact with people, reminding yourself of your first step in organization, first projects and tasks that at that point of time were impossible for you, now seeming to be so easy... do you always have this passion? Do you have it for every small activity you are doing? If not why do you do these things?
4 - happening right now, today - out of 15 people at presentation we have already 4 appying to AIESEC wohooo!

Together with first people interested in establishing new LC

CEE Newsletter

GN and Gloabl updates, opportunities and more!

The last CEE Newsletter is HERE.

Enjoy reading :)!

Wondering where Ivan is going?

To my team

No matter where you are :)

what do u do between 16 and 17.10.2007?

http://www.standagainstpoverty.org/

CEE Shouts at EuroCo

Ivan's favourite :)



The oldest and at the same time the newest CEE song...



And last but not the least... WENA and CEE shouts together.


Speaking about WENA and CEE together, Ivan and Rob have decided to demonstrate even physically the synergies between the two GNs.

Live from EuroCo 07 in Lithuania

Is school useful?

How often do you complain that ur study is not sth u can really aling with ur personal goals?
Today I realized I do love my studies...
why?
1) I have e-learning courses- I can study while being in Bulgaria, I can study with people from all over the world; exchange opinions, share experience- amazing, trully virtual platform;-)
2) I have demandind tutors that challenge me, expect me to research and learn, I think that I have to spend much more time on this e-learning that I used to for "normal" classes...
Still one of the subjects I attend is Transformation of CEE :-) Have you ever asked yourself any of these questions?
Frankly speaking I don't but I'm happy I was asked them now!
I enjoy my studies :-)

1. Please discuss the influence of socialist regime and central planning for the today situation in CEEC addressing positive and negative aspects (you may refer to CEE as a region or choose only one country).
2. Please analyze the main challenges for CEE region in the globalized world (you may focus on one/ several countries or one/ several aspects).
3. What would you change in the CEEC transition agenda as a reform expert? Please assume it is 1990 and you have already the experience of the transition results as presented over the course?
4. Which country/ countries would you consider the best example of transition in CEE? Why? Please give arguments for your choice?
5. Which country/ countries would you consider the worse example of transition in CEE? Why? Please give arguments for your choice?
6. How would you assess the EU enlargement of 2004 from the perspective of CEE new member states? What problems/ challenges and benefits would the new members face?
7. How would you use the experience of transition in CEEC for the changes in China? What scenario of changes is possible in China? How would the Chinese agenda differ from the CEEC experience?

I&I updates : Updates from the ONLY conference in AIESEC which reunites the LCPs of the strongest GNs in AIESEC.

Yes, Irina and Irina are at EuroCo :).
Which means that Ira made it to Vilnius after a 14 hour journey (this is a seperate story catch me during country visits) and Iritzi and Ivan has already been here for some time.

Following are Iritzi's thoughts (pictures will follow later).

Hugs from the other Irina :)

Iritzi's random thoughts from EuroCo

Updates from the ONLY conference in AIESEC which reunites the LCPs of the strongest GNs in AIESEC.

Yeap - it is a conference with a lot of Ps - MCPs, LCPs, OCPs - everybody here has a P somewhere ...

- I have never seen a group of AIESECers bonding and connecting to each other so fast!!! Never have I seen AIESECers doing such intense netoworking from Day 1 of a conference ( and I have been to 2 ICs!) Never have I seen a bunch of people enjoying each others' comapany so much!!!

- we are so lucky to have a truly unique chair - Caro was MCP of Switzerland for 2 terms, aaaannnd - she even attended the ancient version of EuroCO - WeastCo ( from the times when we had Weast and Meds, not CEE and WENA )

- Things seem to flow and to come so naturally - most of the facis were/ are MCPs ( at least once) - and all the delegates have seen several conferences - so things come so naturally. I mean really - when they enterned the opening plenay - it seemed like the entire room was on fire instantly:D

- today is day 1 - we started with the home groups

- Ira - please please hurry up and get here - everybody is trying to talk to me about ER!!! They are obviously confusing me - soooooooo, ER seems to be pretty popular around here since so many people are looking for you

- Ivan and Rob are here - they did their sexy AI dance in the morning plenary today; Ivan helped us out with the coreography of the faci dance - veeeeeeeeeery sensual. Not just sexy - coulumbian-wise sexy ( man, you guys should see these)

- Australia is in the house!!!! we have 1 LCP from the other end of the earth attending EuroCo!

- during GN time, CEE gets to stay in the plenary - cause like always CEE LCPs are more than WENA LCPs - WE ROCK!!!

- I feel truly blessed to be here - I am the only person in the faci team who was not MCP, not even LCP - I am so lucky to be here and to be witnessing EuroCo - it's not a conference - it's a phenomenon! I am really considering running for any of these 2 positions next year :) - and this coming out of me only after 1 day of conference - gives a total different view of what our product leadership is all about! It is first and foremost about THESE PEOPLE!

- Lithuania...Vilnius - truly beautiful - yesterday after global village ( which was inside a shopping mall) we got to walk through Vilnius to reach the site of the opening ceremony. One colour to describe Lithuania so far: greeeeeeeeeeeeeeen. So many forests.

3 Words to describe my EuroCO XP so far: Explosive. Private. Friendships

Stay tuned!

EnterCEE conference impressions - all zipped in 4 minutes

This is an e-mail Vlada, the MCP of Serbia and chair of the EnterCEE conference last weekend, sent to us today.
Feels good :). Thank you Vlada for everything!
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Hello CEEtizens,

I just wanted to share with you couple of impressions as being a chair of Enter CEE conference in Bulgaria last week.

First about the OC and AIESEC Bulgaria - amazing humble people with aim to serve as best as possible to everyone.I really enjoyed time spent with them. They made the conference very pleasant and unforgettable. Thank you AIESEC in Bulgaria and AIESEC Veliko Trnovo for all the effort. You were great!

Geri and E-drive team (faci team) - Geri did great preparation of conference and faci
team as well. It was really smooth to work with them. E- drive team is a group of special people. If I should choose 2 words to describe them that would be smart and cheerful.
They were so eager to deliver great conference but not only that! They spend so many late hours before and after the conference trying to find a way to make program as successful as possible and their support as E-drive team to participating LCs and countries as useful as possible. I was so impressed and amazed. I salute you guys!

Delegates - coming from so different backgrounds and with different experience it was a real excitement and sometimes challenge for facis and me to deal with that fact. They were all interested in content and wanted to learn as much as possible and have fun as well. I met so many interesting delegates that are really passionate about Entrepreneuralship and their projects - it was so nice to talk with them and seeing them putting effort during sessions.

Ivan - your presence there was really good for all. Having you there gave to conference a special flavour that neither OC, facis or I could give. Even being sick and taking all those horrible pills you made it ;) Thank you for the inspiration and showing all of us a big picture.

Last but not least about the program - this was a great learning experience for me - both personal as being a chair and learning about the EnterCEE program and gaining deeper understanding of the program and our GN. I realized that we can make it happen. We can make this program successful. We can make it more relevant to external environment.
We can make it a great platform for our members.

We just need some more faith and effort to do it. I think we are so close, so close like one step away. Just by learning little bit from similar initiatives from Ibero America, AP and Africa GNs we can make it a solid and strong program with great impact. I think that we should to do what
other GNs are quite good at - making additional effort and looking out of their countries!

What is there that may happen for whole GN! How we can make a f...g great program on GN level that will rock not the house but the whole GN! :) Just by making this aditional step towards unity for common good we can do it.

Please excuse that I dared to take this role of commenting the program and giving my personal observations about the GN, program and our attitude. I hope that after "investing" more than 7 days of my term into this program by being a chair of EnterCEE conference (which was great pleasure and honour)

I felt like you will allow me to do this.

Thank you for reading this thoughts of mine :)

Zdravo

Vlada

I sometimes wonder whether we realli think so or it is just empty sentence. The more eXPerience and knowledge you have, the more importance this sentence becomes to you?Induction period is coming, lot's of the conferences taking place, so if you think you have sth to share with others take your chance and apply as faci.
My last conference - EnterCEE was really amazing. I hope participants learnt at least as much as me. I increased my self- awareness, ability to cooperate with different people, public speaking etc.
Morover, my network of contacts increased again. I feel that now I can undoubtedly say that CEE is my playground.
Anula, Geri, Gulsen, MarTina, Wojtek and Vlada ;-) Thank you for this XP, cannot wait to meet and work with you again.
Just to share with you my feelings...
Enjoy the Faci Roll Call

And | or feel our happiness and pride at the end of the conference :-)

Enter... CEE...

Sometimes things happen for a reason or the adventures of a CEE ER

I always say that things happen for a reason...

After a great week in Macedonia, a weekend with family and two nights with two of my amazing teammates (Ivan and Geri :)) in Sofia, it was time for EuroCo and Baltics country visits.

Well, this is how I thought about it. AirBaltics had another opinion about that. Having a super-complicated plan of getting there through Istanbul, I arrived again to the amazing place between Asia and Europe, met Mehmet and the other amazed MC members :) and in the morning happily went to the airport, just to find out that there was a problem with the payment of my ticket and I couldn't fly.

So I ended up working for 2 days from Istanbul until 7th when luckily I will be able to fly to Lithuania after all :). But at the end of the day it turned out to be an amazing day - I met with Orcun who is soon to start his internship in Bridgestone in Paris, as well as saw Candost, the President of AIESEC Turkey live on the national TV (CNBC Channel), talking about AIESEC and opportunities. Here are some pictures :)

The happy MC, waiting for Candost appearance on TV

And Candost himself :)

And this is the my travel map :) Thanks Ivan for the idea :)

Hugs from Istanbul and see you soon around,
Ira

EnterCEE spirit

What are your connections when you see/ hear EnterCEE?
I bet you think of CEE spirit don't you?
Do you remember dicussion about CEEtizen - what it means for us, what are the differences and similarities between the countries.
Having almost all the CEE countries in one place, obviously we had to scream some of our shouts

as well as we came up with some new, especally for EnterCEE:-)

So I bet you don't have doubts anymore about CEE spirit:]

EnterCEE number 1!

How was your weekend?
For some people from CEE it was amazing! I think I will keep on posting about it for the whole week or more.
Why?
Cause during previous weekend EnterCEE conference took place in Bulgaria! Hopefully delegates have at least such amazing time as I had. Being part of Faci team. I wish I had opportunity to meet E-Drive team again. People so passionate, enthusiastic and knowledgeable. People with whom you can overcome the biggest obstacles and you really believe you are here to make a difference in CEE and to achieve results!!!
I wish I had opportunity to meet again delegates- people able to grow during such period of time, people able to leave their comfort zone in order to learn more, to know more, to improve themselves.
Now sitting in the MC office it's hard to focus only on MC duties, EnterCEE became such an obvious part of me that my only focus is how to make day longer in order to have more time for EnterCEE ;-).
Hopefully Picassa and You Tube will let me put some videos and pictures here soon :-)