2017 has been a hectic year with a lot of travelling for work to many new destinations.
The year started of by visiting Eritrea. I was amazed by the beauty of Asmara where the Italian feel is still present through the buildings and old cars. Further away from the capital city, camels made me feel relaxed through their way of walking and friendly eyes. In Keren I had my first traditional coffee ceremony ever and it tasted good!
More Italian food and architecture was discovered in Italy, Rome where I traveled to for about six times to work on training of trainers, leadership and creative writing with staff from a big agricultural organisation.
Another European country visited two times was Switzerland, where I had the chance to facilitate workshops in beautiful natural surroundings. The first visit was in Chateau-Bérard, where we stayed in a very pretty monastery to work on team building. The second visit was to Mount Saleve where I worked with 20 people in a very tiny cosy mountain hut on team building. It was really awesome!
Last but not least I went to the city of Belgrade where we trained in the Art hotel in the middle of the shopping heart of town. Not far from a beautiful fortress, with an astonishing view on the river. A very nice walk after the training on Human Resource Management. My love visited me for a couple of days as well.
Well the real last but not least was a personal short holiday to Spain, where I hiked in the mountains of the Alpajurra and the Sierra Nevada. It was very pretty and I discovered a lot about myself as well.
During the summer I had the occasion to go to Benin for a very nice mission to observe a process of selection projects by youth. I was impressed by the creativity of some of them. And was lucky to be able to go to my second home country Togo, to visit my mother in law and assist my love in guiding a group of schoolkids from the Netherlands (see more here here).
Staying on the African continent but in another month I went to Senegal to evaluate a project. I discovered the Snake Island during my day off and enjoyed the ocean breeze in the evenings to cool off. Sheep were all over the place, indicating that the important Tabaski was approaching.
Adventurous might not be the right word to describe my trip to Palestine. Beautiful environment, difficult life for people. I was touched by the beauty of Ramalah where people thought me and my colleagues were local ladies. I loved the food and the lemon juice. Before heading back we made a short trip to Jerusalem as well and were treated like bad people at the airport.
My lucky star brought me to Bali as well where I worked with a fantastic Indonesian colleague on Impact Measurement of Training. It was fantastic. The participants were so engaged and creative. And of course the surroundings were very nice too. I took my chance to take a short break as well to tourist/yoga heaven Ubud, where I biked and climbed a volcano. From there I went to Flores to visit a friend, rented a motorbike and went on a 2 day boot-trip. The best trip of 2017 I think, with dolphins greetings us several times, a komodo dragon firmly walking our way and beautiful sunsets. I could have continued for ever...
The last trip of this year was too a less idyllic country, Tchad. I worked in Ndjamena with 38 participants collaborating with the population in harsh conditions. It was a heartwarming assignment to finish the year with.
A part from traveling abroad I had a couple of very nice trainings in the Netherlands as well, both in Ede and Amsterdam.
Thursday, January 4, 2018
Saturday, February 27, 2016
Responsible cycle tourism in Togo
From 7-25 March 2016 Josefien has conducted a preliminary study into the possibilities of developing responsible cycle tourism in Togo. Interested in this? Contact us!For stories about Josefien's experiences in Africa, visit her blog.
Monday, January 5, 2015
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