charronfamilykosovo: Prizren American Corner Earth Day Activity

To celebrate Earth Day, I helped a group of students at the American Corner plan an activity for Saturday, April 22. We met with the Mayor of Prizren, and each of the students presented a part of our planned day which included cleaning up City Park and then celebrating Earth Day with refreshments and games.

Here I am talking with Mayor Ramadan Muja. One of my students is a guy in his 40s who is the Director of Protocol for the municipality, and he helped set up the meeting. To my right is Shykran, the American Corner Coordinator.

Each of the students presented in Albanian except for one Turkish student who presented in English. Sitting on the couch with Shykran is Ilirjan, the Fullbright English Teaching Assistant. He is an Albanian-American from the Bronx and speaks fluent Albanian, so he translated what the mayor said for me.

Students signing a release form so that I can forward photos of the event to be used on the U.S. Department of State's website.

One of the students brought me a ladybug, not knowing how meaningful that was! Frank, the girls, and I have a thing about ladybugs. It's a long story, but basically I feel Nana Sabo's (my Mom) presence when we have a ladybug on the scene. Ladybugs have shown up in the weirdest places throughout the years! It always makes me feel like my Mom is there with me having fun.

Some of the volunteers. The one on the left is Elona. She is a senior in high school and dreams of becoming a pilot. The one in the middle with the blue sweater is Miranda. She is also a senior and wants to become a psychologist. The other two are their friends.

Anesa, on the right, is a senior English language major at the university. She is student teaching and these are some of her students.

Besmir (third from left) is another regular at the American Corner. He is a senior math major at the university. I just finished completing a recommendation for him for a scholarship to the University of Sheffield in Thessaloniki, Greece where he hopes to pursue a M.S. in Computer Engineering. He is also student teaching this semester, and these are some of his students.

Frank with Lum ("River"), one of my university English students, on the left, and Besfort, a high school senior on the right. Besfort is going to study chemistry at the University of Pristina next year.

Group photo of the volunteers that Frank took.

This is Durim with me. He is a senior in high school from a small village near Prizren. He is also an American Corner regular and hopes to become an opera singer.

Ilirjan (Fullbright ETA) and I with the two t shirt contest design winners.

After cleaning the park, we walked as a group back to the American Corner along the Lumbardhi River that runs through Prizren. Notice the white t shirts on the right and the fortress on the hill below the tall mountain.

Marigona with the snacks at the American Corner. She is a business graduate of a university in Macedonia and is currently applying for graduate programs abroad.