GUST

I visited the Gulf University of Science and Technology (GUST) here in Kuwait City today. During a presentation I gave last fall in Fez, Morocco I met Ray Weisenborn, the dean of Arts & Sciences at GUST, and he discussed extending the GM network to Kuwait - this is pretty typical, which is why I give so many papers at conferences overseas (including four on this long trip). Anyway, we ended up running a GM with Mark Olson from GUST this semester on divorce in Kuwait and the US. The university is interesting in that all the classes are segregated by gender (a recent phenomenon caused by the election of more Islamist members to parliament) and we actually divided up a couple Champlain classes by gender to match up with the GUST courses, which was a real teachable moment for our Vermont students. The men and women even, technically, have separate wings and even floors of the library. I say technically because they mix fairly freely in the central area and the eating areas. At the same time the women dress in a more "western" fashion than any Arabic school I've ever visited. At a place like Zayed University in the UAE all the girls where the traditional black abaya and hihab - same with Sultan Qaboos University in Muscat, Oman. At a school like the University of Jordan you have a rough division into thirds - completely traditional, completely western, and somewhere in between (western wear and the hijab) - but even here the western wear would always be jeans. Here, on the other hand, you'd have a similar division into thirds, but the western students were actually wearing dresses or skirts and showing a fair amount of skin (as with Jordan, there has been a steady growth in the number of students wearing thw traditional wear in the last few years, although it's hard to say whether that is because of a growth in faith or as a result in a changing sense of fashion).. It's a strange mix because it's also a country which is pretty conservative in other ways - including a complete ban on all alcohol - causing many ex-pats to brew their own on the sly. I'll try and post some pictures later.

Kuwait Rock City

OK, I've made it to Kuwait City without too many problems. I'm not a real big fan of Kuwait Air Ai the food was pretty sub-par and the crew seemed to always have a chip on their shoulders about something - it's like once you got beyond a certain point they were OK, but that their initial response was to over react to every question or request (as if they were intended as an insult - of course, it could also just be the horror of dealing with ugly Americans on a daily basis). Of course, it might have just been the fact that during all quiet moments they played elevator music versions of "You Were Always on My Mind" and "You're the Wind Beneath My Wings.". On the London-Kuwait trip I sat next to a nice Indian woman named Jasmine Singh, who grew up in Kuwait and is a Sophomore at Iowa State University. Kuwait, like the UAE, has a large subcontinent population.

Ray Weisborn and Mark Olson from the Gulf University of Science & Technology picked up at the airport. Then they took me to Applebee's because it was convenient. Kuwait has a ton of American chain franchises, including a series of the largest Burger Kings I've ever seen. I'm staying at the Ritz Salmiya which is pretty nice, although there is no pool or exercise facility, so I should have worked through the painyesterday and lifted weights - I have missing workouts. I'll know more tomorrow about Kuwait when I might it over to GUST.

London Stalling

OK, so my direct flight to Kuwait wasn't so direct. We have a brief layover in London before the plane goes on to Kuwait, although we have to get off the plane with all of our carry-ons and then get marched on this long trek through Heathrow, including a trip through security (?). Very strange. My theory is that it's just to make us walk past the duty free shops again - or as a direct order from Starbucks. Next stop, and I mean it this time, Kuwait.

Getting Started

The journey of a thousand miles always seems to begin with a trip through JFK. No trouble so far. I'm checked in for the first long flight of the trip, and the good folks at Kuwait Air gave me a bulkhead seat (which will be much appreciated on the 13 hour direct flight from NY to Kuwait City). It always helps to get to the airport early, be especially charming, and sprinkle the conversations with the few words you know of the language of the airline - in this case, lots of shukrans and insh'allahs. That said, the folks at Kuwait Air could not have been more pleasant. Beyond attracting more looks than normal - I had a nasty bike wreck the other night, but nothing that four hours in the emergency room and 15 stitches on my face and two hours in the dentist chair this morning reconstructing the front tooth I broke off (I look slightly less like Frankenstein now) couldn't fix - there's been no trouble. I just finished a plate of tortellini that just about reached the level of institutional quality (I guess Burger King was the better choice). The next stop is Kuwait City where I'll be met at the airport by two professors from the Gulf University of Science & Technology, which I really appreciate because it will be my first trip to Kuwait. The only problem is that they want to immediately take me out to dinner - I leave JFK at 9:45 tonight and arrive in Kuwait City at 7:00 pm on Wednesday evening, so it makes perfect sense, although I'm going to have to rally. The journey of six weeks . . .

New Destinations

This summer's first trip is going to be different because I will be making my first visit to four countries: Kuwait, China, Slovakia and Ireland - and even in Spain I'll be visiting a new city in Barcelona. Except, even here it won't be all that bad because I have contacts in every one of the countries. It's not like my first visits to places like Kenya or Egypt where I didn't know a soul. Now that Rochelle has put together the itinerary I can buy guidebooks and begin looking around for hotels. Luckily China is already organized, and so is the UAE and the conference folks in Slovakia are taking care of everything because I'm speaking. I won't jinx the trip quite yet by pointing out that it is starting to come together (doh!).

Summer Travel Redux

OK, it looks like the summer trip is coming together, although, as my poor, long-suffering travel agent can attest, these things are never easy.

26 May - Burlington to Kuwait to visit one of our newest Global Module partners, the Gulf University of Science & Technology (GUST). This will be my first visit to Kuwait. It should be really interesting. We ran our first GM with them this semester. The school segregates their classes by sex and we agreed to separate out the Champlain students as well - a great learning experience.

29 May - Kuwait to Dubai, where I'll be presenting at a Globalization conference and visiting our GM partner Zayed University.

1 June - Dubai to Beijing, where I'll be presenting at a Humanities conference and talking to some Chinese universities about the GMs. This will be my first trip to China.

11 June - Beijing to Xi'an, where I'll begin a CIEE Silk Road faculty development program - that's a whole other adventure and I'll post the itinerary for that later on.

23 June - Lanzhou, China t0 Bratislava, Slovakia (by way of Frankfurt and Prague) to present at an Ambiguity Conference and talk to the good folks at Catholic University of Ruzemberok about the GMs. Then there will be a little travel around Slovakia provided by the conference folks. This will be my first trip to Slovakia. From there will be taking the train to visit GM partner schools in Austria and Hungary.

5 July - Bratislava to Barcelona, Spain to present at a conference a visit one or two Spanish universities. I've been to Madrid a couple times and a side trip to Toledo, but this will be my first trip to Barcelona.

10 July - Barcelona to Dublin, Ireland. This is one of those odd trips that came together simply because of the peculiarities of travel. I had a layover in Dublin, so I decided to stretch it out a couple days and visit one or two Irish universities I've been talking to on GM business and take the opportunity to see Champlain's Dublin campus. I've never been to Dublin before.

14 July - Dublin to Burlington - and total collapse.

Summer 09 Travel

Well, it looks like it's time to try and put together the first of two extended summer trips. This is one of the situations where my travel agent, Rochelle, just dreads the appearance of an email from me. Essentially, I need to take off in late May for a quick trip through Kuwait, to visit the Gulf University of Science & Technology on Global Module business, and then move on to Dubai to present at a conference. Then from Dubai I fly on to Beijing, China to present at a conference in early June, and then have a little down time for exploring the city before my Faculty Internationalization Initiative funded CIEE trip begins later in the month. Several of us are heading to China this year (last year's Middle East trip was FII funded, and there are several Champlain folks who are headed back to the Middle East for a refresher trip, but I don't think I'll make it back to the Middle East until next Fall at the earliest - I think my late summer trip will probably be to Africa to visit Global Module partner schools, or maybe attend a conference related to a government grant proposal I'm part of), although, typically, everyone else is taking off on a CIEE faculty development tour of southeast China, and I'm the only one headed to central China on a Silk Road trip. Now, to get there I need to fly to Xi'an from Beijing to meet the tour, which will then take off for a couple weeks (more on that later, it sounds very cool). The tour will end in Lanzhou, which will then mean a return trip to Beijing. All of this has to be done seemlessly and quickly (something Rochelle excells at) because I have about one travel day from the end of the tour to get to Bratislava, Slovakia to present at a conference - and then I'll be dragging my sorry, tired body home. Believe me, none of this is as exciting as it sounds. First off, filling out the paperwork for the China visa.