Preparations for Joint International Mountain Day Observations 2021 by OshTU in Kyrgyzstan and the UIMF in Utah
On 13 November, 2021, students from Osh Technological University (OshTU) and Utah Valley University (UVU) planned to have their fourth virtual meeting as preparations for joint observation of the United Nations International Mountain Day (IMD) on 1 December 2021.
The main theme of 2021 IMD is Sustainable Tourism in Mountains. Students from UVU have been represented by members of the university’s student clubs group which was named The Utah International Mountain Forum (UIMF).
When our team from OshTU started meeting via Zoom, we didn’t see our colleagues from UVU. We waited 20-30 minutes but they didn’t appear. Tatiana Panfilenko started to send messages through WhatsApp to UVU students and faculty with the question “where are they?”
And we immediately received a response from them that they are planning to join us. The reason for their absence was the change of time in Utah for one hour back during last Sunday, which didn’t happen in Kyrgyzstan. Due to that the time difference between us now is 13 hours, 12 hours as it was before.
Tariel Talantbek uulu speaks during meeting
Therefore, we decided to meet on the same day: November 13, 2021, but half a day later. When we gathered together later the same day, Tatiana Panfilenko and Tariel Talantbek uulu as OshTU faculty and Nazik Erkinbek kyzy and I as OshTU students were able to join the meeting.
Nazik Erkinbek kyzy, OshTU student speaks during meeting
We discussed in detail which photos we had to send to the "International Mountain Day'' contest to the FAO-UN and which rules we should follow, and we noticed the fact that we need to send photos of the mountain nature with tourists there, preferably from abroad. We didn’t have too much time to discuss other issues for IMD preparations, and decided to discuss them during the next week's meeting on November 20, 2021.
Screenshot of the meeting participants on 19 November 2021
On 20 November, 2021, the following persons from OshTU participated in the meeting: Tariel Talantbek uulu and Tatiana Panfilenko as faculty and Nazik and I as students. Dr. Almaz Atabekov wasn’t able to join us this time. From UVU the following individuals participated: Dr. Baktybek Abdrisaev as a faculty who was joined for the first time by Dr. Rusty Butler and Alitha Thompson and Dallas Karren as a students and leaders of the UIMF. The main focus of the meeting was to identify the names of the speakers of IMD 2021 at UVU from the OshTU.
Dr. Rusty Butler speaks during the meeting
Alitha Thompson was leading the meeting and she introduced to us Dr. Rusty Butler. We were glad to meet him and learn about his contribution to the partnership between the Utah and Kyrgyzstan. He was the Associate Vice President for international affairs and diplomacy at UVU until 2016. He visited Kyrgyzstan many times and he was named as the Honorary Professor of the Kyrgyz National State University in 2003. As Alitha said to us, Dr. Butler would be one of the leaders of our delegation to the UN next year.
Alitha Thompson moderates the meeting on 19 November 2021
Our joint team discussed the importance of submitting photos about tourism in Kyrgyzstan and in Osh to the international contest hosted by FAO-UN as soon as possible. Alitha one more time reminded us that the deadline for the submission is November 22, 2021. We decided that the more our members will submit photos then it will be the better result: even if we will not win, still more information about tourism potential in Kyrgyzstan and Osh will be provided to the FAO-UN.
Also we decided that there would be two speakers from OshTU during IMD 2021 at UVU: one will be Tatiana Panfilenko speaking as a mentor of our student team and me as a student from OshTU. We decided to start to work on our presentations and submit them to Alitha and Dallas for their approval next week. I’m planning to speak about the role of tourism in the economy of Kyrgyzstan and Osh. And as usual Alitha and Dallas will help me to prepare a good presentation. As part of the contribution from the OshTU team to the IMD 2021 we prepared and forwarded to the UVU team by WhatsApp a short video about tourism in Osh with our comments in English.
As it seems to me, our joint team is making good preparations for the IMD 2021 at UVU and hopefully it will be a successful event on December 1, 2021.
Baiel Abibillaev, OshTU student majoring in geology and contributor to IMD 2021 at UVU.
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STUDENT REFLECTIVE ESSAYS
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21-11-24-Alitha Thompson-OshTU and UVU continue to build friendship through Zoom
