Happy Republic Day--May 28!
Happy Republic Day! Although we worked Memorial Day, we do have off one day this week for Azerbaijan's Republic Day on May 28!
This week, I've been meeting one-on-one with more of my coworkers and editing more documents in English. My current project is creating a reference powerpoint with common mistakes and tips to make writing in English easier for some of my coworkers (and to help alleviate the amount of editing for others to do when I leave). I'm also investigating some other research projects to work on, and I'm doing some preliminary research to determine which projects would be most productive and most helpful. I've found that doing research on Azerbaijani law is quite challenging, due to the lack of availability of the laws themselves. However, I am making progress, and learning a lot in the process! There are two roundtable discussion events coming up in June, which I plan to attend. The first will be in Baku, and the second will require a trip to the Guba region. I am excited and interested to attend these events and will be sure to give a full report!
This past weekend, I went sailing with a coworker on the Caspian Sea--it was so beautiful! The water becomes so much cleaner just a few minutes away from the yacht club (and doesn't smell like oil, as it does along the city). On Sunday, I climbed an enormous amount of stairs to arrive at a wonderful viewpoint near the top of the city, and got some great pictures of the city and coastline! I asked some fellow English speakers at the top to take my picture with the view...they turned out to be arm wrestlers who were in Baku for a four-day tournament. Who would have thought! I explored the Old City some more and took a museum tour at the Palace of the Shirvanshahs. With my love of books, I was set on finding the miniature book museum I had read about. Buried in the middle of the Old City, it turned out to be a quaint little room of cases filled with tiny books. It was a smaller "museum" than I had expected--but there's no need for much space when the books were so small!