READ Regional Meeting

This past weekend I participated in the first READ Regional Meeting. The meeting was in a hotel in Nagarkot, Nepal, and gathered staff members from READ Nepal, READ India, READ Bhutan and READ Global (the umbrella organization).
Nagarkot, located 32 km from Kathmandu, is one of the most beautiful places I have ever visited and the Hotel Country Villa, where we stayed, is nestled in the mountains overlooking the Himalayas. Unfortunately, for the 3 days we were there, the entire region was filled with a heavy fog that prevented us from seen the mountain range in all its majesty.

The meeting was very productive and represented a great opportunity for READ members from different offices to get to know each other. Besides having workshop sessions from 9 am until around 6 pm everyday. There was also time for fun activities such as walk to a nearby village (coming back uphill to the Hotel we all got a ride on the back of a truck, it was such a great time!!!)

and a presentation of local Shamans.

I also had the opportunity to do a very brief Marketing presentation and share with the entire team some of the topics that I plan to discuss with READ Nepal next week.

After the sessions on Sunday we all came back to KTM for some sightseeing and a lovely farewell dinner, at Nepali Chulo ( Chulo is a traditional Nepali oven). During dinner, which in the traditional Newar style had several delicious courses, we enjoyed several folk dances, such as the peacock dance, and even a yeti "impersonator"... (kind of scary sometimes... but lots of fun!!!)

It was the perfect closure for a really great weekend! Who says work can not be fun!?!