Having spent the past month feeling rather distant from the Insight staff in Boston, it is fortuitous timing that I should now find myself in Croatia assisting on a mediation training program. This opportunity came up during the summer thanks to Ericka Gray, who trained us in facilitation and mediation. She and Gabrielle Gropman, the former administrator of the Harvard Mediation Program, are working together with USAID and World Learning to train Croatian judges in mediation—a dispute resolution practice that is newly being introduced to the Croatian judiciary system.
Ericka brought up the possibility of the Fellows joining her as assistants during this training in Croatia and it all came together about a month ago. I arrived last night and met Rebecca at the hotel (Seisei unfortunately couldn't make it up from Kenya). We hadn't seen each other in two months and it was great to chat and catch up.
The main challenge we faced today was dealing with the simultaneous translation. Since most of the judges speak only a little English, we all wear headsets and have to deal with lags in translation, issues with the equipment, and remembering to speak very slowly to allow the translators enough time to keep up. Hopefully this won’t be too much of an impediment to the success of the training as a whole.
This morning we were up bright and early for a preparatory breakfast meeting with Ericka and Gaby, whom I was meeting in person for the first time. As we walked over to the Commercial Court building down the street, I was a bit nervous, and then I was really nervous when we arrived and we greeted by a group of 25 senior judges. But they were terribly warm and welcoming, and very excited about the training which got off to a great start. Rebecca and I mainly just assisted Ericka and Gaby—though our acting ‘skills’ were called upon for several short mediation demonstrations.
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