Hi there, I’m currently at a café in Malmö, Sweden, with my new friend and colleague Amanda. Last day we met our Kyrgyzs colleagues (they are in Sweden now), it was so nice to meet them before going to Kyrgyzstan and they made a really good impression. Since I will spend some time blogging from Osh in Kyrgyzstan I thought this would be the perfect moment to introduce myself. After years of studying at the University of Gothenburg, last week I finally got my bachelor’s degree in political science, something I’m very happy about! I’ve been writing my thesis about gender differences in political knowledge so as you may understand, I have an interest in gender issues. This is also something I will work with at the partner organization of CAG, Novi Ritm, a youth organization based in Kyrgyzstan.
My area of focus will be on a Forum Syd financed project, with its goals mainly related to capacity building trainings, youth initatives and also CSO conferences. I have previous experience from working with international development cooperation since I’ve been an intern and a programme manager at Sida, the swedish agency working with global development cooperation. I’ve also been studying a course in Shanghai at Fudan University, China, but this is basically the experience I have from Asia. Central Asia as a region is therefore quite new to me and I’m so excited to learn more about the Post-Soviet states. I also hope to learn more about democratization and the role of youth in these processes.
I will blog about everyday life in Kyrgyzstan and also some blogposts about different thematic areas such as: gender, democracy and conflict transformation.
I hope you will enjoy the reading.
Emma