cc licensed flickr photo shared by cogdogblog

I’ve been home a few days now following a 2 week travel route that included the last week in Doha, Qatar to participate in the World Innovation Summit for Education (WISE). It was an unusual meeting/trip/experience on several fronts, and I’m baffled trying to find a coherent thread to pull together, so lacking that, I am winging it.

The event itself, was usual and unusual, and mostly what I can say the event happening itself was the real result. It was an audacious undertaking, daring, many said, for Sheikha Mozah Bint Nasser Al Missned, an extremely articulate woman leader in a place where woman don’t often lead, to convene 1000 educators/business people/press/publishers/activists/one cogdog to focus on making education, on a global skill, a vital/necessary goal. Some said the aim was to make WISE the “Davos of Education”.

I did not really see much of Doha beyond car/bus windows passing by, as most of the time was spent in venues in 2 hotels; there was one night out with friends in the Souk Waqif, and I am really, really bummed I did not do enough to catch up with Jabiz (aka Intrepid Teacher), who I met last year in Shanghai.

cc licensed flickr photo shared by cogdogblog

So I cannot give any overall summary of what the place is like, besides it has a skyline of towers under construction that might make Shanghai look like a cow town. You really could not count the number of skyscrapers growing out of the sand, and there were even more things being built around, roads un-rolling, growing out of the sand.