I'm just home a visit with Holger to Banja Luka, in preparation for DebConf11 in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In summary, we were pleased with everything we saw there (hotel, venue, distances and city infrastructure). We had two meetings with the Minister for Science Technology, Prof. Dr. Jasmin Komic (one formal, one over lunch). The minister was enthusiastic about DebConf coming to Banja Luka, and made it very clear that the government of the Republic of Srpska supports us strongly. We had several meetings with local DebConf organisers and volunteers, and arranged who would work on specific tasks.
We stayed in Hotel Bosna, where most of the DebConf accommodation will be, directly across the road from the conference venue Banski Dvor. This was a nice four-star hotel, with good facilities including open wireless everywhere and an ATM in the lobby. On Monday we were given a tour of Banski Dvor by the friendly janitor, including the back corridors where we can run cables for network and video. The main talk rooms (for up to 350 and 150 people) are rather impressive, with grand chandeliers etc., and also with plenty of power sockets, and existing cabling for audio. The local tourist board were very helpful, and will provide us with more information on matters we asked about by email. An official from the tourist board took us to see the location proposed for the day trip, where we discussed the possible options for activities. During our visit we also appeared in the most-read newspaper of the Republic of Srpska, including a photo of our meeting with the Minister, and apparently we were also mentioned on the evening television news. While the cost of our flights for this trailer visit will be paid by Debian from the DebConf budget, all local costs were covered by the government of the Republic of Srpska. And due to the generosity of the government, the finances for DebConf11 itself will work very similarly. We're now both very much looking forward to returning to Bosnia and Herzegovina in 53 days, and hope to see you there too! Holger and Moray Here's a rough schedule of what we did on our trip: Sunday arrived at Zagreb got taken to Banja Luka in car (took about 2 1/2 hours driving including the border crossing) met Adnan checked into Hotel Bosna had dinner in hotel restaurant, planned agenda for other days met local team Monday 11 a.m. meeting with Science and Technology minister tour of Banksi Dvor walked around town, visited other hotels met Zoran Sankovic, from Tourist Board of Banja Luka, in cafe met local team, agreed proposal for schedule of special events during DebConf went for cevapci dinner with some local team members Tuesday visited proposed conference dinner venue (Aquana aqua park restaurant) visited proposed day trip barbecue venue and discussed options with manager (who also offered his help on other matters) visited Tourist Board office, got their contact details (late) lunch meeting with minister and officials from DIVA NGO met local team Wednesday walked round town again taken to Zagreb airport in government car (again the journey took two and a half hours) -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-project-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org Archive: http://lists.debian.org/banlktinlvk_pxk687fpnbcakjxtpmar...@mail.gmail.com