The seventh Polyglot Conference took place in Fukuoka Japan. In this post, I share the three daily vlogs I shot at the event. The Conference is “for everyone who loves languages” and takes place each October, in a different location. In the vlogs, the focus is on conveying the vibe and giving a voice to some of the many attendees. I attended a lot of the talks as well and there are snippets included as a taster (check out the Conference’s YouTube channel where the full talks will eventually all appear).
I missed the legendary first incarnation (Budapest, 2013) but I attended Novi Sad (2014), New York (2015), Thessaloniki (2016), Reykjavík (2017) and Ljubljana (2018). I cut my teeth as a vlogger at the 2015 event. Just before, I bought my Cannon G7X vlogging camera at NYC’s famous B&H camera store.
I edited each of my three vlogs from last year’s Ljubljana event overnight so that they were out for the beginning of the following day. That meant being up till after 3am each day and was, shall we say, a bit much. This time, I’ve gone to the other extreme…. Yes there’s been a long delay as I completed editing and publishing my large Asia Diaries vlogging project in Russian, German, Basque and Welsh. Better late than never, though. For those of you who were at the event, I’m sure you’ll enjoy reliving what are no longer the freshest of memories!
Enjoy and a big thanks to all those who took part!
On the Eve
There’s traditionally a “welcome” event at the Conference venue on the Friday night before things kick off properly on Saturday.
On the eve of the Polyglot Conference Fukuoka, there was a full day’s “pre-Conference” programme. It included a Japanese tea ceremony and karate demo. There were group Irish, Welsh and Basque lessons from sponsors italki.com. In the evening the organisers Richard Simcott and Tim Keeley welcomed us on the main stage. There was then a brief speech (in Japanese) from the president of the host venue, Kyushu Sangyo University. To finish, there was a spectacular performance from a troupe of young taiko drummers.
Enjoy the first and second vids. I’ll update this post with third vlog when it’s ready.
Day One
Here’s the vlog from the first of the two full days of talks.
Day Two
To finish, check out the vlog from the second day.
The eighth Conference was to take place 16-18 October 2020 in Cholula, Mexico. For the first time it was to combine with LangFest (usually in Montreal) with the LangFest team organising events before after and during the Conference weekend. Now, due to the on-going COVID-19 pandemic, Cholula will be in 2021. The 2020 action will move on-line with Polyglot Conference Global.
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