One of the last events for which I had to seriously prepare was the colloquium Orientalia Antiqua Nova XV, which traditionally takes place in the city of Plzeň.
This event has been running for 15 years already. The organizer is the Department of Middle East Studies of the Faculty of Philosophy in Plzeň. Usually this colloquium lasts 2 days, about 40 people present.
The colloquium topic is quite broad - the Middle East. Mainly, of course, archaeologists and historians presented. There were quite few linguistic topics.
Trip
You can get to the city of Plzeň from Prague quite quickly, but not always conveniently. The conference started at 8:30, so I had to leave home at 6 am. The Student Agency bus takes only 1 hour from Zličin metro, the ticket costs 100 crowns one way.
The university itself was quite close, 15 minutes walk from the bus station.
After Prague universities - the building is quite inconspicuous :)
Inside you had to go up to the 3rd floor. There we were met by a table with cookies and water. Simple, without tricks, but the most necessary - is there. Presentations started on schedule.
We went to the colloquium, you could say, with the whole department. Sounds impressive, but it's just ultra-small. I went, my only classmate and our teacher.
We were lucky, we presented on the same day, right one after another.
Our presentations were closer to midday, so at first we just listened. The working language of the conference was Czech, however, there were a couple of presentations in Slovak too. Presenters - mainly doctoral students and associate professors. We seemed to be the only ones who haven't even got a master's degree yet. Soon we presented too. Each person was given half an hour - presentation, questions. I won't say everyone fit into time, but I managed quite shortly :)
Our teacher - Pavel Čech
Classmate Maria
Me, starting my talk
As you can see, everything was quite simple - you stand at the podium and tell. At first there were quite few listeners, but closer to lunch - they pulled in.
My topic
If anyone is interested, I presented with the topic "online service for translating syllables into cuneiform signs". Sounds scary, in reality everything is much simpler.
I started my project back in winter and finished it by April. You can see the result here - cuneiformization.ru. You probably won't understand anything, of course, but just in case :)
Summary
I liked the colloquium, although it was quite simple. But you have to start somewhere :)
We all presented quite successfully, everyone was invited for next year too. No problems arose - neither with Czech language, nor with organization - they accepted all of us quite warmly. In general, everyone who is somehow connected with studying the Ancient East - pay attention :)