The Rotary clubs of Plant City hosted a cultural exchange this month by inviting a group of professionals from abroad to visit Plant City.
“They’re young, and they’re from all over Russia,” said George Banning, a Plant City Daybreak Rotarian who hosted two of the delegates.
This year was the second time the clubs have worked with a group called the Center for Citizen Initiatives to host a group from Russia. The first time was in 2006. In 2011, Banning went to Russia through the program, with Alan Feldman from the Rotary Club of Brandon.
Banning said the biggest thing he learned while in Russia was that there were significant similarities between the two cultures.
“Basically, they have the same values we do,” Banning said. “They are friendly, and it’s amazing to see how they have gone from a communist society to a free market society.”
This year’s group of delegates comprised eight dentists and two doctors. Accompanying them was an interpreter who was born in Russia but lives in Portland, Oregon, and a trip coordinator, Nataliya Ivanova.
“The main idea is to learn new practices and new technologies,” Ivanova said. “All the innovative things you have here.”
But, of course, the American professionals who they met learned from them, as well.
Ivanova is a full-time business consultant, but she started organizing trips to the United States for Russian groups in 1995.
“It’s my hobby to take people here,” she said. “Not necessarily medical professionals, it could be any professional, for the exchange of learning in the U.S.”
Ivanova led the delegates who visited Plant City in 2006. That trip was such a success that she wanted to return to with another group.
The delegates stayed with Rotarian host families in Plant City from Oct. 5 to 10.
Ivanova said staying in American homes instead of hotels was one of the delegates’ favorite parts of the experience. Some of the delegates she brought in 2006 are still in contact with the Floridian families who hosted them. Similarly, some of the Floridians they met that year have gone to Russia to see them again, like Banning did.
Each full day of the trip included a visit to a dental or medical business in the daytime, and social activities in the evening.
All of the delegates are managers or owners of the clinics where they practice. Ivanova said they were mostly interested in how leaders of American clinics and hospitals organized and managed their practices.
Ivanova specifically targeted Florida for this trip because of its lifestyle and culture.
“I’m glad that I took them to Florida, because people here are special,” she said. “They are warm, they are hospitable … they are more relaxed here in Florida than in other places in the U.S.”
The delegates stayed with members of the Lakeland and Brandon clubs before heading back to their home country.
Contact Catherine Sinclair at csinclair@plantcityobserver.com.