Training Days

After those two wonderful blogs frm Deepu I thought I should be writing something. Actually the schedule was so tight during training that I hardly found time to write anything on it. If we weren’t training then we were either in the gym working out or, out shopping… most often just finding out the prices of things we were planning to buy for gifts. The training as such was good as it was definitely adding to our professional skills. But it was not that physically demanding as it was made to look. The Americans have this habit of actually training or rather working in between long breaks. They would work for four days and on Friday the fifth it would be weekend from 2 pm onwards. Amazing how the country still runs fine. Back here we have the habit of slogging 24*7 without much of value addition. It was something to learn.
Most memorable things about training apart from the course content itself were
1. The food- If there is one reason I’ll dread going back to the US for another stint is the kind of food they eat. Nothing much to explain… have a look at the pic.

Off course the Indias restaurant and more than all the Priya and MTR readymade foods saved us for the last part of the training.
2. Shopping – I’ll always remember those huge malls like the Wal-Mart, Steave & Beary’s, J C Penny’s, Dillards, the Dollar tree, Academy sports, Circuit City, Comp USA, Best Buy and many more.
3. Bus journeys- the evening return journey on the bus from Zachary training facility were very memorable for the singing sessions we had on them.
4. Weekend visits- weekend visits to New Orleans ( the equarium of the Americas, movie at the IMAX, and off course the Bourbone st.), the White Oak Plantation, The Nottoway Plantation, The flea market, the Swamp tour…
5. CQB exercises- shooting hostages will off course linger in our minds for a long time.
6. Mayor of Baton Rouge- Being made the Honorary Mayor of the city for a day was definitely a nice gesture.
On 3rd of Nov we had our graduation at the Oak Lodge and on the early morning of 4th I left for Fort Lauderdale to join Deepu. I think this should rank amongst one of my most memorable journeys in life. That anticipation of seeing her after a six week long wait was something that’s to be experienced. Six weeks I was kept alive by her phone calls and I was just glad on that flight, that all that was coming to an end and I don’t have to depend on that instrument anymore.