Module 2 - Apri 3 to 17, 2005

The keen followers of my blog site would have noticed that there have been no updates for a long time. The reason is that I had gone for my training session (module, the first of which is the subject for my first blog) in Denmark and followed that with a tour of Paris, Venice and Italy.

In this blog I would restrict myself to the second module. The tour would form subject for an entirely different blog.

I went into the first module with a lot of expectations and a lot of anxiety. All that I knew were stories that the seniors had told me and usually most of these were exaggerated ( naturally so) , like stories about Asians being ignored by the Europeans , about how the culture shock would be too much to bear and all that . But having been the first module and all the anxieties being laid to rest, I was eagerly looking forward to the next module- for one it would mean making many more friends , lots of fun and frolic and of course a welcome break from the drudgery of auditing bills in my office.

This time there were 6 of us Indians together and it was as good a team that I could ever dream of. We flew out to Copenhagen on the 3rd of April on an Air France flight via Paris. The flight was much better than the Lufthansa that I took last time. Each seat had an individual screen and a host of movies to choose from. Unlike the cramped Lufthansa, i found the seats to be comfortable as well. We touched down at the Charles De Gaulle Airport and had about four hours for the connecting flight to Copenhagen. We strolled about the mammoth Terminals and checked out the duty free shops. We reached CPH at about three in the afternoon and took a taxi - a big one that , it could take all 6 of us and the luggages as well. It felt great to be back at the comfortable settings of the Dansk FolkFerie, Karlsunde.( thats the name of our module centre)

The opening dinner was as usual the occasion where the proverbial ice was broken and the not so proverbial bottles were uncorked. It was time to meet up with old friends and also meet the new ones. We had ahead of us 2 weeks of long class room sessions, a day’s visit to the ship yard and of course the informal social activities and parties at the end of the day. The tuitions started with 2 days of Maritime law. The usually boring subject was made interesting thanks to the 2 lawyers who took the sessions. There was even a mock court trial to round of the tuition.

The visit to the Shipyard was eventful. It was the first time almost all of us were going to a ship yard and seeing the world’s biggest container ship being built was an awesome feeling. The same day night we had the cross culture dinner, where the trainees were split into teams based on their nationality/ geographical area and asked to prepare their traditional food. We had in our team seven Indians, two Bangladeshis and a girl from Mauritius. We prepared Vegetable Biryani, Butter Chicken, couple of side dishes, Kheer and Papads. Thanks to all the instant/ easy to make MTR packets that we carried beforehand the cooking was made easier. The dinner was a grand affair we had a global menu, ranging from the Caribbean to Chinese, from Arab to East Asian, from European to African. It was a treat to the gastric juices. I may sound immodest, but I have to say that the Indian food was widely accepted to be the best. Thanks to the girls and to Snehal – the only one among us guys to actually cook. Yours truly and the other guys in the team were, ahem, co-coordinating


One day we decided to hit town; so after having dinner, we took the train and set out to Copenhagen. The temperature outside was a very low 7 degrees (that IS very low, for a Chennai native like me) and I had never felt so much cold and numb. By the time we returned it was half past 12 and we had to walk a good 20 minutes in the cold from the station to the module centre. Am sure by this time the temp would have dropped further. It was absolutely insane, I couldn’t even speak and my teeth wouldn’t stop chattering.

Another insane thing that my colleagues came up with was the idea of going for a jog after classes and food, at around 8 in the night. Though initially I was all enthusiastic about it, once I stepped out I developed cold feet. It was due to...well... the cold. Coming to think of it I would say that I developed cold feet, cold ankles... right up to my head.

The classroom sessions were there daily and this time there were quite a few interesting classes. Liner trade and Terminal Management, for e.g., were real good sessions

Our activity manager – a slightly over enthusiastic but lovable chap from Cameroon worked real hard to arrange for activities for the group every night. As a result of his efforts, we had a night of Dance classes (salsa, disco et all), a night of aerobics, a trip to the bowling centre, a quiz nite etc, each of which was immensely enjoyable and fun filled.

The module ended with the closing dinner which was a multi course dinner which was agonizingly long and painfully distasteful. The good thing about this dinner night was the fact that all the girls had dressed up in their very best and looked beautiful. We guys had a tough time running around them and getting ourselves photographed with the lovely ladies. After the closing dinner was the final party, which was absolutely rocking.

With a heavy heart and a heavier head (well with a party till 3 am what else you expect) we said goodbyes to all the friends and left the module centre in the early hours of Sunday April 17th. Our destination was Paris and we were looking forward to a week long sojourn covering Paris, Rome and Venice…..