Sitting in Chennai's airport before boarding a plane to Dubai. It has been a hectic few days. Yesterday, I woke up at 5 am to catch a 7:20 am plane with an Italian and an Indian colleague (for whom it was the first day with us). Unfortunately, the flight was delayed by more than 2 hours so we ended up getting up early for nothing... On the way to the airport on the highway, a car came in the other direction on the fast lane in the dark (although with the lights on so our driver had anticipated well in advance). Crazy Indian driving!
We spent the whole day at the plant and worked until past 11 pm after which we went to bed into the newly refurbished rooms of the field hostel. Quite OK even though once you come out the room, there remains a huge amount of work to bring the place up to standards...There was also a little hiccup in that I did not bring a towel and there was none, but in the end it also turned out there was no water in the shower or at least I could not make it work...
In the afternoon today, we drove back to Chennai where my two colleagues caught a plane for Hyderabad whereas I am heading to Dubai landing around 1 am then leaving again by car at 8 am to go to Abu Dhabi for 2 days of "Senior management Team" meeting (more or less 60 people from the region). On the schedule there is also a early kayak trip in the mangroves on Thursday.
Last week we had some intercultural training for an afternoon with an Indian lady from Chennai (who had lived in America) together with the Dubai management team. Quite interesting to learn about the differences in the way westerners and Indians communicate. Overall, we Westerners need to be a little less direct otherwise we risk being considered rude whereas we should be open to the more indirect way of communication of our Indian friends.
We also watched various videos including some funny ones that I had found on internet, here is a sample!
We spent the whole day at the plant and worked until past 11 pm after which we went to bed into the newly refurbished rooms of the field hostel. Quite OK even though once you come out the room, there remains a huge amount of work to bring the place up to standards...There was also a little hiccup in that I did not bring a towel and there was none, but in the end it also turned out there was no water in the shower or at least I could not make it work...
In the afternoon today, we drove back to Chennai where my two colleagues caught a plane for Hyderabad whereas I am heading to Dubai landing around 1 am then leaving again by car at 8 am to go to Abu Dhabi for 2 days of "Senior management Team" meeting (more or less 60 people from the region). On the schedule there is also a early kayak trip in the mangroves on Thursday.
Last week we had some intercultural training for an afternoon with an Indian lady from Chennai (who had lived in America) together with the Dubai management team. Quite interesting to learn about the differences in the way westerners and Indians communicate. Overall, we Westerners need to be a little less direct otherwise we risk being considered rude whereas we should be open to the more indirect way of communication of our Indian friends.
We also watched various videos including some funny ones that I had found on internet, here is a sample!
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