I went to Nadi, (TPAF, Namaka), to train the trainers for this project we did for this customer yesterday last week Friday. It was the second session to train them on a very simple first phase (out of three) of this project. The first time they funded the return flight ticket; unfortunately, this time they cut down their budget and provided a four wheel drive pickup for me.

As planned, I woke up at 4:30am, got myself ready and revised my training manual while I was waiting for the pickup. They (an Indian driver and a Fijian gal) got to my place at 5:15am and stopped at service station for coffee and hot bread before we left Suva around 5:30am.

It was a cold and drizzling morning with a pitch black sky and not a single soul on the road until we pass Lami. We had a small chat on the road and found out that the driver is very fluent in Fijian. He conversed with the girl in Fijian nonstop to keep himself awake or just being his talkative nature.

They laughed their heads off several times in their conversations and checked back at me a few times to see how I was doing. Myself being a quiet nature, I didn’t/couldn’t join in their conversation and just dozed off at the back.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t doze for long as I had to catch my breath on these lumps on the road where the car just practically flew over them. I noticed then that the driver was driving with a scary speed of 160km/hr and would not slow down near the turns or on the road block lumps.

I hurried to belt myself up but I couldn’t pull out the seat belt as it stuck to the wall and wouldn’t budge an inch. I started getting sick in the stomach on every jump and kept checking the car speed meter. It reached over 175km/hr almost right to 180km/hr mark.

Amazingly both the girl and the driver did not seem to care about how fast they were driving and enjoying their conversation. I normally get motion sickness after 1 or 1.5hr of normal driving. This time, it was not even 1hr yet and I started throwing up at the back. As usual, I prepared myself with tissue paper, plastic bags and a water bottle so I did not mess up the car. I rolled down the window and tried to get myself fresh air but the wind was too strong and I couldn’t keep it open for long. I didn’t make a sound on my first two throw ups so they didn’t notice me and I didn’t want to let them know either. Then a few turns before Singatoka, I couldn’t bear anymore and made a big puking sound and kept throwing up all the water I drunk after the first two pukes.

They then shocked to discover that I was very sick and made a stop near Singatoka temple. It was around 6:40am and a few shop already opened so we stopped for about 10min and continued to Nadi. I was a lot better after the stop and the driver did slow down his speed and drove around 125-140km/hr.

I noted that it was the fastest drive I’ve ever ridden in my life and the shortest time taken to reach Nadi. If I guessed it right, we took just 2.25 or 2.5hr to reach Nadi which normally takes around 3.5 to 4hrs. The driver mentioned that his normal record from Suva to Nadi is 2hr 20min and he can drive faster than that if the road is clear. I’m so used to my Dad’s driving of 60km/hr that I dislike speedy driving. I decided I refuse to ride his car ever again after that day.

As we get closer to Nadi, the weather is getting hot and the sun started glaring. We reached to Nadi around 7:30, picked up one of their staffs at his place and got to Namaka around 8am. We setup all the machines in the lab with the software and ready to start the training at 8am. They introduced me to their big boss (said he’s the new director) and he thanked me for the good work done with the project. We then started off the day with a somewhat long prayer. The director then made a short (15min) speech on this year theme, what they plan to achieve, how this system will help them etc. and left for his other appointments. Then I started with my training; there were only 8 participants in this session out of 14 from the previous one. There was one new face in the group and the rest attended the previous session so they all have the manual and CD with them except the new one. I’ve prepared a few extra manual print outs so it wasn’t a problem and commenced the training smoothly.

The TPAF trainers were very busy that day and every now and then, they went out of the room to attend their classes and pop back in after a few minutes. I find it annoying that people moving around while I’m talking but couldn’t do anything as they have their business to do. I tried to cover all sections in the manual and went through individually with late comers or those moving in and outs. We previously planned to have a whole day training in which I planned to go through both version of the system but they couldn’t spare the lab for the evening and I can only cover the administrator version of system. We finished around 1:30pm and waited for our pick up. One of the TPAF staffs showed me around their Namaka centre and we went in to one of the classroom commenced by one of the participants in my training. She introduced me to her students; they were roasting boneless chicken and baking some buns. It smelled really nice and I was so hungry as it’s passed lunch time. I guess she noticed me hungrily staring at the chicken so she offered some to taste but unfortunately the chicken wasn’t cooked enough yet and she asked the student to put it back in the oven for a few min again. While we were waiting for the chicken and continuing with their cooking session, my pick up arrived. I couldn’t wait for the chicken so just took a few buns, said thanks to the students and left the Namaka centre around 2:30pm.

They then took me to their office at Nadi Airport to pick up something. My dad called to ask how things were and told me to try out lunch at Ta Ta’s place. I asked the place to the driver but he wasn’t sure where so we drove around Nadi town and asked some policemen for direction. We found the place and had our lunch around 3:15pm.

We left Nadi around 3:30pm; we were supposed to come back together with their boss but we left the boss group and took off early to Singatoka for vegetable shopping. I bought a few heaps of oranges, cabbage and papaya. There were lots of good looking dalo bundles and some of them were purple. I remember mom loves purple dalo and asked the girl if that’s the right dalo but turned out they were not. The vendors told us to look for some on the way to Suva as they don’t plant purple type in Singatoka. We drove slowly and stops many times to wait for the group behind us. The driver got out and smoked on every stop and he told us that he love smoking and drinking grog. We quickly strolled into Outriggers for a loo and waited the other group outside.

Finally the other group caught up and took a lead in front of us. Their driver was driving with 120km/hr flat and our driver cannot over take him as the boss was in that car. So he followed behind disgruntled and making faces and fits at the driver in front via the mirror. As we get closer to Suva, the car in front slows down to 80-100km/hr and no more over taking at all as the cars from Suva coming nonstop from the opposite lane. It was raining and with a slow drive, I didn’t puke at all on the way home. We then saw some guys selling dalo at the road side and the girl asked for purple dalo. Luckily they got one last purple bundle and I happily bought it.

I got home around 7:35; the driver repeated his name 3 times and told me to call him if I ever need to drive to Nadi as he drives private taxi in his free times. I thanked him and the girl for the day and forgotten their names after 5min. I was so tired and sat around for an hour reporting back the day events to the family; had shower, dinner, check emails, wrote down a few lines for the post and slept. And finish up the post after a week.

The End.

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