WP Carey Orientation, Day 1
Day 1 was largely a matter of travel and check-in. I flew out of Sacra-torment-o airport, which was largely empty as usual, and arrived in Arizona about 1pm MST. Arizona's Sky Harbor airport is pretty cool. I can't really describe why, but it's big, it flows well, and it has multiple levels for traffic and multiple terminals. It had a lot of people in it, but it didn't feel overly crowded.
After grabbing my luggage and figuring out where the courtesy phones were (which took some doing), I called the Embassy Suites to have them come pick me up. They directed me where to wait, and after about 40 minutes, the shuttle came. At that point, I met a guy named Tim, who was one of my cohort-mates, and all-around nice guy to boot. Unfortunately, as I found out later, he wasn't on my team. But that's okay.
Checking into the Embassy Suites was no problem, though I thought it strange that they charged $10 extra for internet access. Don't the cheapy hotels have that for free? Maybe they figure most people who stay there are staying there on business and charge everything to the company, so the $10 just gets charged to the company and the people who stay don't care. I didn't really care either since I didn't come with a laptop, but it was strange none-the-less.
After checking in, unpacking my suitcase full of business clothes and making sure they weren't overly wrinkled, I went down to the check-in table, where I met Ivy, Toni, and... I can't remember who the third person was. Maybe Emily? In any case, they gave me a HEAVY backpack with a huge orientation binder, and books for my first and third classes (again, weird -- why not the second class?). The backpack was strange as well -- it didn't have zippers, but rather cinch-necks -- and the cinches were the straps! So, in other words, when you put the backpack on, it automatically cinched the neck. And when you took it off and opened it, the straps pulled in so they did not hang all over the place and snag on stuff. Neat in theory, didn't work so well in practice. :)
After getting my stuff, it was time for happy hour -- where they had a FREE open bar! Hell yeah! That's where I first met Rod (from Boeing), who was the other guy outside my team that I spent a lot of time talking with throughout orientation. After chatting it up, we were herded towards the ballroom for the opening dinner. As you might expect, the opening dinner had a lot of welcomes -- but the food was surprisingly good for catered food! I got the first opportunity to meet my team:
Jasmeet, an Indian guy who works for Motorola and lives North of San Francisco, AZ
Ryan, who works for Lockheed in Phoenix, AZ
Matt, who works for some small investment banking firm in Phoenix, AZ
Jim, who is a navy recruiter in Tucson, AZ
Christina, who works for the dept of health (or something like that) in Virginia
As you can see, 5 of my 6 group members were from CA or AZ, which was unexpected -- but good -- it'll make it easier to contact each other if we're mostly in the same time zones. Also, everyone on my team was nice -- in fact, everyone in the entire program I met was nice. Very cool. I got a chance to talk to Jasmeet a little bit later that night after dinner, and got to know him better. Even though he's from India, his English is very good and we got along great. I have no doubt that he'll make a good teammate.
After grabbing my luggage and figuring out where the courtesy phones were (which took some doing), I called the Embassy Suites to have them come pick me up. They directed me where to wait, and after about 40 minutes, the shuttle came. At that point, I met a guy named Tim, who was one of my cohort-mates, and all-around nice guy to boot. Unfortunately, as I found out later, he wasn't on my team. But that's okay.
Checking into the Embassy Suites was no problem, though I thought it strange that they charged $10 extra for internet access. Don't the cheapy hotels have that for free? Maybe they figure most people who stay there are staying there on business and charge everything to the company, so the $10 just gets charged to the company and the people who stay don't care. I didn't really care either since I didn't come with a laptop, but it was strange none-the-less.
After checking in, unpacking my suitcase full of business clothes and making sure they weren't overly wrinkled, I went down to the check-in table, where I met Ivy, Toni, and... I can't remember who the third person was. Maybe Emily? In any case, they gave me a HEAVY backpack with a huge orientation binder, and books for my first and third classes (again, weird -- why not the second class?). The backpack was strange as well -- it didn't have zippers, but rather cinch-necks -- and the cinches were the straps! So, in other words, when you put the backpack on, it automatically cinched the neck. And when you took it off and opened it, the straps pulled in so they did not hang all over the place and snag on stuff. Neat in theory, didn't work so well in practice. :)
After getting my stuff, it was time for happy hour -- where they had a FREE open bar! Hell yeah! That's where I first met Rod (from Boeing), who was the other guy outside my team that I spent a lot of time talking with throughout orientation. After chatting it up, we were herded towards the ballroom for the opening dinner. As you might expect, the opening dinner had a lot of welcomes -- but the food was surprisingly good for catered food! I got the first opportunity to meet my team:
Jasmeet, an Indian guy who works for Motorola and lives North of San Francisco, AZ
Ryan, who works for Lockheed in Phoenix, AZ
Matt, who works for some small investment banking firm in Phoenix, AZ
Jim, who is a navy recruiter in Tucson, AZ
Christina, who works for the dept of health (or something like that) in Virginia
As you can see, 5 of my 6 group members were from CA or AZ, which was unexpected -- but good -- it'll make it easier to contact each other if we're mostly in the same time zones. Also, everyone on my team was nice -- in fact, everyone in the entire program I met was nice. Very cool. I got a chance to talk to Jasmeet a little bit later that night after dinner, and got to know him better. Even though he's from India, his English is very good and we got along great. I have no doubt that he'll make a good teammate.
posted by Tarindel @ 2:32 PM
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