Ouch...!

talk about intensive. just spent four very interesting days at Chamonix, toasting in hungarian, portuguese, russian, dutch, polish and cockney, and now everything below the neck hurts...!! if you can take your mind out of the gutter for a fraction of a moment, retrieve that slathering tongue from the floor - let me elaborate. A C&W (that's where I work) training program for 'peyshaal peepuls', that almost didn't happen (would you believe a recall message to all the participants who were selected?!). Anyway, despite hard times, the company thought the program and us good enough an investment, and 22 of us made it.... each of us thinking, jeez - 4 days with people you don't know, ugh - what a nightmare way to spend your weekend. Well, that was what I was thinking anyway....and i couldn't have been more wrong!!!
utter humiliation, burning muscles, frustration, smugness, laughter, banter, annoyance, extreme competitiveness, unexpected encouragement and support, irritation, raised voices, sense of accomplishment, new tricks, old tricks, calories, snow capped mountains, ruined manicures, group hugs, espressos by the bucketful, exhaustion, teasing, pulled hamstrings, thick accents, toasts in 7 languages, abseiling, dependencies, dancing, patisserie to die for, stress, spiders webs, blindfolds, anger, champagne, competitiveness, sunshine and snow....and that's just scratching the surface.
the most intensive 4 day training course i've ever been on, the most effective, and the most rewarding.
the highlight had to be patrick from our belgian office with his 'listen to the client, talk to the client, think with the client'... all this with his foot up to his ear, mouth and head, in a standing position!! which lead to a ridiculous challenge of the cereal box - the trick being to bend down and pick up the box with your mouth, no hands involved, and tearing a strip off the box after each successful try. how low can you go???? not low enough without putting your hamstring in a shockingly compromising position as i discovered much to the greeks chagrin as that put an end to any bending over ;-)