Warning! Warning! Travel chit chat below!
I am just back from SAP training at our sister companies in Germany and Italy. What a trip! Some one asked that I share my experiences so here it is.. First, since this is an AS/400 forum, we will be implementing SAP on an AS/400. SAR, the Italian company was one of the first to implement on an AS/400. Our training though took place on a Unix box- The training was mostly hands on, and looking at how each company implemented SAP. Most of the time we had a person that had worked with implementing the same module we are assigned. We worked long days, and some evenings, but still were able to enjoy the surroundings. We met with the German group first, the company is Pfeiffer and is located just north of Lake Konstanz. We enjoyed local brauhaus' and bier. The food was great and I especially enjoyed spatzle, wild game, with cherry sauce, and fish from Lake Konstanz (ended up being in american-lake perch). One evening the controller took us to Mainau, or Flower Island. The roses and gardens were beautiful, went through the butterfly house, and had a wonderful dinner. I will recommend the salmon, and have rose sorbet drowning in champagne for dessert. We left Germany on a Saturday and drove through the Swiss Alps on the way to Italy. The ride through Switzerland was breathtaking. We stopped at a place to take pictures-and a string of 100 Corvette's came by! The mountain villages are just like in the pictures! Even saw a sign for Heidiland! I took lots of pictures. We stayedover night in Bologna, very old city! The guys in our group enjoyed the statue of Neptune in the piaza. We arrived in Pescara on Sunday about 2 pm and hit the beach! Playedvolleyball and swam. This is the tannest I have been in years! Alsoate at a nice restaurant on the beach-first indication of what kind offood we would be eating for 2 weeks. Calamari rings, baby octupus, lots of shellfish-like from the shells we find in Florida, most come still in the shell. Whole steamed shrimp, and something that looks like a cross between a shrimp and crawfish (scampi maybe) . Bread, wine, pasta, pasta, pasta, then the main course, fish. It was very good. Sometimes we had pizza-thin homemade crusty crust, and with shell fish on it, not much sauce or cheese. Hiking on June 20 was great! We drove into a very old mountain village Sulmona, to a flea market of meat, bread, cheese, veggies, and fruit. There was also clothes, plants, cd's etc. Every one picked up something for lunch. We drove to a small village and toured a church from 800 ce. There was a wedding at the time so we couldn't go down in the grotto, but the wedding had a soprano singing. It was beautiful. From there we drove up in the mountains, parked in the small village, and hiked down. It was breath taking. We crossed a small stream 3 times and arrived at a small waterfall and pool. It was very cold, but refreshing to swim in. Had lunch and hiked back. In the church in the center of the village, there was going to be aconcert of Italian mountain songs. We listened to both all male groups. The chorus' were all men. One song was Frank Sinatra's "My Way" in Italian. The ride back to Rome was beautiful, the mountains and scenery weredifferent from Switzerland. There were armed guards in the airport. It is great to be back home, but I find myself missing the mountains and the new friends we made.CELLPADDING=5 bgcolor="#FF9FFF">
="#800080"> Barb Brooker

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