Doing the BI Certification with Koenig-Solutions in Dubai - Part I

Going to Dubai from Copenhagen is quite easy. I found a flight with Qatar Airways. A quick stop in Doha before arrival in Dubai (1 hour) was OK. Landed in Dubai at 2.10am local time and was kind of tired. Unfortunately many people had choosen to go to Dubai, so getting through customs took about an hour. From here it should be painless, but my suitcase was apparently forgotten in Doha. Luckily many flights go from Doha to Dubai so only 30 minutes of waiting and of to the Koenig Apartment. But now the local time was 4.15am. A quick call to Koenig caretakers to tell them I was coming resultet in a quick welcome and showing to my flat and room. A nice big flat with 2 rooms and 2 bedrooms. Breakfast was at 8am, so not much time to sleep.

A quick shower and rushing to the breakfast which includes eggs, toast, fresh fruit, juice and several types of cerials. Even the ones my kids are not allowed to eat. Then off to the Koenig Office for starting the course, using the Koenig Bus which transports all people, including instructors, to the office. A nice blend of indian, oman, american and danish blend in that bus. At the office the manager at the office welcomed me, informed about the reimbursement of taxi trip and daily cost for lunch. The lunch at the office is done at "food court" where several fast-food stores are present, including KFC and Subway, but also indian and italian style food. Pretty ok selection. Back to what I came for, the SQL 2008 BI course. The instructor - Prakash - introduced to the course, with a overview of the different elements in the course and then we startet. Being the only one on the team is pretty ok. The instruction is a mix of using the traditional (...veryyyyy traditional) Microsoft stuff, with slides and some pretty boring lab exercises. But Prakash also uses a simple whiteboard for introducting the subjects and explaning what the comming module would contain. And this is actually ok. At least when the lab exercies are spiced up with improvised exercises where things not goes as the theory says. And most often, this is where the potential and skills of the instructor becomes visible. But so far its going well. At 13 o'clock it's time for a 1 hour lunch break, which seams like appropriate. Getting some lunch and some rest in the sun is nice. At 17 o'clock the instruction is done, and around 17:15 the bus takes us back to the apartment.

So to sum it up, the experience so far has been positive. The course is going well, so far almost covered the SSAS area in 2 days, been to the pool twice, ran 5 kilometers and had some interesting conversations with the two caretakers.