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I am still on my vacation with the family and spending time with friends whom I got to know through this blog. We picked North Carolina as one of the destinations to spend few days purely based on Tuhin Patel(you can read this post how I met him). This time, I came with my family and stayed his place for few days.
We felt very special from the time we arrived to NC. He even try to made us so comfortable during our stay by playing classical Sinhalese music and providing Sri Lankan food for us. All his caring nature felt us, we are staying at one of our close relatives. We noticed he had taken every single step to make our stay enjoyable. He took 3 days leave (PTO) and dedicated 100% of his time for us. Our children enjoyed spending time with him, while my wife & I enjoyed having meaningful conversations with him.
On the last day of our stay, he took us to his office (Cisco RTP campus) and gave us a little tour.
I am glad he took us to his office floor (even though mostly he works at customer ends not being at the office). There was a “CCIE Wall of Fame” for Advanced Deliver Network team where he belongs.
During that walk-through, He introduced us to his manager (Howard Pearse). Even though he was on a conference call, he was kind enough to spend some time with us. Being a technical person (in fact dual CCIE) in the past, it seems he understands his team well and gave them enough flexibility to grow.
There was another friend who made our stay at NC special. I met Mark McFadden during WLPC in last Feb (You can read my WLPC experience in this post). Even though we met for the first time, I felt there was a strong connection between us. I told him I have a plan to visit NC in June.
Thanks to Glenn Cate, who works for the same company I was able to contact him in the last minute (as Mark was not that active on twitter). When I texted Mark in that morning (the day before we left NC) he immediately called me & said he will definitely come to see us. Even though He lives 2.5 hr drive away, he came to see us with his wife after the work. That surprised us and created very beautiful moments. I introduced them to Tuhin & Rahul (a Cisco Support Community VIP – lives closer to Tuhin’s place) and we had a great time with them. Mark is having so much positive energy and I am really glad I met him & develop this friendship with him.
When he reached home on following day early morning, he texted me this beautiful message which made my day.
“Good friends & fabulous companionship with you and your family, friends. We came home safe with no issues.
And most importantly I will rest well knowing that I have a true friendship with you. Enjoy”
I am amazed about those friendships, by looking back how they started and built up strongly in such a short time. This 10 min video explain how you meet like minded people around the globe (highly recommend to watch it if you get spare 10 min) & why you should be positive instead of being negative.
Related Posts
1. Being True Friend
2. On the way to CLUS
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