Trainee at fair: #BB14 – Mission completed – #over

Exciting, enjoyable moments always pass far too quickly. What remains of them? Fragmented memories of particular places, particular people, particular conversations. At Neutraubling, Nittenau, Nuremberg, Murau, and the mission, in which eight trainees were tasked with becoming experts for the BrauBeviale 2014 – and, of course, ultimately succeeded. And the company of Klara, Lisa, Julia, Fred, Daniela, Michael, Markus and Nina opened many doors for me, leading to some unique opportunities. Here are some flashbacks from the past few months:

#BrauBeviale2014 – I’m wandering about in a sea of black-suited executive clones. – #BB14 – Back there! At last I’ve espied a green T-shirt, move, move! – #BB14 – I meet some hardworking trainees talking to a client. – Two months earlier, in Neutraubling: I’m sitting at my desk and editing a blog posting; my finger twitches towards the delete key: a machine with a tabletop?! – Oh, no, I remember: the Linatronic does NOT have a tabletop?! – Inexplicably, an image rises unbidden in my brain of the bring-me-a-sausage machine I once saw on a TV show for kids (does that have a tabletop?). – I struggle through cryptic machine designations. – October 2014: Michael, Daniela and I are sitting in the car; our destination is the Murau Brewery in Austria. – We love Austrian radio! – For an hour now, we’ve been driving along country roads. – Sleep is out of the question (nothing to do with our driving skills, though): one hairpin bend after another. – September 2014, Neutraubling: we wander through labyrinthine buildings, desperately looking for the meeting point agreed with the product specialist. – We get some helpful tips: “You have to go down the stairs and then turn right, I think!“ – Perhaps they weren’t so helpful after all: “No, that’s all wrong, you need to go one floor higher!”

Traffic jam. – Traffic jam. – Still traffic jam.  –  First day of the fair in Nuremberg, and we’re on our way. – We arrive later than planned: tomorrow we’ll set off earlier. – First impression of the fair: WOW! – Impressions from the back office: it’s crowded, bustling, everyone busy at work. – #BB14 – October 2014, somewhere in Austria: still on our way to the Murau Brewery, still clocking up the mileage on the country roads; we’re beginning to have doubts: are we heading in the right direction? Is there going to be anything at all out here? Villages? People? Animals? – After what feels like another hour, we again discover traces of civilisation: there are a few isolated caravans visible between the trees. – Is camping allowed here? – Finally we’ve arrived. – August 2014, Neutraubling: I’m writing what feels like a thousand email circulars. – Half of these are answered by the automatic absence assistant: after all, who’s going to be working in August? – Change of strategy: I make what feels like a hundred calls. – These are followed by another ten email circulars. – Hurrah, the date for the first meeting with a product specialist has been fixed, despite holidays, vocational college and other obligations.

Second day of the fair: we get there at half past six am. – The doors are shut. – #BB14 – I’m looking for green T-shirts again. – #BB14 – In case of doubt, always look near the BEVkeg. – #BB14 – The video is done and dusted! – September 2014, Neutraubling: we sort the material for the presentation videos: an incredible amount of comical outtakes has accumulated. – The camera clicks. – Bewildered glances follow us. – Eight trainees, in bright green T-shirts jumping from benches. – Photoshoot! – August 2014, Neutraubling: I’m sitting at my desk and writing an email to one of the trainees, where I know only the name: a message from Lea Müller to Lisa Müller. – The first meeting with the trainees: new faces and exciting stories. – Murau Brewery, first impression: brewing beer is brilliant! – Second impression: Wow, I definitely want a brewery of my own! – Even an unscheduled shower of wheat beer can’t dampen the enthusiasm: perhaps I’m a born brewer, and hadn’t realised it. But then again, perhaps I’m not. – September 2014, Neutraubling: for an hour now, I’ve been trying to understand how one of these fillers actually work. – Illuminating conversations with the product specialists and with Markus and Fred prove helpful. I now have a rough idea, “rough” being the operative word here. – October 2014, meeting point Krones Museum Neutraubling. – In our determination not to be late, we get there much too early. – A few of us go and fetch a coffee first. Now we have to make sure we aren‘t actually late!

#BrauBeviale2014 – We’re the first ones in the back office. – Hurrah, there’s cappuccino. – The office fills up, it’s getting more and more crowded. – A sip of cappuccino: everything’s fine, there’s somewhere to sit on the radiator. – October 2014, somewhere in Austria: on the way back from Murau. – It’s pitch dark, we’re sitting in the car. – Confusing signs on the autobahn indicate road works. – The satnav guides us off the autobahn, and then back onto it. – The satnav is a liar, so I follow my instincts! – Five minutes later: “Let’s wake Mike up, he’s bound to know the way.” – A bit earlier in October 2014, Neutraubling: we’re on our way to the fifth floor. – Today it’s the meeting with the members of the Executive Board. – I’m curious: what are their offices going to look like? – I’m also nervous: hopefully everything will go according to plan. – I’m facing a medium-serious crisis: how does the dictaphone work? – Great view from the fifth floor! – Mr Kronseder’s office is (though very chic) too small for all of us, so we relocate to a conference room. – The camera clicks. My pen scratches over the paper: for the worst-case scenario if the dictaphone refuses to function. – The relief is palpable: everything’s going according to plan. – We conduct two really interesting interviews. – Time flies.

#BB14 – Pling, a blog post is online. – I’m relieved. – I meet an incredible number of people at the fair. – Conduct even more conversations. – September 2014, somewhere in Nittenau: Julia, Nina, Markus, Fred and are sitting in the car, the rain is pouring down. – We can’t find the way to Evoguard – “Ah, there are some Kronese over there!” We wind down the window and ask the friendly people in Krones T-shirts for directions. – October 2014: meeting with a product specialist: we get a lot of new information. – Learned numerous technical details. – Flash of inspiration: “I see, so that’s how it works!” – August 2014: cryptic machine designations. – It’s like learning vocabulary: Linatronic means empty-bottle inspector, Hydronomic means water treatment system, Ergomatic means labeller. – November 2014 #BrauBeviale2014 – Return to the back office. – First I click through all the open tabs, while keeping an eye on my smartphone as well: Youtube – Facebook – #BB14 – Google+ – #BB14 – Twitter – #BB14 – Instagram – ####BB14 – LinkedIn – #BB14 – Xing – #BB14 – Vine – #BB14 – Pinterest – #BB14 – WordPress – Then the shock news: “The upload has failed.” – Who broke the internet?!? – #BB14 #over.