National pride and the importance of family come to mind about this country. It runs deep here. It has been very evident on our mission.

The first day of training was started with a ceremony paying respect to their service, their leaders, and their country and to GlobalFire. There were prayers and singing of our two national anthems and welcome comments from BFP authorities.

The GlobalFire Team Lead was given an opportunity to speak and explain our organization and its dedication to the fire service. Following that each team member had an opportunity to introduce himself or herself and address the 76 students that travelled in some cases hundreds of kilometers by local transit.

The students had been previously divided into three teams by the BFP. Day one was filled with a lot of classroom instruction with safety as a priority. We had to ensure that the students had a good understanding of all safety issues and an understanding of the content because most of the teaching topics were new to them or in greater detail then they have ever had before. We are all fire fighters and they are expected to do the same job as us so great care was taken by the teaching cadre to connect with the BFP fire fighters and ensure their needs were met.