Sending belated thanks after a year or two may still make sense. In my case it is 37 years, but I decided to send it any way. During sometime in 1980, I met Mr. Pedro Padlan, the FAO aquaculture expert and who carried a Philippine passport at the premises of the Fishery Agency in Cairo where I worked. Few days after, I knew that Mr. Padlan nominated me to the top management to be his national counterpart in an Egypt/UNDP project on aquaculture development. I was very clear with Mr. Padlan admitting that my knowledge on aquaculture was so modest –if any.
However, upon the insistence of Mr. Padlan, I accepted such challenging task which focused on capacity building and took place at a governmental fish farm (Zawya) in Kafr El Sheikh. The 6-month training course hosted 21 participants of middle to senior positions and who affiliated to various fishery departments. I would save the technical details on this course for another post hopefully in due time.
In this “Thank you” message, I should admit that through managing the course and via the one-to-one discussion with Mr. Padlan, I was able to gain and accumulate technical information which was of great help upon joining my graduate program in USA shortly after the termination of the course. I always acknowledge Mr. Padlan in my frequent presentations related to the development of Egyptian aquaculture but this time I decided to thank him in public although I have no idea where is he now.
Note: One of the photos was taken in the fish farm while the second was taken at my home few days before the departure of Mr. Padlan. I guess you can identify the persons as Mr. Padlan is the one with glasses and so I am the other one.
