Team Member of the Month » September 2006

Name : Tobias Prade
Born : 1978
Team member since : 2004
Prior Club Mistral Destinations : Dahab

This month's Team Member of the Month is Tobi Prade, who rather fittingly has his birthday on the first of the month, so our heartiest congratulations to him with all good wishes for the coming year.

Tobi comes from a real windsurfing family, all of whom are involved in the industry in some form or another. He is also a Bavarian through and through.

After his apprenticeship, Tobi spent a while organizing the VDWS warehousing. Initially he didn’t intend to leave Bavaria, or indeed Weilheim, but once his little sister Melanie decided to spend some time abroad, he followed suit, and took on an apprenticeship in Dahab to become a windsurfing instructor.
Once his three months of training were finished, he was so enthusiastic about the centre that he extended his stay and, within an amazingly short time, was fully integrated as a windsurfing instructor. That was back in 2004…He then swiftly completed his VDWS license and dramatically improved his windsurfing: since then he has been teaching successfully and passionately.  He has also improved his linguistic abilities, moving from a heavily disguised English to being as good as good as fluent in that language. 

Tobi’s special talent, though, is in dealing with kids, where he is inspirational. He gets them up and sailing within a really short period.  One small girl, aged six , even sent him a love letter after her windsurfing course: we reckon that says a lot!  His character has a lot to do with this as he is very gentle and good natured, with an open and friendly nature which make him a very popular character amongst the team and guests. He is also very ordered and organised, which was perfect when the centre manager in Dahab was on holiday, as he was able to take charge of the centre at the drop of a hat.  Even this, an entirely new challenge, he mastered and managed very competently, showing that he not only enjoys it but it is thoroughly capable of taking on responsibility.

Whilst in Dahab, Tobi also got to know Olga who has since become the love of his life. Both are now in Alacati for the Summer season to gain more experience at another centre and, possibly, to take up kitesurfing.

The plan is to send Tobi to what was the old Helnan centre as centre manager as soon as the new Meridian Hotel in Dahab opens.  The Team in Dahab certainly misses him and they often say: “Lets do it the Bavarian way”, in other words everything in its place, neat and tidy and exactly as it should be. A lot of the guests from Dahab miss him, too, and have been asking after him.

Naturally, we hope that he will stay with us at Club Mistral for a long, long time to come.

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