Snowcap

I left the office a bit after ten PM the night before and was more than ready to get a few hours of sleep before Wednesday. 

Seeing how this was my first congress as a Delegate and Hotel Coordinator at MCI and that I had just started barely a month earlier, it wasn’t only a guest list with requests out of the ordinary to manage but a brand new operating system to learn on top of that. 

Know the feeling when your workload is so great that it feels like no matter how many things you check off your to-do list it just never seems to get any shorter? and you find yourself wondering ”What the hell did I get myself into???” You can say that I got a jump start into the role as Coordinator. 

So back Wednesday, we ordered a cab pick up for half past two and at quarter past I still hadn’t packed up my computer or work-shirt for that matter and forget about lunch! (Yes, so my priorities differ quite a lot when I’m working from when I’m not. On my leisure it takes a great deal for me to go more than two hours without eating but at the office, one meal keeps me going for about ten hours.) And no, I didn’t starve. A lovely colleague ran to the store and got me a huge sandwich and a piece of chocolate (how sweet isn’t she?) and another one forced me to eat it in the cab on the way to location. There we unloaded all our luggage and reasoned that hey of course we can carry eight bags by ourselves (clever huh?) and slowly made our way into the conference. We managed alright too, if you disregard the small misshapen of me dropping one roll up in the middle of the revolving doors and stopping the whole shebang. 

Two hours later however we had set up the printer and made ourselves at home behind the Green counter were we would spend the upcoming days. The name tags were ready to go and so were the purple lanyards and we were officially open for business. As it was still the day before the actual conference and exhibitors were only just setting up, it wasn’t crazy busy yet but rather a preview of what was to come. When we closed up it was time to prepare for the following day. Working behind the scenes means the work begins when everything closes down for the public. 

The charm of working with events, right? #LoveWorkingBehindTheScenes 

On Thursday it was time for my virgin journey à la Titanic and the morning started with a cab ride to the Waterfront Conference at Radisson Blu. 6 in the morning it was still ghost town but that changed an hour later when the delegates finally started to arrive and making some buzz that didn’t stop until late that evening. 

A little after nine PM everyone had left and I and the Project Manager were the last ones standing. 

Leaving the scene of events we decided to have a quick last minute dinner before finally going home for some sleep before it was time to return early (early!) in the morning. 

- Enjoying the asian cuisine I came to the conclusion that food never tastes better than when enjoyed with a scenery of trains, airplanes or people in movement. It just sort of adds a unique spice to it. 

When Friday arrived I had on record time gotten used to the onsite-procedure of taking a cab to work, which tells you a little something about me: I adapt quickly to new conditions. And taking a cab is quite luxurious - I mean I rarely even take a cab home after leaving the party at four in the morning but will rather wait forty minutes for the bus… But that’s just me. 

Friday was D-day with the main event ’The Closing Dinner’ taking place in the evening and it was the hot topic all day as the pressure for tickets was high. Though I wasn’t working that evening (unfortunately) I did get a sneak peak of the settings before I left. 

As my colleague A who was in charge of the running schedule gave me a quick description of her work assignments for the evening I was not just a little bit jealous. Attending the party was probably great but me, I get my kicks working being behind the scenes. Obviously. 

So in the afterplay, leaving the office late before prepping for working three intense days onsite, I’ve been asked if I am tired or even exhausted? 

But honestly I am completely unfazed - I absolutely LOVED IT!