Categories: uncategorized
Date: 19 September 2004 07:00:42
Well I am glad to be home. It was not as excruciating as I feared however this was helped along by the company of some like minded individuals. We managed to avoid being evicted from any of the sessions, which I thought was quite an achievement considering the spirit of sarcasm which seemed to manifest itself in us.
So. What happened. Left home at 7 on Saturday morning. Arrived at the site at 9. Was told by friend that I did not count as "unable to safely walk up the mountain" so managed the grueling 5 minute climb without the aid of a mini bus. Sad. Realised that I still didn't have my name tag (which doubles as an entry pass) as someone had stolen mine at church a few weeks ago. Christians. You can't trust them. Anyway, I went to the info tent and randomly accused strangers of stealing my name tag. I was given a new one. And all was well in the world. We were herded into the large shed after giving up on waiting for the rest of our group. We found ourselfs in a back corner, with good ventilation and an excellent view of a tv screen (which was good as I like to be able to see who's talking to me and they were really quite a long way away). The rows of chairs in the shed are all fairly conservatively spaced. Somehow we managed to make the row in front of us so narrow that no-one sat there. This was excellent as it provided much leg room and also allowed us to turn the chairs round and put our feet up. Might as well make oneself comfortable in such trials.
There were three speakers. One was fantastic, one was ok and one was... not to my liking. The topic of the convention was... erm... walking in truth? Something like that. There was much singing. Some of this resulted in variable amounts of mirth among myself and my similarly possessed companions.
There were three talks on Saturday, broken up with morning tea and lunch. Lunch was a pleasant chicken caesar wrap and the lunch break was given an injection of excitement when an old lady fell over next to where we were sitting and we all got to practice first aid. I was particularly impressed with one friend's reassuring ability. She was great. I'm not very good at that bit. A bit sad but I'm getting used to it.
Saturday festivities finished at about 4:30 and we were released from the shed. The group from my church was staying at a house about 20 minutes drive away and we all meandered off there. Oh, I must mention the terribly pagan behaviour displayed in the car park! 3000 women means a lot of cars. The car park is a field and is managed by people wearing yellow vests and carrying radios. They tell you where to park in the morning (cos there are no lines. It's really just a field) and wave their arms around and stuff. On the way out, however, there is not good exit strategy. Packing cars into a field neatly is one matter. Getting them out is a whole new kettle of fish. We were stuck trying to get into the exit stream of traffic for a good 10 minutes. Not because the field was in gridlock but because no-one would let us in. I realised I should try to restrain myself a bit as most people could see me shaking my fist through the windscreen. Luckily the windows were closed so they probably couldn't hear my er... verbal manifestations of rage.
Made it to the house eventually, after stopping at the lolly shop and purchasing various over-priced, yet tasty goods (peanut butter M&Ms. mmmmmmmm). As a group we eschewed the suggested "discussion time" and spent the evening eating, reading the paper and playing games. Uno Attack is a great game. It removes all elements of skill from the game. This is obvious when I tell you that I did not win once.
The young folks went to bed at about 11 however we were all kept awake by the "young mothers" who were very excited at being up late with no children and were making a dreadful ruckus. Ah well. We're all forgiving sorts. Well the rest of the are. I quite like bearing grudges... er well anyway.
Sunday! The first talk was by the fantastic speaker. I enjoyed it. At morning tea I bought some books. I like buying books. The rest of morning tea was spent in angst. You see the second (and final) talk for the day was by the speaker who did not appeal to me. This created a problem because I would like to finish with the good speaker. Should I stay or should I go? I remembered that I had my Greek workbook in my bag so it was decided that I would go with my similarly possessed companions, sit in the back row and do Greek.
Oh yes, more singing. Why oh why do organisers choose songs with male and female parts for women's conventions? I don't understand! Anyway, in And Can it Be, we took it upon ourselves to provide the male voice. I didn't think five of us would be much good against 2995 women but we did our best. I think there may have been other pseudo-males though because the singing leader commented on the admirable male parts. Surely she could hear us from the back row!
Finally it drew to a close! We left before the official 'thanks for coming' speech and ran down the hill to our cars, thus avoiding a repeat of the road rage incident. Had one stop on the way home to buy doughnuts. Now all is well.
Summary: don't know if I'd go again. It was fun but possibly for the "wrong" reasons.