土曜日, 12月 17, 2005
My First Trend Christmas Party
I gate crashed at our EMEA office' Christmas Party! I missed last year's and so this was my first with the company. I won this doggie stuffed toy!
All the ladies came in dressed up like those Hollywood actresses, it was so grand! (see I'm easily turned Irish...they use the word 'grand!' for 'great!'.) The men were equally dashing..and yet the invitation said 'semi-formal'.
Cork office was fun & friendly. They all would ask how I'm doing and if I'm ok, and they all feel geniune to me.
Surprisingly, I'm popular with the guys even with my fully covered, winter long sleeved, checkered, everyday blue wool blouse. They all said, I have good excuse because I'm just visiting, and I was doing ok anyway (wow, what nice complements hahahaha). Although I absolutely don't have any idea if those were just devious ploys to a seemingly naive looking Asian, I enjoyed the attention anyways and I did perfectly blend well.
Everybody introduced themselves to me although I don't remember a single name hahahaha. Derek, Cork office' head apologized because he didn't realize I was still in Cork. I said 'no worries' (again, the Irish English for 'no problem or not at all').
This was open bar and everybody was just drinking to death! There was a live band singing country music and we all loved them. All the girls (me included) danced on stage. The guys started coming to the dance floor as the night went deeper and champaignes kept on pouring.
Went back to the hotel at around 1am half feeling sorry that I was about to miss the more interesting part of the party. Woke up at 4am with a headache and was off to the Cork airport for Amsterdam at 4.30am. While waiting for the counter to check-in, I felt my head was aching and I wanted to bang it against the wall. Everything around me spun but I held my ground, no hang over has ever beaten me before! This was emergency time for a can of ice-cold coke! I thought I was lucky I found a potato ship with vinegar flavor. Time and again, sour food and coke is my ultimate anti-hang over.
There was an announcement at around 6am that we will have a delay because Amsterdam airport suspended all air traffic due to strong wind. Further noticer will be every 30 minutes. Everyone was panicking except me. I decided to take a nap and with my stuffed toy as pillow, I had a powerful one. At around 7.30 they've announced that we would probably fly at 8am, pending Amsterdam airport's approval.
We did manage to fly after a 2 hour delay. As expected Schipol airport was crazy with all the backlog and delays. The weather was not good and it started to rain so I decided to cancel my Amsterdam sightseeing, besides I'm was in no mood to appreciate the beauty around me.
With little shopping and a cup of coffe, I sobered. My flight back to Tokyo was also delayed, as expected so I hang around Mc Donald's. The place was pretty cozy for my usual McDo image. At around 3pm all Tokyo-bound passengers via KLM were paged over at Gate F4.
It took us another 1 1/2 hours to board the plane and when we finally do, I was again sleeping like a baby, instantly waking for snack and food breaks. There was no space and my legs would hurt. Aside from that, I started to feel the nuisance of having to carry the stuffed toy. It was good company at McDo but I just didn't have the spare space. Anyways, I made it back to my home Saturday 2.30pm...what a long journey.
There was no rest for me because I had to dash back to Shinjuku Takashimaya to shop for tomorrow's ensemble for Tera's wedding party. Good thing the store's assistant chose everything well for me, so I practically had nothing much to do except fit. I left the dress, shawl and shoes in the office so I could just change there tomorrow. It was too late for a hair treatment appointment so I would just have to do that later. Same with my nails and I have to do a make-up trial for tomorrow. I don't want to be caught off-guard again, Tera said it was semi-formal. But I also don't want to look like a show-off.
Thanks for visiting!