zenn bites...

yesterday night was damn drama mama

we'd this cruise planned for the casual dinner...got everyone on board this gorgeous ship - airy upper deck with tables&chairs, tidbits&drinks aplenty..the guests got to try out this wine from Thailand's first vineyard (or so they claim)...didn't get to take a sip though...

the lower deck had a lovely air-conditioned room with 7 stations providing foot and neck and shoulders massage...alot of the guests took up the 10-minute massage offer and there're big grins and thumbs up from those who enjoyed the soothing touch of the therapists...

the 75-minute cruise ride took about 95minutes instead though...and while some guests got impatient, most were still in good cheer, especially when they started karaoke-ing (must be the drinks)! i was glad too..coz the delay meant i had time to squeeze in a foot massage...woooohoooooo after a long day running around in heels, the foot massage made me feel like i was walking on air...

we finally got to the pier and everyone's ready to hop off once the ship docked, when there was

a SPLASH

OH NO did someone fall in!??!?! everyone peered over the rails to see what had happened..

turns out the bridge had collapsed...BANGKOK BRIDGE HAS FALLEN DOWN...*help*

it's this little wooden bridge that links land to a floaty block that the ship's to be attached to..and it's the ONLY way we could get to land, sans going for a swim....the bridge somehow lost it's footing on the floaty bit...and half of it splashed down into the water...

goodness...it's every event organiser's nightmare...unforseen circumstances that you can do absolutely NOTHING about...except pray..

the restaurant and pier staff got to work immediately..somehow, about 8 of them managed to get onto the floaty bit (i think they went for a swim in the yellow, icky chao phraya river..eww)..there's alot of rope-tying and heaving..and it took about half an hour of pushing this and pulling that before they managed to heave to bloody bridge back onto the floaty bit, and secure it with loads of rope...the ship took another 10minutes to maneuver itself into a parked position..

most of the guests remained jolly and said this was the best live entertainment they've had so far *phew* but of course you got the annoyed ones who was grumbling and showing black faces...grrr

there's alot of joking around on who should try the bridge out first haha but finally, in single file, all the guests managed to get off the ship without any mishaps..

DINNER TIME!!!!!!

food was yum...especially this very interesting mushroom soup with coconut milk...but we're all doing damage control, and didn't have much time to eat...

yes..damage control...while the guests were enjoying their food in the sprawling lawns of SUAN TIP (supposedly one of the best restaurants in thailand), we made hurried calls back to the hotel for my 3 colleagues who stayed behind, to churn out personalized letters to apologize for the "trauma" caused...our client actually cried coz she's so stressed... =/

of the 200 event guests, we had to weed out the names of the 90 who actually went for the casual dinner, and room drop personalized letters and a gift (a bottle of wine or a box of hand-made chocs if they're muslim)...all these had to be done in a couple of hours..so that they will have the gifts in their rooms once they get back to the hotel

it was a frenzy...

but all's good and done...*phew* the rest of the night after we got back from dinner (at midnight) was spent churning out personalized departure and recreational activity letters...*sighz* i'll be so glad when this is over......

i wana go shopping!!!!!!