The hotel staff probably placed this note in every room this morning, especially those situated near the pool:
The private function being referred to would be ACI's Fun Night.
Although The Deck was reserved from 6pm to 12 midnight, dinner was scheduled at 7pm. With about an hour to spare, I hung around the hotel room watching cable TV while Julpha and Rhoda ate Halo-halo at the hotel's Lobby Lounge.
Julpha and Rhoda returned to the hotel room and we went down to the Deck at the 4th floor together around 7pm. It was Dennis who told us to come early so we could choose a table that is in the airconditioned room, since most of the tables woule be in the open air. Nice idea, and even if we didn't care about air-conditioning, at least there would be a roof on our heads just in case it rains.
The food was still being brought out to the buffet tables when we got there, so we went around taking pictures:
Near the pool:
Near the buffet tables:
By 7:30 we were already eating though the other delegates were only arriving. A band played while we were eating and in between sets, raffle prizes were being given away. The smaller prizes where giveaways from Reuters. No wonder we didn't get a Reuters item in our goodie bags yesterday. Reuters opted to give out raffle prizes. He he.
Around 8pm, we went to the hotel entrance since our order of pomelos from Winkool Fruit Mart had arrived. Since there were a lot of boxes, the concierge suggested that the hotel keep them in storage rather than deliver them to our rooms. It was fine with the others but Rhoda insisted on bringing her boxes of pomelo to our room even if she had to bring them up herself - which she did. The rest of us kept the claim stubs the concierge gave me.
Around 9:30, we got tired of listening to the band, so Rhoda, Julpha and I walked towards the poolside. We saw a group of Marlboro promo girls enter and they started giving freebies to anyone who smoked (the poolside is a smoking area). The eventually guards realized they had crashed in on the party and told them to leave. ICAP gave free drinks to clients in one corner of the Deck, but delegates thought it was an open bar care of ACI so everyone flocked there (even other brokers, I heard).
By 10:30pm, a lot of the raffle winners were from Eastwest that Dennis, who was on the stage calling out the winners, had to explain to the audience that Eastwest sent a huge number of delegates, therefore increasing the chances that winners will be from that bank.
The raffle was over around 11pm, and Rhoda and I decided to leave the party and go to our rooms. Rhoda will be taking the first flight to Manila tomorrow and had to leave the hotel early in the morning (make that dawn). She wanted to start packing her things tonight rather than do it tomorrow.
The view of the Deck from our hotel room:
A closer look at the place where the stage is:
The pool. The bar is on the left side:
----- May 4 ------
I heard that the guards had to request the remaining delegates to leave the area around 3am this morning. By then, Boss Mon had dared a lot of people to jump into the pool. Once he took off his shoes and shirt and jumped in, the others reportedly followed.
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