This was a full work day for me and work isn’t really a fair description.  It is more like a full day of torture for me. I had a meeting starting at 8:30 and going through to 12:30. Then a lunch meeting from 12:30 to 2:00pm.  And then another meeting from 2pm until 5pm and then dinner from 7pm.  If you think it is glamorous traveling to the Bahamas then just compensate that with today.

Meanwhile Helen and Tina went off and partied on Paradise Island where the Atlantis Hotel (Sol Kerzner’s creation) is based.  Helen described it as Canal Walk on a Caribbean Island. They took a local bus into town (costs $1.25) and then a ferry from town across to Paradise Island ($4). No idea what they did except shopping (because I can see the effects) and eat ice cream (because I saw a photo of Tina at Ben & Jerry’s).  All the while I was been tortured in a day of meetings. The first meeting is where I am actually a member of the committee.  It is chaired by an South African and generally runs quite efficiently. I get to sit around the table because I am a member of the committee. If you aren’t a member you have to sit around the outside. I prefer sitting there because you can do emails / play games without anyone seeing. Being at the table you can’t get away with that.

The lunchtime meeting was productive (they always tend to be) and then the afternoon meeting was just incredibly boring. They really need to give lessons to people on how to chair a meeting. What took the chair lady at least 30 minutes to do I would have completed in 5 minutes with exactly the same result. Seriously. And that frustrates me no end. That and the fact that they really didn’t do much at all. In fact they discussed the terms of reference of the committee for at least 20 minutes to start with! At tea time I did the “duck and run” and did some work for the rest of the afternoon (it was already 4pm).

This evening was the gala dinner and it was to be held around the pool. I say ‘was’ because at about 6:45pm it started raining and by 6:50pm it was raining hard. So much for all the tables laid out. There clearly was no contingency plan as at about 7:30pm the rain abated and they quickly dried off the chairs and out we went for dinner. We had just eaten our starter when it started to rain lightly and then about 60 seconds later it started raining really hard. We didn’t even have our main course yet. We grab a table under a large gazebo and then headed back into the rain to get some food. It was still raining hard so it was grab whatever food we could and head back. Given I had to pay $150 for Helen to attend the dinner it really was not a value for money dinner.  The wind had also really picked up and I felt like I was sitting in CT looking into the teeth of a south easter.  The after effects on Helen can be seen in the pic (used with her permission). Her hair was straight when we went down to dinner.

We left dinner at 9pm though I can still clearly hear the band going full blast at the moment. I am so worn out from the day of meetings that I need to go to sleep or I will fall asleep on the keyboard. If you want to get a sights and sounds of Bahamas then go onto either my of Helen’s Facebook page and you will find a video clip from the hotel balcony.

Until tomorrow …