The staff party was hilarious. First of all we had to wear masks and choosing them was quite something. Because the chairman of the company was in the HR office and it was the HR Manager who'd purchased a whole lot of masks for everyone, she had to secrete them to the locker room (as the chairman didn't want evidence of the party in a work office), where it was a bit of a bun fight picking one.
The Communications Manager, my friend Teresa, and I immediately spotted a silver one that we both liked. I managed to grab it first, but then decided that actually it might look better on her, so I ended up with hers, which was a black lacy effect one. Pretty damn scratchy too!
Then, the whole shindig was held at this amazing place called Venezia, which is Hua Hin's version of Venice. I can't actually say that it resembled Venice in any shape or form that I recognised, but rather it reminded me of a very downmarket Las Vegas attempt! However, we did have a red carpet to have our pics taken on.
 |
| The Doge's Palace? |
 |
| Your guess is as good as mine! |
Our masks lasted all of 5 minutes, as the moment we could we just took them off! A friend of mine, Natasha, had taken a bottle of wine for us to share, but Tal (one of the naturopaths, who was my companion for the night) declined any and as Teresa was driving, that left the whole bottle for just the two of us. On each table there was a bottle of Thai whisky (which I'm not sure would pass any whisky tasting test in Scotland), which smelled more like brandy than whisky and I'd been advised to steer well clear of... and Tal decided he would chance that. Brian, the Facility Manager, who joined our table kept Tal company in the whisky drinking stakes.
The food wasn't the best, a kind of Chinese Thai mix of not the best variety, so I didn't eat much. So what with little food and the wine and Tal and Brian loading on the whisky, we were actually a very jolly party!
One lovely thing though, is that the party is a true celebration of the work force and the chairman gave out certificates of good work practice, flowers and presents to the 2 employees of the year and everyone who has worked for the company for 5, 10, 15 and 20 years respectively got a special gold gift. I think it's something like a ring for 5 years, a bracelet for 10 and getting more and more expensive as the years go by, which I thought was a lovely touch.
There were over 200 staff there, which just goes to show how many people it takes to run a place like Chiva Som and it was lovely to see everyone let their hair down and enjoy themselves.
The funny thing was though, was that, to me, with the music from the band strictly 50's and 60's (the chairman is a member of the band and is renowned for singing 'Johnny B Good'!) it felt like I was in a time warp. And because most people had dressed up to the nines, I kind of felt I was at a wedding party circa 1958!
By 10.30 Tal and I decided we'd get the bus back, but it turned out the bus was non-existent, or at least it hadn't turned up when it was supposed to, so Teresa very kindly gave us a lift back, for which we were very grateful.
Here are some pics for you:
 |
| Me waiting at the Staff Bus complete with scratch mask! |
 |
| Tal and Me just before we took our masks off |
 |
| Natasha and Teresa |
 |
| Some of the Holistic Team + Teresa, who joined us for the evening, all glammed up! |
No comments:
Post a Comment