I had a grand time at the get-together I attended on February 7, 2009. It is something that we have been doing annually ever since we held our 2oth anniversary in 2001. I have been one of the active organizers of the yearly get-together and I have attended all of them except in 2005 when I was in Thailand to teach English for a school year.
Like usual, we indicate the call time at around 4-5pm but people would usually start coming in around 6 pm (there were some early birds like myself ~~ well, because we have always been the organizers, we always have to be there early).
This get-together was supposed to be held December 2008 but the Chairman got busy with family visiting in from Canada and the UK and had his entire December tied down to family gatherings. Anyway, better late than never.
We were expecting around 40 participants but only 23 turned up. (not bad, we always joke that even if it was only the Chairman and myself in it, we will still count it as a batch get-together)
The main agenda in the meeting held after dinner and before everyone got crazy with videoke singing (cool thing, the videoke screen was projected on a wide, larger than life projector screen) was preparation for the big day on our 30th anniversary in 2011. As usual, we selected people who will act as coordinators for the main task of inviting as many batchmates as we can. We were one in saying that this tradition has to go on and we should all work together to reach our target number of batchmates to attend the big day.
There was plenty of food, courtesy of one batchmate who is currently a member of the city council. An all-out good guy, we also pledged our support for him in the coming elections in 2010. We will support him not because he is a batchmate but because he is a real good public servant. The venue where we held it was courtesy of another batchmate who owns the 4-storey building. He has a computer sales shop in the ground floor, an insurance company renting space at the second floor, an internet shop cum mini music lounge at the third floor where we held our get-together and a larger music lounge on the fourth floor with a similar projector screen set -up plus a mini bar. There was even streaming video coverage via the Yahoo Messenger webcam for the batchmates who are stationed in different parts of the world to have a real-time glimpse of what was going on in the party.
Other batchmates who were financially well-off provided other things like drinks, fruits, the souvenir t-shirt and money for the logistics.
This served as a dry-run for the big even in 2011 because we saw where we need to make improvements for better coordination of the event. Like, we realized we need a separate screen for the Yahoo Messenger cam and chat windows and someone to handle responding to the IMs, and other things.
All in all, it was an enjoyable get-together. (probably one that I can call the "best" so far)
On a personal note, I, having led my graduating class in 1981 in singing the graduation song (a main grad song and the locally popular High School Life by a local singer, Sharon Cuneta) always led the participants in the get-together to sort of "close" the program with that song. It has become my "signature" duty to sing that song. Last night, when I did, there were a lot of guy batchmates who joined me in the singing that drowned my voice. One guy classmate who always leads the group in setting up the song towards the end, put the song again in he queue after several other songs and when it came to it, he explicitly asked the group not to "join" me. I obliged and sang the song a second time. After that, he was happy. LOL ( He said he never fails to bring back the memories of that actual moment in 1981 when I sang it in the gym where we held the graduation ceremonies whenever I sing it in our get-togethers) After he said that, I felt sad. (don't know why) but it made me think how fast time flies and morbid as it may seem, a thought crossed my mind -- that in future get-togethers where I won't be able to be there anymore, I am sure it will be a sad moment to sing that song towards the end.
I should record the song on CD....:D
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