Convention Prep

Our convention is going to be July 6-8 at a national stadium in Trelawney, a town about 25 minutes from where I live.  I’ve never been to an outdoor stadium for a convention, and I was completely in awe of how much work the brothers and sisters have to put in to prepare for it.  The one time I did pre-convention cleanup, it was only for one day, and we got to the Cow Palace just a couple hours after the cleaning started.  The work was already pretty much done.  I remember scrambling around trying to find some gum to scrape off the ground so that I didn’t have to feel like we drove 45 minutes for nothing.  Not the case this time around.

By most accounts, the building this stadium was a complete waste of money because it is so rarely used.  There will be only one convention here this year, so we had to completely clean the place up and take care of the lawn, which is a huge job because the stadium rarely is used so the lawn was a mess. Also, we had to set up shade netting to protect the audience from the sun.  That meant unloading hundreds of 10, 21, and 28 foot long metal pipes and clamps that we attached large, heavy covers to.  Oh, and everybody, young and old works.  You’ll see little kids not older than 9 or 10 helping each other carry pipes.  And you’ll see 60 year sisters with machetes going crazy on some weeds on the lawn.  It’s awesome.

On Saturday and Sunday I was in this trailer helping unload the pipes, which were to be carried to other parts of the stadium for the construction.  That trailer was hot, like probably 110, 120 degrees after sitting in the sun for hours. Imagine me at about 10:30 in the morning just covered in sweat after working for a few hours.  It wasn’t even so much that I was working so hard (I was by the way haha) but the heat and humidity makes you sweat heavily after even the least exertion.  One of the sisters who was monitoring inventory saw me and said that I’d better get some water.  I stepped outside the trailer and though not particularly tired, I still felt like heat was radiating from my body.  They told me that I looked like someone had poured a bucket of water on my head.  Even still, I had an absolute blast working with all the friends, its an experience I’ll always appreciate.

 

Apparently, all this work that gets done is nothing compared to what the brothers used to have to do. During lunch a few of us were talking about how it used to be. The work involved was crazy enough, but made funnier when during the conversation they realized I was American.  Here’s how I remember the conversation:

‘Me remember long time me used to go to da BUSH ta build da building mon. Me get BAMBOO n me chop it up, y'kno.’

‘Ya mon, me remember dat. Me used ta ga wah me Fadar’

‘We did HAAARD WORK,  ya ‘understan?

’

Me: ‘Not really, no. Where I come from, we just show up with a broom and everything’s done in a couple hours.’

‘Whah ya from?’

‘Yah English?”

Me: ‘No, I’m from the States.’

‘No mon, 'im from America.’

‘Ya mon, me kno, me kno. Me ‘ear ‘is accent.’

We ended up working all day Saturday and Sunday, and some work will still need to be done this weekend as well.  I have to say, I’m now going to have way more appreciation for the work that goes into conventions in other countries.

Assuming of course that I don’t fry in the burning heat during the program.