There’s a reason why I write this: no joke, that was the first time I have ever involved in organization of activities like Canteen Day (so you can imagine how “active” I was in my uniform body: KRS in my alma mater). Another reason was, this required stupendous amount of investment of time, even as ordinary member like me.
This is the activity of A-Level Student Ambassador (ALSTAR) of Sunway College, and Food Carnival is part of it. Considering how time-consuming it can be, the committee (ALSCO) knows best the pressure they are carrying, while members like us are not having much leisure either. Fortunately, the burden is meted out among us.
And that’s how it began: no stalling please.
As the committee mooted it and consigned the job to us, we started it immediately. Dishes decision, cost-cutting, materials needed, all steps were jotted down into the meeting minute. Following this, we planned out an experiment session on making foodstuff on a Saturday, and had bonanza of honeydew sago, chocolate mashmallow and chocolate cornflakes for ourselves (something to learn from others, considering the dearth of my cooking expereince)! We then came out with a complete list of cost and budget, and presaged that the honeydew sago would be the pay dirt for the team. As the day soon drew near, we held some tutorial session on precaution and techniques: never let a drop of water to mar the hot chocolate, ratio of 1:2:2 for sugar, coffeemate and honey-dew. Unfortunately, that was the moment when we were thinking of flagging down the sales of corn flakes, considering the disillusion of potential customers. We carried on, anyway.
10/10/2014
An aberration to what I did previously, I woke up at 6:15am and entered canopy walk at 7, just the moment when it opened. Why? To help my leaders to set up. As suggests, eat and work, I had nasi lemak as breakfast to support my comrades in other team (and because I rarely have nasi lemak since I enrolled in this College). It turned out that I really eat while work for the entire day: this was the only way for me to dispose my coupons piecemeal, considering my epic-failed technique of coupon selling (I tried some effort, alas, most of which was halted by response “I already bought”, while some slandered us, dourly and jocularly, as “money reaping”).
How about selling? Seemingly docile during tutorial, I still needed to consult my duty partners regarding the modus operandi of preparing the fresh foodstuff. Anyway, the following is the results when the Carnival was called a day: locally, our prognosis went perfectly accurate, whether the honeydew sago was best hit at its enticing price of RM4, while the corn flakes was at its stalemate; globally, the fruit stall finished its business before time, while team selling fried rice, due to over production, met an impasse and had to reduce its price to cleat stock. As the stock clearing technique itself went arduous, some attributed the dire condition as “factor other than price” (I get the joke as I study econs in A-Level), just like our corn flakes. Fortunately, I devised the gimmick of “buy rice and get corn flakes for free”, which somehow duped the consumers successfully (with much promotional work).
In conclusion, from a member’s point of view, the committee really did an exhilarating job, and overcome all possible insolvency to the fund-raising crusade. As of me, I was glad to be involved in it, even though what I did was just a little fraction of the work others have done. This, though, wore me out that I granted myself an amnesty and took a siesta the day after, after my return from a volunteering activity.
anzoteh96 