A response for Deense
Hmm, just had a flash of memory that I was on here last night and too under the influence to answer Deense's question... oops.
The question from her meme was how did I get into Events Management? I thought I'd post the answer for you all to read in case you were interested.
Lately a number of people have asked me how I got interested in Event Management, and thinking about it, I was always kind of destined to get into it. In year 12 I was a part of Kyogle Youth Action - a group of youths keen on making Kyogle a more fun place to live. One project was to build a skate ramp, someone, or probably myself made comment that there should be a skate competition. So there's me, HSC year, suddenly on the committee for the Annual Kyogle 'Fairymount Festival' as the Youth rep who was also running a skate comp for the festival. Not that I knew the first thing about skateboarding! I arranged over $1000 in prizes, rounded up 3 or 4 judges, a DJ, had participants from all over the area, as far away as Byron Bay and a friend and his mates came and did a skating display for us as well. It was a huge success.
Then I went to the USA to summer camp, and I was the one always organising the logistical side of things, we put on plays and I made the costumes and staging and props etc then organised seating and all associated productiony stuff. The people who directed the play took all the credit having done none of the hard work.
And then I went to Uni, I did a Theatre/ Media degree and I was sure I would end up in theatre. I never got a role in a play no matter how often and how well I auditioned, save one role in my final year production of "The Threepenny Opera" where I played a whore with 2 lines. In the second semester of my first year I worked on Village Fair, a music festival that happens every year at CSU Bathurst (and is on this weekend). I was the site construction/ decorator, I made the place look funky and worked my arse off. My second year of Uni I was assistant Stage Manager for Village Fair, I met Machine Gun Fellatio (amongst other bands) and once again worked my arse off. In my third year a friend and I ran Village Fair, I was the Site Manager, and worked my arse off, finally getting some credit where it was due. In the mean time people had noticed my knack for production, and throughout Uni I had worked behind the scenes on many shows, I produced the first stage performance of Trainspotting in Australia, we over sold every night and it is still talked about 6 years later. The same friend and I worked on Trainspotting and it was during the exact same time as we were working on Village Fair, for about 2 months neither of us got any good sleep, often curling up in the theatre during late night bump in for a couple of hours sleep.
As I was working on the final Village Fair I saw an ad for an Events Assistant at Kogarah Council for a 3 month contract over summer to work on Australia Day, which would be ideal as it was straight after the end of Uni. I got the job and started part time 3 days after Village Fair. I then spent my 4 or 5 last weeks of Uni commuting between Bathurst and Kogarah to do 2 days of Uni and 2 days of work. That 3 month contract extended out to about 16 months where I ran a number of events.
After that is was a bit of a battle to find the job I wanted, I did sales, worked for charity, and when in Bendigo worked for a conference centre - which I enjoyed and was good at, but wasn't exactly what I wanted. I always worked on community events for free when I could since I was often dissatisfied with the real job I had.
So now I am quite glad to have the job I do, it took nearly 4 years to get back in to Local Council, but it was always the job I enjoyed most. It's just that there are frustrating days (and sometimes weeks) where I wonder why I do events, and then I think about it and realise that there's nothing else I'd really prefer to do.
As I've said a number of times now, I have never run an SCA event. counter_ermine is quite good about that, being my Pelican and all, that since I run events for a living, why would I do it for my hobby too? Another part that puts me off running SCA events is that they seem to be quite blue printed. I don't find myself inspired as it's usually one of a standard set of event styles - tourney/ feast, ball with finger food, stand alone feast with amusing theme, or BoC. Also I don't fancy cooking for a bunch of people, and so many autocrats are the feastocrat too. Maybe one day I will find some inspiration and run an event, but I'd probably want to start big rather than small, probably not Festival (which I think I would be very well equipped to do), probably more of a crown event based on some really cool images I have squirrelled away... but I sit and wait for the inspiration, and really, SCA crown events don't fit in well with my real job time wise, being that Feb, April, Oct, Nov Dec are all busy times for me. Plus, I'm not really sure i would be given a crown event having not proven myself with smaller SCA events, the irony huh?
The question from her meme was how did I get into Events Management? I thought I'd post the answer for you all to read in case you were interested.
Lately a number of people have asked me how I got interested in Event Management, and thinking about it, I was always kind of destined to get into it. In year 12 I was a part of Kyogle Youth Action - a group of youths keen on making Kyogle a more fun place to live. One project was to build a skate ramp, someone, or probably myself made comment that there should be a skate competition. So there's me, HSC year, suddenly on the committee for the Annual Kyogle 'Fairymount Festival' as the Youth rep who was also running a skate comp for the festival. Not that I knew the first thing about skateboarding! I arranged over $1000 in prizes, rounded up 3 or 4 judges, a DJ, had participants from all over the area, as far away as Byron Bay and a friend and his mates came and did a skating display for us as well. It was a huge success.
Then I went to the USA to summer camp, and I was the one always organising the logistical side of things, we put on plays and I made the costumes and staging and props etc then organised seating and all associated productiony stuff. The people who directed the play took all the credit having done none of the hard work.
And then I went to Uni, I did a Theatre/ Media degree and I was sure I would end up in theatre. I never got a role in a play no matter how often and how well I auditioned, save one role in my final year production of "The Threepenny Opera" where I played a whore with 2 lines. In the second semester of my first year I worked on Village Fair, a music festival that happens every year at CSU Bathurst (and is on this weekend). I was the site construction/ decorator, I made the place look funky and worked my arse off. My second year of Uni I was assistant Stage Manager for Village Fair, I met Machine Gun Fellatio (amongst other bands) and once again worked my arse off. In my third year a friend and I ran Village Fair, I was the Site Manager, and worked my arse off, finally getting some credit where it was due. In the mean time people had noticed my knack for production, and throughout Uni I had worked behind the scenes on many shows, I produced the first stage performance of Trainspotting in Australia, we over sold every night and it is still talked about 6 years later. The same friend and I worked on Trainspotting and it was during the exact same time as we were working on Village Fair, for about 2 months neither of us got any good sleep, often curling up in the theatre during late night bump in for a couple of hours sleep.
As I was working on the final Village Fair I saw an ad for an Events Assistant at Kogarah Council for a 3 month contract over summer to work on Australia Day, which would be ideal as it was straight after the end of Uni. I got the job and started part time 3 days after Village Fair. I then spent my 4 or 5 last weeks of Uni commuting between Bathurst and Kogarah to do 2 days of Uni and 2 days of work. That 3 month contract extended out to about 16 months where I ran a number of events.
After that is was a bit of a battle to find the job I wanted, I did sales, worked for charity, and when in Bendigo worked for a conference centre - which I enjoyed and was good at, but wasn't exactly what I wanted. I always worked on community events for free when I could since I was often dissatisfied with the real job I had.
So now I am quite glad to have the job I do, it took nearly 4 years to get back in to Local Council, but it was always the job I enjoyed most. It's just that there are frustrating days (and sometimes weeks) where I wonder why I do events, and then I think about it and realise that there's nothing else I'd really prefer to do.
As I've said a number of times now, I have never run an SCA event. counter_ermine is quite good about that, being my Pelican and all, that since I run events for a living, why would I do it for my hobby too? Another part that puts me off running SCA events is that they seem to be quite blue printed. I don't find myself inspired as it's usually one of a standard set of event styles - tourney/ feast, ball with finger food, stand alone feast with amusing theme, or BoC. Also I don't fancy cooking for a bunch of people, and so many autocrats are the feastocrat too. Maybe one day I will find some inspiration and run an event, but I'd probably want to start big rather than small, probably not Festival (which I think I would be very well equipped to do), probably more of a crown event based on some really cool images I have squirrelled away... but I sit and wait for the inspiration, and really, SCA crown events don't fit in well with my real job time wise, being that Feb, April, Oct, Nov Dec are all busy times for me. Plus, I'm not really sure i would be given a crown event having not proven myself with smaller SCA events, the irony huh?