So, our week in Florida came to an end, and off we went to
the International Assembly in San Diego, where intensive training of the DGEs
would take place, with a different programme for the ‘spouses’.
Larry took the four of us to Orlando airport in the early
hours for our 6 a.m. flight to San Diego, with a short stopover scheduled in Houston,
Texas en route. The vagaries of booking flights through Rotary International
Travel Service (RITS) became apparent, as Birtha and Lief went somewhere
completely different for a stopover before going on to San Diego. RITS, when
booking your flights, book the cheapest flights available at the time of
booking, which often means a much longer route, with one or more stopovers. As these were relatively short internal
flights, we took what was offered to us (unlike the outward journey from UK,
when we paid extra for ‘World Traveller
Plus’ seats). Consequently we went one way and the Danes another.
There was considerable disruption to internal flights that
day, due to the wintry conditions further north. This didn’t affect our flight
to Houston, but our one hour stopover there was changed to 4 hours. Whilst there we met up with Steve and Jan
Lawes, and Lyn and Ron Marshall, who were travelling together and whose flight
to San Diego had been cancelled. They were on standby only, but by the time we
took off, we were all safely aboard.
During the flight from Houston, I sat next to a young lad who lived in
San Diego and was travelling with his grandfather, who was a few rows back. He
turned out to be very engaging company, and told me about the highlights of San
Diego from his perspective. Although I
didn’t tell him, I decided not to follow his advice to visit the skate park. I
was, however struck by his enthusiasm for San Diego, which he felt was a great
place to live.
Eventually we landed at San Diego, which has a fairly small
but very modern-looking airport, and were pleasantly surprised with the sunny,
warm weather, which was to remain with us for the rest of the week. Leaving the
airport was a delight, as within 5 minutes of getting into the taxi, we were
driving along the sea front, past yacht masts and palm trees. What a contrast
from the perimeter road at Heathrow. A few minutes later we were at our hotel,
the Manchester Grand Hyatt, a very imposing hotel with twin towers, probably
the tallest building in San Diego. Right
next door to the Hotel was a newly built retail and restaurant complex, called
Seaport Village, right on the harbour, and about 400 yards away was the USS Midway, a decommissioned aircraft carrier, which is now a major tourist
attraction.
Our room at the Hotel was superb, on the 10th
Floor, with panoramic views across the harbour to Coronado (a spit of land joined
to San Diego, but which looks like an island) where there is a major US Navy base,
with two huge aircraft carriers moored there and a number of smaller vessels at
the time we arrived. Later in the week, one of the aircraft carriers was to
leave for the Middle East, leaving just one, the USS Ronald Reagan, which we
later learned was the largest aircraft carrier in the US Navy. Also from our
window we could see the USS Midway, so there were wonderful views in all
directions.
The view from our room looking towards naval base on Coronado. USS Midway is on right of picture
An enormous hall on the ground floor was used for all meals.
It had to be big, because there are over 500 incoming District Governors around
the world and they and their spouses were staying in the hotel. So every
morning over 1,000 people sat down to breakfast, coffee breaks, and also lunch.
There were 3 formal dinners during the week, and the other nights we were free
to go out and do our own thing.
Mealtimes in the Hall were quite fun. These were served buffet-style, from 4 or 5 stations
around the room. They tried to cater for all tastes, so Brits could have a fry
up if they wanted, Americans could have waffles and pancakes, there were
noodles for the Koreans, vegetarian food, cereals, bread and sweet treats from
all over the world. I enjoyed sampling some things I hadn’t eaten before, and
didn’t enjoy others. But the best part was sitting down to eat with Rotarians
from all around the world. Sometimes we would share a table with our UK
colleagues, but more often we would find a table where we knew no-one, and
during the week we enjoyed the company of French, Argentine, American,
Australian and Indian Rotarians, and many other nationalities. I was also
pleased to have breakfast one morning with the Russian whose presentation I
attended in Lisbon last year. I commiserated with him that the room allocated to him in Lisbon had been
too small.
RIBI's finest
One very noticeable feature of the Assembly was the giving
of gifts. Everywhere you went, in the bar, in breakout rooms, at breakfast,
lunch and dinner people were giving each other business cards and
accompanying these with a little gift.
The gift may be a badge, some chocolate, a little toy or doll (the Danes were
handing out some very scary looking troll dolls). RIBI recommended to its DGEs
that they did not partake of this gift giving because of the costs involved,
however some, including Vivian, ignored this. She had some book marks made
depicting scenes from her District, which looked quite smart, and were at least
of some use to the recipients. We also had ‘King-pins’ to hand out. The RIBI
DGEs designed and had made a lapel pin in the shape of a crown, in homage to
the RIBI President in waiting, Peter King. So Vivian and I had cards, book
marks and king-pins to hand out, which we did at every opportunity. After all,
you don’t want to take them home with you.
Elvis is alive! Seen outside Hotel
On the first floor, the Hotel had a mini shopping mall,
where the only things you could buy were Rotary merchandise. Here you could buy
hats, shirts, jumpers, jackets and bags, all bearing the Rotary logo. There was
also merchandise with the new ‘Light Up Rotary’ theme to buy, particularly
scarves and ties. Then there were stalls selling Rotary pins and badges,
paperweights, stationery items, all sorts of things. You could even have
one-off badges made to order. Vivian had great fun there. Apart from buying
badges for her own use, she had a shopping list from her District team for
themed ties, scarves and lapel pins. Unknown to me, she also had a District 1140 Consort badge made for me, which I was delighted with. At last, some bling
to wear!
Here, we are modelling the 'Light up Rotary themed scarf and tie.
It is traditional for RIBI to have their own bar in the
hotel, and this year was no exception. Peter King had a suite of rooms at his
disposal, and one of them we turned into a bar, with a stock of drinks and
nibbles, and decorated with the flags of England Ireland Scotland and Wales. The
idea was to give us somewhere to go to for a bit of relaxation, and also
somewhere we could invite new friends to. The DGEs had a whip round between
them to stock the bar, and on our day of arrival Doug took responsibility for
going down to the local Supermarket, Ralphs (about 10 minutes walk away), to
buy the beer, gin, whisky, mixers etc. I think he enlisted help from the Hotel
by way of a vehicle, and members of staff helped him bring it all up to the
room, where it was left until we started using it the following night.
However, to our horror, we discovered the room had been
emptied of all booze overnight, and the Hotel initially claimed to have nothing
to do with it. Subsequently, much of the booze was ‘found’ elsewhere in the
Hotel, and I understand an agreement was reached with regard to the cost of the
remainder. Apparently hotel staff thought it had been left over from another
event, and removed it all from the room.
So, after that hiccup, order (and alcohol) was restored to the room, and
the bar opened for business the next evening. Some evenings Vivian and I didn’t
go there at all, as we were busy doing other things, but on one memorable night
roughly midweek, we went there, having invited our friends Birtha and Lief to
come along. After all, we had been encouraged to invite people up to the bar.
On that particular night, every one of us seemed to have invited someone, as
the room was full to capacity. It didn’t help that Lief and Birtha had extended our invitation to all of their Danish colleagues.
Relaxing in the RIBI bar
The outcome was that complaints about the noise were made by
other residents, and a very loud and angry security manager came to the room
and told us in no uncertain terms that if we didn’t quieten down immediately,
he would evict us all from the room. In any case, there were far too many
people inside and he demanded that at least half of them leave immediately.
None of uis wanted to be responsible for Peter and Di being evicted, so the
rest of the evening was conducted ‘Sotto Voce’ with constant reminders to ‘Shhhh’. We learned later that such incidents
happen every year.
At the end of the International Assembly, we decided to stay
on for 3 nights, as we wanted to see some of the city. Whilst the Assembly was
on, we hardly set foot outside the hotel, and all we knew of the city was the
view from our room, and the 10 minute walk to Ralphs supermarket. We would have to fend for ourselves for these 3 days, as food was no
longer provided. There was a sumptuous breakfast buffet in the Hotel, but we
thought $35 each was a bit much , so resolved to have breakfast out each
morning. There were certainly plenty of options near the Hotel.
The only problem with staying on was that every morning when
we left our room, the Hotel thought we had checked out, and when we returned,
we found ourselves locked out of our room. Each time they apologised profusely,
but by the second day we were getting fed up with this. After a little negotiation
at Reception, we were offered free tickets to the breakfast buffet for our
remaining two mornings. We thought this was a reasonable compensation for the
inconvenience. You can tell a good hotel by the way it deals with guests' problems, and this is a very good hotel.
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