The V3 Column
Get your attitude right!
Shaz, Ruwi and Sachi
It was a travel packed week for V3. First Shaz zooms off to Sigiriya
followed by a long arduous journey to icy Hunnasgiriya. No sooner the
poor girl returns with cramps and a cold Ruwi and Sachi were packed off
to Galle just in time for the Literary Festival. After working to our
bones for the Daily News Independence Day Supplement V3 had to hasten to
Trans Asia to meet a media liaison hoping to take some journalists up to
Dambulla.
“Hope we are not late. I had to hand over a story and pictures for
the Observer Magazine. We’re going to re-launch it as a bumper issue
which will look lush,” pants Shaz. Ruwi soothes their fears, “We have
five minutes to spare. Bet we’ll be just in time to board the bus.”
V3 belted along, half skidding on the lobby’s slippery floor and
grabbing onto the railing to save our necks, to see a pack of
bored-looking journalist colleagues sprawling on the chairs with
backpacks scattered at their feet.
“I just called the organisers and it seems like they have just
stepped out of the office!” said a photographer after a chorus of ‘hi’s’.
“That’s natural of them. They make such a fuss if we get a few
minutes late, but have all the excuses in the world if they show up
hours later,” Sachi sounds irritated, as V3 grab three armchairs with a
full view of the lobby entrance.
“You should have seen the GLF invitation. It said 10 am. sharp and
the GLF media liaison kept us hanging around for 45 minutes!” said Sachi.
“She should have been on schedule no matter what and we had to pay
for her delay. She kept on nagging ‘only fifteen minutes for lunch’ and
‘no time to stop by at your hotels to change or drop the luggage’”
commented Ruwi. “Gosh Ruwi! Who is she? I don’t think I’ve met her,”
Shaz asks widening her eyes.
“She has a village lass’s name,” Sachi goes on with a grin, “She
handled the media coordination along with another institute
representative.” The mention of the institute was enough to give
journalists jitters.
“I met their PR head recently. She is a snob. She didn’t have any
communication with us,” goes on our normally perky Shaz. “You have to
brace yourself to take part in their events. Better to hold back rather
than be subjected to ill treatment.” Sachi hastens to add: “The GLF
media liaison was behaving as if she was doing us a favour by taking us
there.
What a joke! We are not there just to have a good time. We have to
rush back and meet deadlines. It will cost them more than a few bucks to
put an advertisement in the papers rather than ship a few journalists to
the venue.” “Exactly!” Ruwi exclaims, “we don’t need any luxury on
outstation assignments.
A decent room, meals and a vehicle to travel is all we ask for but
most importantly the PRs should possess a down-to-earth attitude. It is
pleasing to travel with some of them while just mentioning others’ names
give us a distasteful feeling.”
She added, “We all needed to change from our traveling outfits for
the opening ceremony and the cocktails but we were ordered to change in
the washrooms at the restaurant that we stopped by for lunch which
didn’t even have any elbow space.
Later she told us to change inside the bus with the curtains drawn
down when we landed near the Fortress.” “What? That’s absurd. Were there
many women journalists?” Shaz wants to know. “Hardly.
There were only four of them,” Sachi fills in and Ruwi takes the
hint: “The GLF liaison was very rude when I asked if I could borrow a
room from the hotel to change and freshen up. She asked ‘what did you
have to change into’. I felt like saying ‘my night gown, of course’, but
thought better of it.” Giggles follow.
“Pity you didn’t. I would have given almost anything to watch her
face...Well almost anything,” Shaz cracks up.
“Wait, the story gets even better. She was in a different top for the
press conference and the opening ceremony. She was dolled up in a sari
for the cocktails while we had been in sticky and tired clothes from 10
am,” Sachi notes with a frown. “I don’t think she changed inside the
bus. She had a room in the Fortress. She was standing there spick and
span, not a hair out of place and in a clean outfit, oblivious to the
dagger looks coming her way,” said Ruwi.
“One of my journalist friends had overheard her complaining to
someone that ‘these journalists are so... fussy!’ I mean the high-ups
should handpick people in charge of media coordination. Some may have
artistic talent but they lack organization skills which is essential,”
Sachi finishes just in time to see a prim figure coming up the drive
with her colleague, a rather harassed looking man carrying a set of
press kits under his arm.
“Ah, here come our commandos. Hold on to your hats. Hope they don’t
land us with any more ghastly memories,” Shaz jokes as V3 hastily put
the final dot to our discussion.
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