Upon the insistence of my ten-year-old and his equally insistent buddy, I was coerced into taking them for an outing at the local ice-skating rink at Ice-Land. Now for those not familiar with this relatively new Jeddah landmark, it is a mega entertainment center with bowling lanes, an ice rink, and gazillions of games and machines for kids of all ages.
After buying the kids their tickets, I was handed a couple of coupons for a prize draw. “And when is this draw supposed to take place?” I asked the attendant. He replied it would take place that evening.
Having filled out my coupons with each kid’s name on it, I threw it in a large drum that was bursting with other such coupons. Large crowds gathered around a stage set for the draw — prizes included a couple of vehicles — and the air buzzed with excitement as time approached.
The event was being handled by a local advertising/PR agency appropriately called Fame, and I quickly made out some of their personnel who were busy making last-minute arrangements. And then it began. The local distributor of the prized vehicles along with representatives from the ad agency and Ice-Land all crowded the stage when the drum was brought on.
A brief introduction was made as visitors crowded the stage, all eager to hear their names read out when the coupons were being drawn.
Ten names were to be drawn that night, and ten the following night. Only those present would be eligible for the available prizes. If their names were drawn and they were not there, then tough luck.
Name upon name was being called, but few were acknowledged. After what seemed like hours and when nine prizewinners were identified as present, the event was called off!
Citing time and TV commitments, the organizers decided that they would settle for nine winners that evening, with the tenth given a chance the following day, even though signs and fliers all pointed to ten selections each evening.
Naturally that did not go down well with me. I sought out one of the individuals at the ad agency organizing the event. “Why did you stop at nine?” I demanded. “Well, the draw was taking so much time and the sponsors have a TV commitment at MBC, and with their tight schedule they just couldn’t afford a delay.”
“But when I see posters stating ten names, I want to see ten winners, not nine. Delays should have been foreseen and worked out before the event,” I retorted.
“It’s no problem, we’ll just do it tomorrow along with the ten other names. Besides, it really is out of our hands. It was the sponsor’s decision,” was his apologetic reply.
Always is someone else’s decision, isn’t it? Like just about everything else.
-Arab News Arab News 13 September 2003
