| The 1999 annual PSWD-JOOI Convention took place in Bakersfield, a growing town in the middle of California. It was quite warm for May but we all enjoyed it. Here are some accounts from the scrapbook of Orville Wright Middle/Magnet School Junior Optimist Club: |
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| My Weekend at Bakersfield by Aiala Levy, 1998-1999 JOOI Club President By now I am sure you are sick and tired of the balloon-shaving booth and want a change in the weather, the story from someone else's point of view. Well, you're in luck. As president of my Junior Optimist Club [in the 1998-1999 year] I was required to come to the JOOI District Convention in Bakersfield. I didn't mind. So on Friday (May 14, 1999) I packed my bags and headed for Bakersfield. Along with me came my sister, Smadar (6th grade Representative and next year's President-Elect), her friend Jamie Leonard and our chaperone (my mother) Clara. We arrived at our destination around 7 PM. After checking in, we found the other members of our club and began painting our club's sign for tomorrow's carnival. That was a lot of fun. The next day, after eating breakfast, most of the junior optimists went to swim in the hotel's pool. It was a lot of fun meeting new people from all over the Pacific Southwest District. Then it was a mad rush to finish our campaign speeches before lunch. As it turned out, the election for next year's district officers was not very organized and you didn't have to be a great speech writer to run for office. I am proud to say that four out of the six open offices are now held by members of our Jr. Optimist club. I share the office of Lt. Governor with fellow member Andy Cardoso, Dror Issacci is our district's future Treasurer, and Jamie Leonard won as Seargant at Arms. At 4:30 we began setting up for the carnival. You already know about the balloon-shaving crisis so I'll skip that. I, with the help of Smadar, ran the miniature golf booth because I made it. Even though I thought it was too weak looking to attract customers, it ended up being our most successful booth. People kept coming again and again and again to get the golf ball in the hole. We had a good deal, too. For two tickets you could have five tries. Every time you made it in the hole you got two prize tickets. If you got the ball up through the almost-impossible ramp, you got 8 tickets. Soon, however, Smadar and I gave tickets away just for touching the rim of the hole or we gave extra turns for certain reasons. People liked our booth because we cheered them along as if we were golfing with them. We raised over $100 just through that booth. Our other two booths also did surprisingly well. The bean-bag toss (created by Smadar, with bean-bags made by my mom) raised over $30. It got really good business compared to the bean-bag toss right next to it, probably because it was easier to win. Our balloon-shaving booth raised close to $50. I don't know why people wanted to shave balloons when they knew they wouldn't pop, but hey, we're all optimists willing to help each other out. Some of the booths that other clubs set up were face painting, turtle race, various types of bean-bag tosses, a booth that was sort of like the wheel of fortune, and a magician's booth. All in all, the carnival was a bit stressful (what with trying to get everyone to help set up, rushing every few minutes to get paper towels or water for the balloon-shaving booth, and helping out with the mini-golf). But it was also tons of fun. In conclusion, my weekend at Bakersfield had its ups and downs, but I really enjoyed getting to know the other members of my club better and meeting new people. |
| THE PSWD CONVENTION '99 IN BAKERSFIELD by Andy Cardoso, 1999-2000 JOOI Lt. Gov. Bakersfield. This name will remain in our minds until, well, until we forget it. But the purpose of this article is to make sure we don't. On the 14th of May we arrived around 5 PM and settled in at the Double Tree Hotel. Nothing of interest happened on Friday night so I won't bore you with every last detail. Let's skip ahead to Saturday evening. This is when the action-packed, stress-crammed, balloon-shaving booth was fired up [as part of the fundraising carnival the JOOI members set up for the adult Optimist members]. It wasn't as successful as we had hoped for it to be. First complication, "I'm sorry, but the hotel doesn't want shaving cream all over the floor, you can't do that." It turned out the hotel didn't approve of our booth after saying it was all right earlier that day. After much protest they let us go through with it but we needed a large tarp on the floor. Problem solved. Second complication equation: (shaving cream+balloons) + cheap safety razors= next to impossible to pop balloons. To put it in simple terms, the balloons didn't pop. You had to stab at them with the intent to kill to get them to pop, as I soon found out. Good old improvisation kicked in and we turned the booth into a balloon shaving race. Yet another complication arose. Two words: large mess. We soon found ourselves in dire need of water. We needed it to wash razors and to clean hands. With water and shaving cream all over the place, paper towels became a must and frequent trips to the bathroom were now taking up time, I'd say one trip every 5 minutes or so. Luckily, we got help from a fellow junior optimist working at the mini-golf booth next to our booth. This made overall life much easier. Still, after about an hour and 45 minutes we were starting to fall apart. The only way to stay sane was to randomly put shaving cream on each other's faces at the stupidest moments. This madness continued until the end. As it turned out we enjoyed this little fiasco due to one thing: human companionship. Without it, I can say I would have shut down after about an hour. If I learned anything from this event (and with a little help from a metal structure I like to call "The Gate"), it would be the absolute vitality of companionship and optimism. |
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