OCS Town Meeting/R & D Kick-off (Day 1)

Coco Beach, Puerto Galera
14 October 2005, Friday

I managed to arrive in the office at around 5:30 a.m. I was the only person in the room so I decided to work first. haha! Just kidding! I just checked my emails.

After several minutes, some of my officemates started coming. We all went down the lobby at around 6 a.m. I just brought my bag at the bus and went to our building's lobby to wait for the Mc Donalds delivery. I was just in time for the delivery girl. =)

Outside the bus – committee members wearing the OCS apple green shirt

with Anne having Mc Donalds for breakfast
We left Makati at around 7 a.m. Surprisingly, it was quite traffic in South Express way that early in the morning. But still, we managed to arrive at Batangas, Tabangao Pier at a little past 10 a.m.

We boarded the two boats waiting for us and we left the pier in less than 15 minutes. Of course, we immediately put on our life vests the moment we get inside the boat. My apple green shirt blends well with the life vest’s color. hehehe...


in the boat - Dave, Tina, Anne & me

Nicolas and Muriel with Louie on the side
It was a smooth sail going to Coco Beach. I'm so grateful that God has given us a good weather, contrary to the weather forecast we saw at Inq7. Glad that there were no big waves on the way. The weather was really perfect for an outing. It was like a taste of “summer in October” =D


view from the boat front - approaching Coco Beach

After almost an hour of sailing, we already saw the Coco Beach signage. (yey!)

Coco Beach!
We also saw this welcome banner as we went down the boat. cool!


OCS welcome banner
As we enter the restaurant at the beachfront, each of us received our welcome souvenirs (shell necklace) and our welcome drink (fresh buko).


We've just arrived

with my team mates wearing our souvenir necklace


sipping fresh buko juice

the girls - getting ready for lunch
Buffet lunch was served immediately after we've arrived. It was a choice of pasta and bread, vegetable soup, grilled milk fish, baked mussels, grilled chicken and ice cream on pancake for desert.


falling in line at the buffet table

having lunch =)
After lunch, we were given the keys for our rooms as well as the resort's directory map. Tina and I were room mates.

The rooms were located at the elevated part of the resort and so it was quite a tough climb for us since we just got filled from lunch. hehehe...

It was a really nice filipino-inspired room. Here's how it looked inside.


inside our room

feeling the comfy bed
There's also a porch and a hammock outside our room fronting the sea. There's Tina peeping at the door.


porch outside our room
We're given 30 minutes to freshen up a bit since all committee members must be at the function room by 1 p.m. to make the necessary preparations.

With our maps in hand, Tina and I proceeded at the function room after our picture taking session in our room (hehe...) It was located at the second floor of the conference building. I was surprised to see that it was a big function room with several large filipino-inspired paintings around. They look really nice!


committee members busy preparing

Ms. Gem, Tina, Me and Ms. Anne cutting some ribbons for the afternoon games
As we were waiting for the town meeting to start, we thought of taking some shots while mimicking the paintings around. Take a look! =D


happy faces! - Chris, Me, Louie & Arne

Feeling Ati-atihan!- Arne, Thet, Louie & Me

Tina with the igorot dancers

the guys getting ready to listen

The meeting proceeded smoothly, with Nicolas (our Techinical Director) and all the project managers doing each of their presentation.

Nicolas doing his company presentation

Our team lead, Axel presenting the Systems Testing and Validation team
Our HR Manager forgot to assign somebody who will manage the powerpoint presentations,and so Vic and I volunteered. I didn't know they took this shot as I was clicking at the laptop. hmmm...

another stolen shot while navigating at the presentations
After the presentations of each teams, afternoon snacks were served. We all enjoyed the delicious “kakanin” - biko, suman and ginatang mais, served with a choice of coffee, tea or juice.

while taking our afternoon snacks
Then it was all fun under the sun after the town meeting. We all proceeded at the beach front for the teambuilding games. We’re divided into 4 teams – green, yellow, blue and red. I was in the blue team (which happened to be my favorite color – nice!).

The first game was called “quadro-pull”. It’s a different version of “tug-of-war” since all 4 teams will compete at the same time. The Green team won in the first round, which left the Yellow, Red and our team (Blue) to compete for 2nd place.

red, yellow and blue team battling for the second round
The Red team won, which left the Yellow team and us to compete for 3rd place. We’re all exhausted already and my arms were starting to ache. But still, the team spirit is there and so after the 3rd round, our team won! (yipee!)

go blue team, go!
Though exhausted after the tough battle, we still managed to smile at the camera. Hehe…

Tina, Claire, Anne and me (with Patrick at the back)

Company picture taking (proud to be beside bosing. hehe...)
“Water Balloon Fight” was the next game. I was picked as one of the representatives who will enter the perimeter fence. All of us inside were blindfolded and we have to listen at the commands of our team leader to know when to “hit” our opponent. The team with the most number of men standing at the end of the game wins.

I managed to hit two opponents. Unfortunately, one of them was our Technical Manager, Noel. (ooppss..) My officemates told him after the game that I was the one who hit him. He was teasing me that it would cost me my performance appraisal. (uh-oh…hehe…)


water balloon fight!

posing after the “water balloon fight”
Next game was the “group sack race”. Too bad, our team was the last one to finish. Maybe, we ate a lot during merienda that’s why we found it hard to jump fast. Hehe…


jump, jump, jump!
The last game was the “plank race”. It was getting dark already when we did this game. Our team won first place! (yey!)


preparing to race!
Whew! We were all so exhausted after the games but we definitely enjoyed them. Most especially, it was a great opportunity to know more of our colleagues and an effective way to strengthen our relationship with one another.


group picture after the games (kawawa naman si Vic)
We had an hour to clean up and prepare for dinner. At around 7:30, dinner was waiting for us beside the beach. Buffet table was again filled with yummy food. On the side, the waiters were cooking barbeque chicken, pork chop and grilled squid. There were also torches bordering our dinner tables. Cool setup!


falling in line for dinner
I had asparagus soup, grilled tilapia, barbeque chicken, porkchop, grilled squid, java rice and mixed fruits for dessert.


Me and Monica (with Eman at the back) posing while filling our plates

Savouring our dinner (hey! nice effect from the torches)

at our dinner table

Our French Bosses
The Awarding Ceremony for the afternoon games was held immediately after dinner. Each team won cash prizes! =D


Our team won 3rd Place (at least…)
After the awarding, it’s free time for everyone. Since it’s “open-bar”, most of the guys took advantage of the free-flowing drinks.


One down… a lot more bottles to go. Hehe…
It’s nice that they’ve also provided us a television and a Magic Sing! Obviously, that meant a night of singing for us. We enjoyed every song number, good or bad. Hehe…

And so, I thought I could escape a song request but I was wrong. My own team lead asked me to sing “Til they take my heart away” (Tabel would surely like this. Hehe). Several moments passed and they're asking me to sing some Nina or MYMP songs. I was making every excuse. Fortunately there were no such songs in the list. (haha!) But Axel handed me the mic afterwards and asked me to sing "You've got a friend". Oh well, that's a nice song anyway. After that song, I quietly escaped from the crowd. hihi...

I went by the pool side and saw Monica, Aileen and Roselle enjoying their swim. I lay at the bench since I was starting to feel sleepy already. But it was sooo nice to see the bright moon shining and the stars evenly scattered around the evening sky. I felt so peaceful.

As I was on my senti mode (hehe…) the guys and gals started coming.


Aileen, Tina, Me and Anne by the pool side

Louie and Arne joined in
We finally climbed up our rooms at around 1 a.m. Though quite exhausted, it was definitely a great day for all of us!