…in which Analiese returns from a one week hiatus and not much happens except for Steve-o loudly telling everyone that “They’re fucked” …
I arrived at the meeting a good ten minutes early this week, which meant I got a question I’ve always wanted the answer to resolved. Every week I notice that Pacific Island Rep, Neil Tahal, comes in carrying two cans of Coke, which has always puzzled me immensely seeming you could juts bring in a 600ml bottle and get the same amount of caffeinated bubbly goodness. “Why two?” I ask. “One for Part one; one for Part Two” he answers, very matter-of-factly. Fair enough, Neil. Fair enough.
It’s 6pm and everone is sitting anxiously around the board room table. Everyone, that is, except for El Prez Rawa Karetai, who, along with Women’s Welfare Rep, Helen van Asch, are conspicuously absent. Their absence is resolved two minutes later as they burst in through the door citing “vehicular issues”. Acting Admin Vice President Steve-o Freeland asks Helen if this was because her windscreen wipers were put at strange angles by an unnamed person who didn’t particularly like her parking.
The meeting is officially opened at 6.02. All the normal formalities occur without a hitch (other than Rawa forgetting to say “all in favour”, for which eh is swiftly reprimanded by, Steve-o) and Rawa gets into his report. Apparently he attended the Young Nats conference over the weekend with the aim of strengthening ties with his blue pals as most of “Albany votes National anyway” (‘Oh really? Was that the reason, then?’ I think to myself quietly). He was most disheartened with the response of the Young Nats in regards to the VSM bill, as it appears that many wouldn’t be adverse to seeing the Bill go through, while his talk with Dr Wayne Mapp, MP for the Shore, was not particularly conducive to serious discussion either.
Rawa has also apparently been busy talking to the Fight Club on campus. I stifle a giggle as I’ve always thought that the first rule of fight club was not to talk about fight club. Apparently they need some help getting started, as do a lot of clubs on campus, so the recently clinched university club funding raise will help them out immensely.
The other big thing on his agenda was educating students on why VSM isn’t in their best interests. He’d had a trial run at presenting to students earlier that day, which I’d attended. To his credit, it was actually rather good.
Steve-o’s report was next, with everything going “as per normal”, according to our peroxide headed friend. His report was relatively detailed this week, which was nice, however the funniest (or saddest, whichever way you want to look at it) thing to emerge out of it was when he spoke of planning for the ASA’s future post VSM if it were to go through. After several attempts of trying to word his sentiments in a politically correct fashion, he ended up with “Basically, we’re fucked. I’d give us six months”.
Education Vice President Annie Zhang, International Students Rep Sumire Tachibana, Rec and Leisure Rep Salam Arif and Neil all reported on what they’d been up to in the past while, with Salam especially pleased at being Helen’s “personal assistant” for Women’s Fest. After a few jibes from the other male exec members, including Asian Cultural Rep Andy Domangas calling Salam Helen’s “slave”, Salam replied with “Hey, I’m in a car with 10 hot models, taking them around, I can’t complain”. All the other males in the room look a bit deflated. Hah.
Not much else exciting happens: everyone is given a briefing on Women’s Fest from Helen; International Movie Night is discussed and new initiatives that Annie is going to research are spoken about momentarily. Overall, not a particularly exciting meeting that clocked in at just over 40 minutes.