“ … and your room-mate is … “

Upon our arrival to the Airport in Antigua, it was pouring pussies and dogs. We were whisked through customs and immigration, not having to wait in line and were picked up and given a tour of the island by one of the senators.

We got to the hotel and all looked nice … at first. We stayed at the Royal Antigua Hotel on the south side of the island. We proceeded to the check in desk and went through the usual procedure. After completing the preliminaries, I was told that I would have a room mate, who had already arrived and checked in … A Room-mate??? WTF??? Now, I would prefer not to have a room-mate, I’m not used to having to share accommodations with a complete stranger. Don’t get me wrong … I don’t have a problem with having a room-mate. I have a problem with the sponsoring organization not communicating this ahead of time so as to avoid the “shock and awe” response of everyone who came only to hear that they would be sharing rooms.

So, I went to my room, wondering who she was, was she cool, all the usual questions … We hit it off so nicely that people thought we knew each other before the seminar. It was amazing at how comfortable we were with each other. She was skeptical too, and was wondering the same thing I was and neither of us was disappointed … (See, I told you that to know me is to love me, and I’m a very cool person … ). My room mate was also very cool, from Guyana, my age and just plain nice.

Anyway, I found the other persons who came for the seminar to be quite friendly and we meshed like a group on the first night at dinner before the seminar started. It was so refreshing. Persons from T&T, Barbados, Bermuda, Bahamas, St. Lucia, St. Vincent, Grenada, Antigua (duh) etc., etc., etc. The training was also very informative. I’m glad I accepted the invitation to go as I learnt a lot about International Labour Standards and Framework Agreements.

Then comes the exciting part …