Continuation of stories from the book "The Art of Events" :
When Boo was asked what he actually does and what the meaning of his profession is, he became thoughtful. His gaze accidentally fell on the 5000 bill that was lying on the shelf. He looked carefully at the monument to the proud general and answered.
- I remembered one story, which, it seems to me, explains the profession of an eventist better than many words.
Several years ago, Shu and I were driving in a large car across the expanses of the United States. The trip was wonderful and enjoyable. At this time, colleagues in the beautiful city of Mo managed to get a project with a serious budget and traditional deadlines for our country.
An important meeting of management had to be prepared for the Black Fuel I-go company. The project took place in I-go, but in such a distant city that not all foreigners could believe that it could be so far away.
To carry out this project, to transport equipment and decorations there, two cargo planes flew there from the beautiful city of Meaux. According to the plan, the cultural center in the city center was to be completely transformed. Several floors of buildings, offices, equipment, many different areas and tasks. More than 20 people flew from Meaux alone.
Installation took several days. And on the last evening before the event, everything was ready. The banners stood like a glove, the false walls amazed with their perfect surface, the flowers were fragrant, the flags fluttered.
The run-through began in the main hall. Speakers read out presentations one after another, numbers flew, slides switched. Master Boo was watching the speakers from another room through the broadcast screen.
And then Boo noticed that “something was going wrong” - at first he understood it in general and only after a moment did he understand what exactly had happened. Drops of sweat rolled down the speaker's forehead, one after another. The speaker took out a handkerchief and wiped his forehead. The atmosphere in the building became tense.
It turned out that the entire air conditioning and ventilation system of the building was turned off. It was a hot summer, tomorrow it will be well above 20 outside, the stuffiness and heat will engulf the entire building, every room of it, every participant in the event.
A few minutes later, a group of specialists entered the attic of the new building and moved towards the control panel. A short meeting led to a hasty decision: “You just need to throw it here... and close it here... and everything SHOULD turn on.”
They threw it over, closed it, there was a crackling sound, sparks, and the acrid smell of melted plastic slowly floated through the attic. The silent scene of electricians frozen in amazement could be the beginning of the end of any important event.
Midnight. In 8 hours, guests will begin to arrive in the morning. We are a city that is as far from the beautiful city of Meaux as New York's Central Park. This time our electrical panel burned out physically.
What happened next? The new building's electrical system was so complex that we had to find someone to design and build it. We brought him by car, picking him up from his birthday party. He briefly described us all as people who are far from electricians and told us what he needed to restore the shield.
The bottom line is that we needed two automatic machines from ABB, 250A each. At 2 am. The success of the entire project, each of its elements, depended on two machines for 500 rubles.
Another hour later, with a flashlight, we walked through the warehouse of electrical goods with the owner of electronics stores in this city and by touch, sending photos via MMS, looked for our machines. Another hour later the machine guns were in the shield and by morning the building came to life and began to breathe. Guests began to arrive.
“Please make it warmer,” the Client asked us. Well, of course!
Here are a few conclusions that Boo and Shu drew from this story.
- Everything can break. Both people and iron. It's not strange that something breaks. It's strange that sometimes it doesn't break.
- What we do happens here and now. There are no serious guarantees that this will happen the way you want.
- We do not leave traces behind, our task is to transform the site, and then return it to its original appearance. Like at the Burning Man festival, we burn everything after ourselves, we remove all traces of our presence.
- Our work is similar to the Tibetan art of creating a sand mandala. We are constructing a whole world out of quicksand. It is beautiful and short-lived. And having created a masterpiece, having achieved perfection, the sand is simply brushed onto the ground. Perfection does not require eternity, it only requires flawless beauty here and now.
These are the events.
You can read the whole book buy here
