Yule Ball
OTHER ACTIVITIES
Approximately a month before Yule Ball, one of the event organizers reached out to me and asked me to help them in making and setting up the decorations. Having seen my roomie last year working on transforming the caf into a magnificent Hogwarts castle, I did not hesitate to accept the request and joined the team. Not only did I enjoy exercising my artistic skills in one of the school's most important events, but I was also acknowledged as one of the organizer leaders at the end, which was something I totally did not expect and was incredibly thankful for.
As all of my task could only be completed on the day, a lot of the materials were retrieved from the storage room beforehand. They were only unpacked when we gathered together in the castle lobby in the morning of the day.
I realized in the first hour that since I had always been engaged in artistic activities and was one of the few people taking visual arts in the team, most people came to me for advices before they put down any decorations. At first, I was uncomfortable to be the one giving out suggestions as I was only invited as an unofficial helper. Though, I noticed soon after that we were running out of time while not making enough progress. Therefore, instead of answering different questions and giving individual person suggestions, I decided to assign to everyone a specific area or task which they were allowed to express the creativity in their own way. With this, the decorations progressed at a faster pace while everyone also had the freedom to be in control of their own work.
The method worked well, though with the pressing time, I did not have the time to rest for longer than a minute. I had already seen the Yule Ball once, hence knew what was missing and what could be improved from the last time. I wanted to give everyone a memorable impression like they were revisiting their childhood memories and rereading Harry Potter together again, whether it was their first or last time attending the event. With this, I paid attention to all details: positions, angles, suitability, and connections between each objects and spaces. In doing so, I felt as though I was also exploring my passion in architecture all at the same time.
I created and recreated some items from the Harry Potter movies as I thought were necessary in transforming the castle into Hogwarts. Items I had spent a lot of time on were the signs. I noticed I was one of the few who could write calligraphy, hence decided to also use this talent to contribute. Simultaneously, I also learned how to be in charge of the group as a lot of people still approached me with questions or requests for new tasks. As time passed and more people volunteered and joined in the crew, I had to manage more responsibilities in keeping the work flowing and evenly distributed to everyone. The concern I had in the beginning in giving out orders was cleared as soon as I realized that the leader role was necessary to keep all participants engaged in the activity and get the decorations done in time. This was definitely one of the toughest roles I had taken and I had learned a lot about leadership from it.
Yule Ball turned out amazing, due to not only the decorating team but also every other teams involved in it: organizers, musicians, Sodexo, and many others that I cannot list all of them. I also took several of the shifts as a school photographer throughout the event. Having been fully engaged with the event, I was particularly satisfied to see that all of my efforts were paid off well with such satisfactory results that I was also able to experience at the end – not as an organizer seeing her finished work, but as another high school student who also had the magical world of Harry Potter as her childhood.
