Please notice this was first posted in the period 2012-2014 and can be outdated
For those who thought our orientation trip last year was great, this year’s trip would be even greater since we weren’t charged for it! Of course we had to help out a bit as volunteers, but it still felt like a holiday where we could cherry pick the activities we wanted to join and lay in the pool during less interesting activities. Besides that it gave a great opportunity to get to know some of the people of the Sasin MBA class of 2013.
Big welcome to the class of 2013 (photo stolen so don’t tell the photographer).
Just as last year the location for the trip was the Dusit Thani hotel in Hua Hin which surprised me since I assumed they would not let us in anymore after last year. But they probably did not want to forgo renting out over 50 rooms on a Wednesday and a Thursday, so they screwed over their other guests by letting us in.
The schedule which looked a lot like the schedule of last year.
The schedule for the trip was very similar to last year’s. There were some minor changes though where the Team Challenge was improved by letting everybody do all the games, and some of the less fun games of last year were deleted. Only problem with the team challenge was still that the overall time counted meaning that you could grow frustrated when you had to wait 10 minutes for another group to finish a game before you could start. Maybe for next year each game should be timed and added up to come to the overall winner.
The view from my game station. I forgot to make a picture of the actual games since I was too busy making sure nobody cheated.
Our class organized some smaller activities on the first day like two simple games to get to know each other a bit better on the bus and some games on the beach in the afternoon. There it would become clear that we didn’t like people coming late since the appropriate punishment was spending half an hour in a kiddy pool which was halfway the games filled with ice; sorry guys for the boring moment.
The risk of organizing a buffet is that some people only eat the items that are the most expensive 🙂
As is a tradition by now the second evening was given color by skits the class of 2013 had prepared in the past days followed by drinking games to get everybody loose for the final party. Unfortunately many people of our class could not come due to other responsibilities like work or an exchange program so our band could not perform and some Thai band was hired for the music.
Drinking games before the big party. Finish up a tray of booze and then do some silly things meant for 5-year olds.
Somewhere before midnight the lights went on meaning they wanted us gone as some boring government people had rented the hall to prepare it for some boring activities they would do the next boring day. Next stop would be the bar of the hotel. Here they did not want to stay open for us too long, probably because we only purchased some mixers as everybody had grabbed the bottles of whiskey at the party. Final stop would be the beach but that party ended around 2AM when the guards had enough of the music and noise.
On the left the spot that brought back memories for the class of 2012.
On the right the reason why we could remember this spot so well.
With everybody in bed around 2:30AM the party was really over and it became clear the hotel was partly prepared for this after last year when we continued a lot longer. It also became clear how well the class of 2013 was raised since they did most of the puking in, and around, the toilets while last year a lot more of the property was covered with the half-digested buffet we had before.
The next morning it was nice and quiet during the breakfast and around lunch time most people popped up again from their room to eat a bit before getting on the bus. The trip back was supposed to last for about 3 hours but as always it takes a lot longer when you try to enter Bangkok on a Friday around rush hour.
Passing the river to go back to Sasin. From here on the bus had to slow down due to the traffic jams and we arrived about 2 hours behind schedule.
All together it was a very enjoyable trip and it was a great opportunity to meet the class of 2013. I look forward to the upcoming bonding activities between our classes as well as the Call of Duty tournaments that should be organized. Also a big thanks to the Sasin team that organized this trip because it all fitted well together perfectly. Now it is time for the class of 2012 to go back to bed since our classes will not start for another 6 weeks.