Ahh, I gotta say, I was sooooo happy, we could pull off one event, not online, but the reallife inperson event. And not just me, even the students, fellow instructors and random people passing by, everyone misses group energy feelings. It's the collective energy that gets created in group events, that unfortunately cannot be recreated online. As thankful as we could be, to have an option of working online, there is really no such feeling as meeting live.
We are now dealing with different type of organisational challenges. Before we were worrying over how many people will come, how much space we have, shall we cover the costs, who to invite etc. Now the challenges have doubled. We are still dealing with all above mentioned, but now we actually cannot know in advance whether we will even be allowed to do an event or not!
So, I did get a chance to organize an event. We were watching news constantly. They were saying OK, events up to 500 people are allowed. The next day only 50 people allowed. The next day it was 500 again. We wanted to invite one instructor from abroad. The border was open. Next day they wanted to close it. The next day, they said everyone crossing the border will have to go to quarantine. Up until the last day we had no idea, if the event can be pulled off or not and if instructors can come or not. And how in the world can one promote the event in this manner? The flyers have to be made at least 2 weeks in advance, better if it's more of course. The instructors have to be invited early enough. The students have to be informed in advance, without the information constantly changing.
Jeez, we have really come into a weird era. But, hey, in the end everything worked out ok. The event was good to go, the institute of national health approved, the police approved, we brought disinfection, we divided space and we draw marks on the floor to ensure proper distance among people.
And most importantly, people came. So happy to be socializing again, dancing in the open-air, with friends, sharing passion and love for life and, in our case, dance. <3
HOW TO ORGANIZE AN EVENT NOW?
If you are asking yourself, whether to organize an event or not, here are a few tips.
1. Be prepared it will be a little different than usually.
2. Call to an institute that is the decision maker in your country. Ask them, what is allowed and what measures you have to do.
3. Watch the news daily and adjust according to new regulations.
4. Invite local instructors to your event, don't think too big at this point. The flights and borders are not stable enough to be inviting international guests.
5. Use mostly social media and e-mail lists for promotion. Make the whole thing a story. Make it fun for people, not stressful.
6. At the beginning of the event, notify people of all the rules they have to respect. Your duty is only to inform and enable all the measurements to be respected, from than on, it's people's personal decision, how they really react and behave.
7. Make it fun. Fun is the nr. 1 thing everyone needs right now. So, if you have to follow some stupid rules, make it fun. Don't make fun of it, just make it nicer. Per example, we didn't draw X marks on the floor. We have drawn hearts. :)
And that would be my main message to you. Since this might be our new normal for a while, why wouldn't we make it fun and easy? It doesn't have to be stressful for all. Not even for us. We just laughed at all the changes during the process. But deep down, we knew everything will turn out perfectly. Just the way it is suppose to. Because when you do things out of love, they always turn out good.
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