Mike's
Report on the Event.....
Just home after a long drive back from Paris.
The event to celebrate Paris pin trading was wonderful.
The day started early at 7am
with distribution of our entry tickets, group photos, and meeting
old and new friends. Charles, the event host, was running around in
overdrive, even more hyper than usual if that is possible).
A gate opened just before 8am and we were shepherded across an empty
main street, through the covered mall, and into the breakfast pavilion.
The stillness of the empty park quieted down the crowd and we trooped
along taking in the unique atmosphere of the awakening park. As we
walked into the event we were greeted by Soraya, who is as calm a
person as I have ever met, facing the oncoming horde with a smile
and greeting each guest personally. She organized the smooth distribution
of our lottery tickets and the mystery bags. We rushed to an empty
table to check the said bag, and lo and behold, a Disney box was sitting
inside the bag. Getting excite now, we burst open the box to find
yet another barrier. A cloud of tissue now stood between us and the
treasure. No problem, tissue paper was dispersed in all directions
to reveal an amazing sight. Nestling in the residue was a large, no
make that very large, Tinker Bell first anniversary pin. WOW!!!.
Second surprise, a lanyard with, wait, one.... no, two pins. Pins
I have never seen before and have not had time to check up on Pinpics,
but they look good. Further exploration revealed all FIVE of the new
pins commemorating the different stores in Disneyland Paris. Then
a shout from the next table as somebody held up a small goofy pin.
Panic. Had they got something in their box that we hadn´t ?.
No problem, more rooting about in the tissue debris revealed yet another
pin. The large PT lettering suggests that this was the pin trading
knowledge pin released at a recent CM training in WDW (how this pin
arrived here in Europe is one of life's mysteries, but hey, who cares,
it is a great pin).
After securing our pins and clearing
the table we started some serious eating from the wonderful breakfast
buffet, taking breaks to track down some of the other English speaking
pin traders. It was really good to be able to put names to faces,
or even faces to names. If we missed any of you sorry, speak louder
next time :)))
The lottery results were not
in our favour, but we saw some very happy faces as people won a large
drawing of their choice to be done by the three Disney artists (Kym,
Laurent and Jerome) attending the event. The last three drawings were
for a very special pin set to commemorate opening of the "new"
Disney Studios park. One number away....pain.
A sad note at the finale, Charles,
our ambassador to EPCOT events of years past (who can ever forget
the DisneyParis pre-release pin grab-bag game in 2001 !!!!), announced
he will be moving on to help Disney make even more money elsewhere.
A loss for pin trading no doubt, but the team to replace him appears
also to be open to input from the customers and I think we will be
in good hands.
Finishing breakfast we progressed
to the trading area. Parisian weather Gods must like pin traders as
it was warm enough to trade al fresco. We even had a few transatlantic
vagrants to make the trading more exciting.
The hunt for more of the anniversary
Tinks proved fruitless, how can 2000 pins sell out so quick ?
To the organizers a great big
thank you. I felt like a guest of honour at the event, as if Disney
was thanking me for pin trading with them. To the artists, thanks
for signing all those pins, and still finding time to make those drawings
for my kids. To the pin traders from all over the world, thanks for
coming and trading with us. Finally, au revoir Charles, you will be
a tough act to follow.
Thanks Mike, for the great report!!
