Decorating the Dance Hall – Class of '69 Joint Reunion

Representatives from the Biltmore had told us that we could start decorating our banquet room at 10:00 AM.

Volunteers

Judith Bodden, née Usher, and husband Willis; Linda McCarthy-Remkes

Carli Scott and husband Tom; Eloisa Bradley; Joyce Perdomo, née Gough; María Scott, née Villanueva, and husband Alex; Ruby Vásquez

Adrian Roe, Gowayne Bradley and wife Hortence, Stan Martínez

Slow Start

When the first volunteers arrived at 10:30, none of the banquet rooms appeared to be ready for us. There was no indication which room was ours. The receptionist at the hotel registration desk didn’t know which room was ours, but suggested that someone in the restaurant might know. No one in the restaurant knew, but a helpful young man there suggested that one of the waitresses might know, and set off to find her. After ten or fifteen minutes, he returned to say that it was the room that they were just starting to clean.

With this information, the volunteers identified our room. The cleaning crew was slowly moving furniture so they could vacuum. It was clear that the cleaners would be busy for a while, so the would-be decorators decided to go about their business and return later.

By 11:30, decorating volunteers started to gathered again outside our banquet room. The cleaning crew was not quite ready for us, so we socialized on the verandah, making acquaintance with those from other schools.

Joyce, Eloisa, and Ruby arrived bringing the silver-flecked foam letters spelling out Class of ’69 and vases for the flowers. On their drive to the hotel, the worry arose that they might not have enough vases. Ruby asked whether the hotel might have vases we could borrow. Eloisa gave her a look and said quite firmly, "Dis da no Stayts, yu noe, Ruby!" All three burst out laughing.

Decoration Begins

As the cleaners worked their way toward the stage area, the decorators set up shop close to the door. On the floor just inside the entrance was an array of buckets filled with gorgeous flowers from Adrian’s family’s farm—bird of paradise, red ginger, and pink ginger.

Ruby, Eloisa, and Linda started arranging the flowers into vases. In the mean time, Carli, María, and Alex started placing old yearbook photos and other memorabilia on memoboards, which Tom helped them hang on the walls. As the buffet and dining tables were set up, Joyce and Judith started putting the finished vases around the room.

Meeting Area

The banquet room ended up being an informal pre-reunion meeting area, especially because several people who had come for the reunion were staying at the Biltmore. Minerva Gordillo de Maldonado (SCA ’69) stopped by to see how things were going and to visit briefly with the decorators. Ruth Garbutt-Tillett (PHS ’69) stopped by on her way to the airport to pick up luggage that didn’t arrive with her. In the lobby, some of us ran into Rogie Rodríquez (SJC ’69).

Preview of Souvenirs

Judith had brought our souvenir travel bags from Los Angeles and the decorators were the first ones in Belize to see the bags. After all the trouble we had trying to get a clear image of the three school logos to put on the bags, we were very pleased to see how well they turned out. Those who had ordered bags quickly paid for and claimed their souvenirs.

The Pace Picks Up

By the time the cleaners were done, there was such a flurry of activity that it’s hard to say who was doing what. Everyone was helping in one way or another, whether it was preparing and putting up decorations, offering artistic opinions about what should go where, buying refreshments for the group, or photographing the process for our scrapbooks.

Judith suggested it would look nice to have a "bouquet" of three helium balloons–one green, one blue, and one white–on each table. Eloisa knew where we could get balloons and placed the order, but had no way to transport them. Alex volunteered to go get the balloons and suggested that we could staple the bouquets’ ribbons to the table cloths. Adrian paid for the balloons out of the money that he had collected for the dinner-dance.

In the mean time, Joyce, Ruby, and Hortence helped put up crepe paper streamers along the wall. Ruby scattered confetti on the tables.

We decided to put the Class of ’69 letters high on the wall facing the entrance. Of course, no one could reach that high. Gowayne decided that a table would be sturdier than a chair, so he stood on a table to put up the letters. Judith handed the letters to Gowayne and directed him how to place them. All went well for a while, but the table turned out to be less sturdy than Gowayne had expected—it collapsed, dropping him to the floor.

Balloons Galore

When the balloons arrived, everyone got involved in dividing them into bouquets of three and distributing them around the room. Joyce and Judith walked around with two large bunches of balloons. As they moved from table to table, several others picked sets of three balloons out of the large bunches, fastened their ribbons together, and handed them to Alex to staple to each table cloth.

It was a festive atmosphere. We were clearly in a partying mood already. While reminiscing about songs that were popular in our high school days, Carli mentioned Ring Ting Ting and the group started singing that song (as best we could remember it) and dancing.

Manager Stops By

Alex King [son of Emory], who is in charge of catering at the Biltmore, stopped in to check that the bar and banquet tables were set up correctly and that everything was in order and ready for our party. He introduced himself to those who didn’t know him and told us to let him know if we needed anything.

Final Touches

Adrian had provided us with so many flowers that after we filled the vases and placed them around the room, there were still two nearly full buckets of flowers. Joyce and Hortence covered the buckets with colored paper and set one on either front corner of the stage where the musicians would play.

The decorations were finished off later in the afternoon with the arrival of a floral arrangement in the shape of 30, which went under our Class of ’69 banner.

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