2012 State Leaders' Forum at Asilomar

     It is that time of year again, where I travel down up to Asilomar Conference Grounds and State Beach at Pacific Grove on the Monterey Peninsula for the 2012 California 4-H State Leaders' Forum.  This year I am going once again as the Team Logistics Leader for the California 4-H Technology Leadership Team (TLT) and as the Secretary to the CA 4-H South Section Leaders' Council.  The forum happened from Friday, Nov. 9 to 11, 2012.  

Friday, November 9, 2012

This year, I flew up to San Jose, and let our TLT adviser, Steven, pick me up.  I arrived at the San Jose Airport at 10:00.  Neal, a TLT member from San Diego, had arrived a little sooner than me, and was waiting for me at the baggage claim.  I met up with him, and we waiting for our ride.  A local TLT member, Matthew, was dropped off at the airport to meet us, so he could also join in our ride down to Asilomar.  He were picked up by Steven.  Daniel, a TLT member and someone I consider a close friend, was with him.  We all got into the van, drove to a Starbucks  and headed off down to Monterey.

The drive seemed to take no time at all, as we all were excited and having good conversations.  We had stopped at Cannery Row to have some lunch.  We had decided to have lunch at The Fish Hopper, one of the most popular sea food restaurants in the country.  I love sea food, so I was extremely excited.  This restaurant has one of the best views of all of Cannery Row, hovering over the water.  One good benefit of being a TLT member is having our meals being reimbursed or covered by our adviser's corporate card.  I had decided to go with the basic Fish and Chips, since I didn't want to order something too expensive since it was being covered by the TLT travel budget.  I wasn't disappointed.  The food was quite amazing.  After lunch, Steven had to do some last minute computer work, so he headed off to the Starbucks for the internet.  The rest of us walked around Cannery Row.  We first went right on the small Cannery Row beach right next to the fish hopper.  It was low tide, and there were a few small tide pools on the southeast end of the beach.  If you know me well, that is where I will go.  Had a good far amount of wildlife.  Good amount of hermit crabs, sea anenomies, and small rock fish.  My friend Daniel seemed to be the most excited.  His life is normally spent at home in front of his computer.  He doesn't have that urge to go out and explore new places and have new experiences quite like I do.  Daniel was so excited to see the tide pools.  He was acting like an excited 2nd grader seeing tide pools for the first time.  Having him have that type of reactions made me feel glad, because I was able to explain some of the species that lived in the tide pool to him.  After awhile, we decided to walk towards the Monterey Bay Aquarium.  I had mentioned there is an glow in the dark mini golf course in that direction, and Daniel was super excited to check it out. 

 We had walked passed the aquarium, and continued to the american canning company building.  In that building is a small mall.  It was very empty.  I figured many people would not come over this way because it is not technically on Cannery Row.  We got there, and Daniel was tempted to play a game.  I had looked at the time, and realized that we don't have the time to play a game.  Daniel thought we had time, but it was better to play things smart.  As we were headed back, we saw this very welcoming candy store called Candy World.  We first saw the taffy, but then we saw a back row and saw the Jelly Belly Beans.  Things had just gotten real.  I wanted some sooo bad, but I was fighting not to get any because of money.  Neal was debating the same, but he had decided to get some.  Once I saw him getting some Jelly Bellies, I followed and got myself a bag.  Neal went crazy.  He had about 2 1/2 pounds of Jelly Bellies.  I only grabbed about one pound of Jelly Bellies. Daniel got about 2 pounds.  Later I would be glad I got the least amount.  While we were filling, we did not pay attention to signs about prices.  Daniel was the first to go pay for his candy.  For 2 pounds of Candy, he ended up paying $36.00.  That was a major shocker.  Right away, I knew I didn't want to pay that price, but it was too late.  Then Daniel and thought about Neal, and how screwed he was going to be.  For my pound of candy, I paid $16.00.  To me, that hurt.  I was shocked and pissed.  We now understood why this story is empty.  It was Neal's turn to pay.  In the end, he had to pay $63.00 for his candy.  My god, we were not happy.  After paying we looked around for signs, and realized that there were no signs anywhere about price.  It was a trap, and it worked.  This is such an unethical way to make money.  I will never go to this place again.  I know of other candies stores on Cannery Row that doesn't cost an arm and a leg to get food.

After the expensive candy spree, we decided not to do anymore damage, and go to Starbucks to meet up with Steven.   We sat there for a little while, then when Neal and I learned we had about ten mins left, we went right back to the tide pools on the beach, which was only right across the street.  After about ten mins, it was time to head off to Asilomar for the conference.  We arrived at the conference center, and before we can get settled in, we have already requests in for tech support.  We unloaded the van, and went right to work.  Two of my biggest jobs for the conference, other than running the team, is to send out text message reminders to those who signed up for them.  Second is the live streaming online of the conference.  The rest of the scheduled evening was usual.  The conference events ended around 8:30 pm.  We headed to our rooms afterwards to enjoy our expensive candy and hang out with our computers. We had brought a projector to our room, so we can watch movies.  We started to watch a new movie called Battleship.  Myself along with others fell asleep while the movie was playing.  Daniel was the only one who stayed up.  

Saturday November 10, 2012

This day for the conference was a standard day.  Starts with an assembly, then workshops.  During the assembly, I worked on the text messages and the live streaming.  After the assembly, whatever team members were not presenting a workshop was to wonder around to the other workshops to take photographs.  In many year's pasts, I had purposely chosen to present my workshop at one of the first two sessions.  Why?  Because the last workshop session of the conference happens to be the same time as the sunset.  It has been a tradition since I started going to SLF in 2005 to skip out of the last workshop and wander off to the beach to explore the tidepools and to enjoy the sunset.  One of my best sunset photographs was taken at the beach.  This year, things would be different, because I ended up teaching my workshop during that time.  During the second workshop time, I was making my rounds to take photographs when I received a text message from Daniel.  It had seemed he was on the beach, enjoying himself, when he should be doing what I was doing.  He had texted me that he had spotted a few star fish.  Something I enjoy seeing at tidepools, and have a rare chance to see.  Right away, I was a little upset because we need as many photos as possible, and it will be tough with the low numbers of team members attending the conference this year.  I had decided to take a break, and go out to the beach with a mission to get Daniel back to his work at the conference.  That would not work so well once I get out there.

When I got out to the beach, it was low tide, and all the rocks were exposed.  Daniel was hanging out with a 4-H leader named Art Smoke, which was one of my State Ambassador Advisers back in 2006.  He and Daniel had showed me the star fish, and I had gotten excited.  After seeing the star fish, my mind told me to back off.  I was currently wearing my tech team shirt and a nice pare of pants.   Of course, my sense for adventure changed that thought and fast.  Before you knew it, I was climbing over rocks, kelp, and jumping over water to get to hard to reach tide pools in chances of more glimpses of star fish and amazing tidepool wildlife.  With great surprise  I just got my shoes and a little bit of the bottom of my pants wet and covered in sand.   I could have spent a few hours at the tidepools, but time got short, and Daniel and I had to return to prepare for our workshop.  I did get to see a good amount of rock fish, four star fish, lots of crabs, and other sea life.  I even managed to take a few example photographs with my phone for my workshop.

Daniel and I worked together for a co-workshop.  The first one we have officially taught together. We taught Smart Phone Photography.  I would teach the iphone section and he would teach the android platform section of the workshop.  The workshop was quite full, which all my workshops are, and was a great success.  The only thing I did not think about when planning was the sunlight.  Near the end of the workshop, we were going to have the delegates spit into groups and go out to take photographs with the tools and skills they learned from the workshop.  If you paid attention to what I said before, the sun sets during this workshop session.  It was dark.  Luckily, we were able to fill the time with questions asked from the group.  The workshop was a great success and something I would teach in the future.

The rest of the conference events for the day were alright.  Just an evening assembly with a few fun activities.  To the tech team, it was fun to watch, but the real fun came after the assembly ends.  The State Ambassadors and the Tech Team usually have an tradition of going out on the beach that night, and this year the State Ambassadors had planned to have a fire on the beach.  We agreed and set a time.  I had even invited our advisers and a awesome leader named Sandy from Humboldt County, who was bored and knew that hanging out with the younger crowd is more fun than staying in the room.  We planned to meet at the fire circle near the mess hall before heading out.  There was a fire, or what was left of the fire, in the fire ring, and a large bag of fire food to feed that fire.  After waiting a few moments, the Ambassadors came, and it seemed they had no idea where to get firewood and didn't plan out their evening.  It was a little annoying, but they were lucky.  We decided to just take the bag of firewood that was sitting there for that fire at the fire circle.  Very lucky that I was there.  They were planning to have the fire near the street and the pathway.  That was the state beach, where fires were illegal.  I had them walk south to just past the boarder of the state beach, where fires on the beach was legal.  It was a very beautiful night.  The sky was clear.  The stars was amazing, and the sounds of the ocean was amazing.  We lit the fire, and we all enjoyed each other's company.  We even did a few name games, since this was a new ambassador team and the tech team and ambassadors work together at SLC in the summer.  After awhile, the ambassadors had left.  Around 11:30.  The logs were not fully done yet, and the tech team wanted to stay a bit longer.  Even though we had the afterglow (a photo slideshow with music) to do for the next assembly in the morning.  The best time ever was after the Ambassadors left.  It was just Daniel, Neal, and myself.  It was quite.  You had the warm heat of the cracking fire, the sound of the powerful waves crashing on shore,  the night sky filled with stars that lit the night landscape, and the cool ocean breeze.  We chilled and hang out for half an hour, until we had most of the firewood burn.  We covered the fire with sand to put it out, and we headed back to the room to work on our projects.  We went to bed around 2 am. 

Sunday November 11, 2012

The day had a tiring start.  We slowly got dressed, and forced ourselves to breakfast, although all we wanted to do is sleep.  We got everything set up for the assembly, then went back to our room to pack and load the van.  Afterwards, we headed down to back to the chapel, where the assemblies and main conference activities were held.  After the assembly, we had to pack everything up and head on out back to San Jose.  Before getting in the car, I had a small moment to look out to the ocean and around the grounds one last time.  This conference was 60 years old this year, and for those 60 years, this conference has been held here, at Asilomar Conference Grounds and State Beach.  Sadly, they have moved the event to be held in Sacramento next year.  I, along with others, are saddened because we have grown to love this conference center and all it has to offer.  I love Monterey and I love Asilomar.  I will greatly miss it.  

On our way back to San Jose, we stopped in Castroville for lunch at a place called The Giant Artichoke.  They have some amazing and very filling sandwiches.  After lunch, Steven had dropped Neal, Matthew, and I at the airport where we all headed our own ways home.