Monday and Tuesday were spent preparing for the visits---meetings about how things were going to go down, what roles we would all play, how we would coordinate everything. I also had to work on a document that gave background information to the traveling press with the secretary that contained bios and information on the people and places at the different events.
Wednesday started the chaos with the Reagan unveiling. It was really nice. Condoleeza Rice gave an amazing speech. The Hungarian Prime Minister's speech was a little over the top. It was actually ridiculous, but oh well.
Thursday was a super busy day. I had to be at the Bank Center at 7:15 to meet up with the press crew. I was in charge of recording the audio at all of the Secretary's events to send them back to Washington. I got an official delegate badge once we got to Parliament at 7:40. That made me feel special. We got to head right into the upper chamber, which is a pretty awesome place by the way. The event didn't get started until 9:15, but we had to make sure that the audio worked, which it did. It was so neat to be only 20 feet away when everyone arrived. One of the coolest sites was Hillary Clinton giving Condi a standing ovation. I never thought I would ever see that.
There were great speeches paying homage to Tom Lantos, a Hungarian Jew who escaped the Holocaust and became a US Congressman, fighting for human rights his whole life.
After that was over, we had to run to another room in the Parliament to get set up for the press conference so I could get the Audio figured out for that. After that was set up, I had to fire up a laptop to get the audio from the opening sent to Washington. It took a while because I had to upload it to a file-sharing site because it was so large. Anyway, I got that done. My quickness was very appreciated by the Secretary's Staff who came and thanked me for my quickness. The press conference was cool. Sec. Clinton did a good job of very diplomatically criticizing some of Hungary's recent un-democratic decisions. I was very impressed. As much as I disagree with Hillary politically, I think she is doing an awesome job as Secretary of State.
Then we took a taxi with all of our equipment back to the bank center for the meet and greet with Hillary. It was cool to get up close and see her in more of a private setting. After that I had to go back to the office and get the audio uploaded from the press conference. I sent that off to Washington. Then I could actually breathe and I took a lunch a break at 3:00pm. It was also around this time that I found out the reason why the person from Secretary Clinton's staff was so happy about my audio performance. Turns out I was just the back up person and the staff person that was so happy was the actual person in charge of the audio. Turns out she had screwed up completely on both events, so I saved her. That made me feel really good.
So that was pretty much it. Some overall conclusions---1)You would be amazed about the cost of this visit. 2)It went really smoothly considering all the logistics involved. 3)Hillary isn't as bad as everyone makes her out to be. 4)There is so much work beyond the scenes that most people never think about. All in all it was an awesome experience,that I may never have a chance to experience again.
Friday was the 4th Celebration day. There was the official party in the Afternoon which was pretty ritzy. A lot of food and drink and socializing.
Then in the evening was the community party for just employees. That was fun too. A lot of eating the whole day. What is more American than that?
woah- rubbing shoulders with the big wigs....
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