pelf-ism is contagious

“If you guys want to go catch a movie, we could do that. You know, Dark Knight?”

“Nope.”

“Why? You don’t like Batman?”

“Err.. I don’t like the title.”

I know it sounds crazy to not want to watch a movie because of the movie title.

But that’s just me. I judge a movie by its title. Similarly, I judge a book by its title. I am not afraid of admitting it, or the fact that the movie or book I dismissed earlier could be a good one. Even if the whole world thinks that it is a very good movie, I would still not watch it.

Because I don’t like how the title sounds.

One of the things that got repeated very frequently at the Wetlands Institute is that the not-for-profit organization loses money in 9 months in a year. In fact, we were told that the only months that the Wetlands Institute makes money are the summer months.

I’m not sure how much of that I believe, but let’s just say that the institute makes significantly less money during the “non-summer months” compared to the “summer months”.

So one of the most important fund-raising events organized by the Wetlands Institute is, undoubtedly, one that would raise lots of money in a short time. And what better way to raise funds than to invite the rich golfers to an afternoon/evening of golf and good food?

Businesses are invited to sponsor a hole at the Sand Barrens Golf Club in Stone Harbor, and each of the 18 holes can be sponsored by many companies. These companies donate a certain amount of money to the Wetlands Institute and a sign is put up on that particular hole (see photo below).

At the end of the game — we all know that golf is a very long game — players would tally their scores on the board, and the best team wins a prize!

Besides good food, there was also a silent auction. Silent auction is a kind of auction where items are placed on a table and a sheet of paper is placed next to each item. Bidders write their names on the sheet of paper, as well as the price that they are willing to pay for that particular item. But of course, the price that you write must be higher than what the previous bidder is willing to pay (otherwise it wouldn’t be called an auction, it would be called a game!).

One other fun thing that was supposed to take place but didn’t was the “putting into the boat” game (click on photo below for notes). The putter (the person hitting the golf ball) will stand on the green patch on the foreground, and s/he will try to hit the golf ball into the boat in the middle of the lake.

I am sure that would have been fun!

All in all, the event was a successful one. Many golfers turned up. Lots of good food was served. I am not sure how much money was raised in the event itself, but I am sure it is successful enough that the institute organizes it year after year

More pictures taken during the golf tournament here.

If you haven’t noticed, I am horribly back-(b)logged, but I can’t help it! There’s so much going on at the moment, and I barely have time to download the photos that I took yesterday at the Philadelphia Zoo, let alone blog about it. But then again, this is something that I wanted to do very badly, so I will still try to squeeze my brain and recall whatever I needed to recall. By the way, may I have a show of hands of those who are still following my journey?

On June 14th, Travis, from the Education Team and I went to a place called Bivalve for a festival called “Bay Days”. I didn’t know what “Bay Days” was until the day we went to Bivalve. All I knew before I signed up for the event was that Travis would be manning the touch tank to raise awareness, and we would be selling Wetlands Institute souvenirs to raise some fund$.

So anyway, the Delaware Bay Days is the largest free festival in the tri-state region (New Jersey-Pennsylvania-Delaware). It was a fun-filled family day “celebrating the rich maritime history, vibrant culture and phenomenal natural resources of the Delaware Bay”.

There was a street parade through the historic oyster town of Port Norris but I did not attend the parade because Travis and I were busy setting up our “Wetlands Institute booth”. He took care of his touch tank — filled the tank with sea water that we brought with us, placed the animals (crabs, horseshoe crabs, sea star) into the tank — and placed the information board and all the important brochures on the table while I set up all the other just-as-important souvenirs on the table.

There were a lot of other stalls/booths that sold fresh seafood, hotdogs, homemade strawberry shortcakes, ice creams, etc. Entertainment (live country music) was also provided throughout the 2-day festival.

And of course, our touch tank was a big hit not only to the kids, but to the adults as well! It was amazing that some kids would never think twice before placing their hands into the tank and on the other hand, some adults would never place their hands into the tank no matter how hard we tried to convince them

And of course, Travis being Travis, never stopped telling kids that they would get 7 years of good luck if they kissed a live horseshoe crab. And guess what the kids do?

More pictures taken during Bay Days here.