Friday, July 3, 2009

APPS 2009


Finally the event has come to an end on Wednesday. The 200 committees of us have been working so hard for the pass 1 year to make the 8th Asia Pacific Pharmaceutical Symposium (APPS) a success. We received 160 participants from all around Asia Pacific region (Taiwan, Thailand, Indonesia, Singapore, Australia, Korea, Japan etc) , breaking the record of the number of participants for the pass few years.

This is the first time we are organising such a big event. Throughout the organising process, we did face a lot of challenges and obstacles. The first most important problem we faced was the financial problem. USD250 for each participant is certainly not enough to cover all the expenses for 1 whole week as the accommodation alone at hotel already consume a big sum, haven't include all those transportation, dinner at hotel etc. We did not get any sponsor from USM or even the Malaysian Pharmaceutical Society, so basically we are standing alone . Luckily with the efforts of all committees, we managed to get the sponsors from the drug companies and others to make it through the event.

Since it was the first time for us to hold this prestigious event, we were all starting from 0, learning through the process. We had to think and figure out all the things by ourselves, the registration form and program prospectus alone had been editted more than 11 times. I 'm glad that we had a good team of role players . Me myself was amazed by the events itself such as the Global Village Night. I bet that it was one of the most interesting and fascinating event that I have ever joined. The performances were really a good one, all of the committees of it had put in so many efforts to learn all different cultures performances from different ethnics though we had only limited time. The slide show of the night was really so great, I didn't know that we had such a great team of technical for doing the slide show, nearly like professional standard.
To my surprise, the booklet of APPS which was designed by my direct junior was praised by so many of the lecturers and VIPs. As his senior, I did not even know that my junior was such talented in doing this. It was really a good piece of job, not an ordinary boring booklet like any other event , but full of innovation and creative.

Basically all the programs for the past 7 seven days went smoothly. I was dead exhausted for the past 10 days, sleeping only 2-3 hours per day. We encountered problem needed to be solved everyday, waking up having heart attacking news. It was really a great challenge to us, having to scratch our heads, figuring the solution of every complaints and problems arise unexpectedly.
I learn a lot throughout this whole year organising process, especially during the 1 week of APPS. All those minors things we need to be careful and take note of although it seems not important. Especially for the protocol of every event, we need to be extremely alert of as there were so many VIPs including those from overseas. I certainly enjoyed all the things although I was really exhausted.

p/s: for my friend who wish to know more about this event can surf our official website at www.usm.my/apps2009

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