An Exhibition of Global Warming?

Keywords:  climate change, exhibit management

About 900 words (3 pages)

            Several years ago--before it made the news or showed up seriously on the scientist’s radar screen--I had a personal encounter with global warming while doing some work in Brazil.  I had gone down to an exhibit in Sao Paulo to man a booth for a forest products industry association.  It seemed like it would be a good time of year to go:  autumn here, so spring there.  The weather would be nice, or so I thought.

            You have to understand that I believe in the cheap and easy model of booth display when it comes to exhibiting at trade shows far outside the USA.  Sure, we can ship a few boxes of magazines and throw-away literature, and if it makes it there or not, fine.  But the essential stuff, I carry with me in a big black trunk:  books, posters, tablecloth, samples, anything of value.  In those days, if you shipped a couple of boxcars and a steam engine, it would arrive no problem, but a few boxes of assorted display items might have a 40% chance of arriving at the show.  So, I took my chances at the Latin American red-light-green-light game at customs (push the random inspection button, and if it lights up green you can bring in an atom bomb; if it lights up red, then they check under the fillings in your molars).  Thankfully, I passed customs with green colors, and I arrived in Sao Paulo all set to go.

            The exhibit center at the time was about an hour outside of town in a dusty complex of scattered buildings.  The cab driver helped me unload my black trunk onto my rickety little set of portable wheels, and into the mob of exhibitors setting up shop I headed.  My booth was in a good location, between some very nice walled in booths of major companies.  In fact, when I looked around, most of the booths were small plastic houses under various stages of construction.  Oh well, I thought, I’ll be out in the open and folks will be more likely to stop by since they won’t have to enter a “house”.

            I was wrong.  The show opened later that night, and it being rather warm I wondered why they hadn’t cut the air conditioner on.  I went to inquire. 

            “This hall does not have air conditioning.  This is why everyone has an enclosed booth,” I was told.  It was quite warm that evening in the hall, but I survived even in my dark suit and tie.  A few people wandered by.  Tomorrow would be better, I knew.

            It was not.  Now it was tropical daytime outside.  The temperature rose in the hall.  The air conditioners of all the little enclosed booths kicked on.  They exhausted more hot air, and the temperature rose even higher. 

            The booth on one side of me had a belly dancer every hour on the hour, and the booth directly across had an espresso dining area.  All in luxurious climate controlled wonder.  I watched longingly as the exhibitors sipped their exotic coffees and basked in the coolness of the major company booth.  The ice in my mineral water melted in short order.  I loosened my tie, took off my coat, and sweated. 

            A number of people said hello to me while dashing from one air conditioned booth to another.  One fellow quickly renewed his membership with me, and I gave him back change in US Dollars.  The laws at that time required one to account for all money converted into Brazilian currency.  How would I explain this to the authorities, and were the jails by any chance air conditioned?  Clearly, heat exhaustion was on the creep.

On the second day of the show, the booth next door had an extra air conditioner installed.  It seemed the 15 or so gawking guys and one bejeweled undulating female navel caused it to be a bit too warm at least every hour on the hour.  I knew something of being too warm.  At last, I sought refuge in the espresso diner booth across the aisle.  But I was an association staff guy not a potential customer of theirs.  I explained everything our association had to offer, quoted in detail from our latest industry standards, and even gave them a free forest product (a book)—which I went over in great detail until they finally said, “here, sit down and enjoy a drink.”  They were already members.

I sat at the small table soaking in the cool air and staring at my parched booth through the plexiglass.  Someone stopped at my booth to gaze at the literature, and I thought I had a customer.  Nope.  He was just picking up a brochure to use as a fan as he walked.  I could only impose on this major company booth’s hospitality for so long, so I readied to go back in the caldron for the last few hours of the show. 

“It’s going to be hot out there,” my new best friend in the air conditioned booth said.  “You know the cooler we keep it in here, the hotter it gets out there.  It’s ashamed it has to work that way.  By my gauges, it’s about—well in Fahrenheit—over 100 degrees,” he told me.  I believed him, after all he was selling machine controls, valves, and the like. 

“I hope it has been a good show for you,” I said as I was about to leave.

“Yes, I’ve sold several thermostat control systems,”  he said, and I stepped outside or inside—whatever the climate may be.

©JP Harrison 2012. All rights reserved.