Wednesday, February 24, 2010

The Spice Saga Pt. 3 - My Money Ha Ha!


CARNIVAL SUNDAY

So I left my brother and sister in law up at the Hilton to buy me a costume. I left my sizes and 5 preferred sections. I know they say beggars cyar be choosers, but as far as I was concerned I wasn't begging, I was paying. The bra size didn't matter to me that much cause I was going to strip it off and put it onto a corset anyways.

In the meantime I head home to finish off and package the few boots I have remaining for my friends who I would be seeing later in the evening. (Didn't go to Lara because of the timing etc so no review, sorry).

In between doing boots, I kept getting updates from my family who were up at the Hilton. The general report was utter chaos at the distribution centre with people coming back to exchange costumes, swapping sizes etc. One call I got said no bra in my size, a next report was only bras and no belt or accessories. After spending an hour at the Hilton and coming up with nothing, I told my brother and sister in law to come back home.

My sister in law was one of the lucky ones and was able to change her Isis Fl (which didn't have the feathers like in the prototype, and parts of the monokini glued and not stitched) to a Moroccan Heat FL.

So now it is about 6 o'clock on Carnival Sunday and I am sans costume. (Sans mean 'without' fuh de non-French people).

Imagine my level of stress!

Is Carnival Sunday.
6 o'clock.
No damn costume. None.
Money in meh pocket.
NO COSTUME!



I think I went into shock and may have blacked out at that point cause I doh really remember much. I know I logged on to Fineahban to see if anyone was selling a Mumbai, Greece or a something. Is salt all over the place!

I finally resigned myself to having no costume and staying home huddled in a dark corner in my room on Carnival Monday and Tuesday.

Still had to meet my peeps for our annual Carni-Sunday lime so I packed up my boots for my peeps and made my way to the lime.

During the lime I re-tell my story much to the disbelief of my friends. Nobody could believe that I of all people, Miss Carnival herself doh have a costume. Anyhoo, one Coke on the rocks later, I get a text from my younger bro to call a contact in the Spice Distribution area. YAYYY!!!

I called The Contact and he said yes there were costumes but I needed to come up to the Hilton NOW. I made my excuses and buss it from de lime quick quick and made my way back up to the Hilton to check The Contact who ended up being the same Tee who I spoke with earlier. When we got up to the Hilton this time, the doors are closed and they are only letting in people 2 at a time.

I call Tee when I got there, and he comes outside to tell me that things are tight, but he took my information (costume, bra in any size etc) and goes back inside. Over the next one and a half hours my sister in law camped outside of the ballroom waiting for Tee to get me a costume, I saw several people walking outside with boxes of costumes. Tee came out at various times to tell me to hold on, he had nothing yet.

Eventually I realised that nothing was happening with this glorious hook up, so I stood up and waited to go inside the ballroom.

When the doors were eventually opened for the 15 or so people who were outside I made my way in. At this point in time all of the management and staff were there, Anya, Rocky, Senior Elias, Daddy Elias etc.

The PR of the band saw me and told one of the women there "This lady was here earlier when you are finished help her." The lady asked me for my measurements which I gave her. I made sure to tell her that the bra size did not matter, I would be ripping it off to put it onto my corset.

She goes to the back and less than 5 minutes later she comes back and says that they have nothing in my size. I tell her the size does NOT matter I will be redoing the bra. She says there is nothing.

I then ask the same PR woman and she tell me to hold on and she will have someone go look. I tell her the same thing, size does not matter.

During the 15minute wait, I notice the PR woman just milling around chatting with management and sipping coffee (water/juice/whatever).

In the meantime other people are being served and among them a girl next to me being served by one of the staff. The girl next to me is offered a Thailand costume in 36D which she refuses because she was not willing to pay more than USD$500 for a costume and the costumes were being sold at full price.

When she refuses the costume I ask her if she is sure she doesn't want it and she says no. I say GREAT! I tell the guy helping her that I will take the costume.

At this point the guy goes to the back for them to have the costume pulled.

I notice management speaking to him.

The guy comes back to me and says he's sorry but the costume is booked. :|

I ask him how could the costume be booked for me, but not for her? *pointing to the girl next to me*

The guy then tells me to hold on and goes in the back.

I turn to my sister in law who was standing there all along and ask, "What going on here? Is it that these people refusing to sell me a costume?!" My sister in law says to me "You know how long I watching them talking and looking back here."

I was infrickingcredulous. I went into shock again.

I ask the girl who was initially offered the costume that I was refused, if she would consider buying the costume for me then I would buy it back from her, she says no problem.

Then sense sets in and I tell my sister in law, "Yuh know wht, I doh need to play mas with this band. Let's go!"

Up to this point the guy who told me the costume was booked eh reach back YET!

Make your own inference about what happened, I chose to believe that Spice refused to sell me a costume. A willing paying customer.

I left Hilton super pissed and fricking upset. And no costume.

Carnival Sunday.
10:30pm
Money in my pocket.
Being blanked a costume by a band.

17 comments:

Raeness said...

Well yes...you got blackballed for standing up for your rights. chupes. Spice better get off their high horse and hope that in years to come they wouldn't end up begging ppl to spend their money to play in dey band. The mighty does fall too yuh know!!
But it's a good thing you got back your money yes. The Caspian Sea feathers look like they dip them in canal water...wtf!! and ppl take that?

anyways..looking forward to hearing about your experience with DKrewe.

Unknown said...

AC, I hope you took all that fakkin
crap, ONLY because you wanted to play alongside your family!....

Springmoon said...

Dammit, I just had a beautiful, thoughtful comment and blogger ate it.

Spice is ridiculous. You want to tell me that you are a producer. You have an unsold product nearing it's expiration date. You have a consumer willing to pay full price for that near-expired product. And you are turning her DOWN? After she came back to you even though *YOU* were the one at fault initially?

Spice is ridiculous. I know how this story ends, but I like the telling!

*striking Spice onto her perma-sh*t list*

Davica said...

SPICE MC!! I hope they crash and burn for all the shit they put their masqueraders through.

shells said...

Springmoon said it best...a paying customer is being refused after coming back to you and offering to pay FULL PRICE for a product that YOU flicked up in d first place?! Unbelievable! ..AC you real had to endure sh!t, and yuh didn't cuss or nothing (at least yuh didn't mention it).

p/s:- allyuh sure dis was spice 2nd year alone?!!

Mz No Behavior said...

I love the title!! It is your money [HA HA] and I'm pleased to hear that Spice did not end up with it after all they put you thru!

Carnivalcocoa said...

Waaay sah!!! Is there a part 4 to this? AC, did you play mas at all anywhere? There are no words for this mess. Good thing you took your money and RUN-- run for the hills, run for the Northern Range.

kimaspeak.blogspot.com said...

Amwayyyyyyyyyyyyyyy! This is something we say in Grenada. Papa yo!!! Buy for yuh and den sell!! I still cant believe that you went back to SPICE. Girl yuh paying! Yuh ehn begging!!! Afrochic. I can. not. believe. it.

Who is this Anya an Rocky anyways? An who is dis pitbull mother. Who de arse is dem anyway? I would have cuss dem rongside like a jamette. Set up a Blog. Doh Play wid Spice. Cause them ruinous destruction. Offer a discount on all boots except Spice boots. Right now I would be racking up ways to make sure these band suffers a bad reputation. Let me stick with my jamish Island People yuh hear. Because if was me, I might hadda pay tax on me mouth. I waiting to hear the rest.

afro chic said...

Just for the record, I only went back because of course, my family were playing in the band.

After the incident my brother was VERY upset (more than me) and wanted to carry back HIS costume as well, but at that 99th hour it just did not make sense.

He has since made it his personal mission to ensure that noone we know EVER plays with them for how they treated me. LOL.

I did not play with Spice, but at the very last minute, got a costume in D'Krewe, thanks to my Carnival Hero - Carnival Kris. I will be doing the review for that next.

And no I did not cuss not ONE person during this whole ordeal, which is still surprising to me because it is so unlike me. Is the shock I think!

After this post trilogy, I will say no more about Spice on this blog. I can promise you that. I does badmind BAD BAD!

shells said...

AC I admire your restraint in not cussing Spice and dey ways. Just this saga and the links to it would have an impact on their business.

Bizzie Chic said...

Wayyyyyy.....AC you good to keep your cool during this ordeal.

Sorry you had to go through all that, hope you had an enjoyable Carnival never the less :)

Unknown said...

to think i was trying to convince my crew to play in this band this year. good thing we stayed in tribe.

spice will NEVER see my money.

you cannot treat customers this way, you cannot treat people in this manner without it coming back on you. and this will come back on this band, i hope they know that. im disgusted.

Anonymous said...

*steups* to Spice.

Darling Annie said...

This is my first time posting on your blog and I'm usually the LAST to complain about anything concerning my mas but DAMN girl, this is absolutely RIDICULOUS!!! Is there a part 4????

babydoll said...

Where's part 4? Please Tell us about how u find a costume in DKrew and hope you have lots of pics.

afro chic said...

Sorry, there is no part 4. My next post will be on how I got through with my costume in DKrewe.

msinim625 said...

I am not one for posting either but after my girlfriend sent me the link i have to comment... Again agreeing with the others on you were good to keep yuh kool and not cus!!! But i understand you wanted to stay a lady throughout the ordeal... I heard about how Spices' costume never stays on you and of course it was evident in the Launching when the chick belt fall off she waist LOL. My point is their product is definitely inferior and for them to 'play' you like that knowing fully well they have no intentions of selling you the costume is unforgivable... SPICE will NEVER see my money... was a TRIBERer but jumped ship to YUMA... AC hope you have a GREAT carnival 2k11 with whomever YOU choose to play with