FLAT OUT AFLOAT AT SHANGRI-LA’S RASA RIA RESORT
It was a breezy cloudy afternoon at the Shangri-La’s Rasa Ria Resort on a Wednesday and the Asia Ability team were all set to welcome a team from Control Risks! Their mission… FLAT OUT AFLOAT: to build a sea-worthy vessel that floats and paddle it along a designated race route! And that was what they did! Although… the feat did not come without challenges…!
Paul our lead facilitator, did a great job briefing the teams on their mission, teams were then presented with their instruction kit, construction blueprints and proceeded to their respective team zones to view their materials. Planning took place, jobs were assigned and delegated, participants stepped up to take on the challenge. It was apparent that some teams were well organised and then there were some teams that decided to be innovative by making slight modifications to the plans (despite being told to adhere to the exact plans to guarantee that it will work!)… at the end of the building phase, we could see that some teams had indeed made alternative modifications to their ‘vessel’ reasoning that the shorter the boat the faster it will be..!
Little did they know, the next challenge came in the form of… raindrops! As you know, cardboards are ruined if they get in direct contact with water! At that time some teams were still in the midst of wrapping up their boats with plastic sheets to waterproof them for when they put their boats out to sea! With quick thinking, teams lifted their vessel off the ground from getting soaked and some teams formed a shaded fort under the resort’s beach umbrella… teams were indeed getting creative and innovative in spite of all the challenges they were facing which was in so many ways was a timely wind of change! And complete their boat the teams did!
By the time all teams had their boats ready for the racing phase, the storm grew stronger… however, the teams were adamant that they complete the challenge with a race! So everyone prayed hard and waited for the rain to subside, they answered some debrief questions that Paul had prepared for them…. when the rain subsided for a bit and with the green light received from resort on the safety to proceed with the rain at sea… the teams RACED into the sea! And man, what a RACE it was… a very WET one! Wonder if the “shorter… innovative" team boats made it? Let’s just stay that it floated and was paddled out to sea lasting for part of the race! The added excitement from the teams splashing about didn’t do much justice to the boats that were not securely wrapped, as it began disintegrating on its journey back to shore!
Overall, it was loads of lessons learnt whilst having fun and probably one of the WETTEST Flat Out Afloat ever!
Find out more about Flat Out Afloat here.