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For me, this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. I feel really lucky and really blessed to
have received the opportunity to even participate in the contest
because the contest alone is not something that every
company is going to offer. From what I’ve been told this is the first time our company
has offered a prize such as this. I just feel like this has exceeded
my expectations a thousand fold, especially how I feel. Like
I didn’t expect to feel so passionate or emotional about it or excited.
For someone who isn’t here, for them to visualize what it is like to be here in the
expo, even for the conference in general for the week, I would
say it’s magical. It really is. The opening ceremonies, when
we walked in and we sat down, that’s when it really hit me that we were on an international
stage because people were speaking all these different
languages and it was so interesting and you’re looking
at their tags, at the countries that they’re from, and it’s CEOs and directors and managers
from Nepal to France. And it made you feel so small yet
so connected at the same time.
The International Dinner was interesting because you kind of felt like a celebrity. It was
formal, ball gown. You walk into the venue itself where
the doors open out and it’s just pitch black, and a million
stars. So it’s a magical dinner under the stars and with the stars because you’ re
rubbing shoulders with all these influential people from co-ops across
the world.
I know most people would know what the definition of a co-op is or the principles or values
or what-not, but I would say this experience has really
opened up my eyes and my heart to what our company
represents and what a co-op is. It’s something that in my generation or even in the company
I want to see more excitement and more passion and more
enthusiasm to get involved and to be aware of what
we’re about. And we should really create something for this generation to move forward
because they’re going to be our Rochdale pioneers
of the future. If we don’t have them, then we don’t have any
vision to look forward to.