Melbourne University Overseas Student Service or MUOSS had organised an event recently, called Night Market, which was held in Melbourne University. All clubs and societies involved took part by selling food, organising games and carrying out voluntary works like setting up the tents and providing help and support to each stall manager and staff during the event. It was held on the 3rd of April 2009.
The Preparation
The preparation for this event was carried out by us, first year students, who had absolutely no idea of what was going on. However, the goal of this event was fulfilled, thanks to our seniors who provided us with support and proper information on the ways things should be done, et cetera. PETROVIC had decided to sell satays and cendol to raise fund for the club. At the end of our final meeting, we had decided to add in sirap bandung in our menu to boost profitability.
To our surprise, making satay was quite a pain in the neck. The pain does not include the ‘ordeal’ we had to face when preparing them. It was quite difficult to estimate how much meat we were supposed to get since it was our very first time preparing, making and selling satay in a huge number, but with the help of some of our very experienced seniors, the problems we faced got very much alleviated.
The preparation started by estimating how much raw materials we would need. It was pretty tedious as we did not want excess materials lay to waste. Hence, we came up with a budget list which guided us to make sure that we would not go off-budget.
Our journey started early in the morning on the 2nd of April when we (Rusydina, Amir, Chuah, Faizal, Farouq) went to Fitzroy Market to get materials for ‘kuah kacang’ i.e. peanut gravy, of which addition were pivotal in giving our customers’ satay experience an extra kick. It was challenging for some of us as we had to estimate how much ingredient needed. Therefore, a conclusion on the high level of difficulty involved in the process of making estimation was made.
Another meeting was held a night before the big day. At the same time, the preparation of satay began. We started by chopping onions, garlic, chillies and the meat, of course, with the help of everyone including senior scholars. Everyone came to participate in preparing the satay as it was projected to be our biggest profit contributor in the project.
The Big Day
The day was, to our discontentment, rainy. Thankfully, the weather got better later in the evening. Prior to the event’s start, the stall was nicely decorated, thanks to the committee members. Our theme colour was green, so everyone involved during the big day wore green. At around 6 p.m. the process of the grilling of our sinful satays as well as the preparation of our cendol plus sirap bandung started. The project was a success, as most of our food items were sold, especially the satay thanks to our customers and friends who supported us along the way. We managed to sell around 1000 sticks of satays. At the end of the day, we celebrated with some cendol for ourselves and had a great conversation, with apparent mood of paean and relief lingering in the air. The goal of raising fund for the club was met. Thanks to everyone who did their bit in getting involved, directly, or indirectly to the success of our night market project. It is of my great hope that such enthusiasm, and collaborative spirit shown by everyone can be maintained, and further fortified for our future activities to garner even higher level of success.
Al Farouq bin Abdul Rahaman
Leader,
Night Marker Committee
