The 1997 Australian Financial Review/Telstra Internet Awards
Monday 10th November 1997
We were up at 6.30am (Melbourne time), had a freshen up and then wandered down to the breakfast room at the Heritage Hotel. Unfortunately the 7am start was delayed by an hour as the lady in charge of breakfast had taken a rostered day off and the hotel manager, despite being called, had little interest in the plight of residents who had breakfast vouchers but had to get off to tours and visits... many left before the cleaning lady arrived at 8am. She was given the job of handling requests for continental breakfasts.
We left the hotel at about 8.30am and walked around the city centre. Just a boy and his dad. It was fun for both... dad bought a three-in-one music CD of 80s music with that classic “Everlasting Story” on it for Au$19.99 while Alex bought an activity book called Nature Trail.
We returned to our hotel at about midday and what was supposed to be a rest for young Alex turned out to be a classic “wriggly 
worm” exercise where he wriggled all over his bed, did head over heels on the bed with accompanying sound signals, shot his dad dead with finger power, and generally worked himself up for the evening ahead.
After getting changed into our black tie outfits we walked to the Grand Hyatt hotel (seen here on the left). Alex received a lot of attention, smiles and looks, especially from the ladies looking as smart as he did.
The picture on the right is my favourite - Event Organiser Rachel Maiden with Alex taken soon after we arrived at the venue.
At about 6.30pm we walked up to where the award ceremony was to be held and sat in the lounge as a large crowd gathered outside the Savoy Ballroom. We met Trishnan who, like Alex, was a finalist in the best for children up to 15 years (seen here on the left with Alex).
Three young ladies dressed in tight fitting gold outfits pretended to be sculptures, moving from time to time into different positions were performing while the growing crowd enjoyed a drink before entering the Savoy Ballroom.
Here are some images taken of Alex in his tuxedo in the city and images taken in the ballroom:
The Australian Financial Review staff who made the award happen are seen here on the right.
At 7.30pm the doors opened and we entered into the large room which was set up with exotic lighting and two large blown up balloons lit up with WWW written on them on either side of the stage. The living sculptures came into the ballroom and played with the large WWW balloons then left.
We sat at table 23 overlooking the stage. We had lovely positions elevated above the area directly below the stage.
Trishnan and his parents sat at Alex’s table as did Kate Kearney and her parents Peter and Kaye (seen here left). Kate was a finalist is the best Personal Web Site. Kate’s dad Peter was a primary school principal in Mildura and was almost as proud of Kate as I was of Alex.
The awards were kicked off by Will Berryman (left) who was followed by Gregory Hywood (right) the publisher and editor of the Australian Financial Review. The first four awards were presented after Hywood’s speech followed by the entree.
In the next break a grey haired fellow from Cisco Systems, Gary Jackson, presented the next set of awards. After the main course (during which Alex and Trishnan got stuck into a big bowl of chips) the balance of the awards were presented.
Alex’s Scribbles - Koala trouble was beaten by Rochedale State School in the Primary Education category and narrowly beaten by Trishnan’s Oz in the site for children up to 15 years. The presenter said, when announcing the winner, that it was the multicultural aspect of Trishnan’s site that swayed the final judges decision. (Trishnan and his dad seen here on the right with the award).
The Chairman of the judging panel, Phillip McCrae from CSIRO came up and sat next to Alex (seen here left) immediately after the award was presented to Trishnan. He introduced himself and said that he felt that the decision “was a tough call”. However Alex and I were quite happy after all he had won the previous year and it was nice to see someone else enjoy winning the prize for best site in that category.
We left the ballroom at about 9.30pm returning home by taxi. Alex was exhausted!
It has been a lovely evening all in all and Alex and I had enjoyed ourselves immensely and I had been able to get some library pictures of Richard Alston - Federal Minister for Communications..
Day four of Alex and Scott's trip to Melbourne
We were up at 6.30am (Melbourne time), had a freshen up and then wandered down to the breakfast room at the Heritage Hotel. Unfortunately the 7am start was delayed by an hour as the lady in charge of breakfast had taken a rostered day off and the hotel manager, despite being called, had little interest in the plight of residents who had breakfast vouchers but had to get off to tours and visits... many left before the cleaning lady arrived at 8am. She was given the job of handling requests for continental breakfasts.
