The Pattaya International Ladies Club (PILC) held its annual Christmas Bazaar at the Holiday Inn Hotel in Pattaya on Sunday, November 17. The Christmas Bazaar, which has become a signal for the opening of the Christmas shopping season here in Pattaya, featured 60 vendors from all over Thailand, many of whom do not sell their wares in mainstream shops, thus giving attendees a chance to find items that are not available elsewhere. Over 500 visitors attended the event over the course of the day.
“This year’s Bazaar, our 21st, was a huge success,” said PILC President Helle Rantsen. “The vendors were very happy with the turnout and attendees were delighted with the selection of products on sale.
Santa Claus helps PILC President Helle Rantsen cut the ribbon to officially launch this year’s Bazaar.
This was the first time we held the event at the Holiday Inn, and they pulled out all the stops to help us make our Bazaar memorable.” All funds raised at the Bazaar, after expenses, go to support numerous charities that PILC supports in the Pattaya area.
A special guest this year was Santa Claus, who, along with Helle, opened the Bazaar at 10am. Santa, played to perfection by William Francis from Bangkok, sang some Christmas songs, and welcomed dozens of excited children.
The event featured a wonderful Santa’s Grotto.
This year, the Club added an activities component to the Bazaar to entertain those people who wanted a break from shopping. A children’s activity area provided a face painting station hosted by Margaret Grainger from Hand to Hand and a wonderful Santa’s Grotto, complete with a post box where children could post their Christmas toy wish lists and tell Santa what they wanted. The Fountain of Life Women’s Center had a foot and shoulder massage area and were kept busy all day with weary shoppers getting a little relief.
Santa’s Grotto was complete with a post box where children could post their Christmas toy wish lists and tell Santa what they wanted.
In addition to the commercial vendors, the Bazaar also hosted eight local and regional charities who were able to sell various products, many of which were made by the people whom they support.
The Fountain of Life Women’s Center’s foot and shoulder massage area was kept busy with weary shoppers getting a little relief.
The PILC Special Events Chairperson, Anja Schoof-Hertroys, was very pleased with the corporate sponsorship the Bazaar received this year. “This event would not be successful without the sponsorship of our wonderful corporate supporters, and I would just like to take the opportunity to thank Asian Tigers Transpo, Bumrungrad Hospital, Dow Chemical, Foster Wheeler and Holiday Inn Hotel, for their generosity again this year,” she said. “And of course, there are many businesses, hotels and shops in Pattaya who have given generously to the Bazaar Raffle, which raises even more money for our welfare work. There are really so many to thank. We certainly couldn’t have done it without them and their support!”
Bargains galore.
Many people were not able to stay for all of the raffle number draws, but you can find all of the raffle winners on the PILC website at
www.pilc-pattaya.com. If you find you have won a prize, please email infopilc @gmail.com for details on how to collect your prize. All prizes must be collected by December 15, 2013.
Some of the items are not sold in regular outlets.
Santa makes his grand entrance.
