The parking awards ceremony was just the ticket
Silence settled over the hotel dining room like heavy snow. The TV screen flickered. The presenter glanced at the shortlist. “And the winner of the 2005 Best New Car Park Award is . . . ” A pause for effect. “Edinburgh International Airport Multi-Storey!” The audience erupted. The victorious executives sauntered up to collect their prize. They looked thrilled. Actually, I exaggerate: they looked pleased. But they were surely exploding with delight on the inside. After all, it is not every day that you win at the British Parking Awards, “one of the highlights of the parking calendar”, according to the organisers.
I attended the ceremony last Friday to help me decide whether the growth in business awards ceremonies was a good thing or not. My gut feeling was that it was not. For a couple of years, I wrote about the media industry for the FT, a job that regularly required me to attend events such as the Brit Awards, the MTV Europe Music Awards and the D&AD Awards. Invariably, I found these occasions depressing, the sight of overpaid media types congratulating one another being generally sick-making.
In recent years other industries have caught the backslapping bug from the music, film, TV, marketing and newspaper trades. Mark Lloyd, who runs ukindustryawards.com, an online guide to British business prizes, says there are now at least 450 large trade and industry ceremonies in Britain every year. In the US, he says, there can be as many ceremonies in each state.
Whereas, in the twentieth century, we all had 15 minutes of fame, it seems that in the twenty-first we will all win an award. But having only ever attended media ceremonies, I thought I would reserve judgment on the trend until I had more rounded experience.
There was no shortage of non-media awards to choose from: the Furniture Awards, the World Billing Awards and the Pet Slimmer of the Year Awards all looked tempting. Initially, I resolved to attend the Awards Awards, a ceremony set up to recognise the achievements of the awards industry, which was put on for the first time last year. But I couldn't get hold of the organisers (maybe they have moved on to arranging The Awards Awards Awards), so instead I paid ￡94 for a ticket to the fourth annual British Parking Awards.
Things began awkwardly when, arriving at the lunchtime reception at the Victoria Park Plaza Hotel in London and realising I didn't know anyone in the parking industry or anything about the parking industry,
I stood at the bar by myself for
10 minutes.
After a drink I felt brave enough to approach one of the attendees who, by chance, was one of the very few attractive woman in the room. “So then,” I began. “Did you, er, find it easy to park here?”
She looked back at me in a cold, you're-only-talking-to-me-
because-I'm-one-of-the-very-few-
attractive-women-in-the-room kind of way and drew attention to the glass of red wine in her hand. She hadn't driven here. And judging by the amount that everyone else was drinking, neither had anyone else. I lied that there was someone I had to talk to very urgently and scampered away to my lunch table, only to spend another 10 minutes standing by myself.
It eventually transpired that I had been seated between a man who sold ticket machines and a parking attendant. When he had arrived, and as the food began to be served, the ticket machine man remarked: “Parking is the most interesting industry I have ever worked in. It combines elements of construction, policy, employment, technology and innovation.” I almost believed him.
After coffee, it was time for the awards presentation. The chairman of the judges made the obligatory remarks about the standard of entries being higher than ever. “The parking industry gets a bad press, but we have plenty to be proud of,” he added. “The entries for Best Off-Street Operation, in particular, show that parking can be an enjoyable part of a trip.”
The man employed to present the prizes was one Adrian Simpson, a TV motoring journalist whom I hadn't seen on TV for a while. It wasn't promising. But as he presented the first award, for Best New Car Park, something unusual happened: I started to enjoy myself at an awards ceremony. I liked the way Simpson didn't take it very seriously. I liked the fact that there were no speeches.
Yes, the winners of the first award didn't look overjoyed. But that may have been because they were Scottish. All the other winners were visibly, touchingly ecstatic. It was hard not to get carried away with the emotion of it all. By the time the Employee of the Year Award was given to Jim Short, the lovely 62-year-old parking attendant sitting on my left, I was whooping along with everyone else.
Martin Amis once remarked that the only sayable thing about prizes was: they're obviously alright if you win them. But I think there is a little more to say about awards than this. Media awards are not alright (unless you win), but non-media award ceremonies are alright. There is something heartening about the under-regarded being treated like stars for a day, even if they are wheel clampers.
I know that, with some organisers charging up to ￡350 a head, many awards ceremonies are just money-making exercises. And I know that the celebrities presenting the awards are only there because they are being paid a packet: someone like Graham Norton can expect to pick up ￡22,000 for a night's work presenting prizes. But, in general, the proliferation of award ceremonies is to be applauded.
每个人都得奖，好吗？
整个酒店饭厅鸦雀无声，就像被大雪笼罩着一样。电视屏幕闪烁不定。颁奖者匆匆看了一眼候选人名单。“2005年最佳新停车场大奖的获得者是……”他故意停顿了一下，以制造气氛…… “爱丁堡国际机场的多层停车场！”观众们一下子沸腾了。获胜的高管们信步走上台领奖。他们显得很高兴。事实上，我有些夸大其词：他们表面看起来很平静，但内心一定是欣喜若狂。毕竟，你不是每天都能获得英国停车大奖的，“这是停车业历史上最辉煌的时刻之一，”大会主办者说。
上周五，我参加这个颁奖典礼是为了帮助自己确定，层出不穷的商业颁奖典礼是否是件好事。我的直觉是否定的。在过去的两三年里，我一直担任英国《金融时报》媒体行业的撰稿人，这份工作要求我定期出席诸如全英音乐奖(Brit Awards)、MTV 欧洲音乐奖(MTV Europe Music Awards)和设计与艺术指导奖(D&AD Awards)等颁奖活动。我总是觉得这些场合十分压抑，收入过高的公众人物互相祝贺的情景常常令人作呕。
最近几年中，其它行业受到了音乐、电影、电视、市场营销和报纸行业的感染，各种颁奖典礼也是屡见不鲜。为英国商业奖项导航的网站ukindustryawards.com负责人马克?劳埃德(Mark Lloyd)表示，目前英国每年至少有450个大型贸易和工业颁奖典礼。他说，美国的一个州可能就有这么多颁奖典礼。
然而，在20世纪，我们都能当15分钟的名人；到了21世纪，似乎人人都能得奖。但由于我只参加过媒体颁奖典礼，我觉得在没有更为全面的经验前，我应对这种发展趋势持保留意见。
非媒体大奖数不胜数，例如家具奖，世界记费帐务奖(World Billing Awards)和年度宠物瘦身奖(Pet Slimmer of the Year Awards)，这些奖项看起来都很诱人。最初，我决定参加颁奖典礼大奖(Awards Awards)，这个去年首度新增的典礼旨在表彰颁奖行业的贡献。但由于无法联系到主办方（他们也许已开始筹备The Awards Awards Awards了），于是我花了94英镑买了一张第四届英国年度停车颁奖典礼的入场券。
当我到达设在伦敦维多利亚公园大酒店的午餐招待会时，我意识到在停车行业内我谁都不认识，对停车行业也一无所知，因此我从一开始就陷入了尴尬的境地。
我在酒吧里独自站了10分钟。
喝完一杯酒后，我感到有了足够的勇气去走近一位与会者，碰巧她是酒吧内极少数漂亮女士中的一位。“那么，”我开始说话了，“你……嗯……觉得在这里停车方便吗？”
她回头看了我一眼，仿佛在说“你只向我搭话是因为我是这里极少数漂亮女士中的一位”，还将我的目光转向她手中的一杯红酒。她那天没开车。而且，从其他人喝酒的量来看，他们也都没开车。我对她撒了一个谎，说必须马上去找一个人，然后匆忙离开，奔到餐桌旁，不料又独自站了10分钟。
最后，我才弄明白，坐在我两侧的分别是售票机销售和停车员。当售票机销售落座后并开始上菜时，他说：“停车是我从事过的最有趣的行业。它结合了建筑、政策、就业、技术和革新等元素。”我几乎相信了他。
喝完咖啡后，颁奖典礼的时间到了。评委会主席义不容辞地对今年参赛者水平超过往年做出评价。“停车业的负面新闻多，但我们有许多值得自豪的地方，”他补充道，“尤其是“最佳非大街停车大奖”(Best Off-Street Operation)的参赛者向我们证明，停车可以成为旅行中令人愉快的一部分。”
受聘颁奖的一位嘉宾是艾德里安?辛普森(Adrian Simpson)。他是一名汽车电视节目的记者，我已有一段时间没在电视上看见他了。这个颁奖礼并非没有意思。当他颁发第一个最佳新停车场大奖时，特别的事情发生了：我开始喜欢这个颁奖典礼了。辛普森没太把颁奖当回事，而且事实上也没有人发表演讲，我喜欢这样。
是的，第一个获奖者看起来并没特别兴奋，但这可能是因为他们是苏格兰人的缘故。其他获奖者都显得激动万分，欣喜若狂。要做到情绪一点都不失控很难。当年度最佳员工奖授予62岁的吉姆?肖特(Jim Short)时，也就是坐在我左边的那位可爱的停车员，我和其他人一起为他欢呼。
马丁?埃米斯(Martin Amis)曾说过，关于大奖唯一可说的是：如果你获奖的话，它们显然很好。但我认为大奖的意义不止于此。媒体大奖没什么意思（除非你获奖），但非媒体颁奖典礼很有趣。那些平时不太受人尊重的人――即使是轮胎钳工，在这一天受到了明星的礼遇，这很令人鼓舞。
我了解到，有些主办者对每位参赛者收取350英镑，许多颁奖典礼的目的只是为了赚钱。而且，我知道名人颁奖只是因为他们可以借此大赚一笔。电视节目主持人格雷厄姆?诺顿(Graham Norton)等人出席一场颁奖晚会有望获得2.2万英镑。但总的来说，颁奖典礼的遍地开花值得肯定。
