Aug 18, 2021 Last Joint meeting this summer

What a great idea! (thanks Cherry Cheung) This summer four Toastmasters Clubs, Lingo Advanced, Fabulous Facilitators, Riverbend and Golden Mountain, combined their meetings to have better attendance (a full screen of 16 tonight), experience different clubs, speakers and evaluators, meet new friends and have an enjoyable time. Check on all of these. 

Tonight Golden Mountain, with Harry P as Toastmaster, hosted our meeting on “Animal Rights and Wrongs.” There were no “scruples” (WOD) in naming our favorite wild animal. Many animals were suggested from huge elephants and giraffes to tiny snakes and turtles. The two speeches were on opposite spectrums. Kal S gave an insightful speech about managing “depression” and Katie W enthralled us about her “exciting but short vacation.” These speeches were evaluated by Rhys D and Craig B. Trudy B Tabletopics Master asked some challenging TT questions. Cam B was voted as giving the best response to his question about hunting. However, we heard about snakes climbing drapes, a princess yorkie and a Tasmanian Devil plus more. Edith B won best evaluator for her evaluation of Tabletopic responses. Dan Mc led the evaluation team, who were all attentive to their roles. Thank you to our two guests, Alisse and Rani, for joining us on this fourth successful adventure. See you next Tuesday at 7 pm. MST. Let’s all strive to gain more members so we will need two screens to accommodate all next year. 

Submitted by: Edith B VPPR (Lingo/Fab Fac)

July 6, 2021 Joint Meeting Extravaganza

In discussing our Theme: ”release from captivity,” 15 of us gathered from four toastmasters clubs: Lingo Advanced Communicators, Fabulous Facilitators, Riverbend and Golden Mountain.  What a release!  led by TM Cherry C.  We had two new and improved speeches (their repeat speeches in Level 1 Pathways project 3).  Anisha R (Riverbend) spoke with a good strong voice on “Why Diversity and Inclusion matter now?” and Gary T (Fabulous Facilitators) spoke with humour on his trifold “Second Shot” (vaccine, video game, and TM). This is actually the second shot at toastmasters for both of these speakers, you could tell.  

With being released, we were challenged by Club Growth Director Dan Mc to personally contact 25 of our acquaintances to tell them about Toastmasters, much like you would tell a friend about a good book and a fantastic restaurant that you like.  Best Tabletopics was won by Hope in discussing what she missed the most this past year, of course friends/family. While all the evaluators had suggestions for improvement with speeches and Tabletopics, we were to “deter” (WOD) using the term “back to you" & "without further ado"  these pet peeves as per Division C Director Peter H.  General Evaluator Rhys D (also Area B51 Director) commented on how we did “gel” as a group within the meeting, it would have been useful with Zoom to come early and informally introduce ourselves.  There were lots of lessons learned from these trio and the rest of us. 

Our next joint summer venture will be hosted by Fabulous Facilitators on July 20th 7 pm MST when we will be discussing “a new skill.”  Do you have a “prowess” (WOD) in a new one learned this past year? 

Written by Edith B (Lingo and Fabulous Facilitators)

3rd Annual Pecha Kucha Night

On May 4, 2021 Lingo held our 3rd Annual Pecha Kucha Night.  Toastmaster Estella M opened the meeting explaining what Pecha Kucha was about.  Welcoming all guests and introduction around the room.  1st speaker Dan M., Title: Together We Will Build Back, 2nd speaker Cherry C., Title: 17 Science-Based Benefits of Omega-3 Fatty Acids, 3rd speaker Austin K.(guest from Northern Light) Title: How not to get burnt out and 4th speaker  Edith B., Title: What the Heck.  All four speeches were followed by Evaluators: 1st Eileen S, 2nd Estella M,  3rd Shaio X,  4th Dan M,    General Evaluator: Rhys D.   Best Speaker fell into the hands of our guest speaker Austin (so professionally done) Best Evaluator  Eileen S.    Tonight, we had 16 participants and 2 guests had to excuse themselves prior to the end of this Japanese Pecha Kucha game.  Our hand gestures symbolized 20x20 (20 slides x 20 seconds each) in the picture.

Submitted by: Cherry C

March 2, 2021 And the Nominees are...

Toastmaster Estella opened the meeting with a question about what we liked about the Golden Globes Award. Comments varied from attire (ladies colour of the year appears to be pink or yellow), the introductions, how the awards inspire us to either prepare by watching the nominated shows ahead of time or putting them on our to watch list. There was even a bit of envy for JLo’s dress. Accolades (word of the day) goes to Eileen for doing triple roles (timer, grammarian and ah counter) and to Rhys for his quizmaster questions and ballot counting. 

And the best nominee is ......”Mamma Mia” as presented by Edith. While the movie was a hit, the technical glitches failed big time; however, speech evaluator/Sgt at Arms Shiao was dancing in her seat. Other nominees were Dan’s Canadian production “Trotski.”  His passion for the movie was felt by his evaluator Yeshu, who won best Evaluator.  Bonnie brought the movie “To Kill a mockingbird” back to life in pointing out the positives and negatives of this movie, which Estella evaluated. 

We all enjoyed the evening and suggested that we do this again, opening the program to guest movie presentations - wonder if Meryl Streep or Pierce Bronson are busy that night. 

Submitted by Edith Baraniecki

1st workshop of year 2021 - Engaging Humour - Your Royal Invitation

 

Lingo Advanced Communicators aka the Queen’s staff and a guest engaged in humour the evening of January 5/21 as they were acknowledged by her Majesty the Queen/TM Edith virtual style at Buckingham Palace. Before this occurred, each member and guest Sandy Z from Toronto were asked “what made you recently laugh out loud?” We heard that all appreciate a good joke and were willing to share one. The evening concentrated on “engaging humour” as we heard what makes this Pathway different from the others, basically incorporating humour into each project.  Estella M in her speech “Are you born with humour?” noted why humour is important.  

 

Using WOD "witticism", Majesty/Edith addressed her Royal subjects saying a few words about this past year and their dedication to her. She then invited each staff person starting with guest Sir Elton John aka Dan, in fashionable glasses, to say a few words about what he wishes for the future before the two minute bell rang. Then “improv” style each staff person continued with the story. This included: Press Secretary - Cherry, noting how early she has to get up, Private Dresser - Yeshu, revealing some royal secrets, Royal Chef - Xiao, commenting on the number of meals she has to make and the staff needed, Royal Butler - Eileen, English accent and all with her loyalty, Royal Hairdresser- Estella, in maintaining the Queen’s perfect hair, Royal Dog groomer - Bonnie, noting the number of dogs the Queen has had and the Royal Historian - Sandy making notes on all.  Unfortunately guest, Boris Johnson was not available. 

 

Speech Evaluators Cherry and Xiao, Table Topics Evaluator Eileen, having dropped her English accent, and General Evaluator Dan, without his glasses, gave helpful evaluations. Timer Yeshu, using technicolor, had lots to keep track as did Bonnie as Ah Counter/grammarian but not so regarding the use of the word of the day “witticism.”  Yeshu and Eileen won best Tabletopics, Why? They both have the ability of making us laughing in tears but they themselves were as calm as cumcubers.

All in all we had a humorous and Royal time and look forward to our next meeting January 19/21. 

Submitted by Edith Baraniecki, DTM

Nov 3, 2020 WOW meetings workshop

For this month's workshop, we also chose a theme:  "A Live Moment of Mock Wedding via zoom" 

The story line behind this mock wedding:  the original wedding plan began in Feb2019, wedding Minister was booked since, deposit paid for a party of 100 persons at the Westin Hotel. Also 100 of wedding souvenirs were prepared, (see picture) 

However, the bride just returned 2 days ago from Russia after visiting her sick mom and must be quarantined for another 12 days. In light of the recent incident where 49 people were infected at a Calgary wedding, therefore,  this wedding has been downscaled to online only; no physical contact.

SAA,  Edith B  aka Sasha who's the bride's long time friend also the Matron of Honour for the night who opened the meeting while wedding processional music playing.        WOD: "fool".    No grammarian was required as we were not necessarily say the word but to have foolish fun all night.  

Our workshop speaker Cherry emphasized that as a leader, it is our job to ensure all meetings are WOW ones that should 1) serve a specific purpose, 2) stay on task, 3) engage the attendees and 4) provide value.     Due to this happy occasion, the objectives evaluation was kept silent and evaluated by Edith. 

Let the party began:  Cherry introduced herself as MC of the mock wedding, The wedding minister Dan M. aka Toastmasters junkie who belongs to 4 TM clubs and V.P. Ed of Lingo performed the wedding ceremony like a pro, because he witnessed many times in his church. So he married the bride Yeshu and the groom Estella and validated the union of two people on papers but the physical union must wait for another 12 days.  

After the ceremony, we invited the Best man also the best friend of the groom, Xiao gave us some very interesting facts about the groom when they were young, ended with a toast to congratulate the newlyweds. Followed by the groom who expressed how fortunate he was finally able to tie the knot with the bride. The groom was able to hold the tears. Next we had the groom's father Dan who was also very happy for the groom being so lucky.

During the break, we cut the imaginary cake and drank our Russian vodka (Gorka in Russia) 

Meeting then reconvened with the toast from the bride's father, Eileen S,  it was 7:00am in Russia with very dim lighting over there.  The father of bride gave a touching speech about the bride's return to Russia, she was able to mend the mother's aching heart. The father of bride was in tears a couple times. They were so happy that the bride was able to return to Canada in time for her wedding. Then, the bride Yeshu also gave us a heartfelt thanks to all and told us.  The bride found out the groom didn't have a swimming pool but did not call off the wedding.  Each toasts & praise were followed by a 1 minute "Eyes & Ears" evaluation by Eileen, Dan, Cherry, Dan again and  Xiao respectively.  The groom Estella double duty as the timer, so many of us to time and no time for the groom to cry.  

Highlight of the night was the Matron of honour Edith B who taught us some Russian  e.g. the bride's name was Lada means a Slavic goddess of beauty and Gold was chosen as her wedding colours,  отец otets = father ,  матьmat' = mother , младенцы mladentsy = Babies. Babushka, or granny,  or baba =married woman.

Gorko!  Wedding toasts are often wrapped up with a shout of “Gorko!” which means bitter. This is a signal for the newlyweds to kiss, which will work in 12 days. Tradition says the sweetness of their kiss will enhance the ‘bitter’ drinks.  

Edith showed us a big loaf of round bread 'on air' and explained that  it is tradition that the newlyweds take a bite of a traditional bread loaf that is heavy on salt. The superstition dictates that the person who takes the biggest bite will become the head of their future household. We will compare bites later.    She held up a bottle of vodka and a crystal glass and explained why it had to be crystal:   if the glass shatters into many shards, each piece signifies a year of happy marriage.  Now let us raise our crystal glasses and shout “Gorko.”   Then Edith asked the bride if she liked to release a balloon with her maiden name written on it, as she begins her new life in 12 days with her new name or in this 2020 and you will keep your maiden name.  Following all these Russian virtues, Edith also gave us a general evaluation of the wedding. We had so much fun, non-stopped foolishness.  Thank you everyone for so prepared and all playing our parts well. Good job everyone     Submitted by Cherry C.

October 20, 2020

 It wasn’t a scary story after all - in fact, it was great.

I am referring to the joint “Scary Stories” meeting between Lingo Advanced Toastmasters and Fabulous Facilitators clubs on Tuesday October 20/2020. Thirteen of us were dressed as witches, decked out in hats, creepy glasses or just our scary lighted selves. When asked by witch Toastmaster Edith B, all members indicated what gave them ‘perturbation’: rodents, heights, flying, being caught with or without a Halloween costume or in a housecoat were some of the items.

First speaker, Mrs X (Xiao) in her chef hat and apron, was interviewed by Estella, Evaluator, regarding her Restaurant X, a not-for-profit eatery suffering during this Covid year. Both did an excellent job.

Second speaker, Yeshu, informed us about her son’s debating experience in her speech “Debating Debate.” Evaluator Oksana said Yeshu came off as a very professional speaker. She wondered if she was watching a YouTube video. Speaker #3 was Lynn speaking direct from her daughter’s bowling game. Lynn’s speech “A little big scare” was just that as she gave as a very descriptive, per evaluator Dan, story of one of the feats she had to accomplish in pursuing her military career. After her speech, Lynn said we would not see her on “American Ninja Warriors” ever.

The highlight of the night was creepy witch Tabletopics Master Cherry, who started a story about a Ouija board experience that all responders had a minute each to continue the story where the last person left off - members took the story to the airport, Canada Place, flying as an unidentified object or bird on October 31st and back to the Ouija board. What a whirlwind and fun. Poor timer, Eileen was kept very busy. According to Evaluator Rhys backed up by alien sound effects Cam won best Tabletopics with his own sound effects.

General Evaluator Peter was impressed with our joint meeting. Quizmaster Lochlan stumped us when none of us remembered Peter’s movie reference to the Chevy Chase’s movie “Christmas Vacation” and being scared on a ladder. During evaluations Dan reminded us that the time was 20:20 on October 20, 2020. If that was not scary enough, Edith reminded us that with turning our clocks back after October 31st, we have the pleasure of one more hour of 2020 than our fellow District 99 Toastmasters in Saskatchewan.

So ended our scary stories meeting - a great success. Fabulous Facilitators will have their own Halloween Meeting October 27th unless they are too scared to do so. Lingo Advanced Toastmasters next meeting is a “Wow” meetings WORKSHOP on November 3rd. Toastmasters, besides enhancing our speaking and leadership skills, certainly get our creative juices flowing. Also noted was how we have all improved in our Zoom portrayal (thanks Lynn for the picture). Written by DTM Edith B, member of both clubs.