 | | | | Feel free to contact us with any questions, suggestions or feedback. | | | | | | | 20 October 2009 | | | |
Tonight we were not the Speakers of Croydon but the Speakers from Transylvania!
Count Dracula - the toastmaster welcomed all new blood dressed in his long black cape, deep purple nails, white face with blood stains oozing from his mouth, manicured jet black hair and those finely pointed fangs. We were surrounded by spiders, webs, pumkins, wands and all things scary.
To get us started we recalled our most memorable horror film. Of course Dracula, but also The Omen, Hannibal, The Shining, Corrie, Zombies, Chainsaw Massacre, Ghost Rider, The Birds, Adams Family, The Hitcher, The Exorcist, The 6th Sense and for one, anything over 15 years!!
The word by the grammarian David Longley was specially selected to add to the already 'Macabre' setting. It was used frequently. Cathy Clarkson the other 'Count' was using her mathematical skills and listening for all those Ah, OH and hesitations. Sarah Mulumba would make sure that all was perfectly timed.
Aki Akiwumi #8 displayed the Persuasive and Influencing Skills Scale. Using these skills his thoughts were transferred from him to us, message understood and accepted. If this is not the case what can we do but shift position or cease conversation.
Abbi Greene ACB #1 'The land of many waters' After 9 hours and one plane change her first impressions of Guyana were green veins like brocolli and sparkles from the sun. As she treked through the rain forest on route to the largest waterfall drop 'Kitu' in the world she encountered numerous bumpy roads and one of the largest snakes - she recalls thinking how her 'daughter would have made a lovely little snack'. David Attenbourgh would have been proud of her adventure!
Vanessa Buck ACB #9 was 'Magic' dressed in her long purple gown and witch hat. She was perfect company for the Count! She cast a spell on us with her list of jokes, her words of wisdom, 'good magic is unconditional love', 'gratitude brings miracles in your life'. We were spell bound.
We are constantly told what we need to do to have a heathly body. But how many of us work on our mind to make it healthier? Sudanta Abeyakoon ACG #3 with 'Meditation' we can quieten our minds. We are constantly thinking of one thing or another our 'monkey mind' jumping so how can we stop this happening? By concentrating on our breathing - as we breath in we think of the word 'shut' and as we breath out we use 'up'. Try it!
'When giving an Impromptu Talk' our training session by Joan Jardine ACS. Joan makes it all seems so easy to answer any question that the table topic masters asks. She mentioned a website called Suite101.com to assist us with ideas. We were not able to put it into practice this evening as it was all speeches only.
The evaluators were Philip Freeman, Deirdre Hynes, Don Grant, David Longley and Frank Thatcher respectively.
Pauline Hardy had us all in stitches as she encountered the antics of a little boy at the swimming pool. The rest is left to your imagination!!!!
We had the pleasure of our area governor David Langworthy who was also our general evaluator.
Now the proceeding started as we delved into chocolate cake topped with a large spider, carrot cake, savouries, holloween chocolates, fermented grapes but most important we got to know each other better surrounded by all things scary. The credits must go to Abbi Greene VPE who organised this event and to our Count Dracula - Neil Longhart who without his purple nail polish and those fangs we would not have been the Speakers from Transylvania!
You missed an very enjoyable evening.
Deirdre Hynes
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