A Winner Lost in Taiwan

     I met Cindy a few years ago when I was asked by teacher Sunny (Chen Chu-Kuei) to visit Guang-Zhen Junior High School, to assist her students interested in performing in Taiwan's Readers Theater contest. I remember Cindy well; she was the troupe member that needed the most persuasion that the skit chosen would win. I worked mostly with them on intonation and body language. She was narrator one. 

      On 2-2-18, Sunny wrote she  was so happy that they could see me again  at Guang Zhen Junior High School on February 7 to help a student participate in a speech contest. She attached three scripts to the letter and asked if I could help them correct or rewrite the scripts "to make them more persuasive or touching." She reminded me that each speech could not be longer than 3.5 minutes.

     I thanked her for inviting me to assist her students in the recitation contest. I agreed that a winning entry begins with a good essay. I told her the three she had sent me were all problematic in the same way: none of them had an introduction, body, or conclusion in the standard English format. The topics of all three were good per se but all needed revision.  I thought the essay dealing with the flower expo had the most content to start with. 

        By February 5th, I had finished editing the three typical Taiwan essays for the recitation contest her school was joining. I would go to her school that Wednesday to coach some children.  
     Cindy, who was an actor in the last two Readers’ Theater at Sunny’s school, was there at the meeting. In a quiet room, Sunny, Cindy and I sat and went over the essay.  Cindy had to memorize three essays not knowing which one the committee would assign her at the contest in March. 

  Together, there was further revision to do. The final okay would be Cindy's since she would be reading it. Sunny tried to rewrite some paragraphs because she thought when people didn't like something, like a flower expo, we could still use it as a promotion;  the contrast would be fun. Cindy listened in and said nothing as Sunny discussed the content of the three revised essays with me. 
     Sunny questioned a few sentences in each revision because she thought it was contrary to the ideas. For example, she thought when I wrote “cheer elders brought to the flower expo" it meant old people would be chanting a cheer!  Also, she thought it weird that school children would be motivated by elders, elders they probably would find annoying. But the biggest concern was the length of the essays; all had to be read in less than three and a half minutes. I read them aloud and it was taped for her to review; all were within time limits, but Cindy might want to read more slowly. I reminded Sunny and Cindy that, like Lego blocks, examples could be removed or even a ‘big idea’ paragraph to shorten the piece. It was up to them. 

    On March 16th, Sunny texted me with good news: Cindy won third place in the competition! I was thrilled but Sunny was upset that she didn’t win first place; she blamed it on the backwardness of the Taiwanese judges; they didn’t like the student’s body language. I had warned them about prejudice against Western essay technique and recitation delivery but this was ridiculous. Initially I wanted to follow up on this, but the decision was final. Taichung City English Speech Contest Group B had 22 groupings participating. Cindy did very well considering. 

Ways to Promote Taichung World Flora Exposition

Good afternoon, ladies and gentleman. My topic is “Ways to promote Taichung's World Flora Exposition.” With the World Flora Exposition opening later this year, I've been thinking about how to make Taiwanese and people from all over the world recognize the beauty coming to Taichung. How can we catch people's eyes and keep them coming on weekdays and focused when the day is done? Here are my opinions:                                                      

First, let’s think about how to catch people’s eyes on the Expo. Yes! “Curiosity.” If we can persuade the USA to turn the torch in the hand of Statue of Liberty into a bunch of flowers, that would turn some heads our way. Turn the Eiffel Tower into a vase with flowers sprouting atop until France and the whole world turns its attention to Flora Expo. Let's spread advertisements far and wide and the spotlight is sure to follow. That will catch people's eyes.

We must spread the news through the internet. Foreigners will easily get messages through Facebook, Instagram, WeChat, Twitter and other social media. So, it is a good idea to invite the world to the Expo through it. I suggest we start a trend; invite people to write invitations on their hands; draw some cute pictures on them and write down "Welcome to Taichung's World Flora Expo.” Imagine flowers blooming virally all over the internet with thousands of people waving "welcome" back at you! I’m sure it will draw a huge crowd of foreigners to Taichung's Flora Expo.

But what happens when that weekend crowd at the Exposition Parks becomes intolerable? How about week day tours? But on weekdays, who has free time? Without doubt, pensioners and school groups have free time and money. As we know, elders love to spread good morning cheer and teachers love taking their students on trips outside school. So why not design some good morning stickers on Flora Expo for free download? Let the young and old wake up the whole city and everyone can bloom a new weekday in blossoms. What a way to enjoy good morning and promote the Flora Expo!

As we know, flowers bloom and fade. People come and people go. But the Flora Expo goes on! When the day comes to an end, keep the memories in a blog of good stories and photos. With Taichung's Flora Expo, we can have strawberry fields forever!
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