Yangmingshan National Park Year-end Party

There are an array of scenic spots in Yangmingshan National Park. The best place to see the autumn leaves is the Boy Scouts Training Center where Yangmingshan Volunteers Interpreters held the 2009 Year-end Party today.

The main lobby of Boy Scouts Training Center was huge to accommodate more than two hundred people. But we had only a group of 90+ volunteers today to welcome the new volunteers to join our big family and to welcome long time no see veterans for homecoming. It felt a little cold especially in the rainy morning!

I knew ahead of time that it was going to be a challenging job for me to serve as the master of ceremony for a group of independent interpreters. Volunteer interpreters are good at natures, but they are not party animals. Unlike Toastmasters, volunteer interpreters are less sociable. They are not using to telling jokes in public. They are not trained to deliver tabletopics (impromptu speeches) any time and any place. So I designed a few group activities in advance to involve as many volunteer interpreters as possible.

The bingo game was a success to begin with. Every participant was given a bingo sheet at the entrance with a matrix of 25 squares (five by five). Each participant was required to put his or her number (registration number) in the middle and have numbers and signatures of 24 participants on the same sheet. In this way, every participant has a motive to say hello to acquaintance and/or to break ice with the strangers.

For the group activities, two groups of volunteer interpreters were asked to compete with each other, the finger-guessing game, eagles and chickens, relay race with various objects, in various forms. The winning group was given a signifying handmade trophy. All new volunteer interpreters were invited to play the "follow my order" game. The winners were awarded with presents. All participants were invited to play the Limbo Rock game to show off how good they could twist their bodies.

In addition to colorful Christmas decoration, audio Karaoke facilities, we also provided many costumes of Mr. Santa, Miss Santa, clowns, to add a great deal amount of seasoning flavor to the atmosphere. Every participant was eager to try on different caps of clowns to have photos taken.

By the time when the year-end party was over, every participant was satisfied and exhausted. In the afternoon, the sun came out to greet us to cheer the success of building solidarity among volunteer interpreters. If I have a dream, that will be a masquerade party of 200 volunteer interpreters. That will be simply historical and awesome!

Autumn Leaves — Nat King Cole
The falling leaves drift by the window,
The autumn leaves of red and gold,
I see your lips, the summer kisses
But I miss you most of all my darling,
When autumn leaves start to fall. ...