English Club

Last night Xuân took me to the 18th Birthday celebrations for Hải Phòng English Club. They had invited all the other English Clubs in the city to come to their party. They meet on Sunday afternoon/evenings and I have never been to one before. The club Xuân attends meets while I am usually teaching. This group meet at a private high school near the War Memorial.

There were people from half a dozen clubs present, and we sat with members of Xuân's club.

The meeting was held in one of the classrooms, all decked out for the occasion. There were several speeches. This little girl recited the English translation of their club president's speech from memory!

This is the host club.

A powerpoint presentation was followed by several musical items - singing and dancing, including traditional Vietnamese and contemporary English. Plenty of both enthusiasm and talent.

After the formalities there were light refreshments and plenty of opportunities for conversation. Apart from a young man from India, I was the only foreigner there so I met many delightfully keen people, all wanting to have a chat. I was invited to join a couple of the clubs, but I cannot commit to Sunday nights on a regular basis because if I have a heavy teaching load on Saturday and Sunday (when it's children's classes starting at 7.30am) I often have very little voice left by Sunday evening. As it was, last night I was really straining to be heard over the noise of that many people plus the loud music. However, I look forward to joining with Xuân's club occasionally in the future. They asked me to be a judge at a special event they are planning for August, so that should be fun.