Rehearsals

The D9680 GSE team to Michigan went through the rehearsal for our district conference presentation last night. Our counterpart Outbound GSE team, who are off to D7500 in New Jersey in a few weeks, were also present. We each have an eight minutes slot during the conference dinner, followed by the Inbound D6310 GSE team who have to try to explain Michigan to us in eighteen mintes or less!

Our conference presentation is in two parts: the first being introduction of the team members; and the second being a Q & A about Michigan from an Australian perspective. So we cover topics such as musicians (Madonna, Bob Seeger, Alice Cooper, Motown, Eminem), the automobile industry, wolverines, and cherry pit spitting. Bathtub gin gets a mention, as do Tom Selleck and Steven Seagall, . . . and Santa Claus Parades and Thanksgiving. The Michiganians will probably find our foreign interpretations quite bizarre! (By the way, did you know the only jurisdiction in Australia that celebrates Thanksgiving is Norfolk Island, as a consequence of Yankee whalers jumping ship and staying with the descendants of the Bounty Mutiny on Pitcairn Island, and keeping up some of the traditions of home.) The scripting for our talk has me encountering a couple of tongue twisters, or unfamiliar phrases, such as "our special subject of Michigan" (try saying that without making a schloshing sound), and the term Michiganian (where I am tempted to continue on with the "ganian-ginian-inian", sounds).

Judging from the D6310 GSE team's blogspot, they are having a truly great time . . . wait until they get up to the Central Coast next week, with all of the national parks, the lakes and waterways, and the beaches, let alone all of the vocational visits and inspections.

So we are pretty excited and looking forward to seeing our itinerary to see what is in store for us!

See yorle morla (Norfolk English for goodbye)