30th May. See you, Manolo!

Our president Sean introduced the session explaining us the difference between nice and kind: both mean doing something for others, but in the case of being kind, it’s done without expecting anything from them. How kind!

Emilie was the Toastmaster of the session and started introducing the topic of the day (for all of us except for him until that moment): Manolo! He’s going back to Madrid with his family, and we wanted to dedicate this session to him. So that all the speakers of the session will be introduced with anecdotes, advices he gave us and stories with him.

Adrien, who was the grammarian, proposed as the word of the day toff, or to be toffed-up, because he saw a translation where it said that in Spanish it would be “vestirse como Manolo”. Also for Luisa and Sonia, the rest of the technical team, he has been friendly and helpful and a great leader in the club.

The first speech was from Alexa, who gave a great Icebreaker on how to match boiled potatoes and sparkling cava. With this weird mixture she made an analogy with different times in her life: her childhood in a German farm, when she was a teenager, and her life as an adult, which have given her different tools, all of them important for her life. The feed on the ground, a well furnished head, and the intuition and passion that come from the stomach (the sparkling cava), which sometimes try to fight with each other but which, like in a receipt, she tries to mix in her everyday life, now in Barcelona and in the club, where she expects to find people with whom to share all her interests.

For Olga, the second speaker of the night, one of the remarkable things about Manolo is that he’s so crazy and unexpected. In her 3rd speech, she told us about her aunt Maria, from whom she learnt among others how to care less about what other people think. She had to go to London to recognize the feeling in her about how it is to live without caring about other’s opinions, and how liberating it can be to get rid of this weight. There, she learned to allow herself not to be perfect and to do things without worrying about what others may think about it. She now wants to live back in Barcelona with this freedom (as a foreigner), after knowing how it feels. She only needs to do it!

The third speaker was Mariyana, who gave us arguments for embracing Pathways. Already Darwin said that the most adaptable will survive, and Pathways is the future! Old-timers still working with the old system have to face the change! Not only because in pathways there’s access to more resources, but also because you gain relevant experience: you get equipped with real world skills. For example, thanks to her training for Pathways she improved her attention to detail, so that when she’s now travelling, she packs better. We definitely need to step on the right path!

During the evaluations, Paul, after encouraging Alexa and all of us to learn attitude from Manolo, thanked her for her great Icebreaker, where she was already using the “magic 3”: he’s sure she will find in the club both control freaks and irrational members who can use a good mixing receipt like hers. Sebastian pointed out how Olga teached us how to unchain ourselves using her storytelling and calling to action with an specific purpose. Isabel reminded us how easy everything looks with Manolo, who has also been working on Pathways with Mariyana. She remarked how Mariyana was putting us in the right path with the usage of lots of rhetorical devices and giving us 3 reasons for which we should join.

The table topics lead by Anna and Maria were a very fun auction of the most valuable objects… from Manolo! So that the participants had to convince us, and specially Manolo, of the reason why they should get that object. Albert got the boina for what he considered to be obvious reasons: he doesn’t want to get a cold either. Jelena jumped to the stage to get his lego, she thinks it’s very funny that you can play this not with kids… but also with adults! And Ángela got his train tickets from 2 years going to and back from Madrid, more than 200: they will earn a lot of money when Manolo becomes famous soon! We didn’t have time for the golden chaleco, but Emilie immediately took it when back in the stage as the toastmaster.

The fake topic of the day for Manolo, who didn’t know it was him, was a story about his name: apparently they wanted to name him after an uncle… who was called Eulogio! Can you imagine having Eulogio as the topic of the session? Manolo or Eulogio, he was our general evaluator tonight und gave us all again great advices, encouraging among others Sebastian to keep doing such great evaluations.

At the end of the session we still had time to wish a happy birthday to Marc and to give Alexa her Icebreaker badge. Sean thanked Manolo for his involvement and help right from the beginning. We will miss you, Manolo, but for sure we’ll find a bar in Madrid!

Berta Cots