It’s been nine months since Covid reared its ugly head, and that’s a long time for this team to be apart from each other. Our longest break is traditionally between our Christmas party usually held at the Pitt Meadows Golf and Country Club and our startup for the new season usually in late March or early April.
Despite coming together for weekly virtual training with Coach Kris and yoga with Dorota, our AGM was the first time we attempted a mass online gathering. We’re proud to say it went very well.
We decided to tackle a Christmas Zoom party, and the executive got to work with test meetings and putting together an agenda that would move things along and hopefully be entertaining. Well, the word must have gotten out, because, at the start of the meeting, none other than Santa himself showed up to cheer on the team and provide encouragement. Thank you, Santa!
We watched our aerial footage of the Inlet Spring Regatta by Jon Ross Films and then went into our first breakout rooms. Zoom can automatically move the large group into smaller groups for discussion purposes. This made it easier for everyone to have their say, which can be difficult in a larger online meeting. We had about 40 in attendance.
Happy smiling faces!
In between breakout rooms of about 4–5 people each, we got back together to play Kahoot with trivia questions organized by Pat W. Kahoot is a game-based learning platform, used as educational technology in schools and other educational institutions.
Some of our Kahoot questions set up by Pat were:
What Christmas carol became the first song ever broadcast from space in 1965?
What is the most popular meal for Christmas in Japan?
There is banana, creme de menthe and what in a Horny Monkey?
How many calories are burned by kissing someone under the mistletoe for one minute?
How many ghosts are there in the movie, A Christmas Carol?
It was so much fun! It felt like being in a game show with bells and chimes and auto-tabulating. To make it even more exciting and challenging, scores were based on correct answers and speed. Thank you Pat for setting up!
Even our former coach, Erica showed up. She whooped our butts at Kahoo too!
Everyone really enjoyed the breakout rooms as they were a little more intimate and we did this three times, allowing new groups to come together each time. Teammates could talk about anything they liked, or prompts were given like:
How are you spending the holidays this year?
If you could travel anywhere for Christmas, where would you go?
Most memorable Christmas present as a kid?
Favourite Christmas food?
What are you cooking this year?
Best Dragon Boat memory?
What are you grateful for?
During a midway break, we played a video of the Santa Ships that recently visited Rocky Point, as well as a video of our win in the Great Grand Dragon Race in Victoria in 2017.
There were lots of door prizes! We gave out a choice of red wine, white wine, beer, or a box of chocolates. Prizes were claimed Sunday morning at the Old Mill Boathouse from the Santa truck. Thank you Brian!
Before we wrapped up for the evening, Darlene gave out prizes for the best Christmas sweater and best overall Zoom presentation (outfit and backdrop). Congrats to Steve C. for the best sweater award, and Julie and Brian for their lovely Christmas ensemble.
Another surprise of the evening is when Laney announced she and Rob were grandparents to a baby girl. She had just received the text from her son during the party!
After the evening finished up, a handful of us hung out virtual chatting afterward. Overall another huge success. Merry Christmas one and all!
Santa truck for pickup of prizes by our winners on Sunday morning. (Thanks Brian!)
ANSWERS to the trivia questions above:
Jingle Bells
Kentucky Fried Chicken
Irish creme
Two
Four
