(434) Visiting Toastmasters at MathWorks

Visiting Toastmasters at MathWork

I visited Toastmasters@MathWorks in Massachusetts on July 9. I’d like to talk about my trip and the meeting of MathWorks. Tonight I prepared five points to talk.

1. Traveling from Narita to MathWorks by itself was a big challenge for me.
2. MathWorks company’s cafeteria has meals for vegetarians
3. Evaluation portion of the meeting was larger than Matsuyama toastmasters.
4. Gramarian/Wordmaster picked up good expressions from the speeches in its report.
5. Taking pictures of you and the people you met is the most precious thing in you happy trip.

 One day in April I got a phone call from my daughter. She asked me to go with her to Boston in summer. Meeting her friend in Boston was her main event in this trip. On the contrary I didn’t have any friends and anything interested there. But I became very happy because it was the first time for her to invite me to her trip. She always travels abroad with her friends. I thought this trip with her would be the first and last one in my life. And besides, I had just joined Matsuyama toastmasters club in April. I heard its sister club, toastmasters at MathWorks is somewhere in Massachusetts. And Boston is the state capital of Massachusetts. What a coincidence! So I decided to challenge to visit Toastmasters at MathWorks.

 Reaching MathWorks was my main concern. I searched for the location of MathWorks by Google map. I was surprised that Google map showed me its location and also how to get there with time schedule of the train. I decided to visit there on Thursday July 9. And I mailed to Pradeep of
MathWorks about our arriving time at Natick Center station. I could confirm he would pick us up and drop us back at the station.

 We arrived in Boston July 8 from Narita Japan. On the next morning we walked to the Back Bay station from our hotel. I sent an e-mail to Pradeep about our visit from the station. We got tickets or more precisely, plastic cards called Charlie Cards. Then we got on the train at Back Bay station.
 
I got a little nervous on the train. Because I didn’t know who check our tickets. There was not a wicket to check our tickets at the station. The train ran. I was relieved when I saw conductors on the train. We got off at Natick Center station without trouble.

We met Pradeep soon, and he took us to MathWorks. MathWorks is a name of company. I didn’t know of it before visiting the club. The weather was very good. He took us to the cafeteria. He kindly treated us lunches. He was a president of the club and an Indian. Then another big man
appeared. He was Allen, vice president. He ate a pack of salmon sushi. He said “today’s sushi is better than the other day’s.” A staff served us what we wanted in paper lunch boxes. There were four kinds of foods. I wanted to try all of them, but he said no. Meals are served in two ways, for vegetarians and non-vegetarians. I have to select one. This company employed people world-wide. There were many people working from various countries. Toastmasters’ meeting started at noon so we walked to a comfortable meeting room in another building.

 Here is a meeting agenda on July 9, 2015. The meeting was held in lunch break. I and my daughter brought unfinished lunch boxes with us. There were about 20 attendees in the room. I introduced myself in the beginning of the meeting. I enjoyed listening to two speeches and table topics. That day’s theme was summer outing. She was requested to say a word, but my daughter didn’t speak English so I did for her. I almost forgot what I talked to them, but I talked much. The meeting was run as schedule.  There seemed be more evaluation portion than Matsuyama. Now I can find General evaluator besides evaluators in this Toastmasters’ agenda. Gramarian/Wordmaster commented about good expressions in the speeches. This was new to me.

I didn’t take any pictures at MathWorks. Nobody said photograph is prohibited there, but I couldn’t. My daughter took two pictures of outside of MathWorks’ building, and at Natick Center station
one picture of I and Pradeep. He kindly drove us to the station.

 We had an enough time to the next train, so we walked south along the road. We found a small park. We finished our lunch boxes on the green grass. There were mothers and children playing there. Some children were eating ice cream. She wanted to eat an ice cream. She bought an ice
cream at the ice cream shop. I also ate an ice cream on a cone but I got more interested in an unfamiliar tree in the park. It had a name plate saying Dawn Redwood.

There was a beautiful church beside the park. And we moved to the station.

At the station I found a small stone monument. It said “Freedom is not free.”

 I can know many things of faraway places by Google map, and confirm its details by street view. The name of the church is first congregational church. The small park is Natick Center Historic District. I can see the same scenery of the place I visited by street view of Google map. So pictures of us and the people we met are the most precious thing.
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