Author: Shirley Chen

English Social Conversation @East and West Learning Connections 2024

*We are constantly recruiting native English-speaking facilitator volunteers for the English Social Conversation program! Please see the invitation message at the end of this announcement.

Have you ever wondered what to talk about in a social conversation? Or, as an immigrant, do you sometimes feel it is difficult to join your local co-workers’ conversation because you don’t know the people or things they are talking about, or you have some everyday questions that you would like to know how local people would think or deal with? Or do you just want to find a safe, relaxing and friendly environment to talk to some native English speakers, and enjoy a pleasant conversation?

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EAWLC Member Salon Minutes

At East and West Learning Connections, we have been holding an online salon for registered members once a month since July 2022. Members and their families are welcome to take the opportunity to meet each other on Zoom, share recent experience, encounters, thoughts, and hear a guest speaker’s stories. Continue reading “EAWLC Member Salon Minutes”

EAWLC Book Talks with Evelyn Chau on How To Speak To Anyone: Communication Tactics for the Quietly Ambitious Who Want to be Seen, Heard, and Valued

In our Book Talks program, authors and/or translators come to introduce their books, and facilitate discussions with our audience.

This month, we are delighted to have Toronto-based author Evelyn Chau to talk about her second works, a communication techniques book How To Speak To Anyone: Communication Tactics for the Quietly Ambitious Who Want to be Seen, Heard and Valued. 

Time: Thursday, June 13, 2024 at 7:30-9 P.M. (Eastern Time)

Click here to register.

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EAWLC Dialogue with Dan Xia: Making the Best out of Travelling the World

Come to East and West Learning Connections to meet with an amazing Chinese American young man who has traveled to more than 140 countries and created a clinic on an island in Kenya to help the people he loves. Dialogue with Dan Xia, and walk home with inspiration to embrace diversity, cultivate empathy, and strive for positive changes in our interconnected world!

Time: Thursday, May 30, 2024, at 7:30-9 P.M. (Eastern Time)

Register here.

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EAWLC Dialogue with Ed Shiller: Adventures of a Journalist and Social Justice Advocate

East and West Learning Connections is very much delighted to bring to our audience this interesting  conversation with a retired American journalist, author, publisher, and adventurous social justice advocate since young!

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EAWLC Outstanding Service Award Winners

East and West Learning Connections (EAWLC) is run by volunteers.  Without their talents, commitment, and hard work,  all the programs we have offered to the public just cannot possibly come into reality.  Every year at our Annual General Meeting, our Board chooses a number of winners to receive the EAWLC Outstanding Service Awards based on time commitment, task impact, and organization involvement in the previous year.  The award does not apply to board directors, advisors, or guest speakers, even though they are also volunteers to whom we are deeply grateful for their help.  Each year there will be friends generously donating some cool items so we can give the winners as a gift.  The winners are the representatives of all EAWLC volunteers who all come to help us with a giving heart for the community.  Thank you so much, members, volunteers, and donors, for your great support and contributions! 

2024 EAWLC Outstanding Service Award winners

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East&West Dialogue with James German and Nathaniel Kingsley Quaw: Voice from West Africa

In our East&West Dialogue program, esteemed guest speakers from different cultural backgrounds volunteer their time to share life stories, knowledge, thoughts, concerns, and have a conversation with our audience.

We proudly kick off our 2024 dialogue with two guest speakers from Ghana.  They will tell us about this west African country, their interesting work, the life of neighbouring communities, hopes and concerns, some tips for tourists, and more!

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EAWLC Book Talks with George Elliott Clarke: Where Beauty Survived

Our Book Talks program brings to our audience an author, a translator, or sometimes an avid reader to share a book of their choice and facilitate discussions.

A Canadian Poet Laureate (2016-17),  Professor George Elliott Clarke is also a prize-winning novelist and screenwriter, a celebrated lyricist and librettist, an internationally recognized essayist and scholar, and a revered poetry recitalist and memoirist. Continue reading “EAWLC Book Talks with George Elliott Clarke: Where Beauty Survived”

Happy Loong or Dragon New Year and Family Day the Canadian Way

By Yang Wang
February 19, 2024

CCB Toronto Visionaries, a peer support organization for the blind, organized a trip to the Lunar New Year Reading and Tea at Montgomery’s Inn yesterday. The event was a celebration of the Lunar New Year (Feb 10-24) and the Family Day (Feb 18). Montgomery’s Inn was a museum in Toronto, turned from a historic inn built in the early 19th century. It was free for visionary members but was attended by a full room of people from across the city from all kinds of cultural backgrounds, age groups, and professions.

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