Page 27 - BPW-UK ANNUAL REVIEW 2022-2023

We began by welcoming in the New Year in our usual manner of lively “chat”,
deep discussion, giggles and hilarious laughter with each of us bringing our own
beverage of choice to the meeting. Most of us have now fully mastered the dy-
namics of Zoom call-ins on our various devices. However for one member, this
has sometimes been problematic as the signal to the phone doesn’t always work. She has
been known to express the opinion that “if it doesn’t work, it’s going out of the window and
into the river.”
Throughout the year we have again covered a range of topics in our “chats”, from national
legislation in the Scottish Parliament, changes in UK law, the future of BPW and new initia-
tives, articles from the e-news and how history can determine the present. We have also
th
talked about great women, including Licoricia of Winchester, a 13 century female Jewish
money lender, who, in the time of great persecution, lent money to the King (Henry III).

We welcomed PNP Helen Ashworth to our AGM and were delighted to hear about an initiative
that she was involved with “If not you! Then who?” Helen explained that she
had started her journey about three years ago and
that she was trying to make changes to her every-
day life so that she could help to lessen the im-
pact of plastics on the environment. After a very
lively debate, she concluded by asking members if they could
make one change and to send a photograph to her of that
change. Several of our members did this and they were included
in the PowerPoint that Helen was producing for Earth Day.

Our year concluded with a fun meeting, with members supplying their own eats, beverages
and, if they wished, a party piece. These included a joint rendition of a well-known Christmas
Carol which should have been accompanied on the kazoo (however it is impossible to play the
kazoo when the giggles begin and won’t stop), festive and seasonal poems including, “Eat,
drink and be sick” by Pam Ayres, “Pudding Charms” by Charlotte Drivett Cole and “Christmas
Fairy” by Frances Dunlop. We concluded with a poem from William Topaz McGonagall, who,
according to the Scottish Poetry Society was “the worse poet in the history of the English lan-
guage”.

See what you think:

“The way to respect Christmas time
Is not by drinking whisky and wine
But to sing praises to God on Christmas morn
The time that Jesus Christ His Son was born”

So, the year ended as it began with giggles and hilarious laughter.

BPW SYNE Report 2022

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