Networking events
Ever since we started our adventure as a company, we have had hundreds of opportunities to help people in their journey to personal growth thanks to foreign languages.
At Experience Lingo, we believe we can solve three kind of problems based on three different time horizons:
Past
A lot of our clients are foreigners living in other countries than where they grew up, meaning they are prone to lose their roots as a person or family. England, and especially London, are cosmopolitan places where you can expose yourself to any foreign culture. However, people do not always have the time or motivation to keep up with their own culture or even language, as seen in the interview of Chris below.
Present
A lot of parents struggle to pass their culture and language onto their children. Living away from your family can make it hard to connect with other people sharing the same background and culture, which can lead to a sense of emergency or limited beliefs e.g. "my child will only be able to cope with one language", as seen in the interview of Mariela below.
Future
Unfortunately, not passing on your language or culture to your children can have a massive impact in terms of how they define their own identity when they grow up. People are increasingly aware of their own mental health, however it is a fact that you will feel a void at some point in your life if your parents haven't shared with you their roots i.e. their language and/or culture, as seen in the interview of Raphael below.
We have met a lot of Chrises, Marielas and Raphaels in the past few years, all of them coming to us with their unique limitations and expectations. However, one thing they all had in common is that they wanted to meet other people having the same life experiences.
This is the reason why we created several groups where people can network and meet others sharing the same goals, or just hobbies. Here are some examples of these communities below:
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Playdates for Multicultural Families
We have created a network of families on the website Meetup.com. The idea is to organise all kind of events in London, where busy parents and their children can discover new places in town while interacting with others and having a good time.
We have called this group 'Playdates for Multicultural Families' as we do not want to only cater for children. These events are best described using the 'oxygen mask' analogy whereby flight attendants instruct adults to put their own oxygen masks on themselves before they help their children put theirs on in case of low cabin pressure. In other words we want to make sure that the adults have just as much fun as the children.
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Please click on the button below if you want to join our network for free, and take part in super cool events for families living in and around London. You will find more details about the whole concept and individual events on the meetup page, but please don't hesitate to get in touch with us before joining the group if you are unsure that it is for you.
Experience Footy
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Moving to the UK a few years ago made Raphael realise how huge football is in London. After all, England is the country of the 'Beautiful Game' and it is well known that the Premier League is the most renowned football competition in the world. There are also about 1.5 million adults who embrace their inner Lionel Messi or Kylian Mbappé by playing five-a-side football each week.
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In 2016, Raphael started organising football tournaments for players living in London or just visiting the city for a few days. A couple of years later, he created a football social enterprise to coach adult beginners who never had a chance to join a team in their youth. This turned out to be a unique concept and he had the privilege to be featured in the Evening Standard and get interviewed at the BBC Headquarters in 2020.
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He uses the website Meetup.com to run this five-a-side football group, with players of all levels meeting every Sunday at the Powerleague Shoreditch Centre. It is a great way of getting people together and promoting physical and mental health while cultivating cultural awareness, since half of the members are French and it is not uncommon to have at least 10 different nationalities on the pitch!
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Please click on the button below if you want to access the website and join a football game or a coaching session.
Experience French Toastmasters Club
Speaking in public in another language than your mother tongue can be a real challenge, and this is why Raphael became a member of a Toastmasters Club back in 2010. He then launched ‘Experience French’ in September 2012, which is the first ever French-English bilingual Toastmasters Club in the UK. This public speaking club is based in London, but it is part of a larger organisation which is called Toastmasters International and that has more than 330,000 members worldwide.
Toastmasters is a non-profit organization whose goal is to help members improve their communication and leadership skills through the art of public speaking, delivering prepared speeches or improvisations. Experience French Toastmasters Club is a friendly, educational and supportive environment, for anyone to have fun practicing and improving their public speaking skills, while listening more effectively and maintaining their ability to think and speak on their feet, in both French and English.
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The peculiarity of this organisation is that there is no coach as members complete training manuals, at their own pace, and help each other by evaluating others to improve in all areas. The result is a real change in the way people communicate with others, both in a professional and social environment, and more generally an increased self-confidence.
Please click on the button below if you want to access the website and join one of the coming meetings.
