Hospitality experiences during public talk trips

tsar_robles

a couple days ago I started having these flashbacks of back in the day when I was 17 or so and was a frequent outgoing public speaker. Believe it or not back then I was so naive in the fullest sense of the word, and none of the signs that I encountered then kicked in until years later.

I obviously could go on and on about the impressions and demeanor that I received from the big shots (elders, ms's) from these halls. A couple that I remember were for ex., one time while visiting a congregation in southwest co I politely waited around to see if any of the elders or a head of a house hold would approach me and invite me for hospitality and tired of waiting around I decided to make that 5 hour solo trip back home. As I was leaving the PO (acka coordinator, lol) who knew me from pioneer school looked down at me and said 'here are 4 dlls so that you can go get a burger at MC'd's" Fortunately for me a friend that lived there invited me over at the last minute to eat and watch the superbowl (den-falcons).

On another occasion my brother drove me 8 hrs to a small town to give the talk. As we approached the town we called the PO for instructions to his home or whoever would provide hospitality (He had been informed that my preference was hospitality prior). He then directed us to the local pizza hut to wait there until 4pm (it was barely 12pm). My (still jw) brother was furious and I think he told the PO something nasty when he approached us at the end of the meeting asking if we had any plans, knowing we had a long ass trip back home....

lol, here's one more: upon arriving at this other hall I was introduced to all the big shots that looked at me with explicit disdain and even laughed when they found out it was me and not my 30 something companion friend giving the talk...

I always wondered if it was perhaps my youthfulness and excellent speech skills that angered these pharisees or if that was pretty common among the most 'loving' brotherhood on earth...lol

AudeSapere

Am I reading this right - you were giving Sunday 'out' talks when you were just 17 years old???

-Aude.

jamiebowers

There have been other threads in the past about unhospitable behavior towards visiting speakers. To be honest with you, I never even knew that was supposed to be done when I was a jw. The only time I remember anyone making a fuss about meals was during the C.O.'s visit. But then again, I was a pioneer with a nutjob jw husband, so I probably would've never been approached to host a visiting speaker. I was never asked to provide meals for the C.O. either.

If I were you, I wouldn't take it personally. Dubs are constantly running the Watchtower wheel. Most people probably used the time after the Sunday meeting to catch up on work around the house or tried to get a few hours of field service in, so they wouldn't get in trouble with the time slip guy.

dissed

I used to travel a bit in the SW Col and New Mex area to give talks. We always were taken care of, sometimes, too well. I guess it was my poor pathetic look and they felt sorry for us.

wha happened?

Speakers were usually taken care of in our area. As were the CO's. Although one CO used to insist on the most expensive restaurants

tsar_robles

hey aude, lol yeah I was 17, back then i was my congregation's wonder boy lol. being fluent in a few languages and good at entertaining the masses with a repertoire of illustrations that I would come up with during my sleep, really seemed to snap people out of their boredom lol.

this wasn't just about the meal part of being hospitable but hey, I'm making this long trip to come see you, can you at least greet me and offer some basic hospitality???

freddo

I can confirm that some of today's older bigshots who grew up as a jw in the fifties and sixties were given responsibilities way beyond their years due to a lack of brothers - and this in a city of half a million population and a few congregations even then.

We certainly had a 16 year old give his first public talk, a 17 year old Assistant Ministerial Servant (as they were called in Qualified to be Ministers in 1967) taking a group study with a 50 year old doily wearing sister as his assistant - and even when the elder arrangement started in 1972 and there were plenty of brothers we had a 22/23 year old elder appointed.

logic

Where I was they must have been hard up for speakers because I started visiting other congregations

giving the public talks at the age of 16. I been told by many that I seem to talk directly to them, which

I think had to do with my non dependence of my outline. I was also confortable speaking to groups

of people. But I think the main reason They liked my talks was because I always ended about 6 or

7 minutes short. I think that was to far back for any hospitality thing.

tsar_robles

logic, were they hospitable to you then?

blondie

We often signed up. Some congregations were good at doing so and in others only a few. The chairman was responsible if no one signed up in many congregations I attended.

On the other end we went to one congregation where the PO had a real attitude and he made sure no one signed up for us and that he was the chairman. No hospitality that time. He made sure that we knew it was deliberate.

In another congregation, we were substituting for the scheduled speaker. The PO there neglected to tell the people who signed up that the original couple had cancelled. You could tell immediately that the wife had no desire to have us over despite the fact they had planned to have someone over. The husband prevailed but we could see them still fighting in their car as we followed them. We decided that we would go home and apologized that they had not been told. The wife gave us the evil eye for years after that although the original speaker knew that this couple was having them over and failed to be polite and call them.

But for the most part the ones that signed up were nice.

Hospitality experiences during public talk trips

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