Nico Neizert at 'Youth Speaks', an Inter-School Debating Tournament

Inspiration - A speech given by Jake Freeman

Inspiration.

Hello, today I am going to talk to you about inspiration.

At some point we have all had a bit of inspiration. And at some points we have inspiration in our minds all the time.

For instance when on the sports field we may have our favourite player in mind.

In academic work we may have a successful scientist or mathematician in mind.

Or maybe we are inspired by someone we know on a personal level like a friend or someone we know about. Inspiration may come from someone in your family; for instance, in the early years of my life my inspiration was my dad as he seems quite happy with his job, his family and his life in general. Inspiration is quite a hard topic to grasp at as it is so varied in the way we see it. When I was writing this speech I was thinking about great speeches from people over the decades like Winston Churchill’s wartime speeches and the works of other great theologians. I know that I will never live up to their standards of speech. That is an example of everyday inspiration through memories that in the back of your head constantly all the time.

 In summary everyone at some stage of his or her life will have a figure of inspiration or someone who they want to live up to be.

Thank you for listening.

Mertens House Music Programme - STOMP...

House Music 2011

This week, the Music Department hosted the annual house music competition. Mertens was represented by 4 performances:

Anthony Yiu (Piano)

Waltz in C sharp minor

Op. 64, No. 2

Frederick Chopin

Hang Kin Kwok (Piano)

D’amour Mariage

Connor Norris (Guitar)Give me love by Ed Sheeran

Laurence Haines, Gani Nuredini, Marcus Hunter, Will Salt, Marcus Monsell, Scott Bennington, Daniel Frank and Jonah Adomakoh with a modern masterpiece - STOMP, a unique musical theatre of choreographed percussion and movement (choreographed by Mr Tester).

Steepo 2011

Steepo 2011 was once again upon us and, as always, brought out the best of the competitive spirit in Mertens. We had much to celebrate with Eddie Davis in Shell winning the Junior competition - well done Eddie, a brilliant achievement. We also welcomed back our Upper Sixth boys who raced for the House. As ever, a great event - made all the greater by Matron's cakes at the finishing line.

Talent show - Part 2 (Shell and Remove)

To end the first term, we were treated to a second display of Mertens' talent, courtesy of our Shell and Remove boys.  Once again, it was an array of talent from comedy to card tricks, music and impressions. We really do have talent (and there was a guest appearance from Father David...!).

The Mertens Soap Box....

Lately, the highlight of each 9.30pm Callover has been the giving of a small talk by one of the boys in the House. We are slowly working our way through the House list and so far there have been some memorable speeches; Anthony Yiu gave an insight into what it was like to start a new life in a new country which everyone found interesting and all other boys in the Shell have done likewise, choosing a topic of their own to speak about.
One of the latest speeches was given by Sonny Bircham which is outlined below...

JUDGING A BOOK BY ITS COVER

I would like to speak to you all about judging a book by its cover because there are a lot of people I know who say oh look at that boys shoes he’s a loser and weird let’s not talk to him. But I talk to people who other people don’t like because of his dress sense or his hair or his weight but no one knows what goes on behind closed doors like for example his mum could be seriously ill or he could be getting bullied no one knows what happens. So what I’m trying to say is why do we all care what people look like how they speak or why they have no friends if you actually give them a chance be friendly to them and be nice you never know they might have the same hobbies as you they might even look like you deep down so if you see someone on its own go speak to him make him feel confident about himself all that kid needs is a little confidence to get him more friends for example when Jonah was new I don’t think he knew anyone or if he did not that well but summers showed Jonah to everyone on his first day and now Jonah basically is good mates with everyone he knows so all I’m trying to say is don’t judge a book by its cover because you never know what he or she is actually like in person !