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Recipes, cooking lessons, tips, tricks, food blog, and more.
Recipes, cooking lessons, tips, tricks, food blog, and more.
I feel honoured to have won this award. Quite an achievement when English is not your first language.
5 September 2010
The Wheeling Gourmet won the award for the Best Plain English Website - Private Sector at the 2010 New Zealand Plain English Awards. It is an incredible honour to see my efforts acknowledged and rewarded in such a way. The awards ceremony was very fancy, and held at the Banquet Hall for Parliement House in Wellington.
After driving around a little bit because I couldn't find the wheelchair-friendly entrance, I finally found the right spot, and managed to get security to let me in. I immediately met Rachel McAlpine, one of the judges this year. Rachel has done a lot of good for Plain English over the years. It was good to finally meet her.
Me, holding the award for Best Plain English Website (Private Sector).
My apologies, the photo is a bit fuzzy.
Kevin Milne was the Master of Ceremony. For those of you out of New Zealand, Kevin is a well known television presenter who has been behind the show Fair Go, a consumer affairs show that has been on air for decades. He kept the event rolling with his trademark humour.
There was a bit of confusion with the award envelopes - I think the certificates were mistakenly put in the wrong envelopes. But that seemed to be the only "oops" for the evening. Certainly not a major thing.
The Best Plain English Website Private Sector was the 3rd award to be announced. Turns out Rachel McAlpine was a judge for the category. She announced The Wheeling Gourmet as a finalist, along with Kiwitax and Martelli McKegg Wells & Cormack. Stiff competition from the corporate sector! I was very happy to be the winner, particularly since English is my 4th language. It wasn't that long ago that I confused writs for elbows, and wrote "cow-orker" without realising it ought to have been spelled "co-worker"!
Rachel made comments about each finalists.She said that "The Wheeling Gourmet website has a single purpose and all the content is clearly directed to that purpose. It is a delight to read whether you are a foodie or not. The site has clear, concise content, excellent page summaries and descriptive headings to aid navigation."
There were two breaks in the presentation with entertainment. The first was the commedian Te Radar talking to us about some significant "failures to communicate" over the years in New Zealand. The second group was The What Pack, a trio of musical improvisers. After all the awards were given out, Colleen Trolove played jazz with her jazz quartet.
Big congratulations to all finalists and other winners!
I couldn't talk about the awards event without a quick mention of food! This was a drinks & nibbles event, no set dinner. But there were plenty of nibbles - I doubt anyone went hungry. Being in a compact crowd in a wheelchair always presents a challenge - you can't really circulate, so you depend on the wait staff to bring variety. Alas! I didn't get to sample as much variety as I wished. Waiters walked around the crowded room with plates of oysters on the half shell, wee slices of roast beef with soy sauce, smoked salmon on toast, mini blinis with a creamy sauce, and many other items I either didn't identify or try.
The Plain English Awards website defines Plain English:
Plain English is a style of writing in which the language, structure, and presentation of a document all work together to help the reader. A document written in plain English is easy to read, understand, and act upon after just one reading.
I try to write clearly and avoid long sentences. I do my best to break down content into "chunks" by using appropriate headers. I avoid using jargon. But Plain English doesn't mean "boring", "simple", or devoid of any richness and texture. I use the correct culinary term where appropriate. I provide a definition if there is a risk that someone might not know what that term means. I use the most appropriate level of language, without "dumbing down" the culinary aspects.
Is a beautiful object. It is VERY heavy. I noticed almost everyone looked surprised when they held the award the first time. I see the award as 2 stylised half fern leaves, mounted on a round base. It is striking and unique.
A friend tweeted that I was being escorted out of Parliement building by security. This caused a lot of consternation. I would like to make it very clear that this was simply because they only way out of the building for a wheelchair user was through some restricted, and locked, areas of the building. I was not being "thrown out" for being a troublemaker! Funny tweet at the time, and true, but people misread that! I just had to set the record straight
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Congratulations, Nic! That is a fantastic accomplishment for anyone, but especially for someone whose native language is not English. You do a great job with this site and it's such a pleasure to see it get some recognition. :o)
Comment by: Mimi - September 5th, 2010 @ 12:26
Well done! That's a fantastic achievement.
Comment by: Reemski - September 6th, 2010 @ 16:16
Very big congrats, Nic. You are prolific, passionate and (a great) photographer. Well deserved.
Comment by: Your NameTerri - September 6th, 2010 @ 19:52
Wow, Nic! Way to go! I am so very glad you won and so very glad you were not thrown out for being a troublemaker! Your site rocks!
Comment by: Cindy O - September 6th, 2010 @ 23:31
Dear Nic:
As a long time Bonsai buddy of yours, (when you lived in Chicago), I am thrilled that you received the recognition you deserved for that first love of Computer design and FOOD!
Many, Many cheers to a well deserving E-mail friend!
Comment by: Carl L Rosner - September 7th, 2010 @ 5:11
Congratulations Nic! It is an honor well deserved. I remember when you were developing this site. It turned out wonderful.
Comment by: Rachel R - November 3rd, 2010 @ 9:29
Everyone loves folks who who blog regularly, it’s really tough to get this particular perception just about any way. First-rate work.
Comment by: farming equipment - December 21st, 2010 @ 2:12