Another drop of Prince George kindness is about to get caught in a bucket of love.
The Bucket List Gala is coming back for a second year after a successful launch in 2017 by the Prince George Hospice Society. The special VIP guest at the event will be Netflix star Leon Logothetis, host of The Kindness Diaries, a show that combines global adventure with personal acts of philanthropy.
Logothetis will come to Prince George on Sept. 22 to personally discuss the lessons of his travel - how acting globally is also acting locally to make this world a better place.
The Bucket List Gala was invented to both raise money for hospice and send positive ripples across the local community. The first edition raised more than $30,000 and inspired a growing wave of philanthropy.
Donna Flood, executive director for the Prince George Hospice Society, said their agency is often the place where bucket lists are openly discussed, and often on the side of regret.
"At hospice, we regularly see and hear the conversations of 'I wish I would have,' 'I should have taken the time to, I really wanted to but now it's too late.' We want to take our experiences and help others in the community live their lives to the fullest by creating a bucket list and accomplishing the items on it," Flood said.
"Beyond the financial win for the charity, the gala also kickstarted an initiative to activate the community to live life with purpose by making bucket lists of their own," said Norm Coyne of UNLTD Media & Events, co-creator of the event. "This year's choice of Leon Logothetis with his message of choosing your own life and spreading kindness was a natural next step to build on the energy of the event's inaugural year which featured keynote speaker Ben Nemtin of MTV's The Buried Life."
The spinoff initiatives can be seen on the Facebook group Bucket List PG. Thanks to major sponsors and community support, weekly prizes were distributed to bucket list participants. The prize was the fulfillment of a bucket list wish posted on that page and tweeted to #bucketlistpg.
Bucket list goals were separated into three equal categories, divided only by their levels of complexity. Level A was for lofty dreams, Level B was for difficult but attainable dreams and Level C was for dreams requiring only a little push.
You get to state your dreams, and get in the running to win them coming true, when you buy a ticket to attend the Bucket List Gala with Logothetis as the keynote speaker.
"Each ticket to the gala includes weekly chances to win fulfillments of varying degrees," explained Coyne. "Each ticket purchase will be accompanied by a form to allow attendees to share the bucket list goals they hope to win. Each ticket will require the purchaser to fill out their A, B, and C goals which are collected by the Prince George Hospice Society. Once a week starting on June 29 the society will draw one ticket and fulfill a B- or C-list goal for that ticket holder. At the gala event in September, the society will draw an A List winner and either fulfill that list item or provide $5,000 in cash towards it's fulfillment."
Tickets for the Bucket List Gala are $85 each or tables of 10 for $750 (service charges apply). Tickets go on sale Friday via the Central Interior Tickets website or box office.
