PechaKucha: Talks With 20 Pictures for 20 Seconds Each

ST. CLOUD -- It's a fun event with a funny name. The second PechaKucha (pronounced: pa-CHA-coo-CHA) is next Wednesday, August 1st at the Red Carpet event center.

Organizers describe it as an informal gathering where creative people share ideas and thoughts. The way it works is each presentation consists of 20 slides, with each slide showing for 20 seconds. That means each speech is just 6:40 minutes long.

Organizer T.J. Larum says it forces you to learn how to deliver a short clear message.

What you find is it goes really quick.  When I had done my initial talk it came out to be about 20 minutes and I had to really siphon it down.  So it really forces you to make a really clear point.

Larum says it's a great way for the speaker to work on their public speaking skills.

I always encourage them to put it on their resume.  Public speaking looks great, it shows that you're comfortable speaking your mind in front of a lot of people you may or may not know.  And also it helps get the ideas out there.  St. Cloud has a lot of really cool people with a lot of really good ideas.

Larum says when they held their first PechaKucha back in May they had about 50 people attend.

St. Cloud is the 1,024 city in the world to host these talks, and we're the first one in Minnesota.

If you're wondering, PechaKucha means "chit-chat" in Japanese.

The event on August 1st starts at 7:00 p.m. and it is free and open to anyone to attend.