WBC Members
Oryah Meir- Chairwoman
Oryah is the CEO of the Israeli Bridge federation since 2013. Prior to that she was the Youth Coordinator of the Israeli Bridge Federation for 4 years and among other things she compiled 2 booklets comprising Bridge tutorials, for youth Bridge teachers which were translated to English, and distributed for free use to NBOs worldwide. In 2014, she was elected as a member of the EBL's marketing committee and contributed greatly by initiating a financial assistant plan to help NBOs to market Bridge nationally.
On June 2022, Oryah was elected to the EBL's executive committee and was nominated as the new chairwomen of the EBL women's committee. Oryah's vision is to attract more young girls to play professional Bridge in a supportive surrounding which will enable them to also establish self-confidence, motivation, focus on the positive side of competitiveness and basically empower them and give them tools and skills needed when competing against men at the Bridge table. More girls who will take this course, will later in life become more adult women playing professional Bridge.
Kari-Anne Opsal- WBC member
Kari-Ann is a lawyer and currently the Mayor of Harstad municipality (Norway), and a Country Leader (Troms and Finnmark) since 2019.
She is a Bridge player since 1994, and is the President of the Norwegian Bridge Federation since 2016.
She was elected to the EBL's Executive Committee for the second time and is currently serving as a Vice President and a member of the WBC committee.
Emmanuelle Monod- WBC member
Emmanuelle is a French Bridge player for almost 30 years.
Having started at the bottom, she reached top level bridge a few years ago but decided to be involved in the development of bridge in her country through various actions mostly by promoting French festivals and recently in setting cooperation between NBOs : helping to develop bridge for young people and now bridge for women through this Committee.
Ida Gronkvist - WBC member
Ida is 28 years old, a Swedish bridge enthusiast. She started playing bridge when she was 11 and haven’t been able to stop since. Ida is a lawyer, currently working as a junior judge in a District Court in the Stockholm area. She debuted in international bridge when she was 12 years old and have since then been fortunate enough to frequently participate in European and World Championships representing Sweden.
Ida was elected as a member of the EBL's Executive Committee and represents a voice for the players. She has a broad experience of what it means to be a female bridge player and the special challenges that comes with that, both within a bridge community in general and within international competitive bridge. Her vision is to inspire more female players to take the step into high level competitive bridge, and to help them feel that they have a rightful place there. She believes bridge on all levels should be enjoyable for everyone participating.
Ian Payn- WBC member
Ian is a Bridge player and the Chairman of the English Bridge Union, since 2019.
He was the manager of a law firm until it closed down during Covid.
During Covid he became involved in dealing with the landslide of online cheating.
He was elected for the Executive Committee in June 2022, and was happy to be the first man who joins the Women's Bridge Committee, where he brings an important male perspective to the table.