A long day, there is more to being a toastmaster than just meetings

Before the meeting, Ernest decided to have a breakfast session with everyone at Ali Maju. Which Ali Maju? The one nearest to Guardian. Honestly, I myself did not know where Guardian is but thankfully, I found the place in the end. John was the earliest, arriving there at 8.00 am, followed by Qinmei half an hour later. At 8.45 am, Ernest and Gajendran came in, unfortunately John had to leave shortly after that. The breakfast session was great because we had the opportunity to get to know each other better outside the formalities of the meetings.

The meeting started a little late as the members as the guests were busy getting acquainted to each other. The SAA of the morning, Qinmei, welcomed the audience, which included many new faces and guests besides a long lost member. Then, everyone introduced themselves and spoke about something that they are proud of about themselves. There were many responses to that question such as some being proud of their SPM results which was just released a few days ago and a few others felt proud because they successfully forced themselves out their comfortable beds on a Saturday morning to attend the meeting. The language evaluator, Jee Aik, was very eager to share the word of the day “jubilant” that he presented the word of the day during his introduction session.

Next up was the presidential address by Ernest where he spoke about our club constantly growing and learning. He also stressed on the importance of communication. Communication should not only be limited to during meetings, but we should also form friendships outside the club. By sharing with others, whether it is difficulties with preparing speeches or even asking for opinions regarding a speech given, we learn something. We are actually helping ourselves.

The TOM was Fong Wen, who was proud to be at the meeting as she had not done so for quite some time. Since Jee Aik had already introduced the word of the day, he was asked to remind everyone to use the word of the day. After that, she gave a brief history of Toastmasters and a brief history of our very own HELP University College Toastmasters. She also said that it is important that we know our roots because without them, there wouldn’t be us.

As usual, the table topics session was without doubt an interesting one. Khai Qi chose quotes and phrases that he had found on the internet as the topics for the table topics session.

Before the theme of the table topics session could sink into our minds, one guy immediately raised his hand and volunteered. Unaware that he was actually supposed to speak immediately after the topic was given, he casually went back to his seat thinking that each speaker was given a certain amount of time to think. The shocking truth came to him when he was called back from his seat to speak. As he stood in front of the audience, he tried his very best to talk about his topic, but to no avail. Even though he did not present his speech entitled “What You Give is What You Get”, he was definitely acknowledged for his courage and bravery to be the first.

The first speaker was Eugene, a guest from Taylors, with his speech “If You Think You Can, You Can.” He started off explaining how everything starts with a thought. He also compared life to a card game. We may not always get the cards we want. However, there is nothing we can do but deal and live with the cards we have and just make the best out of it.

The second speaker, Fan Chen Keat, was given the tittle “The Secret of Success is to Be Ready for Opportunities When It Comes”. He advised us to ride the wave to the next level and not get stuck at our current levels. What use is staying and not moving up? We will never be ready for opportunities as something always gets in our way. The big “if only…” always pops up when we think of moving up.

The third speaker was Ernest with the long speech tittle “I Wept Because I Had No Shoes until I Saw a Man with No Legs”. He urged the audience to see the bigger picture and focus on it. He further explained that people will always influence those around them and that we should always stay positive. He also said that we should be glad to have no shoes because then, we would be able to feel the earth beneath us.

The fourth speaker with the tittle “Follow Your Dreams” was Jee Aik. In his speech, he said that everyone should have a direction. With an end in mind, it is easier to reach the destination.

The final speaker was Jack, a guest from Nilai Toastmasters, speaking about “There is Time for Everything”. According to him, we always need to prioritize in life. We, as students, are young and energetic. We have big dreams. He ended his speech with a meaningful message for the audience to ponder upon that is “dreams are free, so free your dreams”.

The control was passed back the Fong Wen as TOM where she explained the role of each role player, for the benefit of the guests. Then, she passed the control back to the table topics evaluator.

Chee Hoong was the table topics evaluator. He was very detailed in explaining each and every speaker. He pointed out many good qualities and speaking skills of the speakers while also giving some ideas for improvement.

Chee Hong, Table Topic Evaluator

He was very thorough in giving his evaluation even though it was only his first time as a table topics evaluator.

Next up was the assignment speeches.

The first speech was from Qinmei who was giving her second speech of the competent communication manual entitled “Ambitions and Fantasies”. Her speech was basically about the realistic goals in life that one should have and the fantasyland that people should avoid. She concluded her speech by stating that it is easier to climb over the rainbow to reach the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow if you can see it there.

The second assignment speaker was Gajendran with his speech entitled “The Two Faced Plant”. He talked about how marijuana was a two faced plant because while it can bring great benefits, it can also cause great harm. A major question brought up by him was whether marijuana should be legalized. There have been many cases of the harm caused by this drug, yet he feels it should be legalized because it is capable of making a positive change.

There was a ten minute break where refreshments were provided and everyone had the chance to further practice their communication skills through light conversations.

After the break, Ming Haur gave his sixth speech, “Live Your Dreams before It’s Too Late”. He started his speech with a famous quote from Martin Luther King, “I have a dream!” In his speech, he mentioned his own childhood dreams and how they changed.

Then, the General Evaluator, Claudia, took control of the meeting.

The first part of the evaluation was the evaluation of the assignment speeches. The three evaluators, namely Fong Wen (Qinmei’s evaluator), Claudia (Gajendran’s evaluator) and Ernest (Ming Haur’s evaluator) were kind yet effective in listing out the good points and points to work on for each speaker.

After the assignment speech evaluations, the team working quietly behind the scenes while the rest of the audience were engrossed in listening to the speeches gave their reports. The Language Evaluator, Jee Aik, Ah Counter, Ming Haur, and the first time time-keeper, Boon Keong, gave their reports accordingly.

Finally, Claudia, as the General Evaluator, gave her comments on the entire meeting in general, besides also pointing out a few points left out by the evaluators, whether it was about the speakers or role players. She also congratulated Qinmei for her ice breaking SAA role and Boon Keong for his ice breaking time keeper role.

The last part of the meeting was the Closing Address, handled by Ernest. He once again stressed on the importance of dreams, encouragements and courage. Prizes and awards were given out to acknowledge the best speakers and evaluators. The “Best Assignment Speaker” went to Gajendran while Claudia won “Best Evaluator”. Ernest earned himself “Best Table Topics Speaker”.

The usual club meeting may have ended but the day was not over for five young toastmasters. Ernest, Qinmei, Ming Haur, Fong Wen and Chee Hoong, were about to take on a new challenge, that is to play roles at the Area B1 contest, held at Deloitte. There were a few other members who were supposed to join us at the contest; unfortunately, all had to pull out at the very last minute. Even though there were only five of us left and four out of five of us were exhausted and sleepy due to insufficient sleep, one with panda eyes, we still bravely stuck through the afternoon.

We had lunch at a corner shop just opposite the tower building where the contest would be help. Despite the not so delicious food, we still had fun because we once again learned new things about each other besides sharing experiences, humourous ones especially.

When we finally arrived at the 17^th floor after taking an accidental detour to the 19^th floor, we were warmly welcomed. After registering and being offered refreshments in the form of food from McDonalds, we were told to attend a briefing for the role players. Dennis was kind enough to take us on a really long tour around his office just to find a secluded place to hold our top secret briefing. At the end of our briefing, he told us to go out from the other side which was practically a short cut. Picture it like this, the office is a rectangle and we went round three sides of the rectangle to reach a spot for the briefing, then later we only had to walk though the remaining one side to reach the room where the contest was held.

The role players at the contest from our club was Ernest as Table Topics Contest Chair, Ming Haur and Qinmei as Time-keepers, Fong Wen as a Ballot Counter and Chee Hoong as an SAA. We are proud to be from HELP UC Toastmasters. Why? Because we have a fancy timing device that has lights and uses electricity. However, we were asked to hang on to the colour papers as back up just in case our one breaks down.

The contest kicked off with Joyce asking all of us to close our eyes and picture food that we are craving for. There were many responses about what everyone wanted to eat. She then asked us whether it would have been nicer if we were out there having a bowl of ais kacang on the hot afternoon. In spite of all the tempting thoughts of delicious food, we all chose to attend the contest and make it a success.

The first contest was the International Speech contest, chaired by Karen, who happens to be a previous HELP UC Toastmasters member.

The first speaker was Julian with the tittle “Fail”. He talked about how a person failed but persevered and never gave up, eventually succeeding. He urged us to accept failure if it came. But, he stressed that he was not asking us to fail on purpose.

The second speech, “Child in the Orange Farm” was by Kuang Shan who was explaining how hard it was for a seed to grow up and form an orange and how it might not have done that without the support of the stick. He was actually talking about the relationship between a child and the parents. He was also the only contestant who used props, an orange and a walking stick, to enhance his speech.

Carolin Wong was the third speaker with a speech entitled “The Things We Called Love”. She spoke passionately about love, including love for the family, with a sweet voice.

The last speaker for the contest was Chan Siew Peng who gave a speech called “Seize the Opportunities”. She gave a good speech with a wide range of vocal variety and interesting body gestures.

There was a twenty minute break, in which we were served with more water and a box of titbits. Everyone took the opportunity to get up and take a walk while also connecting with others to fight the afternoon drowsiness. The sleepy and the tired time-keepers almost forgot that it the twenty minute break was over until the Meyya, the SAA, asked us whether twenty minutes were up.

Ernest took on his role as Table Topics Contest Chair and explained the rules of the contest before letting us know the topic of the contest which turned out to be “Try Not to Become a Man of Success, but Rather to Become a Man of Value”.

The first speaker was Kian Yoong who mentioned that he would leave his family for a girlfriend. Later in his interview session, he explained that he did not leave his family. And he said that if he had to choose, he would listen to Lillian Too and just keep them separate.

Julian was the second speaker. He chose to talk about how people he knew were involved in politics. He spoke about the corruption and foul plays of the politic world, where values are seldom upheld.

Ngan Eng, who was the third speaker in the table topics contest, tackled the topic with great confidence.

The final speaker was Bonnie Loo who presented her speech very well by injecting a lot of humour and elaborate body gestures. She also inserted a personal experience regarding a climb up the corporate ladder and what it has done to her.

There was a brief interview session with the table topics speakers where they were practically having a second go at the table topics session, except with no time limit and no judges this time. At the acknowledgement of role players’ efforts ceremony, our club was also given proper recognition, probably due to the enormous support we provide. We are glad that we successfully played our roles, indirectly making the contest a great success.

Prizes were given to the winners. Since there were only four contestants in each category, only the winner and first runner-up were formally awarded with the trophies. The winner of the International Speech Contest was Chan Siew Peng while the first runner up went to Kuang Shan. As for the Table Topics Contest, Bonnie Loo emerged as the winner while Kian Yoong won first runner up.

Although it was an area contest, it sure did not feel like one as the atmosphere was light, witty and it portrayed an environment with lots of humour and friendliness. And the crowd was certainly a responsive one.

Going to an area contest is definitely a new experience that must be included in your Toastmasters journey. Even as a part of the audience, watching the speakers present their speeches will prove to be an inspiring and motivating lesson. Playing a role will also be good as you will be pushing yourself to greater heights by taking on a heavier responsibility and learning to be more precise and attentive. And of course, as a speaker, you can test your capabilities and actually get very well acknowledged for it besides gaining new experiences by observing your fellow contestants.

“There is more to being a Toastmaster than just meetings. Only you can help yourself. Let the learning process begin!”

Qinmei

Note :

Being an SAA is not as easy as it seems. Being a time keeper is really easier than it sounds.

yet another 1st of March

The audience was small today. Jee Aik, the SAA, asked the crowd to introduce themselves and also asked them that if they could meet the prime minister, what they would say. Many of them seemed brave enough to let what others think, while some sounded playful with their answers, while some had interesting remarks. Jee Aik then passed the control to the president, Ernest. Ernest briefed everyone about the benefits of Toastmasters one can gain and how important communication skill is.

The Toastmaster of the Morning, Gajendran, took control after that. He initiated the assignment speech session instead of the Table Topics session, because the Table Topics Master, John, had not arrived due to unfortunate event. The first assignment speaker was Kang Han, with his Ice Breaker speech entitled “The I Word.” He described himself as a very cautious person, which is why he also wants to be an actuary as it suits his personality. As he illustrated each point of his story, he marked and reshaped the alphabet letter written on the board. For example, he marked “j” when he was talking about his joy and reshaped it by subtracting the dot of the “j” and lengthened the tail of “j” which led to an “O” for complete. Never seen an Ice Breaker speech like this before, commended Gajendran.

Next came Chee Hong, with his fourth speech called “A Global Threat.” The global threat was not something big like war and global warming but violence in forms of not just physical but also verbal. He gave examples of such violence such as politics and road rage which most people were familiar with. He concluded his speech by saying that we should practice to make good speeches in Toastmaster to overcome violence.

Around that time, the Table Topics Master had arrived, so John took over the control and the session was switched to Table Topics. The topic question was like this. There are several people in the hot air balloon, and the volunteer speaker is one of them. The volunteer speaker is to pick a character or personality, for instance Osama bin Laden, and reason why he or she should be allowed to stay behind in the hot air balloon while the rest should not. This topic John created allowed plenty of room for creativity and was easy, and many people participated without too much hesitation.

The first speaker was Ernest. He picked to be a police and reasoned that he has the authority and can threaten anyone with his gun. Next came Boon Keong, who for the first time trying out the Table Topics. He chose to be Dr Mahathir. He reasoned that he has greater authority, so not even the police can go against him. After him was Dexter who chose to be a serial killer, obviously threatening to kill everyone in the hot air balloon. Next to jump into the stage was Dat Han (nicknamed as Darth Han) and he picked the famous dark lord known as Darth Vader. He boasted about his greatness and power. What’s next? Master Yoda? Nope, it was Toastmaster Gajendran! He picked a Toastmaster which is basically himself. He came out with brilliant logical reasons to persuade us. He reasoned that he has a club to chart and members to train, and that most previous speakers just basically wanted to only kill. And Gajendran won the best Table Topics speaker. Amazing that a Toastmaster can beat even Darth Vader, so never underestimate the power of a Toastmaster, lol. Then came Qin Mei who was not going to let Toastmaster Gajendran to stay in the hot air balloon without a fight. She picked to be herself. She reasoned that she is just as capable as Toastmaster Gajendran as she can be used to do many things including training members. The most interesting part was that she reasoned that she has very small cute eyes which is impossible to resist her command.

After the Table Topics, it was back to the speech assignment session. Claudia was next, with her speech entitled “How to Guide,” which was her sixth speech assignment. She taught us how to maintain long distance relationship. Some of the ways she mentioned were wishing happy birthday by SMS and communication people with a chat program, if possible with a web cam too. In her last words, she said that if there is no effort, there will not be sacrifice, and that means no relationship also. Since she has completed her sixth speech, she is now eligible to be a speech evaluator! That means the club now has three evaluators!

After this was the break. People chatted and greeted one another After the break came the evaluation session. Siew Peng, the Table Topics evaluator, expressed that she enjoyed the Table Topics speeches as the speakers showed great creativity and confidence. Gerard, the evaluator for Kang Han, expressed that Kang Han did very well for an Ice Breaker speech. Gerard was also awarded the best evaluator later. Michael, first time as a Language Evaluator, did well at jotting down the correct and wrong usages of the language. He did it very confidently, even though it was his first time being a Language Evaluator. Then came Pei Yi, the Ah Counter, who seems to be back in action! Claudia gave her evaluation as a General Evaluator for the second time. She seems to have interest in improving her evaluation skill.

Overall, the meeting had one of the best Table Topics session and that members have grown much stronger. The club members have participated new roles, and this is a sign of learning and growing. Hopefully, they become better and more confident in their abilities. An assurance you can make is that the club has become stronger after this meeting.

Written by Jee Aik

February has arrived!

Twas Saturday, the 23^rd of February. A time for people to rest, a time for people to let down their hair, for it is a weekend for relaxation in order to face the upcoming weekdays of work. However, the end of the weekdays means the beginning of yet another enthralling HELP Toastmasters meeting!

The meeting was begun by the SAA of the morning, Chee Hong, with a warm smile as he conducted a brief ice-breaking session to get everybody acquainted with one another. As soon as everybody had a rough idea of who is to their left and right, Chee Hong passed the stage to Ernest, the president of the club.

President Ernest

Ernest, as jovial as ever, welcomed the crowd with open arms, charming the crowd with his spontaneous jokes, but yet sending a clear message to the audience of HELP Toastmasters aim for the year.

Once Ernest had completed his presidential address, he passed the stage over to Kian Yoong, a visitor from DU Advance toastmasters club who is going to play the role as Table Topic Master, to conduct the table topics session of the morning.

Kian Yoong, Table Topics Master

Kian Yoong rose to the occasion with a calm composure. However, as soon as he took control of the stage, Kian Yoong started to display his love for table topics by telling people what table topics meant, and why one must participate in it with a level of passion that few speakers have. In no time, he called upon his first volunteer, Faris, who had promised him earlier to volunteer for the table topics session, to step up to the stage to face the challenge.

Faris timidly came up to the stage, took a brief glance at the audience, and then concentrated his eyes at Kian Yoong. He was presented with the topic entitled ‘failure is better than success.’ Faris tried his best to relate closely to his topic. With all his might, Faris managed to construct a pretty neat two-minute speech, thus overcoming his fear of speaking in front of a crowd for a split second. Faris breathed a sigh of relief once he was done with his speech.

Next up, before anyone raised their hand when Kian Yoong asked for a second volunteer, Chen Kiat immediately raised his hand to accept the second table topic challenge. He was presented with the title ‘is beginning harder than the end?’ Enthusiastically, Chen Kiat, related his two-minute table topic speech with confidence, agreeing that the beginning of something, be it an act of joining a competition, or beginning to exercise after a long break, is indeed harder than the end.

The third table topics speaker slot was given to Qinmei, who volunteered to go next after a great done by Chen Kiat. She was presented with the topic ‘what is success?’ Without hesitation, Qinmei started her speech immediately after hearing it from Kian Yoong, startling everyone by her amazing level of spontaneity. Although Qinmei started her speech immediately without thinking for a split second, she was actually able to come out with surprisingly good speech!

Soon, it was time for the fourth table topic speaker volunteer, which was filled in by a visitor by the name of Edward. Coolly walking forward, Edward faced the audience with a calm face filled with confidence, which again surprised the crowd as not many newcomers display such calmness. Edward still did not display any anxiety when he was presented with his topic entitle ‘0do little things matter?’ by Kian Yoong. With a smile, he started off his speech with such an amazing opening statement that it immediately captured the audience’s attention. The room remained silent for a good 2 minutes as the audience was listening intently to what Edward had to say. As soon as Edward finished his speech, the room was roaring with claps from the audience who were amazed by this newcomer’s speaking ability.

Finally, after four table topic speeches, Micheal felt the need to speak up, thus volunteering himself as the fifth table topic speaker. Micheal, who is the club’s table topic table topic runner-up, knew very well that he musn’t show fear or anxiety while tackling a table topic speech. Hence, Micheal remained calm and composed as he was presented his table topic speech entitled ‘is losing better than winning?’ Taking merely 10 seconds to think, Micheal began his speech with an authoritative voice, which somehow ordered the audience to hear what he has to say. Micheal expertly drew a clear picture of his speech and convinced his audience that losing might not be the end of one’s life but an opportunity for one to learn from his or her mistake.

Soon, it was John Lee, the table topics evaluator of the week, to give his thoughts on the table topic session.

John Lee, Table Topics Evaluator

John was pretty receptive in picking out the strengths and points of improvements of every table topic speaker. With words of kindness and encouragement, John urged the table topic speakers to participate more often as he can actually see the hidden potential in some of the speakers that needs to be cultivated.

After a fabulous table topic session, it was time for the assignment speeches session to take flight. This session was started with a speech done by Qinmei entitled ‘the colours of my life.’ With a smile, Qinmei began to weave a very interesting story of her life as she stepped through the many colourful stages of her life as a girl scout, a prefect, and a taekwondo student. Qinmei brought the audience to a virtual memory of herself with her vivid words. Her style of speaking breathed life to her description; it was like a magic incantation that brought the audience back in time to specially share her life experiences. Such a marvelous speech was immediately greeted with a round of continuous applause as Qinmei bowed slightly to mark the end of her speech.

Then, it was time for Micheal to show the audience what he’s made of by presenting his first assignment speech entitled ‘the many interesting things about me.’ Being the confident person that he is, Micheal swept the audience of their feet by starting off with a bang of an opening statement. Micheal soon went on to elaborate his hobbies and ideology, awing the audience with his amount of general knowledge and wittiness. By the end of his speech, Micheal received a strong round of applause from the audience; a clear sign that they liked his speech.

After an interesting assignment speech session, it was time for the evaluation session. This time round, it was Claudia’s turn to act as the general evaluator.

She and her panel of role players did a marvelous job in giving their evaluations on the strengths and the improvements that can be done as well as their report about the meeting. In the blink of an eye, it was once again time to say good bye and to look forward for yet another stimulating toastmasters meeting! See you my friends~!

Carpe diem,
Jason Moi

Wake up to the world

"Wake up, it is time to cease the day..." whispered the beating of my heart. It was the time of my life once again, for it is time for yet another HELP University Toastmasters meeting! Eager as always, I leaped out of bed like every Toastmaster that are excited to learn the fine arts of speaking would. The meeting started off at around 9:40, with Jason Moi starting off the ice breaking session that requires everyone to briefly introduce themselves and tell the each other what they hope to get for this upcoming chinese new year.

Once everyone was warmly acquainted with one another, the stage was passed on to John Lee, the Vice President of Education, for his opening speech on behalf of the president, Ernest. With a calm and voice, John Lee welcomed the guests with open arms and a welcoming smile. John later handed the stage to Gajendran, the table topics master of the morning.

With a sparkle of excitement in his eyes, Gajendran conducted the table topics session with confidence and charm. The table topic session went on smoothly as participants sweat it out as they speak off the cuffs for two minutes about a topic specified by Gajendran. Once Gajendran has given out all his table topics, he handed control over to the table topic evaluator of the week, John Lee.

John Lee, as always was indeed very encouraging in his words as he generously gave compliments to the table topics speakers and at the same time pointed out the ways of improvement for each speaker. After a thorough table topic evaluation session, John Lee passed the stage back to the toastmaster of the morning.

Soon, it was time for the first speaker, Jason Moi, to start off his second assignment speech of his competent communicator manual. The title of his speech today was ‘Dreams.’ Jason started off his speech with a melodramatic voice, and continued to illustrate the role of dreams in a human’s life.

Then, it was time for the second speaker of the week, Jee Aik, to present his third assignment speech entitled ‘the meaning of religion.’ In his speech, Jee Aik presented a deep thought of what religion truly is. He emphasized that religion cannot be restricted to just the colour of one’s skin nor the one’s nationality, but it must be recognized as one’s belief. Jee Aik believes that all humans have actually very similar traits and that there is only a very insignificant modification of the human genes that differentiates one human being from another.

In no time, it was time for the evaluation session to take place, and in the blink of an eye, it was time for yet another HELP toastmasters meeting to end. Thus, until next time!