Nothing like a good ol' Meeting

Ahh... nothing like another Saturday morning Toastmaster’s meeting to start your day….As first time Sergeant-at-Arms, Michael Chow called for the meeting to begin and posed the question, “What have you done to counter the effects of global warming?” as a Toastmaster’s “warming-up” session to wake up those who were still half-asleep, and also to give the audience a chance to introduce themselves.

The meeting then proceeded with John Lee, Vice President of Education giving the Presidential Address of the morning in place of the Ernest Wong, who unfortunately could not attend the meeting because he was attending another Toastmaster’s Convention.

Next, the floor was handed over to Tan Jee Aik, the Table Topics Master to initiate the Table Topics Session of the morning. He carried out the session by showing the participants a list of topics and asked them to select their own favoured topic.

His request for the first volunteer was quickly met by Han Lian who rapidly responded and chose the topic “What You Do is What You Get”. He caught everyone’s attention by relating his topic to the famous idiom, “What you reap is what you sow”. The next table topics speaker was Michael Chow who chose the topic “There is No Absolute Truth”. He challenged the audience’s trust in so-called “truths” by relating the example of Newton’s Laws of Physics which were disproved by Albert Einstein. This was followed by Jasmine Leong who chose the topic “People Cannot be Trusted”. She too posed an interesting notion that we cannot absolutely believe historical records as it could also be faked by the people of that time. Lastly, Boon Keong, the final table topics participant, selected the topic “Technology has Shaped the World into a Better Place” and discussed the importance of technology to all of us. After this, the floor was handed to Jason Moi to evaluate the table Topics.

After the Table Topics Session, the Toastmaster of the Morning, John Lee continued the meeting by introducing the first assignment speaker, Qin Mei who presented her fourth Competent Communicator Manual speech entitled, “Word or Actions?” She started off her speech by first asking the audience whether they agreed with the idiomatic expression, “Actions Speak Louder than Words”, and naturally, the audience agreed. But she then asked the audience whether they agreed with the phrase, “The Pen is Sharper than the Sword”, causing the audience to ponder about whether to agree with this second statement, thus effectively grabbing the audience’s attention. Qin Mei then discussed the importance of using actions and words in the right situation at the right time.

The next assignment speaker, Claudia Ting presented her eighth Competent Communicator Manual speech entitled “Fashion Updates” while using a laptop as means of visual aid. She assumed herself to be a “Style TV Network” television presenter and informed the audience regarding the latest fashion lines by various famous fashion designers. Everyone was impressed by her extensive research and knowledge pertaining to current fashion trends.

After Claudia’s speech, there was a fifteen minute break for refreshments and fellowship. This was followed by the third assignment speech by John Lee who presented his second Advanced Communication Manual Speech entitled “Lazy Lazarus”. He first gave an introduction to his presentation by informing the audience about the life of the author of the poem, Sylvia Plath, who was a brilliant but mentally disturbed woman. He told as that she had already attempted suicide several times, and that the poem he was about to read was her very last work before she succeeded in doing so.

After that, the assigned speech evaluators came out to give their respective evaluations. Claudia Ting evaluated Qin Mei’s speech, while John Lee evaluated Claudia’s speech, and Jasmine Leong evaluated John Lee’s speech. This was followed by the General Evaluator’s report which was done by Claudia Ting. John Lee then wrapped up the entire meeting by presenting the Best Table Topics, Best Assignment Speech and Best Evaluator Awards to the respective winners, followed by a closing speech.

True to the core,

Micheal

A 5th April Meeting

There were many unexpected problems in this meeting, so it started about 15 minutes late. Many key positions such as role players and evaluators were not filled which caused the situation to be chaotic. Fortunately, John managed to solve all the problems by getting members to replace or take up more than one role. After John settled all the necessary problems, the meeting was ready to begin.

For unknown reason, today’s meeting was small. Most of the people present were regular members while there were several new faces. The SAA, Jee Aik, asked the crowd to introduce themselves and asked what they got fooled on April Fool’s day. Surprisingly, many said they did not get fooled while some said they mistook April Fool’s jokes for facts. The control was then handed to John, who was taking the president’s place for the presidential address.

After that, Jason Lim took control who was replacing the missing TOM. This was his first time being the TOM. He requested the word of the day from the Language Evaluator, Han Lian, which was “prodigious.”

Next was the Table Topics session. Han Lian, as the result of the meeting problems, was asked to play the role of TTM and it was his first time being the TTM. The first volunteer, Michael, was given the topic that if he were to recommend a book to read, what book would it be. He recommended the Bible as a Christian. Since this was inappropriate, he recommended the monthly Toastmaster magazine as a Toastmaster. That was a brilliant switch. The second speaker was Chen Kiat, who attends our club regularly. His topic had something to do with the craziest fashion. Creativity was not his talent since his field is accountancy, he said. He then compared the fashion between men and women, saying women have more choices. I own a Texas hat, he claimed. The third speaker was Boon Keong. What business would he like to do, his topic. He picked cyber cafe. He wanted to make a CC that is better and that has more variety of games than the cyber café available here. Last was Ebenezer. His topic was what your favorite place to think. He picked his bedroom as his favorite place.

For the assignment speech session, the first speaker was Jason Lim with his speech “Things that Define Me.” He said its name Jason means healer and that he aspires to be a potato because of its flexibility. Next was Michael with his speech “Not Your Boring Old Engineer.” He spoke of wanting to be an environmental engineer as he wants to make a difference and protect the environment. He demonstrated many deep long term plans in his speech. The third speaker was Peter Yu with his speech “Have You Ever Wondered?” The central theme in his speech was critical thinking. For example, what do we actually study for? Last, but not least, was John. He presented his first interpretive speech, “All Creatures Great and Small.” His story involved a young boy who was threatened to lose his baby finger if he lost the bet.

For the evaluation session, Peter Yu, though he was not qualified to be a speech evaluator, due to the meeting problems, was asked by John to take up the role and Peter accepted. If he did not, John probably would have had to evaluate 3 speakers. John had been coming in and out of the lectern; he was the president, Table Topics evaluator, speech speaker, speech evaluator for 2 speakers, and he was going to do one more thing later which was the closing business address. He sure had lots of work.

In short, there were many unexpected problems sprung up in this meeting but were managed. We live in an abnormal world where abnormal things happen. So problems are normal in an abnormal world. Although problems are painful and undesirable; nevertheless, they provide opportunities to sharpen our leadership skills and character. John had demonstrated leadership qualities in handling the problems as he managed to get members to fill up the empty roles or play more than one role. The club members and an outsider, also helped in the meeting as they were willing to try out new roles that they never played before and play dual roles in cooperation with John. Problems are never desirable but they give opportunities to build and test our character.

By Jee Aik

A 5th April Meeting

There were many unexpected problems in this meeting, so it started about 15 minutes late. Many key positions such as role players and evaluators were not filled which caused the situation to be chaotic. Fortunately, John managed to solve all the problems by getting members to replace or take up more than one role. After John settled all the necessary problems, the meeting was ready to begin.

For unknown reason, today’s meeting was small. Most of the people present were regular members while there were several new faces. The SAA, Jee Aik, asked the crowd to introduce themselves and asked what they got fooled on April Fool’s day. Surprisingly, many said they did not get fooled while some said they mistook April Fool’s jokes for facts. The control was then handed to John, who was taking the president’s place for the presidential address.

After that, Jason Lim took control who was replacing the missing TOM. This was his first time being the TOM. He requested the word of the day from the Language Evaluator, Han Lian, which was “prodigious.”

Next was the Table Topics session. Han Lian, as the result of the meeting problems, was asked to play the role of TTM and it was his first time being the TTM. The first volunteer, Michael, was given the topic that if he were to recommend a book to read, what book would it be. He recommended the Bible as a Christian. Since this was inappropriate, he recommended the monthly Toastmaster magazine as a Toastmaster. That was a brilliant switch. The second speaker was Chen Kiat, who attends our club regularly. His topic had something to do with the craziest fashion. Creativity was not his talent since his field is accountancy, he said. He then compared the fashion between men and women, saying women have more choices. I own a Texas hat, he claimed. The third speaker was Boon Keong. What business would he like to do, his topic. He picked cyber cafe. He wanted to make a CC that is better and that has more variety of games than the cyber café available here. Last was Ebenezer. His topic was what your favorite place to think. He picked his bedroom as his favorite place.

For the assignment speech session, the first speaker was Jason Lim with his speech “Things that Define Me.” He said its name Jason means healer and that he aspires to be a potato because of its flexibility. Next was Michael with his speech “Not Your Boring Old Engineer.” He spoke of wanting to be an environmental engineer as he wants to make a difference and protect the environment. He demonstrated many deep long term plans in his speech. The third speaker was Peter Yu with his speech “Have You Ever Wondered?” The central theme in his speech was critical thinking. For example, what do we actually study for? Last, but not least, was John. He presented his first interpretive speech, “All Creatures Great and Small.” His story involved a young boy who was threatened to lose his baby finger if he lost the bet.

For the evaluation session, Peter Yu, though he was not qualified to be a speech evaluator, due to the meeting problems, was asked by John to take up the role and Peter accepted. If he did not, John probably would have had to evaluate 3 speakers. John had been coming in and out of the lectern; he was the president, Table Topics evaluator, speech speaker, speech evaluator for 2 speakers, and he was going to do one more thing later which was the closing business address. He sure had lots of work.

In short, there were many unexpected problems sprung up in this meeting but were managed. We live in an abnormal world where abnormal things happen. So problems are normal in an abnormal world. Although problems are painful and undesirable; nevertheless, they provide opportunities to sharpen our leadership skills and character. John had demonstrated leadership qualities in handling the problems as he managed to get members to fill up the empty roles or play more than one role. The club members and an outsider, also helped in the meeting as they were willing to try out new roles that they never played before and play dual roles in cooperation with John. Problems are never desirable but they give opportunities to build and test our character.

By Jee Aik

A succesful Joint meeting!

After toying with the idea for more than a month, on the morning of 29^th March 2008 the joint-meeting between HELP UC and UEM Academy finally materialized. And it materialized pretty well, I would say.This was the first joint-meeting between the two clubs of Area W2 and it was truly a special project speech-marathon meeting. Early in the morning, the entourage of the UEM toastmasters was warmly welcomed by the strong showing from HELP UC toastmasters. After several minutes of exchanging pleasantries and getting to know each other, the meeting quickly got underway.

The meeting kicked off with a neat twist to the typical self and role introduction session by Chee Hoong the SAA, with each member sharing the person “Who they admire the most”. What a colourful and diverse lot they were as answers ranged from inspirational politicians and good-looking footballers to even themselves or simply human in general. That session served as a great pick-me-up for some of the sleepy heads, in fact even better than the Venti-sized Latte that the Starbucks girl managed to upsell to me at “One extra ringgit only”.

Following that, the Grammarian of the morning, Claudia introduced the word of the day to us – Neophyte: meaning a novice or a beginner. Claudia the Grammarian

The Toastmaster of the Morning, Gajendran, then took charge and the speech marathon was officially launched.

Gajendran the TOM

The speech marathon kicked off with Mahidon Promwichit of UEM Academy breaking the ice with his speech “The Rise of the Don” bringing us through the thick and thin of his journey from Citibank to Pharmaniaga where he is today.

Mahidon Promwichit

The second speaker, Qinmei of HELP UC brought everyone back to reality with her inspirational speech entitled “Different”. She shared how we should embrace and cherish our differences rather than use it as a source of conflict. Qinmei

Jee Aik of HELP UC returned the audiences to a lighter mood with an attention grabbing opening to his speech “Overcoming Miscommunication”. It made me wonder what I should appropriately say when I commit any kind of misdemeanor in the future…Sorry? Excuse me? And what kind of tone should I use?

Jee Aik

After a short re-hydration break, the marathon speakers continued on with Mohd Faisal from UEM Academy sharing one of his passions through his speech on “Amateur Radio”. Being a neophyte in this method of communication, Faisal’s speech was really eye-opening to me. As he demonstrated the protocols of the amateur radio communication, I kept wondering which part of the communication is amateurish.

Mohd.Faizal

The next speaker, Claudia, then took the stage with her speech entitled “In Memory”. She shared the details of the life of Princess Diana from the moment she was still known as Diana Frances Spencer up to the last few tragic minutes of the horrible accident that ended her life.

Claudia

ClaudiaThe last speaker was Hedzri from UEM Academy. That’s me, by the way. Presenting my first project from the Interpretive Reading manual, I narrated a short excerpt from the book “Utopia” which was also the title of my narration. The story involved an imaginary discourse between Thomas More, the author, and his friend Raphael about a nation Raphael had visited during one of his sea explorations. The nation, Utopia, had very unique and almost ideal practices (depending on which standard it is compared to) which led to word utopia which means “a place of ideal perfection”.

Hedzri

As usual, the meeting proceeded with the evaluation sessions which I led, being the General Evaluator. I was thankfully assisted by experienced and capable evaluators including Amy Choo of Stamford TM Club, Gerard of Mid Valley TM Club, President Ernest, Claudia (Language Evaluator), Faisal (Ah Counter) and Han Lian (Time Keeper).

Overall I really enjoyed the joint-meeting. I hope everyone enjoyed themselves too. And I now have another reason to wake up early on Saturday mornings, besides nasi lemak.A big thanks to HELP UC TM Club for hosting the joint-meeting between the two clubs and may that pave the way for more fun and mutually beneficial collaborations in the future.

Signing off,

Hedzri