Introduction
Our President, Swarajit, began the meeting by reminding everyone of the Toastmasters UK & Ireland convention in November, drumming up support for Glen, who will be competing in the Table Topics contest. Swarajit reflected on how we learn. Whilst we pick up the ability to speak as children by listening and copying others, we do not pick up the ability to speak publicly, and therein lies the benefit of Toastmasters.
Bronia, our Toastmaster for the evening, was introduced by Swarajit as having a lot to live up to after her last stellar performance in the role. She did not disappoint, keeping the energy up throughout the meeting with a pleasant, confident presence. Bronia’s chosen theme for the meeting was heroes.
- Tracey – the Timekeeper – gave a brief introduction on the importance of time before explaining the timings of each speech presented on the programme and demonstrating the use of the lights to signal these timings to the speaker.
- Rajeev – the Grammarian – presented the word of the day, “limpid”, giving several examples of its use. He also gave examples of other devices he would be listening for, such as metaphors, similes, alliteration and anaphora, despite the fact that his wife says he’s not a very good listener.
Prepared Speeches
Sarah, in her Icebreaker entitled, “Evolution and Me”, began by describing public speaking as her “worst nightmare”. As part of her Master’s programme in Human Evolution and Behaviour, she has to give two presentations and so is keen to overcome her fear. Sarah went on to describe some of the topics she is studying, as well as what drew her to study Evolution in the first place. Her speech was heart-warming and full of humour.
Barnaby spoke about his personal hero, John von Neumann, who was an extremely accomplished mathematician and economist. Barnaby presented many interesting facts about von Neumann’s mind, his key discoveries, and of course Economics, in a manner that drew the audience’s attention and highlighted Barnaby’s glowing admiration.
Jo spoke about scuba diving in her advanced entertaining speech entitled, “Out of My Depth”. She skilfully and humorously recanted her adventures on a liveaboard trip to the Red Sea, including numerous encounters with shipwrecks and sharks.
The subject of Hari’s advanced speech was the eternal greek – Odysseus. Entitled, “A Hero’s Return”, Hari’s speech captivatingly described Odysseus’ return to Ithaca after his 20 year adventure, and how he won back his wife, Penelope, as well as his throne.
Evaluations
Renars began his evaluation of Sarah’s icebreaker by inviting the audience to applaud her for starting her public speaking journey. Though he did recommend she speak more about herself, his overall tone was positive and congratulatory.
Carrie’s evaluation of Barnaby’s speech was extremely well structured with numerous commendations around his progress and presence, his research and credibility, and his obvious passion for the topic. She suggested improvements to his body language, more eye contact and more voice projection before concluding on a commendation on his skilful use of humour and pauses.
Kate found Jo’s speech clear, well-constructed and clever. She commended Jo’s expression of enjoyment throughout the speech as well as her consistent ability to engage with the audience. Kate recommended that Jo put her notes aside in future as they restricted her movements, then concluded by commending Jo’s wonderful descriptions.
Glen described Hari’s speech as a “fantastic treat,” enumerating several things that he personally loved about it. He commended Hari’s solid stance and body language, though his gestures could have had more variety, as well as his easy charm. Glen went on to observe that Hari seemed at times not fully immersed in his own story, and suggested that the story could have been somewhat reinterpreted for a modern audience.
Table Topics
Joe introduced Table Topics as being valuable for winning arguments, selling ideas and creating relationships. He took a very innovative approach by inviting participants to speak in an open ended fashion about objects he had pulled out of a bag.
- Glen began with a useful tip for all table topics speakers, “Don’t be afraid of the first thing that comes into your mind.” However, since he had been given a container of lubricant, he swiftly added that, “Sometimes it is important to self-censor.” His response was extremely humorous and entertaining.
- Martijn, a guest, was given a thermometer, which inspired him to speak about the weather and the temperature differences between England and his native country, the Netherlands.
- Ash was given a lighter, which brought to mind looking out the window at smokers outside her office. She spoke about how she began smoking when she was quite young, though she has now given it up.
- Liz spoke about lip salve, something that she uses frequently, especially in cold weather. Her daughter likes to use different flavours and colours of lip salve, but Liz herself prefers to stick with the plain sort.
- Kate was glad not to have gotten the lip salve or the oil – instead she got a data memory stick. She remarked that she had accumulated 3-4 memory sticks and didn’t know what was on any of them. “What,” she wondered, “did we do before them?”
Femi provided an entertaining and useful evaluation, presenting unique points for each topics speaker. The level of detail in his evaluation showed how intently he listened to each topic.
Reports
Rajeev reported four uses of the word of the day before going on to give numerous examples of the best language of the evening.
Helen filled in as General Evaluator as the day’s transport chaos had prevented the scheduled GE from attending the meeting. She briefly provided feedback to each of the evaluators and functionaries.
Awards
- The President’s Award went to Helen for stepping in as the General Evaluator.
- Sarah earned the Icebreaker Award for her first speech.
- Best Evaluator and Best Table Topics Speech both went to Glen.
- Best Prepared Speech was awarded to Hari for his advanced speech.
Next Meeting
Our next regular meeting will be held on Monday, 11th November upstairs at The Clerk & Well pub, 156 Clerkenwell Road, EC1R 5DU.
Doors open at 6.30pm for a prompt 6.45pm start.
