Written by Margarita
Introduction
On Monday, 10 April, Bloomsbury Speakers tried out a new venue – Horseshoe Pub for their regular meeting. It was a fun and inspiring night with many guests who actively participated in this meeting.
Roles
The meeting started with a welcome speech from Acting President Peter R. who told us how Bloomsbury Speakers helped him become a confident speaker and achieve success at work. He introduced Toastmaster Swarajit who stepped in for this role last minute and entertained us with fun the facts of club members’ doubles that he found on Bing. Swarajit introduced Timekeeper Barbara and Grammarian Julian.
Prepared speeches
The first speaker was Scott, in his Icebreaker speech he suggested that limitations are not always limiting and through sharing his personal experience of studying Spanish he inspired us to take advantage of limitations we have in life and use them to have more things done.
Olga was the second to speak. She gave the first speech of an Advanced manual “Speaking to Inform” entitled “London Markets”. In her fun and engaging speech she recommended us to visit three of her favourite street markets: Columbia Road flower market, Old Billingsgate fish market and Sunbury Antiques.
The third speech was given by Margarita. She also cracked on her Advanced manual and gave her first Storytelling speech entitled “The Happy Prince”. Margarita told us a touching story about a statue of a Prince and a little sparrow, who sacrificed their lives for helping others.
Then Stella, Sergeant at Arms for the night, introduced the guests.
Evaluations and Table Topics
After the break, we heard from the three evaluators – Pao-Sheng, Heleana and Rupert. Then Yamina, the Table Topics Master, took the floor. She structured her very philosophical and entertaining questions around the theme of sun. We heard from Peter F, Heleana, Gary, David, Julian, Pao-Sheng, Anko and Charlotte, who all gave impromptu speeches for up to two minutes. Atul evaluated each speaker afterwards.
Finally, our visiting General Evaluator, Kaveh evaluated our club and the meeting. Peter, the Acting President of Bloomsbury Speakers and VPE of the Club told the members more about his role and invited those who are interested to apply to join the Committee next year. If you would like to learn more about the Committee and/or are interested in joining it, please get in touch!
Then Peter wrapped up the evening by announcing the awards.
Awards
Best Speaker: Margarita
Best Evaluator: Heleana and Atul
Best Table Topic: Helena and Gary
There was also an extra award that the Club received that night: for PR and Social Media.
Next meeting
The next meeting will take place at The Horseshoe (24 Clerkenwell Close, EC1R 0AG), on Monday, 24 April, at 6.30pm. Looking forward to seeing you there!
Please get in touch at info@bloomsburyspeakers.org.uk if you have any questions!
