Wednesday 31 October 2007

Meeting - 20th October

The meeting commenced at 9.30am with Ashrel Goh taking the task of the Sergeant At Arms (SAA). After calling the meeting to order, he proceeded with his friendly address to all who were present. He introduced a few of the role players as usual, and the word of the day 'FLUMMOX' was being introduced by the Language Elevator, Claudia.

Ashrel Goh then handed over control to Madam President, Loo Shu Wei. She shared her experience being an emcee at the DESCO ball, and then closed her presidential address with a piece of advice she learned from the event.

Later, Shu Wei handed over the control to the Toastmaster of the Morning, Jean Ee. With full of enthusiasm, Jean Ee kicked off the day with the usual informative speech about the history of Toastmaster International, and then called upon the Table Topics Master, Chee Hoong to conduct the table topic sessions.

TOM - Jean Ee

Without hesitation, Chee Hoong encouraged guests to volunteer to accept his challenge.

Chee Hoong - Table Topics Master

Faisal Shahbuddin accepts the challenge and had fascinatingly delivered his “supermarket story” with regards to the title “Non-forgetable experience” given by the Table Topic Master.

Faisal

After Faisal ended his speech, Chee Hoong expressed a new title “Cats” which is then accepted by Ashrel Goh. His story was based on his impressions about his neighborhoods' cats in an action-oriented theme, filled with humor.

Asrel Goh

The cycle went on with Fong Wen's Table Topics title “Most Enjoyable Celebrations”. It was yet another attractive story of “Red-dates” and “Angpow” which was found during her Chinese New Year celebration.

Fong Wen

The 4th volunteer speaker, Shu Wei, had to talk about “Why did I change my Hairstyle”. She was excitedly talking about her hair curves visually on the board.

The last table topics speaker was Gajendren, who had intelligently presenting his speech title given by Shu Wei of “ Imagine You Were With Jean Ee & You Get Farted”.

Gajendran, bee-sy time keeper!

The time came for the table topics evaluator, John Lee, to express his opinion. John Lee confidently gave his constructive comments on each and every table topics speakers' performances. After that, Jean Ee returned to continue her role as the Toastmaster of the Morning and wrapped up the Table topics Session. She later brought everyone's attention to the assignment speeches, which were scheduled next.

John Lee

The 1st speech was entitled “Saladin, The Chivalrous Leader” by Faizal Shahbuddin who managed to inspire us about the history of the fallacticism of crusades. According to Faizal, Saladin emerged as a great military commander and leader, who became one of Islam's most notable medieval figures. One key point Faizal emphasized during his talk was the chivalrousness of the Saladin towards women and children.

Next was John Lee who presented his 8th Speech entitled “And They Shall Never Grow Old”. Despite the break down of the OHP Projector, John still managed to present his speech 'manually' showing off his transparency. His speech created a somber atmosphere, especially so with his descriptions of criminal acts to children such as in “Nurin's case”

20 minutes breaks was taken and the meeting re-commenced at 11.15 a.m.

Break time....catching up with mates!!

Meeting resumed.

Next is the 3rd assignment speaker by Fong Wen with her 9th speech titled “Donated drugs: Charity or Dumping”. A persuasive and yet educational speech of “ELLIE” presented by her.

I don't know which to look at, her eyes or her fingers? They seem to contradict, no?

Last but not least is a speech by Ashrel Goh with his contest speech “My Russian Stories”. This was followed by a session of open evaluation for everybody to comment on Ashrel's speech.

Next, Shu Wei evaluated Faisal on his speech. Hui Ven evaluated John and Fong Wen was evaluated by Ashrel Goh.

Our General Evaluator for the morning, Fong Wen called on all the assignment speakers' evaluators: Shu Wei, Hui Ven, and Ashrel Goh to pass on their advice and pointers to the speakers involved.

Fong Wen then gave her thoughts and her opinion on how the meeting was run in general.

Now she looks different again!

The time everyone was waiting for finally came when it was time for the prize-giving session.

First up was the Best Table Topic Speakers who went to Gajendran. The Best Assignment Speech Speaker Award went to Ashrel Goh and The Best Evaluator was Shu Wei.

RANDOM PICS..

The Conducive Toastmaster-ing environment


hmm...thinking aloud?


always busy with the timing device...

Now its the end of the timing service I presume =D

The meeting was adjourned.

Prepared by Choi Yuk


Friday 26 October 2007

27th of October Meeting

Fellow Toastmasters!


We'll be having a regular meeting tomorrow (27th of Oct) with truly fun 'table topics' and 'assignment speeches' sessions which you've witnessed before. The best part is, you'll be able to witness our Area W2 Evaluations Champion - John Lee in action and our Area W2 Humorous Champion - Ashrel before they compete in the Division W contest.

I strongly recommend those of you who are not familiar with the place (Wisma WIM) to join us in the morning, then we'll have a simple lunch, and head there together. If you've no transport, you might be able to squeeze into one of our cars depending on the space available =D.

Now back to business, we meet at 0930 ~1200 hours at the Department of Student Affairs, HELP University College Campus, Pusat Bandar Damansara, 50490 KL.

So let your Satur-day be a blast with these fun and enriching experience. Do drop me a note about future notices should there be any and I'll get back to you ASAP.

Cheers and regards,

Tse Han
VPPR
012-3882711

Thursday 25 October 2007

Becoming a Test Speaker

Dear readers,

Claudia has volunteered to share her experience in becoming a test speaker in an area contest. This is highly encouraged amongst TM members so that experiences like this can be made known to newer members in the future.
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24 of sept was a nerve wrecking day for me. :(
it was the area W5 district 51 humorous speech and evaluation contest.
well, i was the test speaker for the evaluation contest!
and i had quite an intense topic "Legalizing Prostitution"

Well, the contest took place at Securities Commission.
it gave the contest a very formal feel (which was even more intimidating)
I was hardly myself at the start of the contest.
was not really socialising as i was so worried of my speech.
It was the very first time i was going to give a speech at a venue other than HELP.
And most people present there were adults.i felt really intimidated.
Jean Ee's presence was a comfort though. (thanks a lot)

The humorous speech contest went well. it was funny though Ashrel's speech remains my absolute favourite!
The winner was Tan Heng Pang.
so good luck!

Thankfully there was a break before the evaluation contest
i was feverishly re-reading my speech
so unfortunately, my role was exposed! (as a test speaker, no one was supposed to know!)
haha, i could not help it. honestly!

my speech came and i was really nervous.
I kinda messed up the start. some parts were missing, some parts were restructured.
I told myself to relax
and i just focused on delivering the speech (forget body language or eye contact. Heck, i have to deliver the speech first!)
it got better from there onwards and i was gaining in confidence.
actually having guts to pause and see the audience reactions or giving ppl the stare
Jean ee really made me worried though! her eyebrows were way up into her forehead.

It was such a learning and humbling experience.
The evaluation contest went smoothly as well.
i was just so relieved that my speech was over.
I hope i did not dissapoint ppl.
i felt alot of pressure as HELP TOASTMASTERS CLUB has such a huge reputation
and i didn't want to destroy that.
and shu wei, i gave out alot of namecards!! heehee

and thus concludes my little review on my experience at securities commission.
cheers!

claudia

Friday 12 October 2007

Club Charter Anniversary: PART ONE - 6th Oct 2007

Blog post by Chee Hoong:

October 6th marked the official charter date of HELP University Toastmasters club and it was day to remember as members of the club celebrated the fourth birthday of the club with a Halloween themed meeting.

Before the meeting started, some members and guests were dressed up in their “unique” Halloween costume namely Ernest with his afro hair and green tie, Shu Wei with cat ears (which mistook for bunny ears) and Paul with a party hat (haha). Division W Governor DTM Azmi terrified many with his demon mask. A Halloween mood was put in place before the meeting started.


Before the meeting

Meeting commenced at 9.37 with a brief introduction of all the guests and members. Next on the agenda was the presidential address by Loo Shu Wei who thanked the guests for their support to the club.

ASAA Claudia, the Garden Fairy


During the introduction of guests and members


Toastmasters of the Morning, Shu Wei and Ernest

The much anticipated table topics session was then conducted in style. Each table topic speaker was to sell themselves based on traits given by other table topic speakers.

Table Topics Master Tse Han

The Table Topics participants

First table topic speaker Fan Chen Kiat gave a humorous approach to sell himself. John Lee appeared stunned to have someone describe him as humourous and muscular(:P). Gajendran used wit and humour to link his traits together. The first part of his speech captured my attention as he acted as if he was the hulk trying to destroy everything on sight when he described himself as mortifying. Su Pon probably had the most challenging time as someone mischievously stated that she had 22 tattoos hidden in secret parts of her body. She was very much composed and pulled through really well. The table topics evaluation came next and the evaluator was Jean Ee. She focused much of her evaluation on the speaker’s speech content.


Jean Ee as the Phantom of the Opera and the Master Demon General Evaluator


Ernest


Watching the Table Topics speakers


Fan


Gajendran



John


Chee Hoong


Table Topics Evaluator, Jean Ee

Table topics evaluation was followed by assignment speeches. The 1st assignment speaker of the day was Claudia Ting. Her speech titled what goes around, comes around, touched many. It was a speech of a touching anecdote to inspire us to help others in need.

GE reading out the notes to the assignment speech evaluator

Claudia
Next on the list was John Lee. His speech titled “The horrifying truth” horrified many with descriptions of criminal acts committed by past serial killers such as Ted Bundy. The speech was timely as it was given on the Halloween month.


John

The last assignment speech was given by Loo Shu Wei titled “the Roast”. It was a wedding speech specifically for the “bridegroom” Ashrel. It was entertaining and hilarious as Ashrel’s embarrassing moment of eating a mouthful of wasabi in a restaurant to impress a lady was told by Shu Wei. Ernest was momentarily transformed into a lady known as Ernestina throughout the speech.


Ashrel looking uncomfortable during the roast


Evaluator busy taking notes

Shu Wei
When the general evaluator DTM Azmi Sharin came forward for the general evaluation, he instructed members to give an eerie laugh to replace claps and cheers. It was extremely fun to have everyone laughing eerily at the same time. Ashrel Goh evaluated Claudia on her speech. Ernest Wong evaluated John on his speech and Azmi evaluated Shu Wei. Whenever everyone laughs in that eerie tone(muahaha) everyone cant help but burst into laughter.







After the evaluations, a short award presentation ceremony was held to highlight the achievements made by HELP university college toastmasters club. Many cheers to Ernest, Ashrel and Jean Ee for achieving the Competent Communicator(CC) title and Ernest and Tse Han for achieving the Competent Leader(CL) Title. The award is in the form of mini pins presented by Azmi.




The best assignment speaker award went to Shu Wei while best table topic speaker was John Lee and the best evaluator was Ashrel.



The meeting ended with the president’s closing address. It was indeed a memorable morning for our club to chair such an exciting meeting. Closer ties were forged through the meeting. Happy 4th birthday once again to HELP university College Toastmasters club!!
Random pictures:

I bet this picture was Ernest's idea.



Chin with the timing signals he made specially for the meeting =D

Chee Hoong



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