Synopsis for Chapter Meeting on 18 Feb 2011

Our SAA for the evening Bruce Pei, pointed out that the meeting day was actually the 15th day of the Lunar New Year and invited everyone to share the highlights of their CNY celebrations. One member actually had to work on the first day of CNY, most went visiting, some spent valuable time with family while others had restful days just watching TV, sleeping and even surfing!

Our Toastmaster-of-the-Evening Leena recommended the movie "The King's Speech". Club President Nik Chua drew a series of waves and used it to describe his life after he took on the role of Club President in July last year. He shared the highs and lows that he experienced and the valuable lesson he learnt is to enjoy the process.

VP(Membership) Ben Xu inducted our three new members Zhuang Yan, Eric Zhang and Merry. Their mentors Benjamin and Elaine joined them at the lectern to confirm their commitment to help them grow.

Joni presented a mini-workshop about the Toastmasters Program. She gave an overview of how the entire movement has a few clubs grouped as an area, areas grouped as divisions, divisions grouped as districts, all under the purview of Toastmasters International. Katong Toastmasters Club belongs to Area Z3, Division Z, District 80, which comprises Singapore and Thailand. She also explained how the communication and leadership tracks work, eventually leading to the highest recognition of DTM (Distinguished Toastmasters). "In Toastmasters, the learning never ends."

In Zhuang Yan's P1 speech "My Life", we found out that he was born in China but migrated to Singapore at the age of 7. He enjoys photography and shared two encounters of how his fear of public speaking brought about disappointing results. He concluded with the maxim: "Don't regret over things that have been done, but regret over things that have not been done."

2nd speaker Zhang Jun is from the city of Suzhou, which is a beautiful city renown for its stone bridges. He completed a business course and took on a sales job. He shared about the language problems he faced as a foreigner and how he is determined to keep improving despite others' judgements.

In his P3 speech "A is for Apple", Choon Liang started by asking what comes to our mind when we look at an apple. It turned out he was talking about the APPLE company and how Steve Jobs turned it around when it almost collapsed in 1997. He shared about the benefits of owning an Iphone and urged all of us to get out there to get an APPLE today.

1st evaluator Benjamin commented that the hallmark of a good speaker is vulnerability, which Zhuang Yan displayed and enabled him to connect with the audience. He also enjoyed his conclusive story with a powerful point.

Cynthia commended Eric for his strengths: clear structure, speaking without notes, sharing challenges about his life. She recommended that the speech be tightened, for example, spending less time talking about Suzhou and only to start speaking when he has reached the stage and faced the audience.

Ming Hwee was impressed with Choon Liang's use of an apple as a prop in his speech opening to lead into his topic. She suggested using powerpoint slides to share facts and figures in the speech and avoid having a call to action in the conclusion if the speech's objective was to inform.

Our Table Topics Master Cynthia offered us a mind-boggling range of choices in the form of envelops with headings like Personal Challenge, Geography, Politics, Chemistry and so on. Visitor Bensan says he would like his wife to throw away her old clothes so that she can make space for new ones to allow her to speak confidently. Merry responded that one family rule she would like to change is to be given the right to make decisions without having to consult him. Ben explains why living close to a dump is a good thing. Elaine suggested merger and acquisitions, and getting the whole family to join the club to turn Katong into a 100-member club. Bruce aspires to study hard to improve his use of the English language.

LE Joni Siah pointed out brickbats such as the use of Singlish "OK lah" and a forbidden 4-letter word "sh*t" and commended the use of rhymes in "legendary, revolutionary" and metaphors such as "ushered in a new wave of handphone innovations". For a full report, go to

http://katongtoastmasters.blogspot.com/2011/02/language-evaluation-18-feb-2011.html

Best Table Topics Speaker: Elaine Tan

Best Evaluator : Cynthia Zhai

Best Speaker : Yeo Choon Liang

Next event will be our club's International Speech & Table Topics Contests on 17 Mach 2011.

To view photos taken at this meeting, go to

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=327008&id=119437361797&saved