1 Malaysia

Malaysia recently celebrated its ‘1 Malaysia’ day on 16^th September, for those who still doesn’t know what is ‘1 Malaysia’ day other than just a mere holiday- here is a small intro “Malaysia Day is held on September 16 every year to commemorate the establishment of the Malaysian federation on the same date in 1963. It marked the joining together of Malaya, North Borneo, Sarawak, and Singapore to form Malaysia (Source: Wikipedia).

This is really incredible how people from different races and religions are so comfortable in this country, this is the reason that many people want to retire in Malaysia and want to make Malaysia as their second home, it’s very easy to find a proper blend of entire Asia here which is very rare in other Asian countries may be that’s why Malaysia is called Truly Asia.

Out Toastmasters is also the great example of this diversity is races and religions just like the country where we all different identities come together to make a group to help each other, we make friends who help other friends to succeed in life. Toastmasters never differentiate between people, a member is a member no matter where is he from or what religion or race he belongs to, we all speak one language – “Humanity” this program not only helps us grow in the fields of communication or leadership but also it helps us grow as a human being, it helps us learn new things, new culture. We celebrate Raya, we celebrate Christmas, We celebrate Chinese New Year and we also celebrate Diwali.
Every member is respected, given equal opportunities, in Toastmasters there is no superior or inferior thing, even a boss and subordinate are equal members, a DTM speaks the same way with a fresh TM as he speaks to the fellow DTM, everyone is ready to help everyone.

As they say, a country belongs to people or for that matter every organization is made up of people, without people nothing works, same way Toastmasters is nothing without its members and here in Money mastery we have that breed of members who is not only hard working but they are smart working and that is the reason that since 2003 we are always a president’s distinguished club and that is
the reason why new members are so encouraged and motivated to do better and better, they join the club because of the same. I would really like to appreciate and thank our members and mentors for their efforts. I would also like to highlight that even the new breed of members who joined recently are motivated so much that they are ready to take up any challenge, they are doing much more than what their role expects, they don’t hesitate to participate in contests and come out as winners. This mixture of both the breeds will definitely do wonders to our club. With this I would like to wish our club all success and luck for the next term and would also like to apologize if any of my comment has unintentionally hurt anybody's sentiments.

Signing off

Jitin Girdhar

1 Malaysia- Truly Asia

My Journey from breaking ice to Competent Communicator (9/3/10-22/2/11)

My journey began well before giving my first speech, my first step was not to prepare for the ice breaker but to decide to come out of my comfort zone and join the Toastmasters, attend all the meetings and participate whenever &wherever possible, I feel making up your mind is more important than executing your plans but at the same time it doesn't make this execution less important. I would like to thank the entire Money Mastery KL TM team; who always assisted me, inspired me, motivated me and made me capable of achieving this milestone.

I still very well remember my first planned speech. It was a very different feeling; I was nervous and confident at the same time. My hands were ice cold, I could hear my tummy making weird sounds (that happens when I m scared), I was allowed to use notes but still to avoid that I was memorizing my speech, the table topic session started but I was too busy to concentrate, I had a much bigger job, I had to remember my lines, my flow and yeah a strong ending with a strong quotation. I was so focused on the preparation of my speech that even a terrorist attack would not have distracted me. But that was wrong on my part, which I realized later. At toastmasters we give equal importance to listening as well and I was not completely listening to any speaker, I was just hearing what they were saying.

The moment came- we moved to planned speeches, my evaluator Paul Tan was asked to read out my speech objectives, then Lakhmichand (commonly known as Lucky) the GE was asked to read out Note to the Evaluator and then- “Can we call upon TM Jitin Girdhar for his first speech- “My life in my own words”- Jitin” (repeated twice). Well well well a complete darkness in front of me- my legs were paralyzed, with a firm handshake, I took control of the podium and started with my childhood, my parent and my family and I don’t know how the time passed and when the timer showed me the orange light which means it was the time for me to recollect the quotations I memorized. And it ended well in time 5 minutes 59 seconds. My hands were colder than before, fumbling and shaking I reached my seat. I was not sure what had I done and how good it was but when I received the best speech of the day award, I told myself- it was worth all these efforts, everybody liked that speech- well it was my own life and who else cud have narrated it better than me. The feelings were crystal clear and the knowledge of subject made me little confident, the efforts were well paid when Lucky (GE) in his concluding remarks said that this is the best example of the ice breaker speech and that we should use this as a sample for the new comers, and Gean Lau (then VPPR) asked me to frame the speech and publish in our newsletter (later which brought me into the editing team).

These awards were much bigger than the first prize in the international speech contest, I was so happy that immediately I decided that I am giving my next speech in the next meeting and then every meeting I kept learning and cruised along to my last speech. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank Paul Tan for giving me such a wonderful and a positive feedback which really encouraged me and inspired me to give speeches regularly.

I wanted to finish my last speech at the same venue so I had to rush with my last couple of speeches and yeah the day arrived- the last speech before getting CC. The situation was totally different, my confidence was really high; no sign of nervousness, no memorizing of the speech- just remembered the bullet points and the flow. The actual speech started much before when I had to select the speech title- it had to be the best, after all I had to Inspire the Audience (yeah the speech topic) - so what could have been better than the topic of peace, love and humanity after all it touches everybody’s heart so I decided on “Live and let live” and this time my evaluator was none other than the General Evaluator himself- Distinguished Toastmaster Rohijas. This time I was well prepared with the statistics, and had all the material to substantiate my thoughts, I touched the topic of mother nature- the global warming and I was sure I’ll be able to gather everybody’s attention, this confidence was the outcome of my long journey of 11 months and the efforts put in by myself and my entire team in MM KL TMC. And the milestone was achieved with grabbing another best speech award for that day. I was very satisfied with my performance; I could easily see the difference between my first and my last speech of CC.

I would once again like to thank each and everyone who has directly or indirectly participated in making me a better communicator. I would never be able to repay you for this but would promise each one of you that I will give my level best to bring a communicator out of every Toastmaster. My journey does not end here, it is just the end of the beginning, and I will come back even stronger and will reach the pinnacle in style, with confidence.

Signing off

Jitin Girdhar, a proud CC and a member of Money Mastery KL TMC

International Speech & Table Topics Contests 2011

This year, 11th January 2011 is a special day. It is written in short as "11-1-11" and in Money Mastery-KL Toastmasters Club, everyone wants to be "Number 1" because this day is the club's International Speech & Table Topics Contests for year 2011.

First of all, CONGRATULATIONS to our International Speech and Table Topics Contests WINNERS and runners-up at our club contests on 11-1-11.

INTERNATIONAL SPEECH CONTEST:
WINNER : KL Loh
1st Runner-up : MK Low
2nd Runner-up : Julia Leong

TABLE TOPICS CONTEST:
WINNER : Abd Aziz Youp
1st Runner-up : Paul Tan
2nd Runner-up : MK Low

So, KL Loh and MK Low will represent our club for the Area G1 International Speech Contest while Aziz Youp and Paul Tan will represent our club for the Area G1 Table Topics Contest. 2nd Runners-up, please be on standby in case they cannot make it to the Area G1 contests. I will let you all know the Area G1 contest’s date, time and venue once the Area G1 Governor confirm about it. Members, please go and support them when time comes.

Also, I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Honorable Chief Judge Lim Lay Kun, ACB, CL for helping us running part of the show as well and also make arrangement for getting the invisible judges. Also, thanks Francis and Yeo for making arrangement to get the Chief Judge for our contests.

I would also like to thank all the role players and contestants to help and participate to make this event successfully run.

Thanks Ken G and Gean Lau for the Contest Chair role. Both of you are outstanding even though there were some error and hiccup BUT of course all these are learning process. You learn while making mistake and you have gone through it. I sincerely thank you and congratulations to both of you.

Thanks Ginny, Cindy and Francis for the role of SAA. All of you are able to control the event and the contestants as well during the Table Topics Contest.

Thanks Yeo and Francis for the role of Time Keeper. Both of you are able to keep track the contestants’ timing and luckily there are no time disqualification.

Thanks Ben Hoe, Serena and Francis for the role of Ballot Counter. All of you should have lots of FUN and EXCITEMENT to know how the invisible judges judged the contestants. I believe you have learn a lot from this role. I did when I was the Ballot Counter last time and hope you did too.

Also thanks to KL Loh, MK Low, Julia, Jitin, Aziz, Paul, Daniel, Ken, Siew Yin and Stuart for taking their initiative to take part in the contests as Contestants. You all are already WINNERS because of your participations. Congratulations to ALL.

I hope I did not miss out anyone or any name here.

Lastly, I also want to thanks all the Money Mastery-KL Toastmasters Club members, for all your replies and responses whenever I call and SMS you all for your participation and role playing in these contests. Whether you can or cannot make it to the contests, I sincerely thanks all of you for your responses.

I hope you all have FUN in the contests and let us all support our members at the Area G1 contests and see you all there soon.

Thank you.

Regards,

Victor Wan, ACB, CL
Contests Organizing Chair,
VPE 2010/2011
Money Mastery-KL Toastmasters Club.
www.VictorWan.com

My Maiden Blog

Dear Friends…

Can’t believe, I am actually doing this. After planning for long time, I finally got courage and opportunity to write a blog- “The Blog” my Maiden Blog…. This is the fruit of joining Toastmasters. I would really like to thank one and all for all your support, encouragement, trust & confidence, and finally for providing me this platform & opportunity. This Blog is also the result of my speech in the last meeting (speech No. 6) titled “E for Efforts not Excuse” which self motivated me to stop giving excuses and finally write this blog as a part of my duty of being a VP Public Relations. So friends here I am with all my efforts and no Excuse (wink;)).

It was almost 2 months and I was due for my speech no. 6, I remember my last speech was delivered in the Humorous & Evaluation contest on 4th Sept organized by Hj. Naburi. And both myself and Paul Tan made MMKL TM club proud by meeting the expectations of all our supporters.
It was such a wonderful moment when they announced that both the champions are from Money Mastery KL toastmaster club and we would be representing the area G1 in the next contest…..

That was the last time I saw Hj Naburi that day, unfortunately I could not participate in that contest as I had my prior commitments and I was in my home country India for a long vacation with my friends and family

After I came back, it really broke my flow and I really got busy with work, I started giving all the excuses of not coming to the TM meetings but it was Victor’s dedication and persuasion that I finally planned to deliver my speech no. 6. It was not easy for me after this break and I was already planning all the excuses to avoid it. It was then when I remember this line which always helps me choosing the right path at the time of confusion. “E for efforts not excuse” and I realized there could not be better audience to present this topic. Well that was it; I was ready with my speech and reached the meeting room well in time.

It was really wonderful meeting all the Toastmasters after a long time, I was lucky, people still remembered me. There were few new members as well and couple of guest as usual. The session started well on time, thanks to our Time Keeper of the day Daniel. Throughout this blog, you will find lots of pictures clicked during the session on 9/11

After our president gave a motivating speech, it was time for the most awaited moment- Gean Lau- Our Gorgeous TME started the proceedings, Invocation session was handled very well by Victor which was followed by Table Topic Session conducted by Siew Yin and the topics were well connected with the theme of the day- Long Weekend (Deepawali), she got enough support from the volunteers. After Haji Hashim delivered his 2 minutes speech during this session, it really inspired me as well and I volunteered as the last table topic speaker of the day, the topic given to me was really close to my heart so I could get enough material to talk about, in my speech I also mentioned how Haji Hashim always inspire me and many like me.

I also cleared the doubt of Ginny who got to know from her aunt that in India you can’t choose your own spouse and after that she was happy to know that you are free to choose your own wife or husband to get married…. Well that was the end of very well conducted Table topic session which was followed by Humor Session. Haji Hashim volunteered to be the first one to start with a joke and from there onwards the flow went towards little dirty jokes (which was later pointed out by GE) but they sounded nice to us  Shiva Das and TM Chan Chee Keng also followed the suite.

Rest all sessions went very well too and the evaluation as usual was awesome, had real fun and we ended the meeting with celebrating the birthdays of November babies. In the end I made a comment which I would really like all of us to know. I was doing pretty good before my break and had completed my 5 project speeches and also one humorous contest speech but when I came back and delivered this speech no 6, I really felt I am back to square one, I felt the nervousness, I felt my voice was breaking,I felt I have moved down couple of steps back and have to put lot of extra efforts to come back to where I left last time, so I would advise all not to commit the same mistake I did, please be regular to the meetings don’t take a long break, keep practicing and there is lot to learn from our mentors there. This particular meeting boosted my confidence and I felt very energetic after the session. I am ready with my speech no. 7 for the next meeting. See you all there.



It was really wonderful writing my first blog, I really felt great and I m looking forward to write more and more blogs in near future, you all are also free to write your blogs and can post it here. If you guys really like this post then please post a comment.

Signing off….

Jitin Girdhar

Last night's Meeting..... (held on 24th Aug 2010)

Dear friends,

It's been a while (like 2-3 years!) since I last wrote a "last night's meeting..."

Last night's meeting was truly inspiring for me, to say the least. It also made me grateful for belonging to a club where the old and the new, the young and the old are in balance, like yin and yang. I knew more about our early days of independence last night.

KH Song was poised and organized as our TME, led us through the meeting nicely, kudos. Table topics session was fresh, the topics dished out by Victor Wan were general enough that the volunteers had ample room to share for 2mins.

Then, we had a ball with 3 wonderful speeches from Eunice Tan, Jitin and Julia Leong. You guys rocked, good sharing.
Eunice delivered her ice breaker, titled Hunger for Balance in Life. We got to know her a lot more. Hometown's Rawang, married, 3 kids, loves new age music and likes to travel. Her message, life's short, live it to the fullest.

Then, Jitin did his 5th project speech, An Idea can Change your Life. He never ceases to amaze me with his choice of things to speak about. An Idea is a fruit of our thinking. So, the next time an idea pops into your head, capture it, note it down. Do it everyday, you'll have 365 ideas by year end. And share it with people around you, fertilize them. You'll never know, you can be the next Bill Gates. *winks*

After that, Julia astounded us with her storytelling ability. She started her advanced storytelling manual with The Crystal Heart, a poignant Vietnamese folk tale. She had my attention the whole time, that's a thumbs up for you, Julia...it's been awhile since I listened attentively during our meetings.

Now, every GE who visits us always say nice things only. So, let me play the devil's advocate here...the meeting didn't start out well for me til we got to the speeches. The amount of grammatical errors I heard hurt my ears badly, no pun intended.

It's a really serious problem, guys. We really have to make a conscious effort to speak good English at club meetings, with good grammar, good enunciation. Not sure how many of you noticed, even our meeting agenda had an error... Malaysia celebrates its (there's no ' in its) independence.

So, perhaps for future improvement, here's some thoughts for future roleplayers:
1. President's speech can and should be uplifting, especially when we don't have invocation session.
2. Role players should prepare themselves, with a script, very necessary, especially if you speak beyond 2mins. It's annoying to hear grammatical errors in the simplest of things. eg, our young guest, Ian, corrected the table topics he was given tonight. I was truly embarrassed.
3. Future Grammarians, take note. It's recommended that we mention the person who gave us a good quote, phrase etc. Only the good stuff. No need to mention who said the bad stuff, be it grammatical error/ incorrect pronunciation (it's been mispronounced many times even after our dear friend, DTM Azmi graciously conducted a pronunciation/phonetics class with us, it's pronunciation, not pronounciation).
4. The word of the day should be related to the "Theme of day" and we should also try to use the positive and cheerful word to make the environment positive and cheerful.

Otherwise, kudos to our first time diligent ah counter, Daniel Schwartz (he counted ah in people who usually got none, cool) and timekeeper, Fui Lien (precise reporting).

Please save this date:
*Sat, 4th Sept. Area G1 Humorous Speech & Evaluation Contests. MCOBA Building, Penthouse on 4th Flr. Jln Syed Putra. You can see the building on Federal Highway, after Kuen Cheng school if you are coming from KL.

That's all my ramblings for now,
cheers,
huey yee

Money Mastery KL Toastmasters Club Quarterly Newsletter

As some of you have heard, our club has embarked on a journey to establish a club newsletter for Money Mastery KL Toastmasters Club. After months of hard work put in by the newsletter committee, along with the sweat and tears shed in the process, I'm proud to announce to you that our quarterly newsletter has been launched!

Our quarterly newsletter is dedicated to keeping members of Money Mastery-KL Toastmasters Club updated on latest happenings and events of the Club and the members. Inside you will find articles and personal stories contributed by our own members, updates on upcoming events, also the club's progress towards DCP goals.

To all of you who have not yet get and read our first issue of the
quarterly newsletter, you can download it in PDF format by going to the
website as below.

http://www.victorwan.com/248/money-mastery-kl-toastmasters-clubs-newsletter-issue-no-1/

You can also sign up for getting email alert when our next issue of
the newsletter published. Please follow the instructions given in the link
above.

We hope you would enjoy it! Please let us know if you have any comments or feedback - we promise we’ll listen carefully.



Yours truly,
Gean
VPPR 2009-2010

2009-2010 International Speech and Table Topics Contests

Yes, the contest season has started! It's a momentous event that some of us have been waiting for around the year. We, Money Mastery - KL Toastmasters Club, have had our 8th. International Speech and Table Topics Contests on 12th January 2010. It was an eventful and certainly an interesting night as the following contestants showcased their speeches in style.

International Speech Contest 2009-2010:

1st speaker Abu Bakar Ngah

2nd KL Loh

3rd MK Low

4th Paul Tan

Champion : MK Low

1st Runner Up : KL Loh

2nd Runner Up : Abu Bakar Ngah

Table Topics Contest 2009-2010:

1^st speaker Hj Hashim

2^nd SM Kok

3^rd Paul Tan

4^th Abd Aziz

5^th Abu Bakar Ngah

6^th Janice Ooi

7^th Abdulrahanman

8^th MK Low

9^th Hj Naburi

Champion: Abu Bakar Ngah
1st runner up: Abdulrahnaman
2nd runner up: Hj. Hashim


A big congratulations to MK Low, who won the International Speech Contest and Abu Bakar Ngah, who won the Table Topics Contest! The champions of these contests will represent our club to the Area W1 International Speech and Table Topics Contests scheduled on 25th March 2010.
Lets give our biggest support to our champions and all the best to both of them in the contests!