Money Mastery-KL Toastmasters Club (#8141): Meeting #256, Tue, 28 August 2012

The team was here at the Bangunan MCA, in PJ Selatan quite early for our 256th meeting on 28th August 2012. The food caterer of the day, CP Lau has changed to a new stall and the comment on the food was quite good.

Our spontaneous members were helping out in setting up the meeting room. They knew some of the members were not very well and have been "barring" them from taking heavy things. Thank you, caring members.

Our meeting started a little late. Our General Evaluator was late. Without further delaying the meeting, we started by our Assistant Sergeant-At-Arm (ASAA), Toastmaster Kyle Kuah calling for the meeting to order. It was our second meeting of the month, hence, the members read out the second 5 promises of Toastmasters.

The theme of the meeting was "Thriving to Success", created in conjunction with our National Day on 31st August, 2012. The word of the day was "Transform". All members mentioned about the theme of the meeting as well as the word of the day, expressed how much they would like to transform to be better and thriving to success.

The Toastmaster of Evening was Competent Communicator (CC), CP Lau. He started off the meeting by highlighting some of the successes of Toastmasters of District 51. Dr. John Lau is the first Malaysian elected as President of Toastmasters International for term 2012/2013. Our Toastmaster from Penang, Palaniappa Subramaniam was the 2nd place in the International Speech Contest, 2012.

Our Invocation presenter was Competent Communicator, Serena Kong. She used an incident of her car that has broken down to highlight how nice and beautiful to appreciate people that helped us by simply saying "Thank You". Thank you Serena for such meaningful point.

The humor master of the day was none other than our Toastmaster Mathew Philippose. His "funny" body language and tonality telling us the story of why people who jog with a funny movement has definitely brought a laughter to the members.

The meeting moved on to the very interesting session, the project speech session. We have 5 speeches lined up for the members.

Toastmaster Sunny Low has begun the session by delivering his Ice Breaker speech. Why does he use "Sunny" as his Christian name? He always believes that even it is storming now, it doesn't mean that you are not heading to sunshine destination. What a positive guy! He shared with us his study life in college, his experience of getting scholarship as well as how he won the B.Braun Innovation Award. You are great, Sunny! He was also one of the top 5 finalists of a contest hosted by Standard Chartered Bank. He concluded his speech by telling us a line, "Success is not a doorway, it is a staircase".

Toastmaster Kyle Kuah delivered his 4th speech of the Competent Communication Manual. He talked about "Friends". He preferred to have friends that are from different interest groups as this will allow his to learn more things and make his life more colorful. He shared with us one very unique quote to describe friendship, "A stranger stabs you in the front; a friend stab you in the back; a boyfriend stabs you in the heart, but best friends only poke each other with straws.".

Our 3rd speaker was none other than Toastmaster Mathew Philippose. This very experienced Toastmaster had shared some very exciting and scary travelling experiences. With his attractive pitch, rich vocal varieties as well as interesting body language, he caught everybody's attention to listen to his stories. It was so dangerous that his car was turned up-side-down in a road accident. Everybody was holding breath to listen to how he managed to catch his flight when he was locked in a toilet and the flight was to take off in 30 minutes time. Phew.....

One of our senior members, Competent Toastmaster (CTM), Competent Leader (CL) Alwin Chuah has delivered his first speech from the Speaking to Inform manual. Alwin taught us how to be a successful stock trader. After his speech, it was an eye-opener for some of us whom are novice in the stock market. We then knew what is penny stock and what are blue chips. His strategies and methods of "playing" shares were very useful for all of us.

Our last speaker was our President, Advanced Communicator Silver (ACS), Advanced Leader Bronze (ALB), Ken Chan. He delivered his second technical presentation on Multi-Million Ringgit Loan Proposal. He shared with us what are the criteria that the credit committee will look into in approving such big amount loan, such as disposal income, collateral value, borrower's repayment track record, borrower's equity etc. This was obviously a very interesting topic as there were overwhelming questions posted from the floor.

Due to some unforeseen circumstances our General Evaluator Competent Communicator, Advanced Leader Bronze, Mr. SK Lee, came late. He arrived while Alwin was delivering his speech. Members adjourned for a short break before the evaluation session commenced.


Folks are enjoying the refreshment

After the break, the meeting proceed to the Speech Evaluation session. Distinguished Toastmaster (DTM), Francis Ng was the evaluator for our ice breaker presenter. His vast experience in presentation has definitely given Sunny Low some very good learning tips for his next speech.

Kyle Kuah's speech was evaluated by EK Yeo, CC, CL. he has pointed out some of the good points delivered by Kyle and some areas for improvement. We look forward to Kyle's next speech and will see him improve from speech to speech.

Victor Wan, Advanced Communicator Bronze (ACB), ALB evaluated on Mathew's speech. Besides his very attractive presentation, Victor has advised Mathew to move with a purpose on the stage. Too much of movement while presenting may distract the audience. Noted with thanks, Victor.

Julia Leong, ACB, ALB evaluated on Alwin's speech. In general, Alwin's speech has met the objective of the speech as a speech to inform. However, from some of the suggestions that Alwin should look into the notebook for points instead of turning his body to the projector screen.

And, once again, Francis Ng, DTM evaluated on Ken's speech. With informative flip chart and points on the power point, it was commented that the speech was well delivered. The environment and scenario was predefined well so the audience was playing a role as the credit committee.

Mr. general Evaluator also provided his comments and constructive comments to speakers for their improvements. As our club's tradition, we have done a standing ovation to our Ice Breaker Sunny Low. Once again, well done, Sunny!