Meeting #156 (9 September 2008)

What a turn out at our 156th meeting… only fifteen or so people, and our only guest for the evening, ‘ran away’ from the meeting after the break. Whoa! Speak about scaring people away…guys, you’ve got to be more approachable- less male bonding, more mixing with the guests.

So, for the first time in a very long, long time, our members had to play more than one role. It’s déjà vu for me…the last time we experienced this was in 2002 or 2003, when our club was at its infancy.

Anyhow, our members who attended made this meeting memorable. Marcus Chee was entertaining as the TME. Paul Tan was our Table Topics master.

We had a good number of volunteers for table topics.

After the break, we were entertained by 3 speakers…
James Chow with his ice breaker, “A Happy-Go-Lucky Guy”,
Sharon Siow, did his 3rd speech, “Change your mindset”,
Cindy Foong, did her 6th speech, “Saved by a Smile”.

The speeches were thoroughly entertaining and I learned a lesson or two from James, Sharon and Cindy.

We definitely got to know James better…though the youngest in the family, he’s a goal getter and determined to graduate with first class honors from UTAR. Bravo, James…as a man thinketh, so he becomes.

Sharon’s definitely improved from her previous speech…she’s speaking slower, so we, the listeners have time to ingest what has been said. The only constant in life is change. And we can only change ourselves, not others. Thank you for sharing your personal story with us.

I thoroughly enjoyed Cindy’s story about her mother’s (MK, it’s mother, not grandmother) saving grace, her smile. I really like her style of telling story…the eloquence of her words, the appropriate pauses, the weaving of a personal story…the ingredients of a good story. Kudos.

Our General Evaluator, was Alex Kwok, from Great Eastern TMc, a club we sponsored barely 2 years ago. He’s blossoming into a confident speaker and it was indeed refreshing and a privilege to have him give us constructive feedback, thank you.

We have missed many of you at this meeting. Yes, we know the jam’s horrendous this Puasa month. And no, that’s not a good excuse for missing the meeting. Leave the office earlier, take the LRT or car pool with other members…and we’ll See you at our next meeting this coming 23rd Sept 2008.

Cheers,
Huey yee