Happy Chinese New Year 2017

The festive times are always great for a reunion. Here, we got reunited for the 2^nd time in the month of January on 24^th, 2017. It was a lovely moment with a lovely theme- Chinese New Year, very relevant word of the day “Abundance”. We celebrated an abundance of prosperity and happiness together with club members and guests this evening. May your happiness and fortune be bountiful in the year of the Rooster. Happy Chinese New Year from us @ Money Mastery-KL Toastmasters Club.

We came early to fill out our tummy first before the meeting started. Here, I indicated the ASAA to begin the meeting at 7:15 pm. Guess why I, indicated? Hehehe.

@7:15pm: Our Assistant SAA ‘Carim’ called the meeting to order. Carim, is a new member but very enthusiastic. He made everything perfect on the part of the meeting arrangements and begun with “A Toastmaster’s promise” which is a ritual for the members to create a commitment from within us to get the best education from the Toastmasters educational program.

@7:18pm: Our Club president Competent Communicator, Ron Yeap, hopped on the stage to set the atmosphere warm and exciting to unleash the best speaking ability in all of us on this beautiful evening. In his welcome address, he welcomed the distinguished guests who came from outside of the Toastmasters and the other Toastmasters club. Also, he invited the Grammarian to introduce the word of the day “Abundance”.  Later, he invited members and guests to introduce themselves and encouraged, while introducing themselves use word of the day and theme of the day as much as possible. We did very well on that.

@7:40pm:The Toastmaster of The Evening ,Competent Communicator (CC), Advanced Leader Bronze (ALB) Mathew Philippose, briefed on the history of Toastmasters International and our club. He mentioned how TI (Toastmasters International) was founded and later inspired millions of people across the whole world to extend this Toastmasters family.  He also explained the benefits of the Toastmaster educational program in our professional career and personal life. He introduced the role player for this meeting in the sequence,Grammarian-CP Lau, ACB ALB, “Ah” counter-Sivadas, CC, Timer- Manish Jha, CC and the most important person of this evening, the General Evaluator -Victor Ong, ACB CL. All the role players introduced their roles and objectives for the evening. Here, everything was set to have an exciting evening. I’m sure, you want to know what’s next, right? Hehehe

@7:52pm: Invocation speaker, Distinguish Toastmaster (DTM) Ken Chan came up to begin the meeting with a motivational speech. His speech title “WATTS”. He did a really good job breaking the ice on inspiring everyone to enjoy the further speeches. 

@7:57pm: I saw our Table Topics™ master  Kelvin Chong ACB walking towards the stage. I also saw that he was holding some gift packet in his hand to give the gifts to the speakers. He was in a  traditional Chinese outfit. On this day, there were few other people including me in red color dress to support the theme of the day, Chinese New Year. Kelvin Chong explained the Table Topics™ purpose and the rules before all the Table Topics™  speeches. The purpose of Table Topics ™ session is to develop the speaking skills and thinking processes of a person simultaneously. 

These are the table topics™ speakers:
 1) Michael FG (from MIMPJ TMC), 2) Our guest (from INDIA)
  3) Ida (Our Guest) and 4) Ji Sheng  (our former member).

 

Ida, she came here with her colleague and they came to see our meeting in the presence of Division C Director K M Srinivas and Club growth Division C director Michael FG before they charter a new club in their own company. Congratulations to all of you.

@8:09pm:This was the time to listen some prepared speeches where speakers spent a lot of time to prepare their speeches. This session was for 27 mins. Indeed it was extremely interesting listening to them.

1^stSpeaker- Joel Silas, Speech Title- Friends and his speech evaluator was Serena Kong, ACB.

Joel was doing his 3^rd speech “Get to the Point” from competent communication manual. So far, he has done really nice speeches and growing with great enthusiasm. Today he came up with an interesting story from his experience. He described friends to be in three categories.

       1. Friends for a reason 2. Friends for a season and 3. Friends for a lifetime. 

Be careful and enjoy all the three types of friends in life but never give a 2^nd thought about a friend for a lifetime.

2^nd speaker- Yap Ooi Yee, Speech Title-My 1^st Wall Climbing experience and her speech evaluator was DTM, Hj. Hashim Adnan.

Ooi Yee was doing her 5^th speech from competent communication manual “Your body Speaks”. Her speech really teaches us all a lesson, Never Give Up. After all, once she decided to do a wall climbing experience with her husband. She climbed the wall and she won, however her husband reached first at the top. She won his heart. That’s the beautiful part of life, winning hearts. She showed all the body movements which require climbing a wall. We got some awesome tips.

3^rd Speaker Foo Fung Jiun, Speech Title- First Time Property Investment and his speech evaluator was DTM, Dr. Thilla Chelliah.

Fung Jiun- He was doing his speech #7 from the Competent Communication Manual “Research your Topic”.  During his presentation, it was not just about his data from various sources. Also, he tried to bring our attention to the areas in KL, MY where there is low cost and high cost properties to invest in. This is called educate with fun. Good Job, Fung Jiun.

“The early you start investing, the early you will get the return”.

@8:36pm: This was the time for break + Lau Sang

@9:01: General Evaluator, Advanced Communicator Bronze, Competent Leader, Victor Ong was walking towards the stage to conduct the evaluation session. He led the session with his panel of evaluators. He begun by explaining the purpose of the evaluation followed by evaluation from all the four evaluators, role players’ reports and his general evaluation. Evaluation is the breakfast for the champions because a constructive and specific evaluation really matters to improve speakers and make them better in future than yesterday.

@9:39pm: Club president was called on the stage by the Toastmasters of The Evening to do the presidential closing address. He first thanked the TME who handled the meeting so well then awarded the best speakers for the evening.
Best Table Topics™ Speaker- Michael FG from MIMPG TMC,
Best Assignment Speech on this evening - Yap, Ooi Yee.  
Best Evaluation - Hj. Hashim Adnan, DTM and 
Also a Token of appreciation to the GE- Victor Ong, ACB CL

Finally, Mr. President, Ron Yeap, CC, summarized the entire meeting and asked the guests to share their thoughts about our today’s meeting.

Eventually at 9:45 pm: Mr. President waved his hand towards the audience and adjourned the meeting saying, good night, safe journey home, Happy Chinese New Year and happy holidays to you all. See you all in our next meeting on 14^th Feb. 2017 which is Valentine’s Day.

Sincerely, 

Thanks to the Team,

Manish Jha, CC

Money Mastery –KL Toastmasters Club

Vice President Public Relations 2016/2017

P/S: 
I, Thank the whole team including editor, reviewer and critics to provide your sincere support and feedback to grow healthier and better.

International Speech & Table Topics Contests @ 2017-01-10

    Happy New Year 2017!!!

Today was the first meeting of the year 2017. It was great to see members getting together in the New Year. In addition to that, on this day is our clubs big event. It is our clubs International Speech & Table Topics™ Contests 2016/17. Wow, first meeting is a challenging day for the participants and the organizing committee.  We have a good crowd of both members and guests!  I should say is a good start in 2017!!

6:15pm

Some contest committee members had arrived early to prepare for the contest arrangements. There are many details that has been looked into to have a setting for a contest atmosphere and also refreshment arrangements. The committee was busy to make sure everything's in order so that contest runs smoothly later.  Well some guests and members have already started arriving as early as 6:15pm . Also being early gives you the opportunity to enjoy a friendly atmosphere with people having a lovely chat and meeting new friends and at the same time enjoy the refreshments of the day. It was a lovely moment to treasure.

Contestants also arrive early to receive the briefing by the Contest Toastmasters Competent Communicator (CC) Manish Jha, and by our Advance Communicator Bronze (ACB), Advance Leader Bronze (ALB) CP Lau.  It is the contest  procedure that the both the contest toastmasters  for the International Speech Contest (IS) and Table Topics (TT)  have to provide briefing on the procedure and rules of the contests respectively.  There were also some contestants who took part in both IS and TT contests therefore the briefing is held one after another. During the briefing there is a draw by which the contestants pick their names to determine their speaking order at the contest. 

 Once the speaking order is confirmed, our Sergeant At Arms (SAA) Chee Chiao Hui would immediately update the speaking sequence on the contest slide which is projected on the screen.  The ballot counters, timers and judges is simultaneously briefed by the Chief Judge Eddie Tan, CC in another place called the “holding room”.

7:32pm
Competent Leader (CL) Jerry Wong, who played the lead role as a chairperson called the meeting to order.  Jerry Wong, is a member of PJ Toastmasters Club, I should say, he is a humorous person thus has he addressed the audience it lit up a lively atmosphere.  He gave the house rules and without wasting much time passed the control to the Contest Chair  Chitirra Amithalingam.  Chitirra welcomed the audience with a brief Opening Address.

7:42pm

Soon after the opening address the contest chair Chitira, invited the Contest Toastmaster Manish Kumar Jha, CC for International Speech contest. He briefed everyone on the contest rules and introduced the contestants in their order. There were a total of five contestants.  I could sense the tempo of hearts beating as each waited their turn to speak.  So the contest started with the first speaker taking the stage.

KL Loh – Durian Days and Friday Rendezvous

This was the first time I saw KL Loh giving speech, since I joined MM-KL in the end of 2015.  I had always known him as a good speech evaluator.  I should say he is a good humorous speaker, he shared how we can choose a good durian.  He actually brought the knife that is used to split the durian skin. As he demonstrated on choosing durians he shared also about the good friends he made and how they used to share a good time over a durian party. He attributed choosing durians to smelling, shaking, and hearing the seeds move inside.   He likened choosing good friends as choosing good durians, we cannot judge by just the outlook. We need to mix well with good fellowship to know who is a true friend.

Kevin Khoo – The Black Dot

Kevin started by showing a white paper with a black dot in center, and asked the audience what they saw. He took a vote of how many saw the black dot and how many saw the white paper.  His speech was informative and captivated the audience to think how they saw life. Is the small black dot in life magnified compared to the positive things white part that surround one's life?  A challenging and a motivational speech to the power of positive thinking.

Ken Chan – Blood, Sweat, Tears

Ken, a seasoned speaker in the club meetings, as usual he connected to the audience by throwing a few questions. As the audience responded, he shared his story and advised the audience not to give up even though while facing many failures at times. A moving speech of his experiences of childhood, youth and adulthood, how life’s blood Sweat and tears able to lift moments of failure to guaranteed success.  He also concluded with a question, “Are you ready to bleed, sweat and tear?”  And guess what the audience would have replied, they said YES.

Kelvin Chong – Nothing Left but Money

Kelvin captivated the audience with a song: “…. Money, money, money.  Must be funny. In the rich man’s world….”.  Haha, he enjoyed to sing on the stage. He asked audiences who can we call, if we facing problem.  He drawn the attention of everyone, he brought out the story of how people come to him when they needed help. It was a time when he was holding a position in the government sector.  When people do not need him the same friends had disappeared.  Money is important but he echoed that we cannot forget friends when we find money.  He said if less money one can raise a humble child, on the contrary if too much money can also lead to problems. At the end of the day we need money so we must save money…..Haha  

Mathew Philippose – Magic Words

Mathew shared with us the 4 magical or golden words which can bring a big impact in our life. Here, they are “Sorry”,“Forgive me”,“Thank you”, and “I love you”. He also shared with us how he used the 4 words in his life, which worked and still working awesome. Later, his speech made him champion this evening.

8:38pm

After the 5 attractive speeches, it was time to have a 10-min break and some quick bite. While Chief Judge Eddie Tan, CC and his panel team were required to finalize the IS contest results. During the break time, SAA Jerry has alerted all of us with the timing and called up the contest to order after 10 mins sharply. Some audiences and contestants were still enjoying the ‘NasiLemak’. Hahaa…they have to finish their food and back to seat as soon as possible. Jerry invited Table Topics™ Contest Toastmaster, CP Lau, ACB, ALB to take over the control of the TT Contest session.

8:49pm

Same as previous session, CP Lau briefed the outline of contest rules and introduced the contestants and their order of speaking. The difference was, CP invited Chief Judge Eddie Tan went on stage and picked one topic from three of prepared topics. The selected topic would be the one who was going to be presented by all the TT contestants.

Title: If you are given a 2^nd chance

Julia

Julia shared with us how she satisfied and happy with her life, In family as well as in career now. Instead, she returned the question back to audiences why she need 2^nd chance. She even stated that we must do well in the first chance, so that we don’t need the 2^nd chance.

Mathew Philippose

Mathew commented he is currently living his second chance of his life. After a massive heart attack he was resurrected a few years later.

Kelvin Chong

Begin with a statement “If I’m given 2^nd chance, I won’t join politics. He shared with us how he be respected by others when he is still holding the position in government agency. But once he quits, many ‘friends’ disappear. He said it is not easy to start again after the loss of power. So, if he has the 2^nd chance, he will like to do his own business. He comments that, as of now, the best way to earn in Malaysia is running business.

Joel

Joel is a new member in MM-KL, still a student, but his courage to participate in Table Topics™ contest is really a good very appreciable attempt. He started his topic by saying ‘Joining Toastmasters Club is his 2^nd chance’. Then following by mentioning himself is a bad guy and sharing with us the loss of his friend caused him realizes the importance of life and he need to do something to correct his bad attitude

Vijay kumar

Vijay said, he has done many mistakes before. If he has the 2^nd chance, he will be a better son and better brother. He will study harder and save more money. Besides, he will do something just on relationship. In the end, he ended his thought by reminding audience that, there is no 2^nd chance. So, when the first chance comes, let’s seize the chance immediately.

Ken Chan

Ken gave us some examples on relationship and job opportunity. He highlighted that: “There is no 2^nd chance, but we can do something by not giving up”.To be initiative, he suggests if we miss the first chance then we should look for the 2^nd chance ourselves!

Kevin Khoo

Kevin Khoo, surprised us by saying he will like to be a female if he has the 2^nd chance. He asked audience whether notice of his good elements that should be in a female. Haha…For example, thick and black hair, fair and smooth skin, young look even in his 30s. But he dislikes the young look at this age which is not convenient for his life and career, when people treat him like a cute kid.

9:23pm

Finally, the Table Topics contest came to an end. There was 2 minutes of silence for the judges to complete marking their ballot. After that Chief Judge and the ballot counters went to the holding room to finalize the result. Meanwhile, in order to continue enlightening the audiences and release the tension from contestants, Jerry conducted an interview session with the contestants.

Afterwards, Contest Toastmasters presented a token of participation to all the contestants. Contest Chair Chitirra presents token of appreciation to Chief Judge and his team, and also to all the role players.

This was the time to disclose the result! Chief Judge, are you ready? Chief Judge replied confidently and walked to the stage steadily, then passed the sealed envelope to Table Topics™ contest Toastmaster CP Lau, ACB ALB and Manish Jha, CC respectively to announce the results. President, Ron Yeap, CC was called on stage to give the awards to the winners. Here, are the results!!

2016/2017 Table Topics™ Contest Results

3^rdplace → Julia Leong, ACB ALB, 

2^nd place → Kevin Khoo, CC and

 1^st place → Ken Chan, DTM

2016/2017 International Speech Contest Results

3^rd place →KL Loh, ATMG, 

2^nd place → Kevin Khoo, CC and 

1^st place → Mathew Phillipose, CC ALB

Congratulation to all the winners!!! The 1^st and 2^nd place winners will represent the club in the area contests.

For contestants who could come under top three, don’t give up, you may be the next winner. Your courage and efforts will work for you. A big thumps up to you guys.

9:57pm

At last, Mr. President Ron Yeap was called to do his presidential closing address and presented the token of appreciation to our Contest Chair, Toastmaster Chitirra. Then he led us to the photo session. As usual, since this was the first ‘meeting’ of the month, we were having a cake cutting session for the January’s born babies.

In conclusion, organizing a contest is not an easy task as there are a lot of things need to be prepared and communicated beforehand. It needs co-operation and commitment from person in charge and participation from members, needs advice and guidance from senior members or president. Moreover, it may have some ad-hoc changes or issues happen in the last few days. It really tests the committee’s patience. Let’s congratulate to Chitirra and her team for successfully conducting the contests.

I sincerely thank to all the role players, Chief Judge and his team, ballot counters, timers, photographer, SAA, audience and contestants. Without all of them, the contests would not have been organized successfully. That’s all from our 1^st meeting of the year 2017.

See you again in our next meeting !!!

Sincerely, 

Thanks to the Team,

Manish Jha, CC

Money Mastery –KL Toastmasters Club

Vice President Public Relations 2016/2017

P/S: 
Thank you so much "Yap, Ooi Yee" to write this wonderful blog. I also thank the whole team including editor, reviewer and critics to provide your sincere support and feedback to keep up the good work.

My 2016

It was an exhilarating evening as we attended the last Toastmasters meeting of the year organized by our club even though it was at 13 Dec, 2016. The Toastmaster of the Day had come out with a very reflective theme for the meeting, “My 2016”, which kept every one of us thinking and reflecting our goals set at the beginning of the year and the result as at that moment.

As usual, our Assistant Sergeant-At-Arms, a new member of our club, Toastmaster Chiao (Chee Chiao Hui) had called the meeting to order and led us to recite the Toastmasters Promise, a standard proceeding of our club meeting, reminding us, as Toastmasters.

Our President, Ron Yeap, CC, acknowledged our guest of honour, the General Evaluator of the meeting, Rohijas Md Sharif, DTM. He began his presidential opening speech with the theme, “My 2016”. He appreciated the supports given by the members when he stepped up & took the role as the Club President. As a report card of the first 6 month’s performance, he was pleased to announce that Money Mastery-KL Toastmasters Club had achieved Select Distinguished status as the club achieved 6 upon 10 DCP (Distinguished Club Program) goals. A big round of applause for our beloved club!

Ron had also encouraged everyone to have a well-planned 2017 and a great year ahead!

Another brave new member of our club, Toastmaster Joel, took up the most important role of the meeting, the Toastmaster of the Day. Salute and bravo Joel! Keep up the good work, and continue to take up opportunities when offered. We will never be the best, but we will continue to be better.

Joel brought us through briefly the agenda of our meeting and invited the role players to brief their responsibilities in the meeting. We have the following role players for the day:-

1.  Grammarian – Ron Yeap, CC 2. Carim – Ah Counter and 3. Wendy Sim – Timer

We had many “first” in our meeting that evening. Our one month old member, Carim, bravely took up the role as our Ah Counter of the meeting. A big hand to you, Carim!

As the first timer being the Toastmaster of the Day, Joel had done a great job. We certainly hope that this gave him a boost in his confidence in taking up other responsibility for the club in time to come. Well done Joel!

Meeting moved on to the most exciting session that was our Table Topics™ session, which was led by Toastmaster Yap Ooi Yee. Her topics selection was in accordance to the theme of the meeting. Ooi Yee had provided the “what-if” questions to our table topics speakers to share with us their well doings in the year of 2016 and plans of the year of 2017. Table Topics™ Speakers are as followed. We witnessed more than  50% senior Toastmasters in Table Topics™ .

Our visiting guest, Victor Ong, DTM, had won the Best Table Topics Speaker award! In his speech, he had also mentioned that he had completed and delivered his 500^th speech in his Toastmaster journey. It was truly inspiring and encouraging! You are definitely a role model for all Toastmasters!

The excitement of our meeting continued when we moved on to the assigned speech session.

Our seasoned speaker of our club, Ken Chan, DTM, started this very exciting session. He delivered his 9^th ice breaker speech in front of us. A remarkable record of our club as he has completed his Competent Communication manual for 8 times! This marvelous record has inspired our members, especially our new members wanting to try on delivering project speeches.

Ken had demonstrated a well organised speech, introducing himself to us, with injection of humour in his speech. His evaluator, KL Loh, ATMG had pointed out these good points of the speech for us to learn.

Toastmaster Chitirra has delivered her 3^rd speech from the Competent Communication manual. In her speech, she taught us how to bake a cake, a Christmas cake. It was a brilliantly designed speech. Chitirra has made it in such a way that, each of the baking step was accompanied by an inspirational quote. Each of the baking step is a life learning step for the audience to take home. She concluded her speech by inviting us to try the cake that she baked for us! Thank you so much, Chitirra! You deserved to win the Best Assigned Speech award! Keep up the good job, keep up the good quality!

Our next speaker was our good looking member, Toastmaster Cheng Seng San. Oops! I must address him as Competent Communicator by now. He delivered his final, inspiring speech from the Competent Communication manual.

Seng San talked about love and gratitude. It was truly a touching story. We could see that Seng San was emotional at a stage of his speech. We felt you, Seng San. We were glad that you and your lovely family have managed to pass that very difficult moment and moved on with loving life. It was love and gratitude that kept you going. We wish you (and every one) continue to practice these 2 important elements of living life, LOVE and GRATITUDE. And, continue to inspire us in your coming advanced speeches! Thank you Cheng Seng San!

Our final speaker of the meeting, our final speaker of the year, was none other than our Immediate Past President, Mathew Philippose, CC, ALB. He delivered his advanced speech from the Specialty Speeches manual. It was an impromptu speech where his evaluator, Victor Ong, DTM, selected a topic for him.

Mathew’s given topic was to deliver a speech in a eulogize of his friend. He had high respect for this friend of his. He told us about the greatness of his friend. It is definitely a lost for his friend’s family as well as for Mathew.

A 10 minutes break was well spent over delicious food and laughter amongst members and guests. The “talking” did not stop after the meeting, it continued over the break session.

Induction Session by our VPM, Wendy Sim.

When we came back from the break,Vice President Membership, Wendy Sim took over the floor immediately. It was the new members induction ceremony for our newly joined members - Chee Chiao Hui and Carim. Mentors were assigned to assist them in their toastmasters' journey.

A) Mentor Kelvin Chong, ACB - Mentee Chee Chiao Hui

B) Mentor Mathew P. CC, ALB- Mentee Carim

 After that, we came to other highlight of the night. Our General Evaluator, Rohijas Md Sharif, DTM, led us in the last session of the meeting, i.e. the Evaluation Session.

The panel of evaluators were as follows:-

1. Table Topics Evaluation – Manish Jha, CC.

2.   Evaluation for Ken – KL Loh, ATMG.

3. Evaluation for Chitirra – CP Lau, ACB, ALB.
4. Evaluation for Cheng Seng San – Serena Kong, ACB.

All our evaluators had carried out their roles diligently.  They had provided their in-depth view on each and every speech, highlighted how well the speech was delivered, the areas for us to pay attention. Not only that, they had also provided their constructive suggestions in terms of the areas of improvement, hoping to help the speakers to deliver better speeches in the near future. Thanks to all speech evaluators, for demonstrating high listening skills, for rending sincere opinions. All of you deserve a big round of applause from the audience.

The meeting was called to adjourn by our Club President, Ron Yeap’s closing address, followed by the happy group photo and the singing of birthday song for our December birthday baby, Victor Wan, ACS, ALB even though he was absent! Happy Birthday to You, Victor!

Last but not least, our next meeting on 10 Jan, 2017, is our Club’s International Speech and Table Topics Contests. See you there!

Sincerely, 

Thanks to the Team,

Manish Jha, CC

Money Mastery –KL Toastmasters Club

Vice President Public Relations 2016/2017

P/S:
Thank you so much "CP Lau, ACB ALB" to write this wonderful blog. I also thank the whole team including editor, reviewer and critics to provide your sincere support and feedback to keep up the good work.

§  

Never Give Up

It is about 145 days since President Ron Yeap took office,to be exact the date 22^nd November 2016 is the club’s 369^th meeting since inception of the club. As up to this day every meeting as being going on as scheduled. It has been much fun and enthusiasm at every meeting. I should say every meeting had a different facet of the diamond.  If you missed a meeting it was as good as you missed a part of the life of the club. The new man at helm with his team made the club take a new dimension.

On this special day, I was approached by the President and he said “Mathew, can you be the General Evaluator of the day”. I, without a second thought replied “Yes Sir, I will do it”.  This position is normally given to person who is well learned in Toastmasters activity and from another club. In toastmasters we take a promise, “To serve my club when called upon to do so”.  This promise is one of the promises we take as an oath before each of our club meetings. 

What is my role as a General Evaluator is to assess the club for the entire meeting right from the start.  In my heart, I felt very emotional, as I was the Past president of this club and today my task to evaluate a single meeting and give feedback.  As a General Evaluator, I have to highlight what is good or what went right and areas that need improvement to suggest something that will encourage and motivate the club.  A general Evaluator is helped by key role players who check the timing, the words we use and if there are any speech crutches also there are speech evaluators who help to evaluate a speech. My role is appreciate these evaluators how well they have done their roles and suggest if there are ways we can further help for the club to learn and grow.

As our Timer Wendy Sim reported our meeting started on time and all speakers and speeches went on time.  The timer has 3 lights she used to guide the meeting green, yellow and red. Yes it looks like traffic light color. Some of us may get caught up with our speeches or our sharing so timer’s role, keeps us back on track so that our meetings as much as possible starts and finishes on time.

Actually, is easy to speak, however it is difficult not have speech crutches like “ah”, “eh” “hmmm” or repeat words like “ also”, also”, “I see” I see”,  “ you know”, “you know” .  The specialist to check this is called the Ah Counter.  This time the Ah counter was competent Communicator Vijay kumar. He carefully noted our speech crutches, can one imagine he even manged to detect a person with 39 speech crutches. Well, many of us start of like that. I remember hearing one of speech champion Distinguished Toastmaster  Justin Ong he shared that when he started he had more than 50 speech crutches.

Our Grammarian for the Day Chitirra, her role is another tedious one, she makes sure that we use the correct grammar, pronunciations and did we manage to use the Word of the Day in our speeches or in our sharing.  During the President address, she was asked to introduce the Word of Day and the meaning of the Word. She said the Word of the Day was “Laconic” sometimes a word like this is difficult to pronounce so in the meeting we get “a hands on” practice.  So our Grammarian will highlight the one who successfully used the most number.  I should say Chitirra was quick to observe the good phrases, misused phrases, good sentences structures and the how a wrong sentence can be corrected. A Grammarian is not necessary an expert in the language. This role helps us in the skill of hearing which is similar like the Ah counter. A Grammarian as she hears  the English language is able to learn and appreciate the language better.   

We had four speech evaluators on this day, Advance Toastmaster Gold (ATMG)KL Loh is a very senior member of the club he evaluated Mandy Chan a new comer to the club. She was only doing her second speech. I say she need a lot of encouragement to continue the journey in toastmasters in giving speeches.  KL Loh, ATMG, pointed out the strength this shy looking lass had. It was her second speech she manged to speak for the time allotted with our looking at notes, “Bravo’.    

When she was introduced with her speech title, all was thinking what was “YOLO”, she gave a personal story and explained "YOLO", You Only Live On Earth Once. It’s amazing, how she made the speech interesting. Our seasoned evaluator KL Loh ATMG gave tips to improve her speech who maybe a prospective speech Champion.

  

Our next evaluator Competent Toastmaster, Competent Leader (CTM, CL) Tan Ben Hoe  is another senior yet dedicated Toastmasters.  He evaluated Cheng San San for his 9^th speech in the Competent Communication Series.  His speech title looked strange “Bursa PETS channel”. Kept most of us wondering is it all about pets.  Cheng San is an expert in stock exchange and he pointed out through graph and charts how if have knowledge we can gain much through stock exchange. He had a power point presentation to bring his point clearer. As Ben Hoe CTM CL applauded him on his topic he was quick to give him tips how he can use all what he learned in his earlier speech topics to make his speech look much more rewarding. Surely, Cheng can use this tip and give a great finale for this 10^th Speech.  As the saying goes “Rome is not build in a day”.  As Cheng San keep speaking he not only attain his Competent Communicator status but he will be admirable speaker.  

Our President Ron Yeap was the next evaluator and we imagine who he as evaluating, it was May Ong CC, ALB. She is one of the area directors(AD). She had a unique speech title HOLD. She was inspiring us to continue our Toastmasters journey by repeating what we taught we are good in so we can be better. In his evaluation, Ron Yeap CC, admired her courage and the same time he added that such a persuasive speech like hers may have added more value with a more persuasive speech title.  His other examples for a good speech, I am sure added value to the AD May Ong and to the rest of the audience.  

Our Final evaluator is Advanced Competent Communicator Bronze, Advance Leader Bronze (ACB, ALB) CP Lau. This evaluator that has smile that can influence anyone to smile is one of our Past Presidents of our club.  He has participated in number of speech and evaluation contest. He had the privilege of evaluating our long standing member Advance Competent Bronze Kelvin Chong.  Kelvin was giving his speeches based on the Advance Communication Manual. All of us know Kelvin Chong as a very humorous man.  He has usual made us laugh as we enjoyed his speech. The evaluator CP Lau ACB, ALB in appreciating the speech gave finer points of how his speech, “Resources for living”, could be more meaningful if it can fulfil more of the speech objective in his speech topic “Speaking to inform”.  The nuggets that CP Lau shared was rewarding not only to the speaker but to all.  I should say as all the evaluations summed up may have made the club gain a new height in excellence.

As General Evaluator, I take all the points given by my support group to acknowledge the strength of the club and areas of improvement.  There are two important people who made the meeting successful, it was Sergeant At Arms (SAA),  Wenny Loh and the Toastmaster of the Evening (TME) Kevin Khoo.  SAA Wenny put the meeting in order by highlighting the house rules when the meeting began and she led all in reciting the in toastmasters promise, It may look like a small task. She is instrumental for meeting to be on time even after a refreshment break in between.  Our TME Kevin, actually helped to run the meeting according to the agenda. He had good gestures and high motivation spirit that kept the meeting lively.  Actually, he being the Vice President of Education, had been working on the success of this meeting more than a week of the meeting.  As he rolls out the meeting he was prompt in all his introduction.

TME Kevin Khoo CC, took special care of our guest Carim, as he introduced the history of Toastmasters and what one can benefit from joining it.   In any toastmasters meeting a session that gives inspiration to all is table topics.  He introduces the table Topic Master EK Yeo, CC, CL. He hand over the command of the meeting to him which is normally done by a handshake. As Table Topic Master took over he explains the session and encourages the audience to participate in the impromptu speaking. 

We had four speakers, the first speaker KL Loh had a topic “In order to succeed you must first believe”, and without wasting anytime, very fluently this seasoned speaker spoke of memorable event of fulfilling his dream at the age of 50years by climbing Mount Kinabalu. He used the word of the Day “Laconic" as he captivated the audience. He was followed by Wenny Loh, this pint size girl , with a slow and steady space answered to the topic given to her “ It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do”. She repeated the title to all to hear clearly and she said how she overcome the fear of the future.  She quoted the theme of the day “Never Give Up” which was introduced by the President Ron in the beginning of the meeting.  Wenny said, “Even when she need to let go she will never give up”.  Can you imagine how bold this girl is although small in size?  

The first two speeches inspired our guest “ Carim” and he decided to take part. He came up and repeated his title, ‘The best preparation for tomorrow is doing the best today’. When the Toastmaster gave the title and he repeated, it was in the mind of all that he is prospective toastmaster who has the style of speaking like a toastmaster. Well, for sure he signed up as a member at the end of the meeting.  I say for first timer He spoke well. Our final speaker was Manish, He is a bubbly man, when given the title “it always seem impossible until it’s done. It hit his adrenalin gland, Manish cannot sit still, and he is an achiever. As usual he attract response by asking the audience question, using this gesture as a pivot he sums up his speech. Yes, he uses the theme as he says “you can do it, never give up”

Table topics sets the pulse of any meeting. It creates so much of excitement. However as I said in the beginning, I am impressed by the president himself. President Ron in setting the meeting rolling, He gave an inspiring introduction speech. He welcomed the guests and he quoted people who succeeded without giving up. He inspired the seniors to continue in toastmaster's journey in not giving up with the speeches.  I was admiring this man for the past few club meetings. Something within him has changed as he took over the new role.   I truly believe I see this transformation not only in the President but in every EXCO.As a general evaluator I made comments of some changes to make the club environment of the club to look better. 

Finally I like to say Money Mastery-KL Toastmasters has fulfilled the Mission of Toastmasters International in providing a supportive and positive learning experience in which members are empowered to develop communication and leadership skills, resulting in greater self-confidence and personal growth.

Reported by Past President, Mathew Philippose, CC, ALB.

Sincerely, 

Thanks to the Team,

Manish Jha, CC

Money Mastery –KL Toastmasters Club

VPPR (Vice President of Public Relation 2016/2017)