Meeting Report, 26th July 201
Excalibur Advanced
Speakers Toastmasters Club Meeting Report for Wednesday 25th July
2018
On a (rather too?) balmy London evening (the mercury hit 31
degrees Celsius/88 degrees Fahrenheit and off-the-scale humidity), our meeting
was called to order by Marcin.
The meeting itself was opened by our President, Monika, before she handed over to our Toastmaster, Robin. Robin
expertly sailed the good ship Excalibur far from the jagged rocks of boredom
and whirlpools or disappointment by giving us a little background information
about the role of Toastmaster before introducing the theme of the evening: fairy tales.
Before
each person took the stage, their favourite fairy tale was announced, and why
it was special for them.
Robin then invited our Meeter and Greeter for the evening, Freddie on stage who introduced our three guests: Moh (who was our GE
for the evening), Marti and Thomas.
After each had told us a little about themselves, our Toastmaster invited our immediate past president, Chinkata to explain his role as Timekeeper.
Ben was Table Topic Master for the evening and
continuing the fairy tale theme, he invited a member of the audience to choose the
hero of the evening’s story from a set of twelve carefully selected photos. The
room fell silent with anticipation before the face of our protagonist was held
up for all to see. There were gasps when (in a possibly slightly rigged
vote), people recognised our Prince Charming as none other than club VPE Freddie!
Table Topic participants
Cat, Lynne, Nick, Ian and David in turn
picked two pictures from a hidden deck which they were invited to incorporate in
what became a fast-paced and unpredictable yarn that one audience member was overheard
suggesting was good enough to be long-listed for the Booker Prize.
Once the story had reached its riveting denouement, the Table
Topic contestants were
evaluated by Chinkata, Monika, Noor, Marcin and
Lukasz (possibly even in that order). The club followed an atypical Table Topics this
evening which brought a nuanced and even
challenging variation to one of Toastmasters’ most popular activities. The club’s
VPPR (this evening's Table Topic Master) can report that members gallantly rose to the challenge.
We await confirmation of this assessment from the VPE.
After the Timekeeper’s report, we moved on to the prepared
speeches which began with a speech by Lynne titled “Say Anything” (Pathways
Strategic Relationships #2 – Evaluation and Feedback). The speech was an
expertly delivered and amusing semantic feast that held the audience
throughout.
Our second prepared speech, from the Story Telling Manual #2 Let’s
Get Personal, was delivered by Noor. “Wisdom from an Outcast” took us on a
Tantric journey of self-discovery.
Our final speech was delivered by Ian (#2 from the
Entertaining Speaker manual, “Resources for Entertainment”). Ian introduced us
to the concept of “Kakistocracy” which he explained was the all too prevalent
system of government in which the worst people gain positions of power.
Speech evaluators were Ian, Nick and Freddie, all of whom delivered skilful and insightful evaluations.
Excalibur Speakers followed these evaluations with an Open
Feedback session—in which the entire audience is invited to make commendations
and recommendations on the prepared speeches. Expertly moderated by Cat, this session teased out more valuable suggestions for the speakers and audience to
ponder.
Our General Evaluator, Moh, then took the stage to
describe what he liked about our club, also making a number of suggestions. Moh demonstrated his experience with his relaxed and thoughtful delivery.
The evening wound down with Robin, our accomplished
Toastmaster handing back to Monika, our President, who announced the evening's prize winners:
Table Topic Winner: Ian.
Speech Evaluators, Freddie and Nick shared
the honours.
Best Speech: Lynne.
Despite the tropical heat and oppressive humidity, attendance levels
were very good and the evening was a great success. A promising degree of
rehydration was achieved in the neighbouring King and Queen public house immediately afterwards.
Our next meeting is scheduled for 8th August at
the Fitzrovia Community Centre, 2 Foley Street, London W1W 6DN.
Guests are very welcome!
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