Written by Svetlana

Introduction

President Jo opened the meeting with a short overview of the 90-year history of the Toastmasters movement and some statistics for the benefit of members and guests.

After her introduction, Jo handed further proceedings to Glen, one of the former presidents and founding members of Bloomsbury Speakers club. Glen emphasized the meaning of applause – to infuse enthusiasm, and of handshake – to hand control of the stage to and from the speakers back to the Toastmaster or Table Topics Master. Paddington Bear’s anniversary being this month, Glen’s theme of the day for the introduction of speakers and functionaries was childhood heroes. Glen introduced functionaries of the day: Robert, the Timekeeper whose favourite childhood hero was Dennis the Menace, Swarajit the Sergeant At Arms, and Peter L the Grammarian (with the word of the day, “anticipate”) helped Glen make the evening most entertaining.

Prepared Speeches

There were four prepared speeches on the agenda. The first speaker Nathaniel’s favourite childhood hero was Rupert the Bear with his sartorial, smart clothing style. Nathaniel’s No 2 Speech “Consider Your Composition” started with a statement, “Tell me what you eat and I will tell you who you are”. He explained why wheat, corn, potato, and rice were the most affordable foods. The prevalence of these products was explained by low cost of production and high level of profits gained by a handful of individuals. It also explained the prevalence of food induced diseases, such as obesity and diabetes. He called upon the audience to make wise choices as to what to eat to stay healthy and take advantage of the variety of food available nowadays.

Michelle whose favourite childhood hero was Cinderella, delivered Speech No. 4 “The Power of Positivity”. Michelle talked about mental and emotional attitude. She advised how to achieve positive mind set. Positivity helps achieve goals and realise one’s true potential. Self-doubt and negative thoughts should be replaced by positive thinking and positive speaking, which go hand-in-hand. Setbacks happen in life, but every cloud has a silver lining. Such attitudes help keep one energised and reduce stress.

Helen whose favourite childhood heroes were the Smurfs and Spider-Man delivered her Speech No. 8 entitled “Yes We Kanban”. Helen substantiated the theory that our brain doesn’t like unfinished business. It is important that we keep track of various projects in hand. The idea of Kanban was first introduced by Taiichi Ohno in 1953 in Toyota factory in Japan in the form of billboards. It helped the factory productivity as workers would signal that they finish the portion of work they were given and get parts for the next portion of work. That way it was easier to focus on work in progress and do not have more work than they could handle. David J. Anderson used this principle for technology projects. Later on, Jim Benson and Tonianne DeMaria Barry applied the idea to personal productivity and used three rows with tasks under the signs “to do”, “doing”, and “done”. And now, smart phone apps are available.

An advanced storytelling speech was then performed by Joe, whose favourite childhood hero was Banana Man. The speech entitled “Why?” was focused on experiences of success, and what makes people successful in sports and in business. While in sports it is important to exercise and in business it is important to be efficient, the most important thing is to ask ourselves, “Why am I doing this, and what is the purpose of it?”. We need a well-defined purpose in order to succeed was the main piece of advice from Joe. The message was drawn from three stories: a personal story, story of sportsmen, and NHS reform.

Warm guest introductions were held by Swarajit and valuable thoughtful evaluations provided by Egor, Ash, Bronia, and Kate.

Table Topics

The table topics session conducted by Ahmed switched the theme to childhood experiences.

Question “Which childhood hero would come to your rescue?” went to Peter L who shared that his favourite hero rescuer would be Pooh Bear and he explained why he thought so.

“What are the best and worst movies of your childhood?” – was addressed to Svetlana, who said her favourite fairy tale movie was “Thumbelina”, which, as she grew up appeared to be the wrong fairy tale to like; she had to go back and focus on positive episodes to have them transpire.

“What childhood hero would make a good politician?” – went to Jean-Marc who said Bugs Bunny would make an excellent politician as he was quick to run, change directions, and good at being cunning.

“Which is your best childhood hero” – Axel said it Spider-Man and he explained why.

“Which childhood book should be made mandatory for schoolchildren to read?” – Danika said it was Nathan Wise as it helps children emulate the best human features.

Carrie provided the evaluation of Table Topics speakers with a balance of commendations and recommendations.

Grammarian Peter’s report was followed by a General Evaluation from Jean-Marc from Clerkenwell Speakers.

Awards

Best prepared speech award went to Helen for her No. 8 speech. Best evaluator award went to Ash, and best impromptu speech award went to Jean-Marc.

Next meeting

PLEASE NOTE THE CHANGE OF VENUE! Our next regular meeting will be held on Monday, 27^th October, upstairs at The Perseverance, 63 Lamb’s Conduit Street, London WC1N 3NB (http://www.the-perseverance.moonfruit.com/). Doors open at 6:30pm.

Written by Svetlana

Introductions

Bloomsbury Speakers hosted its regular meeting on Monday, 22^nd September with the president Jo starting off with an introduction on how, while practice makes perfect, it is perfect practice that really makes a difference; and conditions for that are best at Toastmasters for anyone who genuinely wants to improve their public speaking skills. Constructive evaluation and support as well as learning environment provided here has advantage over practicing among family and friends.

After her introduction, Jo handed the steering of the meeting over to Peter F. The theme of the day chosen by Peter was reality TV shows: what kind of reality shows would participants stage if given a chance? The first functionary, Stella, the Timekeeper’s theme for reality show was simulation of Apollo flight with real equipment from NASA.  Stella gave a detailed and quite poetic description of her role and timekeeping rules to speech participants. Grammarian of the evening was Helen who introduced the word of the day “smorgasbord” borrowed by English from Swedish meaning “a range of open sandwiches and delicacies; a wide range of something; a variety of things”. Helen said she expected meeting participants to use the word of the day and she encouraged the use of interesting and beautiful language.

Prepared speeches

The first speaker Svetlana’s idea of reality show was a virtual game with avatars and staging various business scenarios useful for team building in the work setting. Svetlana’s Speech No. 5 “What Can I Do For You?” was humorous and devoted to vodka culture. Her speech contained anecdotes, a historical brief, sayings and expressions summarising the vodka culture. Her speech was received with much laughter and a warm round of applause.

Peter L’s idea of a reality show was to take a bunch of consultants and dump them in a war zone and watch them uncensored. Peter gave his No. 2 speech “Cry Freedom for Holidays” about the importance of holidays in our life. He gave three reasons why he would not swap holidays for anything else, such as money or privileges. Peter’s speech was theatrical and entertaining with lots of action and vocal variety.

Hari’s idea of reality show was to take a group of friends to an exotic island somewhere in Turkey for pure enjoyment. Hari’s advanced entertaining speaker project entitled “One Tough Mudder Fudder” was informative and amusing and described his own experience of the Mudder Fudder challenge. 12 miles of beautiful scenery with difficult terrain full of mud and with 24 obstacles quite painful and extreme to overcome with a reward of an orange head band and beer at the end. Hari’s speech performance contained a lot of movement while he was enacting the description of the challenge.

Joe’s TV reality show was close to what Hari described in his speech about the Mudder Fudder challenge. Joe’s advanced storytelling speech project “A Boy I Have Known” was about a boy called Jacob who had a condition from birth, which was an insatiable appetite, who stayed in a nursery home where Joe’s grandmother was staying too. Despite his condition, Jacob was a very lively and kind, chunky 10-year-old boy who put a smile on every person’s face. The ethos of that nursery home and the values, which people shared, was remarkable. Old and young people got along so well that the memories of it remained as a highlight from childhood throughout Joe’s life.

Before the break, Jon, Sergeant at Arms of the evening, led the guest introductions.

Evaluations

Ahmed, who did not like reality shows, and did not have an idea of his own reality show provided a detailed and useful evaluation of Svetlana’s No. 5 speech. Ahmed commended Svetlana for the use of humour and body language and advised her to use the stage more freely and try and enact her speech even more. She could also improve her eye contact.

Tracey was more interested in music than reality shows. Tracey evaluated Peter L’s No. 2 Speech and commended him for the strong opening, humour, lots of action and vocal variety. Tracey advised Peter L to try and avoid too many repetitions of one reference to a previous speech, which Peter L made.

Bronia evaluated Hari’s advance entertaining speech, commending him for his confident and relaxed manner and for telling something he knew really well, which helped him engage the audience. As advice, she suggested that Hari could include a conflict, an intrigue into his speech to grab the attention of the audience even more and turn it into a story rather than just a vivid description of the Mudder Fudder challenge.

Michelle evaluated Joe’s advance storytelling speech and commended Joe for good structure, content, and emotionally stimulating speech. Michelle advised Joe to better organise his notes and cards in order to avoid long pauses. Overall, the speech reached its objectives and was quite moving.

Table Topics

Swarajit, the Table Topics Master’s idea of a reality show was to take a bunch of celebrities to an island with wild animals and leave them there and not bother about shooting a video. He came up with a number of questions based on the known TV reality shows.

Jo’s question was how she would persuade Simon Cowell to keep her in “X-Factor”. Jo told a real life story of her karaoke performance some years ago in a pub. With a few beers her talent of singing sounded very reassuring to herself, and she thought she sang like a star. She added to the story the fact that Simon Cowell was or could be sitting at a remote table and watching her approvingly. That’s how she would have persuaded him.

Ash’s question was whether she would eat rat’s testicles, based on the reality show “I’m a Celebrity Get Me Out of Here”. Ash said she would eat rat’s testicles if there wasn’t anything else to eat and that rat’s testicles were small and probably easier to eat than testicles of other animals.

Rebecca answered a question, how she would justify to her employer, why she should be kept and not fired, based on the TV reality show “The Apprentice”. And Rebecca said she would tell how everybody else was doing badly and thus, destroy the competition in the eyes of her employer.

Lucy answered the question about what were her “Room 101” ideas. Lucy would put what she didn’t need or which was annoying to her, such as her neighbours from downstairs, lots of stuff, some of which she actually needed but didn’t like so much. Finally, she would go to Room 101 herself too.

Oriel answered a question, which was based on “Britain’s Got Talent”, winners of which perform at the Royal Variety show. And the question was, whether the monarchy should be abolished or continued. Oriel said the Royal family were a good tourist attraction and she thought they had pleasant personalities and she thought monarchy should be continued.

Glen provided a very thorough and useful evaluation of Table Topics speakers commending and giving tips to every speaker.

Conclusion

Grammarian Helen delivered a very interesting report on how figures of speech and the word of the day were used by speakers and functionaries throughout the evening, after which Andy, from London Toastmasters, gave a thorough and all-round evaluation providing a lot of pin-pointed and useful advice on how we can improve.

Awards

The best prepared speech award went to Peter for his No. 2 speech. Best evaluator award went to Glen, and best impromptu speech award went to Ash.

Next meeting

Our next regular meeting will be held on Monday, 29^th September upstairs at The Clerk & Well pub, 156 Clerkenwell Road, EC1R 5DU. Doors open at 6:30pm.

P.S. Sincere apologies for the stray email headed “Area 34 Humorous Speech & Table Topics contests this Thursday”, which some of you received on the 23^rd of September by mistake.