460th Chapter Meeting (19th Sep 2013)

Meeting recap:

Best Prepared Speech: Joe Wan, P3: "What I Learned From Driving"

Most Improved Toastmaster: Ronnie Wang

Best Evaluator: Ng Kin Foong, CC

Best Table Topics: Jack Chu

Word of the Day: SPUR

Her Royal Highness Chong Cheng Lee, DTM, graced us with her presence as Toastmaster of the Evening. Having HRH as TME always ensures that the meeting is fun and lively.

Our Club President Gurmit Singh kicked off the meeting with his version of "The Starfish Story", which I first heard about a long, long, loooong time ago (from Stephen Covey's book "Seven Habits of Highly Effective People" I think). I understood it as "you can't save everyone, but you can save this one" however Gurmit's take on it is that we don't concentrate on completely overhauling ourselves, only change one bit at a time.

First-time Language Evaluator Gladys Tye shared with us the Word of the Day: "SPUR" which means the sharp, star-shaped thing on the heel of a cowboy's boot, used to make his horse go faster. Used as a verb, it means to jolt someone into action, or to act impulsively ("spur of the moment")

The first speaker, Ronnie Wang, talked about the coincidence in his life where he had an English Oral Exam a few days after his speech. What was unusual about his speech was that our VPE Kin 'volunteered' him when someone pulled out at the last minute. And that speech helped Ronnie's Oral Exam.

Next up was Shaun Li, ACS, ALB, who also talked about a coincidence of a different kind- how a girl he used to like, met and married another guy. But it was because he didn't go out with her on Christmas Eve, and she went out with someone else, and married that guy instead. Could it also be that Shaun told her, "I'm sure you'll find someone to date you" that day?

June Tan, CC, our third speaker, did an Advanced Project from the Persuasive Speaking Manual. She was playing the role of a Sales Promoter, and our very own Mr Tan (Coen) was her prospect. He said he would want to buy the product, Happycall Double-sided Pans from Korea, for his wife and in-laws. June managed to close the sale, selling 2 pans to Coen, I mean, Mr Tan.

Joe Wan talked about his lessons learned from driving:  Focus on the Positive and  Evaluate Quickly. I liked Joe's speech because of the personal stories and wisdom I have gained.

Matthew Er's P5 Speech about the experience of being jobless and eventually finding a job after months, was something that I could relate to, having been jobless myself once. It's strange because you're in a funk and nobody wants to hire you, unless you make a stand like Matthew did, and he got hired!

The Table Topics was about the Mid-Autumn Festival, which was appropriate for the occasion, because the day of the meeting was on the Mid-Autumn Festival. Table Topics Master Christina Ho chose a new format: reveal the first 3 questions for the first 2 Table Topics, and subsequently, the others would be as per normal Table Topics, ie we wouldn't know what the questions would be.

Best Prepared Speech: Joe Wan, P3 "Lessons I Learned From Driving"

Most Improved Speaker: Ronnie Wang

Best Evaluator: Ng Kin Foong, CC

Best Table Topics: Jack Chu