This is the summer season, bleak and dry. Like the desert landscape, the club attendance also tends to take on the looks of the Empty Quarter. In-town President and out-of-town VPE struggle to make the quorum and keep the roles going. Gradually they see looming before them a session that has no project speeches scheduled and attendance in single digits. Will the unthinkable - cancellation of a session - happen?
Not on your life.
VPE Panna comes up with a new format, perhaps inspired by her husband's constant demand for a snack as soon as he is back from office: THE MAGGI SPEECH. This would be a 2-minute prepared speech that all present will have to deliver, with a prize for best speaker. There would be two such topics, so two rounds of speeches, and two best speaker awards.
This was different from both the Project Speech as well as the Table Topic. It was shorter than a project speech, therefore easier to remember. But being only two minutes long, it severely restricted the contents and forced the speaker to choose what was really important.
The session started as usual with the usual gentle warnings of the Sergeant-at-arms, followed by the President's address, who related the story of the sages who understood voices raised in anger to signify hearts too far apart to communicate softly, and admonished us maintain soft voices and loving relationships.
Contest Chair Panna straightaway took us into the Maggi Speech contest (there being nothing else scheduled today). There were ten speakers available and our guest from MMTC club, TM Chetlur acted as evaluator.
The first topic (common to all participants) was "A Second Chance" and wanted the speakers to relook at their adolescent years and wonder whether things could have gone differently in changed circumstances. Speakers varied their approach from a usual "if only" regret to an emphatic "I'd have it no other way". Aji even tried to change the course of the world with a collaboration with Steve Jobs, and was told that it did not align with the topic very well.
The second topic was "Meeting with a celebrity" (real or imagined). Contest Chair probably expected more of imaginary meetings and humorous situations, but speakers stuck to their own experiences and by and large serious reporting. Aji waxed eloquent about his role model Jessie Owens and was informed once again, with long sighs, that this did not align with the topic either.
It was evident that the level of preparedness varied and participants had treated them as much as table topics as off-table topics! TM Chetlur, when giving a general feedback of the efforts, had to mix his pitch between the two. That said, there were some impressive outputs, especially from DTM Rajendra Verma, that were entertaining in their brevity.
This verbal tiffin-session was followed by an Education session by TM Chetlur, where he explained the logic of the progression of the 10 project speeches. This was interesting indeed, and our thanks to TM Chetlur for the simplified version of the CC manual.
VPE announced that the next session on 3rd Sep would, apart from a P-4 speech, have a demo debate organised by SBG club for the benefit of Ruwi club. This will indeed be interesting and we look forward to some friendly sparring.
The session was concluded by the President, snacks and tea.
The day's awards were:
- Best speaker 1st round: TM Rajat Ray
- Best speaker 2nd round: TM Rajendra Varma
In keeping with the contest theme, packets of Maggi were given away as awards.
No comments:
Post a Comment