Ruwi Toastmasters Club: Session 130

Summer hibernation continues and the club populace is still out of country. However the presence of the Area team as well as our Educator did ensure that the hall was decently full. We were also happy to receive a guest from Shinas Toastmasters.

The session kicked off 1 minute late, as noted by GE, but SAA TM Viswanath livened up the proceedings with an apt quotation.

President TM Rajat, just back from a holiday in India, applied his speech to question why holidays often felt like work, what would enable holidays to feel like holidays and finally what would make work feel like a holiday. While most of us are far away from the third stage, why not at least gun for the second?

TMOD Ramalingam has chosen as his theme "Humour and Health". Humour had always been his forte, although the extent he quips on husband-wife relationships may not be good for our health if we apply them at home! He took us through types of humour and gave a tutorial as to how to crack a joke successfully, something useful in the serious quiet evenings, no doubt, when wives knit and husbands watch TV.

Jokemaster TM Venkat, whose very appearance on stage stimulates laughter, presented a few jokes that lent some additional fodder to the TMOD's fire.

Wordmaster TM Sabu introduced the word CONFABULATE to the audience, which was a difficult word to digest after lunch. But the TMs made fair game of it and were not verbally challenged.

TM Vignesh explained the speech criteria for a Pathways P-1 speech being presented today.

The speech titled "Knowing the Unknown" was delivered by MTM Panna, who was giving a P-1 once again after completing her ACB manual. It was interesting to see a P-1 that incorporated all the skills of speech-crafting and delivery, something we did not see in the earlier P-1 as the speaker would be totally new to the project.

An education session on "Impromptu Speaking" was delivered by TM Subratesh Chakravarty from SBG Toastmasters. The 20 mins were well-utilized in expounding the goal, approach, techniques and preparation for impromptu speaking, or Table Topics as we call it. Moreover the session lent a lot of inspiration and motivation to club members to go up and grab the mike.

Table topics were conducted by MTM Shobha, who was happy to be on the other side of the table. Nevertheless, her topics were in the question style and not obscure debatable ones, and the speakers were all happy to speak on them.

Evaluation feedback was conducted by TM Vignesh, which was mostly laudatory. We all know MTM Panna as an accomplished speaker on all platforms and her P-1 had been exemplary.

General Evaluation was given by TM Chaitanya, who praised most of the role-players and today's session as a whole.