October 2, 2012: Why Me, Why This, Why Now?

Ian Tai

Distinguished members of Friendship and guests, 

We are still embracing the joy of victory of Timothy Nakayama winning both the humorous speech and evaluation contest in Division W just three days ago. The vibrant atmosphere was further enhanced by the amazing presence of Grace Tan, Victor Ong, guests from UniRazak Toastmasters Club and the dazzling Susan Lim, who has been away for quite some time. Susan gracefully took the role as our Toastmaster of the Evening. Susan did a wonderful job, as many acknowledged that she put in a great effort and to lift the energy high throughout the meeting.

Our dazzling Toastmaster of the Evening, Susan Lim

The first event was led by Area Governor W3 Chor Chee Hoe, who conducted the induction ceremony of two new members, Andrew Low and Ben Chan. Welcome to the Friendship family, Andrew and Ben!

 

Following after the induction, Chee Hoe smoothly transit us to the Table Topics Session. It has been a while since I last participated in a Table Topics and gladly, I did my routine Table Topic Speech with another three brave contestants – past President Ben Fong, UniRazak Toastmaster member Amir, and guest, Rohaizad. 

Amir, from UniRazak Toastmasters Club participated in Table Topics

Our guest Rohaizad, delivered his first attempt in Table Topics

We have four project speakers for the evening. First, it was Nancy Soo with a highly anticipated performance as I sat expecting an entertaining sharing on her climb to Mount Kinabalu. Geok Ean hit the center stage with a spectacular entrance, asking us “Are you ready?!” She shared her recent experience on preparing one of her company’s events, and she got a fever right after that. Somehow, the fever is not any physical sickness, but rather her passion and motivation on her work. Both Nancy and Geok Ean had shared with us very important values that they learned from their experiences. Well done girls!

Nancy shared her experience and lessons learned as she climbed Mount Kinabalu

Geok Ean had an 'unconventional' fever

Timothy delivered a mini-workshop on how to select a topic for a speech presentation. Indeed, it is a great practice session for Timothy to deliver his live workshop for the benefits of many Toastmasters to become better speakers in the future. 

Oh Lien Chai came in and entertained us about his experiences with sandwiches and women. His message is clear to all of us. Never steal a bite of a piece of sandwich hand-made by Lien Chai!

 

Lien Chai with his speech "Sandwiches vs Women"

Our VPM Sylvia with Timothy and his collection of trophies from Humorous Speech and Evaluation Contest

We are honored to have Jefferey Tang, to be our General Evaluator, who hailed all the way from UniRazak Toastmasters Club.

Timothy creatively delivered his Table Topic Evaluation, where each Table Topic Speaker is characterized with the delicious tastes of different ice-cream flavors; Premium Vanilla for Past President Ben Fong, Neapolitan for Amir, Sinful Chocolate for guest Rohaizad and myself, a Smooth Sweet Corn.  Do you want to know how he did that? Please come to join us more in Friendship’s future meetings!

Following was my turn to give evaluation to Nancy. I have to admit that it was a tough assignment for me as I like her presentation and I had given my best to evaluate her according to the guidelines stated in the manual. 

We always love to have Victor Ong in our meetings. This evening, we were lucky to have Mr. Victor evaluating Lian Chai’s speech. I believe he had provided a lot of valuable insights to Lien Chai to improve further as a poised speaker.

Victor Ong with his evaluation on Lien Chai's speech

Our immediate Past President, Angeline Lee stepped up and gave her analytical feedback on Geok Ean’s speech. We could not be more agreeing with Angeline as she thanked Geok Ean for such an amazing delivery  and important message for us to take home.

The ever-amazing Grace Tan evaluated Timothy’s speech, is like a treat from heaven. She gave an insightful and in-depth evaluation and shared her tips on how to maintain the momentum of the speech which takes 15 minutes long or more.

Best Table Topics Speakers - Ian Tai and Past President Ben Fong

Lien Chai took the Best Project Speakers award

Best Evaluator of the evening goes to Grace Tan

The meeting ended happily with high attendance and hopes for a much awaited Bee Farm trip in Melaka on October 13, 2012. To continue the celebration for Timothy’s victory, we went to Soul Out and had a splendid time.  

Our guest, Hamidah share her comment about the meeting

All in all, we had a blast and can’t wait for our upcoming meeting on the 16^th October as Geok Ean will be taking the lead as Toastmasters of the Evening!

Stay Tune and See you there!

Our Token of Appreciation to General Evaluator, Jefferey Tang

 

Ian Tai

Vice President of Public Relations

September 29, 2012: Timothy is our Division W Humorous Speech and Evaluation Contest!



Winners of Division W Humorous Speech and Evaluation Contest 2012

 

Distinguished  Members & Guests, 

It is my honour and privilege to share my joy with you that Timothy Nakayama has won BOTH awards in Division W’s Humorous Speech and Evaluation Contest held in University Malaya on September 29, 2012. As a result, Timothy will proceed to the District 51 Contest which will be held on 17^th November, 2012 in Holiday Villa Hotel & Suites, Subang, Malaysia.

Contest Day Highlights:

It was a day with high hopes and expectations for Timothy and FTMC. After spending a night relaxing and meditation in Midvalley’s Cititel Hotel, Timothy and I drove to University Malaya to get ready for the showdown. 

The faithful and die-hard fans of Timothy and Friendship Club; President Alexandra Lau, Grace Tan, Nancy Soo, our long-time-no-see Susan Lim and your truly were present to encourage and give support to Timothy. 

It was a tough battle in the humorous speech contest; all contestants were highly entertaining and caused the audience bursting into laughter. Fortunately for our club, Timothy’s speech was not only humorous but also contains a valuable message for everyone who is present, thus, bagging us our first gold of the competition.

The evaluation contest resumed shortly after a break and started off with an inspiring speech given by the test speaker. The evaluation contest was tight with no clear cut winners as the contestants were well-trained and polished in delivering their evaluation to the test speaker. 

Timothy was the fourth evaluator out of five contestants, and he struck gold when he demonstrated how being outrage can help to increase the emotional intensity and impact to the audience. Perhaps,  it was outrages that differentiates Timothy from the contestants, thus, earning us our second gold in the evaluation contest.   

The Division W contests results as following:

Humorous Speech Contest

• Champion: Timothy Nakayama
• 1^st Runner Up: Sivaneswaran T.
• 2^nd Runner Up: Deepak P. Singh

Evaluation contest

• Champion: Timothy Nakayama
• 1^st Runner Up: Vincent Hor
• 2^nd Runner Up: Kenneth Yee

Well Done, Tim!

Ian Tai

Vice President of Public Relations, FTMC

September 18, 2012: Feel The Fear, Do It Anyway!

Ian Tai

Personally, I love this meeting theme as this is what Toastmasters Organization is all about. People from all walks of life step out from their comfort zone in order to learn how to rise and shine as an powerful public speaker. 

 

 Members and guests of Friendship's 18 September meeting

The meeting started slightly later than the scheduled 7pm and was diligently hosted by our Division W Governor, Tan Lay Theng. Table Topics was conducted by VPE, Daphne Au and we had six outstanding speakers in their own way. 

 Division W Governor, Lay Theng as our Toastmasters of the Evening

Ben Chan had made major improvements from his last attempt in Table Topics, while Fen Ng has a lovely voice and stage presence. Yong and Kelly Fun were steady and natural on stage while Justin was entertaining with his personal story. He reminded us to tighten our belts and obey to instructions given by the cabin crew during flights.

Yong and Kelly Fun from WIM Toastmasters Club delivering Table Topics speeches

 The most notable speaker was Andrew. After seating at the back of nearly six or seven meetings, he finally introduced himself to us with his virgin Table Topics attempt. It’s a huge breakthrough, and I believe he deserves a thunderous applause for his effort today. Way to go, Andrew!

Andrew gave his Table Topic Speech for the first time

We had three amazing speakers, Oh Lien Chai, Penny Choo and Timothy Nakayama. Loaded with smiles and opened about the good and bad side in him for his Ice Breaking Speech; Lien Chai successfully build good rapport with the audience. We do not find any bad side of him as he is honest, friendly and articulate.

"Do you want to hear to good, or the bad side of me?" asked Lien Chai during his speech

Penny Choo from MidValley Toastmasters Club was attempting her Speech number 6, about the Five Letter Words, which is S.O.R.R.Y. she gave a dramatic and engaging speech about how we should put our ego down and saying sorry, is after all not that hard to do.  

 

"The Five Letters Word" by Penny Choo

Timothy was attempting his Advanced Manual in Storytelling, where he shared a story about once a beautiful city. With the skills and techniques he already acquired, he managed to describe the details and the city painted beautifully in our minds. We got so engrossed into his mythical yet irony story, as if we were watching a fairy tale movie.

All three speakers have done fantastically well with adequate preparations, good stage presence and excellent performances. Well Done, guys!

Sure enough, the feedback and evaluation session is when speakers are given “veracious” comments and “constructive” criticism from a panel of evaluators. I started off with my evaluation for all Table Topic Speakers, which was followed by three outstanding evaluators, Timothy, Zaiton and Alexandra Lau.

After the technical evaluation, it’s time to decide who “the speaker of the night” is. Fen Ng was voted as the favorite Table Topic Speaker, and we gave her a certificate which will serve as a nice souvenir from us. Timothy Nakayama was voted as the winner for both speech and evaluation “contest” of today’s meeting. It’s a great morale boost for his upcoming division contest in University Malaya on Saturday, 29th November 2012. Be sure to be there to support him!

Fen receiving the Best Table Topics Award

Timothy receiving the Best Evaluator and Project Speaker Awards

General Evaluator, Teoh Chun Ming receiving our token of appreciation

Ian Tai
Vice President Public Relations