Beyond ordinary – that’s what we are, and always will be.
It’s
Saturday, but no ordinary Saturday. It’s the second Saturday of the month, and
all roads led to the 59th Anchorvale Toastmasters Extraordinary
Chapter Meeting at Sengkang West Zone, ‘D’ RC Centre where fun, prizes, and
surprises awaited everyone!
Our able
President, Sathiyamoorthi, CC, set
the mood of a champion club by bringing out photos of two dashing gentlemen who
made name in football, Philippe Lahm of Germany, and Lionel Messi of Argentina.
A winning team is not necessarily a bunch of elite players, rather a company of
characters that can cohesively work as one as articulated by our President in
his opening address.
Part of the
prize when attending Anchorvale Toastmaster’s Chapter Meeting is a privilege
seat to witness prepared speeches from our talented fellow Toastmasters, to be
inspired, entertained, and enthused. To start off the highlight of the meeting,
a not-so-talented (yet ,eager to learn) Toastmaster kicked off the show (oh, it
was moi!) with my Project 2 topic on photography. I began by sharing my little
knowledge on photography, and then shared my personal philosophy behind it –
what cameras see that our eyes don’t, and sharing that experience to people and
hopefully enlarge their own life experience.
From the
wonders of eyes and lens, Hwee Leng,
our second speaker brought us to the wonder of human mind, and explained in
details how the mind influence, not only on our thoughts, but also on our
natural expression manifested in our daily communication with her Project 3 subject,
NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming). I felt the topic is quite relevant to most
of us who are learning public speaking, at the same time, managing our personal
relationships by preventing conflicts and arguments.
And from
knowing one’s mind to managing other’s mind, particularly the intricate and
delicate minds of women, Muthu ably enlightened
us the striking difference between male and female thoughts in his Advanced Project 1 topic. Not only informative and interesting, the third speaker of the
day tickled the audience with his punch lines and humorous anecdotes, as well
as, educated his androgenic audience on how to better understand their estrogenic
counterparts, how to avoid conflicts, and how to work out a more understanding,
loving and progressive relationship. He bagged the Best Project Speaker of the
day!
It’s time to
think and speak on your feet! Our Table Topics Master, Rachel Heng, took center stage, and brought more surprises to
everyone as she brought along mementos coming from different parts of the globe,
and put them inside a black plastic trash bag (what a nice way to wrap surprise
presents these days!). Participants were to draw one item from the plastic bag,
and share their thoughts about it in 1-2 minutes. Our amiable Past President, Roger Yap, CC/CL, wowed the audience as
he brought us to Mongolia along with his memento through the figment of his
imagination and the gift of tongue. He was awarded as the Best Table Topic
Speaker of the day!
Evaluation
time! The debonair Zulhafni, ACB
kicked off this portion with his creative delivery of his evaluation of my
project, and provided me an honest and direct feedback (so thanks for that,
dude!). He is followed by our eloquent Salma,
CC who shared an insightful evaluation to Hwee Leng’s project. And lastly, our charming Roger Yap, CC/CL brought the house down as he delivered his
evaluation for Muthu’s project. He
brought home his second bacon after winning the Best Evaluator of the day. Using
triple Ks (Kiss – Kick – Kiss) methodology (and no, they didn’t give us a
kiss!), the evaluators rightly pointed out our strengths, and more importantly stressed
the things we can improve.
It had been
a fruitful, fun, and entertaining Saturday afternoon so far, but that wouldn’t
have been made possible if not for our equally able Debananda, our Toastmaster of the Day who cunningly stirred us
around from start to finish during the program, and put everything in order.
Has it come
to an end, yet? No! The evening was still young, and the fun has just begun.
Anchorvale Toastmasters Club held its teambuilding session with quiz and games –
which means more fun, prizes and surprises to come.
Our
enthusiastic quizmaster, Riz,
spellbound everyone with his wits and tricks as he chaired the quiz show, after
the group was divided into three teams to compete with each other. The energetic
Chee Sian took over the limelight
from Riz when he moderated the game,
Pictionary cum Charade, as our game master. In the end, we learnt how Anchoreans
are not only good in speaking communication, but also great in communicating
without the spoken language – reading between the lines and behind those
horrific drawings!
Team 2 (oh,
it’s my team!) was proclaimed as winners, but overall, Anchorvale Toastmasters
Club transpired as the real champion as we ably demonstrated how we could
continue to create great things together with fun, help develop one other, and
move forward as one.
The sun had
started setting down, and dusk enveloped the sky, yet it’s still not to go home
for Anchoreans. The second and the best part of last Saturday’s program was yet
to start. Barbecue Party!
As a newbie
of this club, it was my rare opportune to commune with my fellow Anchoreans,
and get to know some of them on a personal level. The high-spirited Salma immediately set up the place, and
voila, everything settled in their proper places in minutes! I was tasked to do
the most laborious tasks -- making the garlic bread (LOL, shame on me, and
please take note of the sarcasm). As I gently spread the garlic butter on each
slice of bread, others were sweating out trying to make fire at the BBQ pit,
while the rest painstakingly threading food onto the skewers or wrapping
potatoes and corn with thin foil to be barbecued.
More people
were arriving for the night, while I started smelling the aroma of barbecue food
from the pit a few meters from me. Little by little, pieces by pieces, cooked
food came to our table, and immediately vanished! As the night progressed,
everyone was moving around, catching with up with fellow Anchoreans, and simply
having a great time.
Every great
event always has extraordinary people behind it. The Anchorvale Toastmasters
Club Extraordinary Chapter Meeting cum Team Building cum barbecue party
wouldn’t have been made possible if not for our dedicated, extraordinaire
Anchoreans: Chee Sian, Salma, Anila, and our President, Sathiya.
Well done and kudos to you, guys! And to everyone who came, and contributed to
the success of the event, congratulations and thank you for this wonderful,
memorable event!
The activity
wrapped up with a “groupie”, and Anchorvale Toastmasters Club, again, emerged
as the champion.
“It's unbelievable what we have achieved. Whether we have
the best individual player doesn't matter at all. You just need to have the
best team.”
- Philipp Lahm
To catch
more fun, prizes, and surprises, visit us at Anchorvale TMC’s 59th Chapter
Meeting on the 27th of September.
I’m sure you will have loads of fun!
Just a
gentle reminder: This coming Saturday, 20th
of September, our Club Humorous & Evaluation Speech Champions, Riz and Zulhafni, ACB, will be participating in the Area A2 Humorous an
Evaluation Speech Contest. It will be held at Temasek Polytechnic, Business
School, Block 26, Level 2, Lecture Theatre 19 from 1.30pm to 5.30pm. If you are
free, please come down to support our dear members in their fight to greater
heights.
Special
thanks to all appointment holders and family members of Anchoreans (as coined
by Mae :D), who helped to prepare
the awesome food we had.
Best
Prepared Speech: Muthu
Best Project
Evaluator: Roger Yap, CC/CL
Best Table
Topics: Roger Yap, CC/CL
Written by: Julie Mae
Game Master Chee Sian
Muthu clinching the gold for his prepared speech.
Roger effortlessly bagged the other two!
2nd Runner-up!
1st Runner-up!
Champion team! Congrats!
Everyone helping out with preparation.
Satay, anyone?
A gift-of-appreciation for Chee Sian, the organizer of today's event. Thank you!
Everyone had fun? You bet!
