Anchorvale TMC Chapter Meeting on 14th February 2015

Balloon, roses, chocolate

14^th February. Valentine’s Day. On that lovely afternoon, Anchorvale TMC gathered for a short and sweet chapter meeting at Seng Kang West Zone ‘D’ RC Centre. The meeting quickly got started with our President Sathiyaa, CC asking everyone to introduce themselves by sharing an interesting incident of their loved ones.

The meeting immediately moved on to the prepared speech segment. Senthil spoke on how to relax ourselves through a short and simple meditation exercise. Deb shared his story on how he earned everyone’s respect during his university times. His dramatic recount bagged him the gold. Ken then gave an amusing speech on how ugly he was as a kid. Chee Sian explained how love is able to change the growth of living things. In Thiam then persuaded everyone to change how they view photography by keeping it simple.

The table topics segment followed right after. The table topics followed the theme of the day – Valentine’s Day. Kin Foong, CC’s cheeky explanation of his topic won him the best table topics speaker ribbon.

Next was the evaluation segment where Salma, CC, CL, Sathiya, CC, Kin Foong, CC, Devesh and Zulhafni, ACB gave very helpful tips for our speakers. Zulhafni eventually beat the rest for the best project evaluation.

Since it’s Valentine’s Day, the ribbons were awarded with balloons. Surprisingly, the colour of the balloon matches the colour of the attire worn by the speakers perfectly! (See below for photos!) And it wasn’t a set-up!

Our first big event of the year, Anchorvale TMC International Speech and Table Topics Contest, will be held on 28^th February 2015 from 1:00 to 5:45 PM. It is an event not to be missed as you will get to see the best of Anchorvale battling it out for honour and glory.

Special thanks to all appointment holders and visiting guests: Ng Kin Foong, CC (Tampines Changkat Toastmasters) and Devesh Nair (Grassroots TMC).

Best Prepared Speech: Deb, TM

Best Project Evaulation: Zulhafni, ACB

Best Table Topics: Kin Foong, CC

Written by: Chen Ken

Hot Pink!

Light Pink!

Purple!

Division A Amazing Race on 31st January 2015

Wearing her shoes, all twenty-four carat,

To The Prom, she starts to walk.

After a meal, at the Old Market,

The Catfish swims, back to his spot.

This is a riddle. Can you guess the four landmarks it is referring to? For Anchorvale CC Toastmasters contestants to the first ever Division A Amazing Race; Norman Tan (Catch Us), Rachel Heng (The Killer Girl Squad), Roger Yap, Julie Mae, Ken and Rasu (Anchorvale Avengers), Suresh plus son Liktesh, Deb and Chee Sian (Anchorvale Minions), beside scratching our head, we had to frantically draw lines on the map linking Golden Shoe to The Promontory and Merlion to Lau Pa Sat. Next come the running to the metal cone sculpture (where the lines crosses) to take picture before running back to the starting point at UOB Plaza for the next clue.

Interestingly, our assignment at UOB Plaza was to do a spontaneous group dance for a minute, what a great workout! The Avengers and Minions (not the super heroes and the cute playful lots) decided to do a Macarena! You know, the one with folding arms and head touching movements……. All for the sake of the next clue, which is…..

Dashing off to Haw Par Villa! Taking the trains, it’s about one of few times we can take a breather. Phew! But on reaching the car park there, we have to stomach this; literally two pieces of bread and two biscuits per person from two members in each team before we can proceed into the villa. There we were treated to a hurried, or shall I add sweating, educational tour of traditional Chinese values, by taking picture of statues and information boards (if any) with at least two members from each group based on the clues given. On correctly identifying and photographing the five needed, one of which is Confucius (one other is Statue of Liberty – traditional Chinese values? How confusing!), we were given the next instruction to……

Scurry down to Vivo City! To the roof top near the hanging man for our next clue. Running around in an air-conditioned shopping mall, taking embarrassing pictures with mannequins (each team member to take one with each) and collecting free samples (at least one food, one cosmetic and one brochure) is another mad men experience. In addition to that, remembering at least fifteen words and acting out five of which from a gymnasium advertising “wall of offerings” is testimony the organizers (our member, Salma, is one of) believe in both mental and physical extreme stretch before we are allowed to…….

Enter Sentosa Island by foot! A great day to burn calories. No, the bread and biscuits cannot make up for it. We could take train or bus once we are in the island to Palawan Beach though. Again, no, not the one in sunny beautiful Philippines. But we were helped by beautiful beach goers in taking photograph of all four of us in a team jumping up, captured at the precise moment when we are in mid air, with the beach and the sun as our background. Taking in mind the jump was a challenge in itself as it was done with weak knees. This is so as we had just built a sand castle approximately a meter wide and, ahem, knee high! We had fun going back to our childhood play though. And alas, the moment of truth…..

Crossing the shaky and crowded hanging bridge with our shaky knees, we made our way to the final pit stop, which is the Southern Most Point of Continental Asia. Hurray! Anchorvale Minions emerged third in this inaugural Amazing Race! The magnificent bonding continues……

Written by: Chee Sian, TM

Groupie!

If it's not a full-stop, what is it?

Macarena!

Rushing to the checkpoint!

@Vivo!

Deb, you look really tired...

So hungry...

Chee Sian... 

2nd Runner-up!

Chilling out after a tiring day.

Anchorvale!

Group shot with all the participants!

Anchorvale TMC 64th Chapter Meeting on 24th January 2015

Short and sweet

This  was Anchorvale’s express chapter meeting! Although it was a two hour meeting instead of the usual three hours, we still managed to cover everything. (With just a bit of rush, of course) On that day, we had four splendid speakers who shared their speech with lots of confidence. In fact, Xavier did his first Icebreaker speech, where he shared about his life stories and his awesome experience while he travelled to Las Vegas during his school internship and the amazing skydiving he tried over there. (Not to mention he lost one of his shoes during the dive)

Julie Mae moved on to her Project 6 – ‘Vocal Variety’ while In Tiam shared on his Project 8 – ‘Get Comfortable with Visual Aids’. In Tiam showed us some unique presentation tips using the PowerPoint slides.  It was really fun listening to both of the speakers as they engage with the audience.   

Lastly was our club champion Riz who delivered his memorable Project 10 – ‘Inspire Your Audience’ with boldly with confidence especially when he inspired the audience that it is not the size of the fighter but the size of the fight inside the fighter. The highlight came when he got everyone to stand up and got us to motivate ourselves by speaking encouraging words to ourselves and each other.

After the four prepared speeches, was my favorite segment- table topics! Rasu chaired the table topics as he challenged the audience to imagine they are living in the past or future (depending on the topic they picked) as 10 brave volunteers racked their brains to give an impromptu speech.

Lastly is our evaluators’ turn to shine while they shared what they liked most and areas for improvement.  They are Rachel, Hareesh, CC, Norman, CC and Shu Zhen, ACS, ALB, when they provided their thoughtful evaluations to the respective speakers. Norman’s excellent comments and evaluation won him the best evaluator of the day.

So do join us for our next chapter meeting on 14th February 2015!

Special thanks to all appointment holders and visiting Toastmaster: Shu Zhen, ACS, ALB.

Best Prepared Speech: Riz, CCBest Project Evaluator: Norman Tan, CC
Best Table Topics: Deb

Written by: Xavier

Congratz on your CC!

Best evaluator!

Best Table Topics!

Anchorvale TMC 63rd Chapter Meeting on 10th January 2015

Happy New Year!

The first chapter meeting of the year was held last Saturday, 10^th January 2015. A simple round of introduction signaled the start of the meeting as everyone spoke briefly on the languages and dialects that they can speak. Different people can speak different languages and dialects, but there is one similarity – English. And everyone is here to improve their English speaking.

The meeting quickly moved on to the President’s opening speech as Sathya, CC enlightened us on how our idea will influence our words, which in turn influences our actions, then our habits, and finally our character. He even conducted a tiny experiment to explain his point. He placed a bunch of white flowers into a jar of blue dye and invited us to see what happened to the flower at the end of the meeting. We had a Language Evaluator that day – Muthu, CC, CL. He encouraged us to use the word of the day – ZEST.

The much anticipated prepared speech segment starts right after. As her ice breaker, Nisha shared with us her personal experience as a firefighter. Senthil then educated us on the benefits of spending just 20 minutes every day jogging, as he had improved his health condition through this activity. Ken told a suspenseful yet humorous story about monkey brain, surprising everyone with a twist at the end. Riz had everyone laughing as delivered a hilarious speech on the difference between the brain of man and woman. Finally, Leng Leng educated us on how to lead an awesome life by following the 3 As – Attitude, Awareness, and Authenticity. With that Leng Leng completed her Competent Communicator manual and is now to be known as Leng Leng, CC. J Congratulations!

Following the end of the prepared speech segment, a short refreshment break gave us the opportunity to mingle with the guests.

The end of the break marked the start of the project evaluation segment. Alice, Anila, Prasad, Salma, CC, CL and Roger, CC, CL all gave their insightful comments on the prepared speeches. Salma’s evaluation impressed everyone to win her the coveted best project evaluation.

Next came the interesting and adrenaline inducing table topics segment! Our table topics master, Deb, made this special by wrapping the topic slips with a piece of chocolate. The topics were suitably made to fit into the New Year theme. Richard, DTM eventually bagged the gold with his informative speech. However he decided to present it to a guest, Rainee instead.

It was the language evaluator’s turn to shine as he was jotting down impressive uses of language throughout the meeting. Muthu, CC, CL commended everyone for successfully using the word of the day repeatedly.

The meeting eventually ended with the President’s closing address.

Oh! Remember the flowers? They turned blue!

Interested in finding out more? Come join us on 24^th January 2015 for Anchorvale TMC’s 64^th Chapter Meeting.

Special thanks to all appointment holders for their contribution.

Best Project Evaluation: Salma, CC, CL

Best Table Topics: Richard, DTM

Written by: Chen Ken

Best Project Evaluation!

Best Table Topic!

Our guest, Rainee

Congratulations on ice breaking!

Leng Leng, CC

Anchorvale TMC Malacca Trip 2014

Across the bridge...

In 1972, UNESCO adopted a convention to identify and protect places of cultural or physical significance in human history. Such places are named as World Heritage Sites, and governments are encouraged to preserve these sites as much as possible because of their historical value. In 2008, Malacca joined the list of about 1,000 such sites in the world, due to its unique architectural heritage influenced by the Malay sultanate (15th century), the Portuguese and Dutch (early 16th century) and the British (end of 18th century).

Malacca was thus a fitting place, indeed, for a historic joint meeting between Anchorvale and ICT-Bintang Toastmasters Clubs, based in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur respectively. Sparked by a friendship between Anchorvale’s Roger and ICT-Bintang’s Gabriel, the first joint meeting was held a year ago at Anchorvale CC, where we had upwards of 50 people in attendance. This time, about 40 toastmasters and guests made their way to the majestic meeting room at the UTC building, ready to be engaged and entertained.

The theme of the meeting was appropriately “Shared Heritage”, which was well reflected in all the events on the program. After the individual introductions and welcome address by Anchorvale’s President Sathya, Toastmaster of the Day Justin spoke about this meeting embodies the living heritage of the Toastmasters founder, Ralph Smedley. Next up was Sathya, who, as his first time as Humour Master, tickled our funny bones with the mishaps of his attempts to meet girls as a young man, and how he was thwarted by his mischievous friends.

The third event was the Table Topics, helmed by Salma. Always interesting due to the impromptu nature of the speeches, there was a broad range of topics mostly centered around the similarities and differences in heritage between Singapore and Malaysia. Nine people participated:

1)      Pam told us about the two main things she admires about Singapore -- its education system and its affluence;

2)      Patricia revealed her wish to date a girl if she were to become a man for one day;

3)      Rachel explained the concepts of “kiasu” and ‘kiasi”, two misconceptions that people rightly have about Singaporeans;

4)      Melvyn shared with us his joy of dancing and the importance of being happy instead of being correct;

5)      CC gave his sharp and witty observations about the types of tourists in his hometown;

6)      Rasu described how people fight for water in Chennai;

7)      Gabriel cheekily recounted an anecdotes of how he caught a couple “bonding” in a car during the lantern festival;

8)      Jane mulled over the unusual Singaporean (and Malaysian too?) obssesion with food

9)      Alvin imitated a Singaporean making fun of Malaysia’s education and transport systems.

Then, it was time for the prepared speeches. We had four charismatic men that day, each with a powerful speech. First was Steffan, a new dad. He imparted to us a lesson that he’d learnt from his father about parenting - it is just as important to spend quality time as it is to spend enough time with your child. Next, Rasu spoke about the complaining nature of human beings and how it suppresses positive thoughts. He then gave us a tip to stop complaining - put yourself in other people’s shoes and try to see things from their perspective. Following that, Robin narrated his story “All I want for Christmas” -- a touching account of how the impact of losing his grandfather impressed upon him that what he wants are not material things, but instead the intangible good health and happiness of people around him. Finally, Hareesh brought us to Amazon Rainforest as he regaled “The Wings of the Butterfly”, a magical folk tale about a girl who chased a butterfly into the forest and learnt to appreciate the larger world beyond the human one. One line that sticks with me is “The mind sees better than the eyes”, which reminds me that sometimes it’s better to trust my instinct than to follow others!

After these stimulating speeches that provided much food for thought, it was time to feed the belly. A wide array of local delights awaited us out in the corridor - from curry puffs to nasi lemak to nonya kuehs. My mouth is still watering now, when I think of the curry puffs! It was also a good time for club members to mingle and make new friends.

Bellies filled, we got back to our seats for the evaluation. Melvin, our meticulous Table Topic evaluator, was the first. He succinctly described each speaker and gave us short tips on how to improve. Next were the evaluators for the prepared speeches: Chee Sian, Gabriel, Roger and Ivan. Each evaluator had their own strengths and it was a treat to hear the different ways an evaluation could be carried out. Chee Sian was direct and straightforward, leaving Steffan with a message: Be mindful of the audience. Gabriel focused on the structure of Rasu’s speech, pointing out that the preamble was a tad too long, leaving little time for the conclusion. Roger showed how Robin could connect to the audience by being more succinct and improving his stage presence. Finally, Ivan demonstrated how to use sound/vocal effects to make Hareesh’s folk tale come alive.

Then, all that remained was to wrap up the meeting. Grammarian Muthu, Ah Counter Tammy, and Timer Joshua gave their reports, and General Evaluator Zul congratulated everyone on a job well done. Then it was time to hand out the awards for the best Table Topic speaker, prepared speech speaker, and evaluator -- Melvyn, Steffan and Roger respectively. Congratulations to all three! 

And with that, it was time to end the meeting with the closing address by Benny, ICT-Bintang’s President. Special thanks were given to Chee Sian and Cherie (ICT-Bintang), who had the mammoth task of coordinating and handling the logistics for the meeting. It was indeed an amazing effort on their part, without which this historic meeting may never have happened. I’m sure I speak for all those present when I say that it was a huge success and I enjoyed myself thoroughly during the trip!

Written by: Rachel

Kids Public Speaking Workshop on 21st December 2014

Our first ever public speaking workshop catered for kids was the brain child of Sengkang West Zone ‘D’ RC in collaboration with Anchorvale CC TMC.

Roger Yap and Alice Ow were the esteemed trainers for this unique workshop, where believe it or not, we had 16 fabulously enthusiastic kids coming on a Sunday morning to learn some skills.

Alice, the child care extraordinaire, kick started the morning with an enjoyable ice breaking session where each of the kids bravely introduced themselves at the front using an animal puppet. We had some hilarious and creative answers.

Alice, the Puppet Master

Then, Alice organized a game of charades with a Christmas Theme and the children were incredibly vibrant as they animatedly acted out the words. It was so entertaining to watch them perform, I couldn’t believe one hour passed by so fast. That’s how much fun we had!

Seeing Alice communicate to the kids was truly a privilege. She has a way with them, the love she showed was boundless.

Next up, was the skillful Roger who was training kids for the very first time! He conducted a fun session where he explained the importance of speaking in short sentences, voice control, and body gestures. Explaining such things to kids in a simple and fun way is no easy task. Roger did it like an experienced professional with a clear explanation at the beginning, and then getting the kids to participate and speak.

Roger showed different cartoon characters like Mickey Mouse and Doraemon, and asked the kids to speak using the voices of those characters. He asked simple questions and asked for short answers in reply, all the while encouraging them to have some useful movements.

Roger showing some actions

And finally, he trained the kids in the dreadfully frightening but oh so fun, Table Topics. He gave simple topics like, ‘My School, My Mother, My Best Friend,’ where the kids worked in their groups and prepared to speak about the topic, using all the skills they acquired during the workshop.

The teams in hyper mode

Even better, we gave an immediate evaluation to the participants. The parenting skills of Sathya and Riz were so delightfully shown here, as they praised the children on their efforts, and gently told them where they could improve. 

Sathya giving his evaluation

Giving evaluation to adults is easy peasy. Giving it to children, phew boy!!

The day ended with a McDonalds lunch from the RC, much to the delight of everyone.

To the parents who trusted in this workshop and brought their kids here, thank you so much! Alice and Roger were so utterly brilliant and joyful as they trained children in public speaking. Riz and I who were team leaders had a wonderful time mingling with them, and bringing out our inner child.

Sathya, the supremely dedicated President came straight from the airport after arriving from India to support this workshop. To the children who came, I am sure they will go very far. The level of enthusiasm and eagerness to learn was incredible. Big thanks to the Sengkang West Zone 'D' RC for organizing this. 

It was a marvelous Sunday morning indeed! 

Written By: Salma Begum

Another fun shot