Author: London Victorians

Terry was our toastmaster for the evening, choosing the uplifting theme of spring for the meeting. In line with that theme, the word of the day was “Effulgent” selected by grammarian Eleanor. Chui had the role of harkmaster and Fil acted as timekeeper who reminded us of the importance of time with the quote “Time only seems to matter when it is running out.”

First speaker was Karen who’s speech informed us of three reasons why she felt the UK should remain part of the EU. The benefits outlined included the positive effect on the economy, the advantages of having the ability to tackle issues collectively, and the peacekeeping effects of forging good relationships with neighbouring countries.

The second speaker was Andy who’s informative speech about the origins of oil, how it is an essential component, the price and supply of which has a direct and indirect effect on many industries. A speech packed full of eye opening information around the subject of oil.

Lastly was Stephen’s speech. Stephen educated the audience in three practical techniques which he practices in order to supercharge productivity and ways in which to become more effective. Stephen informed the audience about prioritising, the importance of “being present”, writing down your thoughts and having a “to-do” list.

We had ten speakers who participated in table topics, the impromptu speaking portion of the meeting. The results included speeches by Joyce who named President Barack Obama as her perfect dinner guest, Olivia imagined that huge dogs might take over the World in the year 3000 and Rob said, if given the choice of meeting someone from his Family’s history he would like to meet his relation Thomas Edison, the inventor of the light bulb!

A successful first meeting of Spring! Join us for our next meeting on Tuesday 29th March.

Prateek took charge of our last meeting as Toastmaster of the meeting and quickly introduced his team for the evening. Club President Florian standing in as timekeeper this evening to highlight both the importance of time within a meeting of the value of redoing roles to learn new things. Nadia took on the grammarian role with “nonchalant” as word of the day. Finally our harkmaster for this meeting was Eleanor B.

The first speaker this meeting was Sophia “Risk equals opportunities”. Sophia took us on the journey her brother undertook to launch his own smoothie business Savse. From a dinner with friends to the successful award winning business it is today. Our second speaker Hannah “be careful of the company you keep” informed us about the joint enterprise law and how someone can end up being imprisoned if taking part in a crime involving a friend. The third speaker was Toby “a new world” who explained the new possibilities offered by virtual reality worlds. He also highlighted the possible downsides include easy escapism in better worlds. Finally, the final speaker was John “Try, fail, learn, succeed” inspired us with a personal story of the importance of trying and failing in learning how to succeed.

Our four evaluators were Eleanor G, Isabelle, Fahad and Stephen. Each provided extensive feedback on the strong points and points for improvements of tonight’s speakers.

The table topics session as facilitated by Annabel who used the London Timeout magazine for inspiration. Questions included “what’s the best part in London to live in” and “what would you change about London”. Both guests and members alike took part in the session and enjoyed themselves tackling Annabel’s questions. Each table topic speaker was evaluated by Edwin as table topics evaluator.

Nadia and Eleanor B came back on stage for their grammarian and harkmaster reports. Followed by Catherine from London Olympians as general evaluator who gave thorough feedback on the club and meeting.

Come and join us for our next meeting on March 22^nd!

Edwin was our charismatic Toastmaster of the evening introduced each speaker to the stage. The theme of the night was Inspirational Woman, each speaker was given the opportunity to name a woman who inspired them.

Tasked with keeping this meeting on time was Tatianna, Andrew was grammarian, Fil as harkmaster and finally Thomas as vote counter and Table Topics evaluator.

The first speaker of the night was Alessia, her speech informed the audience of methods and skills that could be introduced at school in order to better prepare students for the working World.

AK’s inspiring speech had the message “Your Words Have Power”. A very apt topic, his speech outlined three examples where words had the power to change an otherwise hopeless scenario.

Third speaker was Florian who delivered an advanced speech. He spoke about the technical topic of nuclear safety, explaining through the use of a visual presentation and simplifying challenging concepts through the use of metaphors. These techniques enabled Florian to educate the audience in an otherwise very complex subject.

At Toastmaster meetings there is an opportunity to give a short impromptu speech. This is a very rewarding skill to develop. Through practice members develop the ability to organize their thoughts quickly and respond to an impromptu question or topic with skill.
Alex’s role at the meeting was to select the topics each speaker was given.

Terry was asked to detail his perfect date night. In order to rekindle their relationship, he described how he and his wife visit Brighton Pier, the place where they first met. They would play on the 2p slot machines to win toys for their two children. The perfect date would end at KFC where he would splurge on a romantic dinner.

Kim was asked to describe her life as a superhero, she recounted how useful it is to have the power of invisibility. Although this was Kim’s first time visiting Toastmasters, she informed us in her impromptu speech that she had attended previous London Victorians meetings incognito!

Paul was asked who out of three celebrities would he take on a cruise ship, he selected American politician Donald Trump! This decision developed into very humorous impromptu speech outlining the reasons why he would take the billionaire politician on a sailing trip.

An enjoyable evening with laughter, education and inspiration! Join us as a guest at our next meeting on Tuesday the 15th March!

At Toastmasters we love giving out awards and the theme of our last Toastmasters meeting was “Victorians’ award show”. Taking charge as Toastmaster of the meeting was Fahad. Assisting him as timekeeper was Eleanor G who took this role for the first time. We love to have unusual words of the day in Toastmasters meetings and tonight’s one by our grammarian Stephen was “pizazz”. Maria and Andrew S completed the crew as respectively harkmaster and vote counter.

We had five speakers on the agenda. The first one Alex was beginning his Toastmasters journey by doing his icebreaker speech “A little bit about me”. Here we learnt just that, including his job as actuarial consultant and his travels in India, South America and Nepal. The second speaker for the evening was Nadia “King Solomon – Debating what are we here for and what’s life all about?” in her speech Nadia covered part of Ecclesiastes and the importance of not taking a text out of context. The third speech “Life with Jim” was by Olivia. In a crafty twist the subject was her relationship with gym and how by exercising more she became happier and stronger. Our fourth speaker was Annabel “Shop Now” who covered the history of shopping from ancient Greeks, to modern supermarkets to a future of drones and virtual reality. The final speaker was Nuala “Design is about people” who explained more about her job as aircraft interior designer and the three main end-users to take into account; economy class passengers; business class passengers and flight attendants.

The beauty of Toastmasters is that everyone who speaks receive a through verbal and written evaluation of his/her speech. Evaluating Alex was Thomas who recommended a slower speaking pace. Isabelle as evaluator of Nadia’s speech praised her clear structure but suggested she uses no notes in the future. Andy evaluated Olivia’s speech, praised her intriguing introduction but highlighted that the speech should have been outlined at the start. Terry took on the evaluation of Annabel’s speech and commended her for her clear structure. Finally, John evaluated Nuala, praising her use of the stage but recommended adding more pauses at key points in the speech.

After a short break, the meeting reconvened for a table topics impromptu speaking session. Keeping up with the movie theme, our table topics master AK asked questions such as “what’s your favorite movie line” “what’s your guilty cheesy movie?” or “Are there too many bad movies”. The session was evaluated by Eleanor H who provided thorough feedback to all speakers.

Maria and Stephen then came back for their reports. Following on from them was our general evaluator Chris from London Corinthians who evaluated the club, ambiance and everyone else not evaluated so far.

Congratulations to our best speaker Olivia, best evaluator John and best table topics speaker Florian.