On Tuesday 6th September guests and members were treated to a meeting full of fun, energy and enthusiasm as former President Florian Bay took to the stage as Toastmaster of the Meeting.
Eleanor G was grammarian with the word of the day being “quaint”, which with this being London Victorians, this meeting was never going to be! Gary stood in at the last minute as timekeeper, telling us that if you want to be a valuer of life then you should be a valuer of time. Eleanor H completed the functionaries as harkmaster, ensuring everyone listened intently, with the promise of chocolate rewards if we did.
Competent Communicator Speeches
Majdouline El Aasemi gave the first speech with her icebreaker titled “Dubito, ergo cogito, ergo sum” which translates to “I doubt, therefore I think, therefore I am”. Majdouline’s speech gave us insight into how she views the world by sharing some short stories of her life. An impassioned speech, definitely achieving the objectives and displaying a vast array of speaking skills far in advance of an icebreaker.
The second speaker was Bruna who was doing her second speech from the competent communicators manual. Immediately grabbing the audience’s attention with a theatrical opening, Bruna used rhetorical questions throughout to encourage us to think about how we make decisions in life. The speech was titled “Oh, noooo, it’s going to be a disaster” but Bruna’s confidence and engaging style made sure it was never going to be.
The third speaker of the meeting was Fahad who was doing an advanced speech from the Speaking to Inform manual. Fahad had the whole audience involved, he had us all on our feet, eyes closed, breathing purposefully, demonstrating how we can find calm in stressful situations. He called this finding your “Ha-Ra”, which was also the title of his speech. With everyone feeling so calm and refreshed after his interactive demonstration, it’s not surprising Fahad won the best speaker award for the meeting.
Table Topics
The second half of the meeting Sophia took to the stage as Table Topic Master. Instead of asking a question of the speakers, Sophia asked them each to pick a surprise item from a bag and to sell it to the audience. This led to some hilarious instances including Pranav almost convincing us that a paint brush was in fact a magical brush that makes you love life and Terry doing an amazing improvised sketch of a mum and daughter extolling the virtues of the platinum range of Fairy Liquid.
The competition was tough as the standards were high but it was Florian who won the best table topic speaker award with his promotion of a can of hairspray that would, apparently, prevent your hair from making you look like a shrew!
Join us at our next meeting on 13th September when London Victorians will be hosting their annual Humorous Speaking and Table Topics contests.
View all the meeting photos in our gallery or see us on Facebook.
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