Meeting 8 Jan 2008

Attendance at this was poor with only 9 members present, two guests and one visiting Toastmaster. The theme for the evening was BE INVIGORATED and considering the small turnout the theme certainly invigorates those present.

The SAA Monsieur Tilaka was temporarily domiciled at Pantai Hospital and the ASAA Mohamad took the gavel to start the meeting at sharp 7 pm according to the room time. The control was handed to our VPE ever hard working Leong Kok Wah and got the meeting going with an introduction. And for this evening he asked them to tell the their dream at the end of the year.

He later passed the gavel to the TME Dr Gan Eng Meng who took the control for the first time like a fish in water. Being well prepared she did what she needed to do and introduced the Table Topics Master Masdiana. There was no Invocation this evening as time does not permit.

Masdiana wasted no time in introducing the table topics session and asked for volunteers. On this 8th day of the year 2008 only 8 speakers were allowed and they were Adam, Jalini, Ho, Leong, Sherine, Khung, Mohamad and Siew Foong. And the winner goes to our guest Siew Foong.

After the session Dr GEM called on our PP Philip to handle the evaluation and with confidence he gave his views with candour and encouragement.

Tonight is a special night when we have to induct a new Member Mr Khung. this was elaborately done by our President at exactly 6 minutes. As usual, our club's ritual is to get the inductee to read his Promise and the members have to re affirm theirs to him as well. Our GE Mr Lucky was very impressed with our Members Promise, well printed by our VPPR Ho. Thank you HO. The President also requested our VPE to notify the new member his new mentor and Mr Mike Teng was named.

We then proceed to the 4th floor for our dinner and as usual everybody was happy with the food except that our VPE gave us a distress signal that the food cost may go up by RM1 (fine with me) except it is for each person.

After coming back to the room we were ready for the next session and our Dr GEM introduced our next speaker Lovingly Levine Lee who is doing her CL project from the Successful Club Series 'Finding new members for your club' to take the floor. This followed by Adam who tackled the Advanced Project with a title "Beware of Toastmasters". Whilst Levine was soft and warm, Adam was loud and funny. We enjoyed their presentations and only one evaluator was invited as Levine's presentation does not provide for Evaluation. Masdiana did not minced her words when she presented her evaluation and Adam now understands clearly what need to be done for his future speeches.

The grammarian for the evening was Leong Kok Wah, the Ah Counter was handled by Levine as Jeffrey was MIA and Mohamad took the time job. He must be so hot that the machine blew up before he could touch it. As usual the always prepared VPE, put his Plan B into motion and we had to settle for a manual sign - a little exercise for the 'slim' Mohamad.

Our GE Mr Lachmichand MA encouraged us to encourage members to use the word for the day by giving the speakers signs placed all over the room. He also commended the well designed Members Pledge card done by Ho Ho Ho. Finally he mentioned that "Some people are afraid to speak in front of other people but there some people (like him) who felt not stimulated to speak to a small group." Those who did not turn up for the meeting see what you have done to a good speaker? Next time turn for the meeting.

Finally our President took over the control of the meeting and presented the three Awards. The Most Friendly Person for the evening goes to Adam Fung and the Best Role Player went to our TME Dr GEM Gan Eng Meng. (I've mentioned the name of the Best TT Speaker earlier - scroll up a little more)

when Jalini was invited ny the President to say a few words, she readily commented that she has known TM for over 10 years but no one has invited her except Levine. She felt our meeting is fun and the location perfect. She will be joining us soon.

For Siew Foong, she said that she is still thinking about giving her commitment to the club. This is her 3rd visit and will give serious thought about joining. She was invited by Dr GEM.

The Closing Ode was done by our PP Philip who said that since he was as young as 20 years old he has been a leader but has always the fear of speaking in front of an audience until she met Masdiana when he was working for Sin Chew Press. He gave acknowledgement to Masdiana for introducing him to Toastmaster and no matter how busy he is, he is willing to spend time at TM meeting.

That's all for now folk, Happy New Year 10.01.08(Muslim Calender) - Awal Muharram