A toast!

As much as i would like to indulge in the happy time topic (~visualize clubs/bars where friends drinking and toasting to each other saying happy this and happy that~) but sadly it's not about that kind of toast. Not even roti bakar!

What i have in mind is actually the Toastmasters International, where a group of people meet and basically talk their hearts out. Most Toastmasters meetings are comprised of approximately 20 people who meet weekly for an hour or two. Participants practice and learn skills by filling a meeting role, ranging from giving a prepared speech or an impromptu one to serving as timer, evaluator or grammarian. It is actually a good vehicle to improve your communication skills and your grammar, etc.

Now, i know about Toastmasters for quite some time and have never been bother to actually join them because i consider myself quite a speaker. (And i had the nerve to ask my english teacher what do they do? Drink beer and toast?)

Until today that is. A friend of mine by the name of Zack has been inviting me to join the office chapter. Reluctantly i agree to come as a favor because he said they weren't having enough speakers for today. There i was sitting and not knowing what to expect (Beer toasting kept popping up!). I was the 5th speaker for the table topic session which is a 2 minute session where you are given a topic and basically talk anything related to the topic. I chose "Transmute Gold". I wanted to do teleportation but an earlier speaker chose that and talk about Star Trek. Next was flight but Satish had to pick that and basically put pictures in our head of him in red undies... wahahhaha... so i chose Transmute Gold instead. After my 2 minutes session was done i sat and enjoyed the rest of the meeting.

When it came to the evaluation session, they were recording/keeping count of my Umm and Ahhs. and got 5 of them combined. I didn't realize that and i thought "Wow, i really need to weed these Umms and Ahhs out!". As a token of my silly table topic, i was voted "Best Table Topic" speaker for my version of the midas touch.

Zack cangratulated me for the funny speech i made and said, "if you want to join, just let me know".

I am seriously thinking about it...

plus the food was great!