Meeting Recap for the 13th of August 2019.
The meeting started off at 7.30 pm as usual with a total of 7 guests (returning and new comers); Hasrul, Wilson, Amzar, Hal, Nadia, Jeremy, Khai, and Hazwan.
Toastmaster of Evening
After the meeting and guest introduction are completed, the Sergeant at Arms; the floor is taken over by the Toastmaster of Evening, Aziman Nasir, ACB ALB. Aziman proceeded the meeting with the introduction of his roleplayers:
Table Topic Master – TM Aditia Salalu
As the TTM, Aditia is responsible in facilitating the Table Topic Session of the meeting and invited members from the audience to attempt impromptu speeches for 1 to 2 minutes.
Table Topic Evaluator – Wong Hui Ting, EC1
As the TTE, Hui Ting will provide valuable feedback for the speakers who attempted Table Topic Speeches to help them improve their future impromptu speeches.
Grammarian – TM Supatra Lee
Supatra’s role is to introduce the word of the day,note down any usage of the word of the day, and provide valuable feedback for any excellent English usage throughout the meeting.
Word of the Day
Cloister (verb)
To seclude or to isolate
Example:
A scientist who cloisters herself in her laboratory
Startup are encourage to collaborate instead of cloistering away to create
Ah Counter & Who Said What – TM David Lim
For this role, David will listen attentively to every speaker throughout the meeting and note down any filler sounds or crutch words used by speakers, and lastly test the audience listening skill by quizzing them any facts mentioned throughout the meeting.
Timer and Tip – Syatrah Roslan, SR3
Syatrah keeps track the time taken for each speaker to ensure the meeting starts and ends on time. She will also provide a report of how long each speaker takes for their speeches during the Evaluation Session. Syatrah also shared her Timer Tip to the audience: Wrap up your speech when (timing device) light turns yellow. Excellent tip for us to always be on time!
General Evaluator – Rahmat Tarsat, CC CL
As the GE, Rahmat will facilitate the third part of the meeting which is the Evaluation Session where she will invite evaluators to provide their feedbacks and reports. She will also evaluates other evaluators, provide comments on the general setting of the meeting, and other details of the meeting.
After introducing all of his roleplayers, Aziman shared with us his thought of the day:
“Today You, Tomorrow Me” – Mexican Immigrant
Aziman shared with us a story where one of his best friends was about to get married, and this particular friends don’t have a lot of family members to help him out in organising and managing his wedding. Aziman and his friends help this soon-to-be husband friend managing and organising the wedding. The story ended with how the wedding ran successfully thanks to the effort of everyone helping their friends out. This story reminds Aziman of the quote from the Mexican Immigrant which in turn reminded us to always help each other.
Prepared Speech Session
In tonight’s meeting, there were two speakers attempting their prepared speech from Pathways.
Otis by Lai Ling Ling PM attempting her Level 1 Project 1 – Ice Breaker
Lai Ling Ling shared with us a humourous story about her dog named Otis. When she was young, she told us the story about two of her neighbour’s glamorous dogs brought havoc to her family’s belongings. To resolve this issue, their family decided to get the meanest possible dog to guard their house. As soon as they found one terrifying looking dog, they decided to get that dog. Unfortunately the dog is not for sale, however its only scrawny son is left for sale. Thinking the harmless puppy will grow up to be as big as its dad, the family decided to get that pup and named it Otis. Hilarity ensued when Otis turned out to be the world’s worst and useless guard dog ever. Ling Ling’s family eventually got more guard dogs and ever since, a lot of dogs come and go in her family, however Otis still remain in the family for years. Until one day, Otis left the family for whatever reason. As useless as the dog is, Ling Ling’s family was upset due to the loss of Otis. They spent weeks looking for Otis. Until one fateful day, Otis came back home, which made the family shed tears of happiness. This incident made Ling Ling realised that “You don’t choose love, but love chooses you.”
How My Family Communicate by Allen Ang DTM attempting his Level 2 Project 2 – Dynamic Leadership
Allen Ang shared with us his method of communicating with his family, particularly his parents and sister. He started off the story by telling us, we communicate with different people differently depending on how we behave towards others. He brought us back in time when he was still a student. He told us despite the fact that everyone in his class are happy and congratulating him whenever he scored the highest mark in the class, Allen will still be upset. This is because his mother wanted him to score at least 100% for every test. He told us his mother is the demanding type of parent. His father however, exactly the opposite of his mother, where his father is always supportive towards whatever Allen is doing and not put too much stress on his academic performance as much as his mother. Years have gone by and now Allen is an adult, but his parents’ behaviours remain the same. He further told us about how his wife is an outgoing, fun, and sociable person will always ease the tension by calming Allen’s mother, and his sister is the analytical type of person who always analysing and assessing the situation. Despite the differences in personalities in the family, Allen assured the audience his family communicate well with each other. Allen told us how he adapts to different communication style when he interacts with different family members, for example, he always encourages his wife for her every action, he always communicate with a direct approach with his mother, he always gives the facts for every situation to her analytical sister, and lastly his father where they would both just node with each other as a sign of everything is all good..
Table Topic Session
This is the moment our Table Topic Master TM Aditia Salalu to shine, however, he wouldn’t be shining alone as he will give others the opportunity to shine by offering them to try to attempt Table Topic
Our first Table Topic Speaker was Kelvin, he was asked the question, would he try to help a lost person on the street. Much to our surprise, Kelvin is the kind of person who loves to help lost tourists whenever Kelvin is in Bandar. He often brings some tourists to interesting places in Brunei Darussalam and enjoys the conversation he has with tourists.
Our next Table Topic Speaker, Wilson (Guest), was asked what item would he give if he had something to give. Coincidentally, currently he’s going through the dilemma of whether to donate his clothes as he cherishes all of his clothes.
The third Table Topic Speaker is our fourth time guest Khai, he was asked whether he donates his blood regularly. He humourously responded he never donated blood before because he needs his blood more. But he soon explained the audience that he has hemophilia a condition where the body unable to make blood clot properly. He jokingly told the audience he got fatter due to him having a blood transfusion when he discovered he has this condition.
The fourth Table Topic Speaker is our newest member Rashid, was asked whether he would consider to donate his organs when he’s still alive. Initially, he doesn’t mind to donate his organs if he was not alive, but when he’s healthy and living, he’s afraid of donating his organs will be fatal for him. But if the recipient was his parents or close relatives, he will have no doubt to donate his organs to them.
The fifth Table Topic Speaker, Era (Guest), share with us the story of when she was doing volunteering work called Community Outreach Programme in Thailand. In Thailand, she was given the opportunity to teach English to primary kids who are not as fortunate as Bruneian children. Doing volunteering work in Thailand also help her to improve her skill as a negotiator at a higher level.
Our final Table Topic Speaker, Hazwan (Guest) share with us about his experience with giving money to charity. He started off his speech by humouring the audience on how “friends” always act like they are a charity since “friends” constantly asking for monetary help. He even reminded the audience not to fully trust our money to our “friends”. He proceeded his speech by stating that he is a skeptical person, and won’t easily trust charity to utilise the donation for the cause they are supporting.
Evaluation Session
In this session, everyone who speaks will get evaluated by their respective evaluator. Our Toastmaster of the Evening Aziman Nasir handed over the floor to Rahmat, our General Evaluator, to host this session.
Congratulations to our fourth time guest Khai for winning the best Table Topic Ribbon tonight! We hope to see you win more ribbons in the future!
After the Evaluation Session ended, our Toastmaster of the Evening expressed his gratefulness towards the audience for attending tonight’s meeting and the roleplayers who made the entire meeting ran smoothly. Aziman handed over the floor to Brunei Speakers Club President, Allen Ang DTM.
President Take Control
Congratulations to Wong Hui Ting, EC1 for winning the best Evaluator Ribbon.
For tonight’s “Any Other Business”:
Workshop on 17th August at Sekolah Menengah Rimba II to teach impromptu speech to 100 ‘O’ Level students to prepare them for their Oral Examination
Brunei Speakers Club has new family! Welcome on board Rashid, we hope we will learn a lot from each other in the future!
Mark your calendar! We will be having Area Appreciation/Installation Dinner on 31st August 2019 at Higher Hotel @ 7 PM. Any member who brings a non Toastmaster guest to the event, Brunei Speakers Club will sponsor $10 off both of the member and the guest entrance fee. The entrance fee is $20 per person.
President Closing Remarks
The president DTM Allen Ang, reminds everyone to stand back up and recover fast whenever we slip. The message here whenever we are having a setback in our lives, it’s important for us to quickly recover from the setback, learn from our mistakes, and continuously build a better version of ourselves. He also commented on our guest who is tonight said that he was lucky enough to get Table Topic that he is familiar with which makes him able to give impromptu speech easily as it was something relatable to him. Allen Ang disagreed with this, because luck is not the only thing the guest has tonight. He told everyone, luck without hard work will not help everyone to articulate their thoughts properly when given a Table Topic. Everyone believes in luck, but Allen reminds us to believe in hard work more than luck. Because the harder we work, the luckier we are. Instead of relying on luck everyday, he advises us to work hard and stay committed to build our skills as a speaker by attending regularly to Brunei Speakers Club every Tuesday evening 7.30 pm to 9.30 pm at SEAMEO VOCTECH.
Recap written by TM Syahnur Nizam.
Photos credits to Rano Iskandar, ACB, ALB.
