Friday, December 18, 2015



Ho ho ho!

Like Mohamed Ali so often said,” The champ is here!” well, I say, “Algoa Toastmasters, Port Elizabeth is here, with a BANG!”
It’s my favorite time of the year, Christmas Time.

I am not sure what the Christmas season means to, you as an individual and what it is that you are celebrating. For me, the exchange of gifts, travelling and rest from work for many of us, reminds me so much of the biggest gift that our Heavenly father gave to all humanity, his only son Jesus Christ. So go on and give those gifts, and give me some also.
I am sooo sad though that, today, the 8th December 2015 is our last meeting for the year, however, never fear when Algoa Toastmasters is near, as the 12 January 2016 is coming soon when we will meet again, so don’t cry South Africa.
Intelligent people always say be very careful what you do to your children as they will have those memories for the rest of their lives.
I decided to go down memory lane and find out how people celebrated Christmas when they were children and I was amazed at the precise answers that I received from the speakers as they still remembered like they were kids, not so long ago.
I had the honor, privilege and grace of being the Madam Toastmaster for this particular night. Obviously with the support of my wonderful fellow toastmasters. I am a music lover, or “musaholic”, my new invented word and to me, such a supportive and synchronized environment at Algoa Toastmasters reminds me so much of my favourite songs that I love to dance to. For instance, the song, “We are the World”, to mention just one. I enjoy that song so much and sing along to all the different singers and instruments. I hardly ever think of the fact that in order for that particular song to sound so beautiful, different people have to come together and each one had to play their part skillfully to make the song what it is, people such as:
        Producers
        Instrumentalists
        Singers of various parts
        Etc.
If one of the above mentioned is out of sync, the song will not sound as beautiful as it should. Instead it will sound like a horse is singing and you don’t want to hear that.
Trust me, any meeting at Algoa, to me is like a beautiful, sounds of music, because we all love, support, encourage and help one another become the best that we can be and I am forever thankful I joined this club.

Our prepared speeches by Zikona, Deborah, Louise and Megan were outstanding and I felt like I was in parliament as the above speeches were very well researched by all the speakers  If you want to learn life’s lessons at a minimal cost, this is the place to be, definitely. Just to bring music to your ears and make you feel like you were at the meeting....
From the first speaker: Zikona, I learnt many ways and means of saving electricity. Just imagine if we all as South Africans adopted this mentality of saving electricity instead of wasting it. I believe we would have no need of load shedding. Just a few lessons, such as:
        Using energy saving light bulbs
        Switching off your lights when you don’t need them, e.g., don’t light the whole house when you are stationed only in one room and
        Switching off the unused electricity utensils, such as televisions, radios, etc….
Mom Z. I think they must give you a slot on SABC to spread this message………


The second speaker, Deborah taught us the pros of line dancing as there are no cons, and I believe her. This dancing can be done by people of all ages, body sizes and shapes, no discrimination and my goodness, it’s beautiful. I am definitely in as I am not a fan of any other types of exercise. It is fun, everybody can join in and have a blast at the same time. This funky and life loving lady is 64 years old herself but she looks, not a day older than 46, now I know why.
Thank you Mom D.


Now this lady, our third speaker Louise, came up with quite a touchy yet profound topic: Men’s health. Isn’t this the most neglected, yet necessary topic to talk about? I certainly think so. I would like to appeal to all ladies to please encourage the men in their lives - brothers, husbands, boyfriends, the works, to go for those regular checkups because “prostate cancer” is killing our men just the same way that breast cancer is these days.

You see, men are not like us women because we can meet as strangers at any bathroom and show each other our scars and stretches and by the time we leave the bathroom, we are friends and have given each other therapy. Well, men are not quite like that, they can be quite shy to share their weaknesses and illnesses, hence I am appealing to you ladies to help them as this is easy for most of us to do.
Well done Sis L.

Our fourth and final speaker for the night was Megan. Now! I for one am not an easily trusting person, I have to really know you before I tell you my heart. When I came to Algoa Toastmasters however, it did not take me long to let my guard down, when I realized the calibre of people surrounding me. Megan was proof of this when she bravely shared a true and emotional story. Well done to you toasters for being, like Dr. Phil, so profoundly puts it, such a “soft place to fall”
Megs you rock and roll



As I mentioned earlier, Christmas is a wonderful time of the year, however, as we have fun at the beach, travelling and meeting new and interesting people, I would like to appeal to everybody to please be on the lookout of dodgy characters and don’t find yourself a victim. Parents, please watch your children like hawks and don’t let them out of your sight and please don’t trust anybody with your precious children.
If you are enjoying yourselves at the beach, please only swim at demarcated areas and don’t give life guards a tough time. You don’t want to be a Christmas lunch for sharks as, believe me, they too know that it’s Christmas time and they will get free Kentucky which could be your leg. Don’t let that happen to you.

From my side till next time, have a blessed 2015 and a prosperous 2016!
CIAO FOR Now, signing off:

Thandi Swekile