One month to the World Cup but Marianah is already kicking goals of her own

Tonight’s Club meeting was all about achievements and top drawer speeches. It was also peppered with some life-affirming insights, courtesy of our Toastmaster for the evening, Colleen Love.

Toastmasters Area E1 Governor Yvonne Anderson was our guest tonight. She announced that our Club’s President Marlene Van Wyk will succeed her as Area Governor. Yvonne also presented Marlene and Michael Warren with their certificates for their recent achievements in both the Area and Divisional Speech Contests.

The biggest cache of certificates was for Nicholas Mitchell, but he was not on hand to receive them. Today he drove up to Gauteng to compete in the speech contests at Ladumacon 2010 later in the week.

Tonight Marlene delivered an entertaining but sobering speech about retirement titled: “Can you AFFORD to live longer?” Quinton Jacobs regaled us with another story from his adventurous summer sojourn to Antarctica called: “Hotel Valeskarvet”. It is in fact the base for the South African National Antarctica Expedition (SANAE IV). Don’t expect 24-hour room service and a mint on your pillow at this “hotel”

Thomas Duthie was voted the winner of Table Topics for his turn as a lippy Dane who while trying to pitch the Kingdom of Denmark as the best host country for the 2018 FIFA World Cup Tournament launched into a tirade against current FIFA President Sepp Blatter.

Many participants in the World Cup-themed Table Topics tried on some accents. Thomas channelled a Viking ancestor to great effect while Alison Immelman (fronting Australia’s bid for the 2018 World Cup) started out with an Aussie twang but switched to a hammy Canadian brogue halfway through her pitch.

But Marianah Lourens was the biggest achiever tonight. She picked up the Top Toastie floating trophy for her contributions to the Club’s success this year. In delivering her tenth speech tonight Marianah fulfilled the requirements of her Competent Communicator Award (one point for our Club). And in a few weeks time she achieve her Competent Leader Award (that will be another point for our Club). Marianah is single-handily responsible for 20% of our Club’s point for this Toastmasters year.

Congratulations Marianah!

The road to Palm Desert: The Division E Speech Competition

Shirley Renwick of East London won the Division E Speech Competition on 17 April. She will now go on to represent the Eastern Cape at the District 74 MaxiCon Annual Conference in Gauteng in May. Joining Shirley at the Conference will be our own Nicholas Mitchell who will compete for Division E in the impromptu speech and speech evaluation competitions.

The Conference is the final stop on the road to the Toastmasters International Convention, to be held in Palm Desert, California in August. Winners of District Contests, including District 74 (Southern Africa), will compete is a series of speech contests at the Convention which culminates in Toastmasters International awarding the World Champion of Public Speaking.

Good luck to Shirley and Nicholas! Remember to watch this blog for all the news from the District 74 Conference in May.

A visiting guest wins Table Topics

In what might be a first for our Club, a visiting guest won Table Topics at the April 13th meeting.

The Table Topics Master for the evening was Glenis Whitehead. The scenario: a crowded doctor’s waiting room. The receptionist announces to the walking wounded that the doctor only has time for one more patient. Cue all manner of theatrics as Table topics participants had to argue as why they should be the doctor’s last patient for the day.

There was Adam Engela’s sick Julius Malema and a hirsute Candice Finklestein with a crippling case of razor rash, but it was first time visitor Mimi Makupula who won Table topics with a hilarious, hearing impaired patient, who also had ants in her pants.

There were two prepared speeches for the evening. Rhona Murchie presented her “icebreaker” and introduced herself to the Club as the ultimate hyphenate: mother-teacher-student. Louise Solomons presented a talk on the arithmetic of success in which love, money and knowledge don’t add up to much; rather it all comes down to an individual’s attitude.

Alison Immelman was inducted as a new member and Thomas Duthie was re-inducted. Thomas also picked up the Top Toastie floating trophy for stepping into the role of evaluator at very short notice.

At our next meeting (27 April) Gillian Nutt will complete her Competent Communicator manual and we will induct our newest member: Zuki Skade.

Hold this date: Saturday, 5 June 2010

The Algoa Club will mark its jubilee anniversary (that’s fifty years) with a dinner at the Port Elizabeth Golf Club on Saturday 5 June. Tickets will be R120. Past members as well as friends of Algoa Toastmasters are invited to join the Club in celebrating this important milestone. Watch your email inbox for invitations and more information on how to buy tickets to the Algoa Club’s biggest celebration in five decades!

So, two jihadists, 72 virgins and a sperm whale walk into a bar...

Our recent club meeting will be remembered as something of a side-splitter. The tone of this past Tuesday's meeting was set by Toastmaster for the evening, Alan Hunter, who brought along the cheese (some truly priceless puns), while those present provided the crackers!

(Okay that pun was pretty awful.)

The format for Table Topics was a chain-story, whereby a participant had to pick up the story from where their predecessor left off. The story began with Table Topics Master, Craig Stephenson, reading the opening paragraph to Herman Melville's Moby Dick.

In the Algoa Club's “re-imagining” of that great American novel, Nicholas Mitchell gave Melville's narrator, Ishmael, a love interest: Arabella. Mark Barry jettisoned Ishmael's best shipmate Queeqeg and replaced him with a jihadist who was off to fight a holy war, and dying to get into a heaven - replete with 72 virgins.

Our circumnavigating American guest (aka Joel) reintroduced the mythic white whale, and a psycho-sexual Freudian undercurrent. Marlene Van Wyk leapt to defend Arabella's reasons for two-timing Ishmael with her secret husband, The Count (a little character development courtesy of Tom Horne), and three-timing both with the captain of Ishmael's ship.

But there was a foil to the man-eating Arabella, a belly-dancing virgin, with enchanting hips, who had escaped the holy warrior's heaven. The super-seducing 72^nd Virgin was Glenis Whitehead's creation, and for it she was voted the winner of this hilarious round of Table Topics.

Following the impromptu portion of the evening the Club was both informed and entertained by three prepared speeches. Educator Fanie Vermaak argued that a trusting relationship between a teacher (parent or mentor) and a child is of far greater benefit to a child's development than corralling children with rules.

Marianah Lourens demonstrated how the “12 Step Program” used by Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) can be used to help anyone change their self-defeating behaviours.

Meteorologist Quinton Jacobs picked up the “Top Toastie Award” for what must have been a Herculean effort to commit to memory his 13-minute “after-dinner speech” about his recent summertime adventure to Antarctica.

It was also the night for a first. Long-time visitor to the Club and recent inductee, Debbie Stephenson, ventured up to the lectern to deliver her first speech: The Toast of the Day. Debbie toasted eating and drinking to good health. She also managed to include Grammarian, Thomas Duffy's Word of the Day: matutinal.

The Algoa Club will meet again on 13 April. Until then be safe on the roads this holiday season.

Three Algoa Club members progress to the District Speech Contest

Area Speech Contestants: Michael Warren; Marlene Van Wyk; Musa Mdadlose; Nicholas Mitchell

Nicholas Mitchell and Michael Warren, will represent Algoa Toastmasters Club in the Divisional Speech Contest on the 17 April after Nicholas won the Area Speech Contest in the impromptu speech and evaluation categories, and Michael placed second in the International Speech section.

Our Club President, Marlene Van Wyk, who won the International Speech section, will represent the ACT Club at the Divisional Contest.

The annual Toastmasters International Speech Contest starts at club-level, with contestants progressing through Area, Divisional and District contests until they reach the finals at the Toastmasters Annual Conference in the United States. The winner at the US conference is awarded the title: “World Champion of Public Speaking”.

To be eligible to compete, contestants must have completed at least six speech projects towards their Competent Communicator award.

Our club contest on 9 March saw Gillian Browning, Michael Warren, Antoinette Baatjes and Quinton Jacobs compete in the International Speech section.

Michael won the club-level contest with an entertaining speech about the nature of truth which included a pinch of quantum mechanics, a splash of Hegelian dialectic logic, and one whole Red Delicious apple.

The Area Contest also included Megan Judd of Madiba Bay Club, and Musa Mdadlose from the U-Speak Club. Musa impressed by placing third in the International Speech Contest section on this his first entry into the Area Contest.

Watch this blog for future updates about the Speech Contest.