“Music is the soul what words are to the mind”.
We were happy to welcome four guests at our online meeting: Ming Wang, Tugce Özkepir, Ipsita Seth and Nadja, who has joined several times and even took over roles this evening.
Nadine, our Toastmaster of the Evening, firstly referred to the theme, explained the structure of the evening and introduced her team. Nadja took over the role as grammarian, Caroline did the Ah-Counter and Gabi was the timer. The general evaluation was done by Sybille.
Nadine had many hats on this evening. She presented the word of the day: eclectic, meaning varied and diversed. This word was used four times in the evening.
Pio’s joke was in line with the theme. It was short and crisp and funny.
Jeff referred to a quote by Oliver Sacks in his thought of the evening.
” Music can lift us out of depression or move us to tears – it is a remedy, a tonic, orange juice for the ear. But for many neurological patients, music is even more – it can provide access, even when no medication can, to movement, to speech, to life. For them, music is not a luxury, but a necessity.”
As Table Topics Master, Nadine very efficiently explained the role and presented her questions charmingly:
1. What was your latest experience in a karaoke bar?
Caroline has never sung in a karaoke bar. However, she spoke about the music Lingola which is widely distributed in Kenia, where she comes from. Whenever she listens to it she feels better and warmer.
2. Suggestion of a song everybody should listen to and why?
Paul mentioned that he is not an expert in music but loves listening to it in Youtube. Music touches him and he loves dancing to it.
3. Sad side of music. Musicians stop their career.
Nadja told us that she misses Jonny Cash and his music.
4. Certain songs have a special meaning to us.
Pio shared a personal story about the song “In meiner Wolke”. This song takes him back to nice holiday times with his family.
In the second part of the evening Nadine introduced Poorana’s speech with the title “Communicate like a toastmaster”. This is the second speech at level 2 in the path presentation mastery with the project understanding your communicatio stye. Poorana shared with us a challenge he experienced in a business meeting and he succeeded because he used skills he has learning in Toastmasters. He concluded his speech with three take aways for us Toastmasters:
– take up roles
– adapt your communication style to the situation
– keep it simple
His very enjoyable speech was evaluated by Jeff who underline the many strenghs in this speech. Poorana started off with a nice story which took the audience right into it. He used the technique internal dialogue: “What if …”, he had a strong message. To improve, the climax could have been more effective when the torture of reading out the legal text would have been shown more.
Sybille gave feedback to all roles of the evening and congratulated Nadine for an excellent job as Toastmaster of the evening.
The award for the best table topic speaker went to Paul. Congratulations.
At the end of the meeting Sybille, as presiding officer, presented two club business issues:
New Officers Team. The following officers have been voted in for the next officers year starting July 1, 2023:
Presiding Officer: Alexya
Secretary and immediate past president: Sybille Maas-Müller
VP Education: Nadine supported by Oliver
VP Membership: Poorana
VP PR: Jeff
Treasurer: Jan-Philipp
Sergeant at Arms: Pio
The second issue were the membership fees. Since Toastmaster International has increased the fees by 33%, our club has to increase as well. Three options were presented. The members agreed on the annual increase to € 132 (which is € 11 per month). This leads to a balanced budget without inforcing money collection at meetings.
(Thanks to our still President Sybille for this grear recap!)
Join us for our next meeting on the 27th of June (in-person meeting).
Best Toastmaster greetings,
Jeff, Mannheim Int. Toastmasters
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Here is a photo of the meeting:
