Do you remember what you did last night? Beulah didn’t, which caused a bit of a row between herself and Mark during the first of several innovative role plays introduced by tonight’s topicsmaster Maria. The night’s theme was ‘memories’, which incorporated childhood TV favourites in toastmaster Jill’s introductions (shout out for MacGyver and the Greatest American Hero!) and various feats of recall during the topics.
Grammarian Nora’s word of the day was decadent, which brought on some holiday reminiscing by Sharon and myself, while Colette told us of finding her Pilates teacher unexpectedly her bed – just to clarify that this was in answer to a topic about remembering dreams!
A true or false role play produced interesting results: the audience had to decide which of the 4 participants was telling the truth in descriptions of their first kiss. Apparently Voxers are not good lie detectors, as we mostly got them wrong! We did, however, learn that coffee drinking starts very early in Spain according to Sylvia, and that buses of teenagers on the N17 are generally up to no good if Stephen was to be believed – unfortunately he wasn’t!
Anna Marie and Paul started up another argument – role plays often seem to feature them – about who pushed who out of a tree in a collectively remembered childhood role play, while Jeremy and Dan returned for another joint effort of ‘whose line is it anyway’ which once again proved hugely entertaining.
A topic asking the speaker to choose between losing their memory or their awareness provoked thoughtful responses from John and Fiona, with arguments being made on both sides. Muna then looked into the future to decide what he’d like to be remembered for, he went for character rather than riches or fame and made a good start by winning best topic!
It was a another fantastic night for speeches folks! Jean Marie started us off with his icebreaker, describing his journey from Lyon to a ‘hippie lifestyle’ living in and cleaning a hostel while trying to get over an initial lack of love for Dublin. The fact that he’s still here hopefully means his opinion has changed, congratulations on completing your first speech!
Freedom! Silence, stillness. The room was collectively quiet as a mouse as Fiona asked us to listen to each other and think for ourselves. Books have their place but don’t expect to find the solutions to everything in them or a handy 10 point plan. Fiona’s speeches always get this blogger looking at the world in a different way, both because of the content of her speeches and her impressive and heartfelt delivery. This week her speech was expertly evaluated by Eddie in practice for his appearance at the district final in May (good luck in Torquay!)
Stephen, well really, what to say about this speech? The innocent title – Hydration. The storyteller settling in for a good yarn as we get on the bus in Peru for a 16 hour journey with a hungover Stephen and his travelling companion. They have everything they need except the most essential ingredient – water. The next thing we know the stones on the hillside are speaking out loud and the speaker is falling backwards out of the toilet cubicle on the bus in a haze of dehydration.
Check your wee. This is the message Stephen had for us tonight. It’s important enough that he mentioned it a couple of times, casually, yet informatively. Now I mention it to you, the reader, and ask you to be aware that too much of the good things in life can bring on a bad result – dark yellow urine. Balance out those coffees with some water and you’ll be OK. Needless to say Stephen’s comic timing is definitely one of his strengths and he is now using it to good effect on educational topics!
Vroom vroom! Rosie loves to drive, she told us, before taking us on a rollercoaster ride as she described her car accident on the M50 last year with vivid physicality. We realised, exactly as she had done, just how lucky she was to be around to describe this life changing incident for us. Just as remarkable was her decision shortly afterwards to get behind the wheel again, her point that thousands of safe hours shouldn’t be held hostage to a minute of hell was well made and inspiring.
Line of the week goes to Mark in evaluating Jean Marie’s speech, when he described the speaker as being ‘as cool as the other side of the pillow’. This could become a regular feature with examples as good as that!
Sweets were handed out as topics prizes, Dan introduced his Women of the Water as he talked about surfing safety; it was once again an engrossing and laugh out loud evening at Vox Populi. I’m sure that everyone has been increasing their water intake and inspecting the results, I look forward to a healthier bunch of toastmasters at the next meeting!
Merrilyn Campbell, VPPR