For the first time in my year of President, we had a proper business meeting. Lead by Danie, we followed the proper protocol for amending a motion and voting on the amendment and then the amended motion. Danie handed the process quickly and efficiently.
I am not sure when this newsletter will be published, and maybe Growcon will be over by then. If not, look at www.minicon.co.za or details. I have worked as part of the conference committee as the program convenor – what an eye-opener it has been! Such a lot of work and organisation goes into a conference where 150+ people are expected. I have renewed respect for people out there who do this for a living. Coming out of the conference will be one person who is the winner of the humorous contest for the Southern African region of Toastmasters. What an achievement! Of course there will have been many people slightly disappointed for having not made the various levels of the contest. Contests are the only time in Toastmasters where people compete against each other. The rest of the time, you ‘compete’ against yourself, hoping to better your previous effort.
This brings me to the ever-contentious issue of repeating speeches. There are advantages and disadvantages to being asked to repeat speeches or to merely move onto the next level. We have looked at this issue in our club committee meetings and thought that the best way forward is this: we will NOT ask members to repeat a speech during a public evaluation. The evaluator can speak to the member in private and merely suggest that they may want to repeat in order to meet the objectives of the particular speech more fully. The member then has the choice and can decide for him/herself whether to repeat or not.
Your feedback however is hugely important. In the near future, we are going to have a proper debate during the table topic session on being asked to repeat a speech. Think about whether you are FOR or AGAINST! In the meantime, if you would like to give us feedback, email me at president(at)4thdimension.org.za

Keep on keeping on!

Yours in growth,
 

President 4th Dimension

The new Toastmaster’s year has got off to a good start with 2 successful meetings. I believe the new committee is doing a sterling job, don’t you? Being on the committee for the third year in a row, I know the confusion that goes on when someone starts a new role. Then by the time you really understand the role and know exactly what to do, the year ends!!

Last year when I was VPE, I only managed to do one speech (poor excuse, I know). This year I plan to do one a month (take note Danie!!). I found that I lost quite a bit of confidence when it came to giving prepared speeches over that time.  On the program you will see a list of names and the last speech given. If you are near the bottom of the list – phone Danie NOW and get back on the program. Constant practice is what gives you the learning edge.

We have a big club, which means that speaking slots are limited. However, there are plenty of clubs close to 4th Dimension, who are often looking for speakers. You will be amazed at how much you grow when you speak to a different audience. Danie and I, and even Andrew, who is the area governor, would be happy to accompany you to visit another club. Just give us a call, and we will arrange everything.

If you want to progress steadily, make sure you take on a role at every meeting – this way you get to speak regularly. REMEMBER to bring your CL manuals to every meeting – you may get asked to do a role at the last minute- then at least you can get that recorded towards your Competent Leader.

Your committee, specifically your Mom’s are here to support you. Let us know what you need. Our contact details are on every program.

Bernadette Devlin’s quote is what Toastmasters is about:

“Yesterday I dared to struggle.

Today I dare to win.”

Yours in growth, 

David Black the Sergeant at Arms called the meeting to order at 18.23.

The Acting President Kirsten Long welcomed and asked everyone to introduce themselves. She confirmed the programme, Clinton ‘offered’ to handle the CL assignments.

Zibu Mntambo, having outlined the excellent progress South Africa was making towards being 100% prepared, then proposed a Toast – that we all be positive towards the Soccer World Cup.

The Programme

Kirsten handed over to Ray Smit, the Toastmaster for the night.

Ray opened his assignment with a couple of quotes to emphasise what a
Wonderful theme we had in “Count your Blessings”. These included:

If you have food in the fridge, clothes on you back and a place to sleep you are among the riches 75% of people in the world!

If you have money in the bank, cash in your wallet and spare change you are one of the 8% riches people in world.

The Grammarian Richard Riche introduced the word for the meeting - GIRN - to complain in a whining voice or contort ones face and grimace.

The timekeeper Monica Oosthuizen explained the timing.

The Hark Master  - Coralie Rutherford summarised what she would look for.

The evaluation Chairman Kirsten Long told us why evaluaiton was arguably the most important part of the evening.

Speeches

Liz Pearson – Bullying CC

Liz had our full attention as she opened with horrific examples of bullying. She outlined the reasons people became bullies and highlighted why so often it stayed hidden.

She urged us to realise that bullying was not part of growing up and must be opposed. She looked at the reasons why adults bully and how they need help and what we can do to help.
Liz finished by saying that it is a long hard road for both the bully to stop their destructive behaviour and the person being bullied to overcome the effects of bullying

Danie Roux – Modified Sandwich Technique ACB

Danie told us how in Toastmasters we are taught about the sandwich technique of evaluation, starting with the speaker’s strengths, then areas for improvement and finishing with more strengths.

In Danie’s eyes this was very boring - dry bread, dry meat and again dry bread but no condiments, to make the evaluation tastily beneficial. This was the modified sandwich technique.

So the bread was unconditional praise and the condiments areas for improvement with practical suggestions on how to improve.

To reinforce his proposal he provided examples of the original technique and his recommended modified technique, leaving us all fired up to apply this creative evaluation technique.

Saar Ben-Attar – Recovering my creativity  – CC4

Saar opened by saying what a bizarre notion to recover your creativity?

His quest started by accident, while wandering around Waterston’s book store in London, here he came across a book so fascinating he read half of it before paying for the book and taking it home to finish and start actioning.

In the book, entitled The Artist, the author Julia teaches about creativity, we are all basically creative but today most of us need to recover our sense of creativity.

The first step is a very practical exercise which should be done every morning. Take a blank piece of paper and start writing, up to 3 pages, of whatever comes into your mind. You will be amazed at your thoughts, which are often very negative. Then summarise the key points.

Following this for 12 weeks, clears out ones negativity and enables us to recover our creativity and sense of faith. The results are astonishing.

Table Topics

A fun Table Topics session was lead by Liz Pearson

Christa Roux entertained us on how we can benefit from the world cup, in her case it would be watching a soccer match for the first time.

Brendan told us that his formula for beating the winter blues was to do the opposite to everyone else. He didn’t hibernate but spent more time at the gym keeping fit and trim so when Yebo summer came all his slim trim body needed was a tan!

Richard gave us a good tip on how to survive the financial crash, by paying off your debt rather than creating more debt, especially when you don’t have the money. The end objective to save and only buy anything when you can pay cash for it.

Clint entertained us by describing what he would do if he was the Coach for Bafana Bafana.

Coralie a non chocolate addict spoke on the “The Joy of eating chocolate”.

For Danie Roux it appears that what he loved most about his job was meeting a range of stimulating people over lunch.

Evaluation

The evaluation session was chaired by Kirsten Long

Karen Geyser evaluated Liz Pearson’s speech, Kirsten Long Danie Roux’s speech and
David Black Saar Ben-Attar’s speech.

Presentation

Leadership Excellence – Delegating to Empower was presented by Kirsten Long as her final assignment in the advanced leadership manual.

Kirsten presented an excellent summary on how to delegate, the process, the barriers, the steps, choosing the right people and communicating effectively to them.

Hark Master and Raffle
Coralie Rutherford was the Hark Master and Christa Roux conducted a profitable raffle.

On a point
Danie reminded members of how they could obtain a DVD of their speech.

Kirsten Long reminded everyone of:

• COT, on Saturday 20 June
• The Installation dinner, in Sunninghill on 24 June, the cost was R120.00 and the dress smart casual. The speaker would be Douglas Kruger who won the South African District leg of the prepared speech contest and would now compete in the US.
• The next meeting, on Monday 6 July, when Danie Roux would be the stand in for the new President.

Kirsten asked for feedback from the visitors.

The meeting closed at 20.20

Kirsten confirmed the programme and Matt proposed the Loyal Toast.

The Toastmaster for the evening was Paul Smith.

Speeches

Thuli Makhene: CC1 Why I must learn the Tango

Thuli held the meeting entranced as she highlighted the two constants in her life – travel and learning to speak an increasing number of languages. Her parents seemed to want her to live in every province in South Africa and while living there to learn the language spoken most frequently in that province!

Once she was operating under her own steam she studied in the USA and then learnt French so she could really make the most of a field trip to Paris.

Now her ears are set on learning Spanish and the challenge of visiting Spain or the more exciting prospect of Tango-ing in the Argentine.

Terry Mashoke: CC1 Perfect work in Progress

Terry who started life in Zimbabwe was very relieved at the age of 6 that her mother decided to stop providing her with more brothers and sisters!

She loved school holidays, especially a trip to the Victoria Falls, when she went on a sunset cruise and game viewing.

Boarding school, at the age of 9 was a bitter sweet experience but taught her discipline & independence.

Her post school days started with secretarial training, which gave her access to, but not a seat in, the Board Room.

So she set off on the road to higher education, first a PR diploma in London, then a B degree in marketing communication and so to an MBA.

This enabled her to graduate from a sales rep, to accounts manager and then strategic management and so the trip continues from typing pool to Board Room and who knows what tomorrow will bring.

Theresa Muller: CC2 Small Business in South Africa

Theresa provided us with a range of fascinating business statistics, primarily from overseas, with respect to small and large businesses, their contribution to GDP, employment statistics, etc.

On the positive side she highlighted that it was actually small business that made the world go round, primarily because they had the flexibility to rapidly take advantage of and adapt to changing situations.

However on the negative side, small businesses tended to be hardest hit by economic downturns, but she countered this with innovative suggestions on how to overcome some of these problems, for example small businesses working together to pool their resources

She closed by saying that for South Africa to do well it must ensure not just the survival but also the success of our small businesses.

Danie Fourie: CC2 Conspiracy Busted

Danie posed the Question  “Did NASA actually land a man on the moon or was it a well orchestrated hoax”.

He presented 3 strong arguments to prove the hoax theory and countered these with three equally good explanations to prove man really did land on the moon.

His first argument was based on the fact that the flag planted on the moon was flying and not drooping, when it was in a vacuum. The second argument hinged around the lack of stars in photos taken on the moon and the final argument discussed the footprint on the moon.

Having challenged our thinking processes Danie left the audience to weigh the evidence and decide for themselves.

Ray Smit: CC3 Random Acts of Kindness

Ray described Random Acts of Kindness as being kind without warning. He said Random Acts of Kindness were always a win-win, since both the giver and receiver benefited.

Google records half a million Random Acts of Kindness and websites are dedicated to the topic.

Classic random acts of kindness include paying a tollgate fee or stopping to help change a tyre for a total stranger.

Ray asked his son and daughter for examples, his daughter suggested playing with a child at school, who had no friends or sharing her lunch with someone who had none. His son suggested standing up for someone who was being bullied

Ray closed with a quote from Martin Luther King “The Time is Always Right to do What is Right”.

Presentation of ACS Badge

Before breaking for recess Andrew proudly presented Graham with his ACS Badge.

Media Education Session

Kirsten and Erich presented a fascinating very informative session on how to conduct a TV interview. Kirsten’s recorded TV interview on the role and value of a Life Coach was viewed and reviewed by everyone.  Kirsten and Erich then reworked the interview, based on a number of suggestions and the audience again assessed this  vastly improved and very much more dynamic interview.

Evaluation Session

Mathew, as chief evaluator, led the session in which Karen evaluated Thuli’s speech, Monica Terry’s speech, Andrew Theresa’s speech, Richard Danie’s speech and Mathew Ray’s speech.

Time Keeper – Emma Dougherty very efficiently provided the timing.

ALS Presentation – Richard summarised the Extensia project, how this club had been very successfully relaunched.

Grammarians Report - Danie Roux gave a creative humorous grammarian’s report.

Hark Master – The audience had listened well and Coralie as Hark Master was not able to extract much money.

On a Point

The next meeting would be on Wednesday 17 June.

COT Training for all new Committee Members was on Saturday 20 June.

The Clubs Induction dinner was scheduled for Wednesday 24 June 2009, details to follow.

The Clubs humorous contest was provisionally scheduled for Wednesday 19 August
and Mini-Con would be held in Johannesburg on 16 and 17 October at Woodmead

Danie Roux reminded members that he recorded on DVD all the speeches and evaluations. Copies could be had at a cost of R10.00. this money was to be put in a self addressed envelope and given to him after which he would forward copies of the assignment.

Members would be asked to vote, via e-mail, for the awards to be presented at the installation dinner.

The meeting closed at 20.50

The President, Andrew Timberlake, welcomed and asked everyone to introduce themselves.

Kirsten Long gave changes to the programme and Mathew Hindley proposed the Loyal Toast.

Kirsten as Toastmaster introduced firstly the Grammarian, Cheryl Koorn, who challenged everyone to incorporate the word “scintillating” into their assignment. Secondly the Timekeeper, Emma Dougherty, and thirdly the Hark Master, Sue-Ann Joe.

Speeches

Brendan van Niekerk presented his CC1, Entitled “Know Thyself “

Brendan introduced his speech by saying know thyself, be thyself and in the case of Toastmaster introduce thyself, so he would try to explain what makes him tick.

It appears that diversity, on all fronts, work, education and hobbies has been the force driving Brendan.

Two years ago he started at 4th Dimension and then disappeared, because he had a nervous breakdown and went through depression as a result of losing both a business in Australia and a family member

He spent time in Thailand, where learning how to kick box and silent meditation, helped him naturally cleanse and heal his body, bring perspective back to him and putting his life back on track.

From this he learnt that he had so much for which he could be grateful especially, that he now has a purpose and mission to his life and can see every set back as a gift.

This saw him looking at the family business in a new way, the result a scintillating new business plan with an inspired vision and mission, which will touch the lives of billions.

Christa Roux - Some Engineering Secrets

Christa opened by saying that engineers perceive things in a strange and different way to the rest of humanity.

Three things make engineers extraordinary. They notice things others may not, they appreciate the magic in the world and finally they are always willing to help.

She used creative examples, a concert at OppiKoppi, a talking frog and the wrong folding of a map to explain each of these phenomena.
She closed by saying that the moral of this is that you can choose to be more like an engineer by noticing things you never payed attention to before, you can appreciate the magic in the world and last but not least please let an engineer help you if they keep insisting on it.

Danie Roux – Tales of a Journeyman

Having completed his CC at 4th Dimension, Danie took us on a creative Journey, visiting the clubs in and even beyond the borders of Division H, as he presented humorous speeches to each one in order to achieve his ACB.

To his consternation when he felt his speech was the ultimate in humour, the evaluators indicated the opposite and where he felt least confident he received a rave evaluation!

In closing Danie said that the prime lesson he learnt as a Journeyman travelling to different clubs in the Division and beyond is to challenge all members to do the same go out of your club and see how the rest of the Toastmaster world operates. There are many beautiful towns, with excellent drinks and food, where the feedback does not have me laughed at!

Coralie Rutherford – Stars of the Antarctic – The Launch of Falcoquine Plus

Coralie briefed and motivated the Aegean sales force on the launch of a new product, Falcoquine Plus for the treatment of malaria. The market situation, product sales target, achievable, sales force incentives, lots of money and even a trip to Antarctica, and the benefits of the product, effective against all strains of malaria and at an affordable price, were presented.

Graham Nicholls - ACS

ACS Badge to Graham Nicholls - Andrew congratulated Graham on completing his ACS and presented him with his badge.

Evaluation

Richard Riche chaired this session. Mathew, Zibu, Graham and Richard evaluated respectively the speeches made by Brendan, Christa, Danie and Coralie.

Emma presented the Timekeepers report on the evaluations.

Grammarians Report – presented by Cheryl Koorn

Annual General Meeting

Andrew Timberlake chaired this section of the meeting and welcomed our special guests Graham Nicholls and Richard Riche.

New Committee - The following were unanimously elected:

Sargaant at Arms          Shared bySue-Anne Joe and Tayangwa Masawi

Secretary                      Raymond Smit

Treasurer                      Christa Roux

VPPR                          Tiaan Otto

VPM                            Monica Oosthuizen

VPE                             Danie Roux

President                      Kirsten Long

They were congratulated on their election.

Adjournment - The meeting was adjourned at 20.25

Dave Black called the meeting to order at 18.15 and Andrew Timberlake welcomed everyone, especially our guests.

New Member Induction

Amid great excitement Danie inducted FOUR new members: A second Danie, Liz, Ray and Theresa.

Should they and all the current 4th Dimension members keep the promise to undertake all the activities in the Toastmaster’s Promise, the Club would never be short of a board or anyone to undertake any assignment!

After the Loyal Toast, proposed by Dave Hardingham, Andrew introduced the Toastmaster, Coralie.

The theme for the evenings: Easter Customs

During the meeting Coralie outlined the origin of Easter and a number of the customs associated with Easter. The Queen of England’s Maundy Money, Easter Bonnets, the eating of Lamb at Easter were all mentioned. Most important of them all, is the customs around eggs at Easter. These range from the painting of eggs, searching for eggs in the garden, egg fights and egg rolling races to last, but definitely not the least: The Russian Faberge eggs.

Speakers for the night

Danie Fourie: Driving my SUV

Danie very cleverly tied the stages of his life to the cars he drove, from the aging sports car that announced the end of his time at University, to his laid back lifestyle with a convertible Combi. So the cars changed as he started a business and studied for his MBA.

Ray Smit: Stuttgart

Ray gave us just a little peek at his life when he described his trip to snow buried Stuttgart in Germany, to attend a corporate conference. He spoke of his hesitancy in standing up to give workshop feedback, how he eventually gained the confidence to talk to people and had a wonderful networking night. We got an insight into his life as a devoted husband and father who missed his family so much that he rushed straight home from the conference.

Theresa Muller – Who am I?

Theresa gave us tiny fascinating insights into her life prefixing each segment with the words “Who am I”.

Is she the director of a strategic marketing and advertising company, a magazine publisher, an illegal US immigrant, a mother? Theresa we all want to hear much more detail of who you are!

David Black – The Widest World Wide Web

David fascinated us by his summary of the development of the World Wide Web from the day the first e-mail was sent until what we know and use today. A meteoric progression which none of us would have believed if we hadn’t seen it unfold before us in those few years.

Barbara Poultney – Memories of World War II

This was not the title of Barbara’s oratorial speech but it sums up the tone of the three speeches she read from those years, speeches which ensured the British did not give up until they had won World War II.

The speeches were “The Glory Years 1939 to 1945”, “the Hour of our Greatest Effort is Approaching” and “D Day June 6 1944.

Table Topics Session

Tayengwa Masawi presented a challenging table topic session. Tayengwa asked each speaker to explain why they had the essential qualities for the following jobs:

David Black – Priest in his local church
Coralie Rutherford – The Spokesperson for the ANC
Danie Roux – A Taxi Driver
Clinton – A School Teacher
Barbara Poultney – A Hangman
Maureen - A Commercial Pilot

Evaluation Session

Andrew Timberlake chaired the wvaluation session where Sharad Mistry evaluated Danie Fourie’s speech, Monica Oosthuizen the speech by Ray Smit, Dave Hardingham Theresa Muller’s speech, Kirsten Long David Black’s speech and last but not least Andrew himself evaluated Barbara Poultney’s reading.

Closing assignments

Sue Munro gave the timekeepers report, Danie Roux, the Grammarian’s report, Liz Pearson was Hark Master and Sue Munro ran the raffle.

On a Point

Kirsten encouraged members to complete assignments for the CL manual and outlined the activities involved.

Members were encouraged to support the Area Contest, Maxicon in Cape Town on 15 and 16 May, the Club’s AGM on 20 May and especially our next meeting.

Because of the elections the next club meeting will be held at Accenture Club on Tuesday 21 April.

Danie asked members to request a DVD of their assignment, the cost was R5.00.

The meeting closed at 20:50.

Speeches

There were seven excellent speeches which retained our concentration for the night as they ranged from a fascinating Ice breaker, through two very different readings, to entertaining and motivational but educational speeches.

Clinton Jacobs – “The One Thing You Need To Know”

Clinton fascinated us by describing the one universal thing you need to know to succeed at leadership, management and to have sustained individual success.

In the case of great leaders they know what their people need at any one time and present this as a constant motivational message.

Great Managers have the ability to turn talent into performance by gathering around them people with a range of different unique strengths and concentrating on the value of these strengths, not on their weaknesses.

And for us as individuals to achieve sustained success is simple, discover what you don’t like doing and stop doing it!

Monica Oosthuizen “The Benefits Of Being A Taxi Driver”

Monica advocated that if you were finding the current traffic a nightmare, aggravated by all the road works and the recent torrential rains which precipitated a lack of pointsmen, a realistic solution was to become a taxi driver.

Taxi drivers were above (and had solutions) for all these problems. Taxi drivers do not have to obey the rules of the road, they can drive at whatever speed they choose, through red robots, on the pavement etc. etc. They foster a relaxed driving attitude at all times, one hand on the wheel, the other with their elbow on the window.

She concluded by urging us all to think seriously about the fact that we can’t beat them so why don’t we join them.

Coralie Rutherford “Handsome Man”

Coralie read the chapter, from the No 1 Woman’s Detective, Agency entitled Handsome Man, where Mma Ramotswe proves her client’s husband is a womaniser by setting the husband up to be photographed while he is giving Mma Ramotswe an enthusiastic kiss!

Erich Viedge “She will not admit it”

Erich told the story of his maid who woke him at 3.00 am one morning saying she was in too much pain to come to work, a major trauma in the Viedge household, as who would fetch their son from school?

The only result of a long drive and a full day of waiting at hospital – one packet of paracetamol.

The maid struggled on in pain for a few days but eventually Erich was forced to spend a day outwitting hospital staff, which, to his wife’s total disbelief, resulted in the maid actually being admitted into the Johannesburg General, with a drip attached to her body! The admission was followed by an operation for gall stones and the return of the Viedge household to normal.

Emma Dougherty “Pleased to Meet You”

Emma creatively used the letters of her name to introduce her to us all.

The E for Emma stood for education, which Emma had pursued with creativity around the world. Finishing her schooling in Potchefstroom, studying communication at Bond University, then, in Australia, a Master of Business.

Then M for love of marketing which lead Emma to open, with a partner, her own sales training and image consulting company.

The second M stood for music a great love of her life.

Finally A was for her admiration of Coco Chanel a woman who not only built a fashion empire but was way ahead of her time with respect to women’s rights.

Kirsten Long “Great Expectations”

Kirsten poked fun at the pros and cons of great expectations when looked at from different viewpoints. Starting with her totally unexpected third pregnancy.

She illustrated how, if we expect too much, we are often disappointed or let down as happened with some of tonight’s speakers or a movie over which everyone raves. With respect to food perhaps we should not expect too much when travelling especially that a food of one country will match our expectations when cooked in another.

She closed with illustrating how two people can have totally different expectations as in the case of Woody Allan and his then current wife, where for Woody sex 3- 4 times a week was hardly at all and for his wife too often!

Barbara Poultney A Reading From “The Mission Song” John Le Carre

A fascinating scenario, Barbara read from a chair with a second empty chair set to her side. She was specifically required not to look at the audience during this monologue.

The reading described the meal eaten and the restaurant companions of a young man from the Congo, of mixed parentage. While eating he tried to read from “Much Ado About Nothing” but was prevented from this by the dominance of a woman in a group of 6 diners who voiced her opinion very loudly on every matter under the sun.

That is until a diner from the only other occupied table stood up and addressed the table stating that he had come to enjoy a meal and read his Telegraph and not be deluged by dialogue after which he paid for his meal and left.

This left our hero reflecting on his less than satisfactory behaviour when his wife informed him that business would prevent her enjoying the 5th wedding anniversary dinner he planned to cook. He consigned the food to the dirt bin before taking himself and his book to the restaurant.

Time Keeper

Throughout the evening, despite a lack of lights, Karen Geyser, ably assisted by Sue-Anne Joe was an effective and efficient timekeeper.

Evaluations

Barbara Poultney ably chaired the evaluation session in which Paul evaluated Clinton’s speech, Andrew Monica’s speech, Barbara Coralie’s Speech, Danie Erich’s speech, Monica Emma’s speech, Erich Kirsten’s speech and Kirsten Barbara’s speech.

All the evaluations kept within the required time constraints.

Raffle

Cheryl bought the last ticket and won the raffle despite much shaking up of tickets!

On a Point and Closure

Andrew thanked everyone for contributing to this “whirlwind meeting” where despite our props being locked away and many changes to the programme, the objective to have an excellent Speakathon which provided effective evaluations had been achieved. He encouraged all the guests to visit us again at the next meeting on 6 April.

Members were reminded to diarise the Area Contest on 6 April, the Division Contest on 7 May and Maxicon in Cape Town on 16 and 17 May.

The Club AGM was scheduled for 20 May.

Forgiveness Please

The writer begs forgiveness in advance for any errors especially with the speeches, she was so fascinated listening that occasionally her fingers made a typing error which she could not decipher!

The atmosphere was electric in a room packed with over 30 people, members, contestants, helpers from other clubs and guests.

Call To Order and Welcome

Dave Hardingham called the meeting to order at exactly 18.15. The President Andrew Timberlake welcomed everyone before, after requesting programme alterations from Kirsten Long, handing over to himself as Contest Chairman!

The Toasts

Kirsten Long proposed the Loyal Toast to South Africa. Colin Roberts proposed the Toast for the Evening – To The Stars, basing this on the RAF motto.

The Contests and Briefings

Andrew, as Contest Chairman, gave an overview of the three Contests, The English International Speech Contest, The Impromptu Speech Contest and The Evaluation Contest.

This was followed by a recess during which the contestants and judges were briefed.

The English Prepared Speech Contest

The Four Contestants for the English Prepared Speech Contest were:

• Danie Roux with a Speech entitled  “The Importance of being awkward”, in which he highlighted that we cannot grow unless we try new things and the first time we do something new it will always be awkward.
• Coralie Rutherford with a speech entitled “The Dilemma” in which she posed the question, which takes preference the constitution and laws of a country of the cultures of its people’s?
• Mathew Hindley with his speech entitled  “Let’s Dance” in which he made an animated case for dancing every time we succeed.
• Kirsten Long with a speech entitled “Consciously Creating” in which she explained how you create your reality via your Prover and if you wish to change your reality then it has to be a conscious on going activity.

The Evaluation Contest

Reginald Muzariri gave a powerful entertaining speech with the title “The Power of a Name” which was a challenge to evaluate.

Danie Roux and Zibu Mntambo provided sound positive evaluations, demonstrating, especially to guests, the skills and challenges of evaluation.

Impromptu Speech Contest

The word that was the subject for the Impromptu Contest, was very topically “election”

The contestants Dave Black, Danie Roux and Sue Munro approached it from 3 very different but fascinating directions, showing their ability to think quickly and creatively on their feet!

Meet the Contestants

After Recess the contestants were introduced to the meeting and spoke, off the cuff, on one of their interests or special achievements.

The Results

Richard Riche, the Chief Judge reported that there were no disqualifications and no tiebreaker.

• Impromptu Speech Contest - 2nd place Sue Munro and 1st place Danie Roux
• Evaluation Contest - 2nd place Zibu Mntambo and 1st place Danie Roux
• English Prepared Speech Contest - 3rd place Coralie Rutherford, 2nd place Kirsten Long and 1st place Mathew Hindley

Congratulations to all the contestants, especially the winners, and most especially to Danie for winning 2 of the 3 contests.

Vote of thanks

Kirsten Long graciously thanked everyone who had contributed to the success of the evening, Colin for the Impromptu toast, The Judges, Timekeepers, Tally Counters, Sergeant at Arms and, of course, the Contestants.

Raffle

Dave Hardingham won the raffle, a just reward for all the work he did moving lecterns, bringing in contestants, but the sting in the tail is that he has to bring the prize for the raffle at the next meeting!

The meeting adjourned at 20.30

Opening Ceremonies

Danie Roux called the meeting to order at 18.20 and handed over to Kirsten Long, standing in for President Andrew Timberlake. Kirsten welcomed everyone after which she handed back to Danie Roux, the Toastmaster for the evening.

Coralie proposed the toast to positive reinforcement.

Danie introduced the Timekeeper, Cheryl Koorn, and the Grammarian Kirsten Long, who gave us Fervour as the word for the evening.

Danie challenged and stimulated us with his selection of speeches that had really changed our world.

Speeches

Clint Jacobs - An introduction to critical thinking

Clint summarised the move from the industrial era to the knowledge economy, with the latter’s need for effective critical thinking. He then presented the three steps to effective critical thinking. The steps are firstly to analyse the situation, secondly to evaluate the argument and finally to make the best decision based on the pros and cons of each option. He closed by saying that he thought critical thinking was as important as reading.

Monica Oosthuizen - The Life of Books

Monica fascinated us with her love of books, highlighting the ability of books to inspire our souls, scare us to death, help us develop the facets of our life e.g. DIY, financial management, leadership skills.

She highlighted the challenge, to motivate our youth to become voracious readers.

Table Topic Session

Tiaan Otto ran a very creative topic session based on the theme “A Day in the Life Of”

Paul Smith spoke on the Day in the Life of a Clown, when he ran out of steam on this topic he skilfully moved the subject to Jacob Zuma.

Kisten highlighted the vast differences between A Day in the Life of a Wise Man on Top of a Mountain and her day. She envied the peace of the wise man’s day compared to the stress and frantic speed of her day.

Danie, in his speech on a Day in the Life of Activist Against the Mistreatment of Small Fluffy Creatures, showed us a new side of Danie his addictive love for anything fluffy, from slippers to fluffy walls!

Sibu when speaking on a day in the life of the ruler of the smallest country in world, which she named Zamunda, showed us that she is an out and out hedonist. As the ruler her biggest challenges would be what shoes and outfits to wear that day and then how she could most enjoy herself, the choice between a flight to a Paris fashion show or which young stud to select once the show was finished!

Guest Liz, met the challenge, and bought us back to earth, when she described The Day in a Life of a Public Hygiene Engineer, all the gory details, from clothes including mask and rubber gloves to the smell and the gung. Your reward a clean environment!

Cheryl Koorn speaking on A day in the life of a Retired Super Hero highlighted her relief at being able at last to do all the normal things we take for granted and especially that she would no longer have to wear underpants!

Evaluations

Paul chaired the session. Zibu evaluated Clint’s speech and Paul Monica’s speech

Cheryl presented the full timekeepers report, Kirsten the Grammarians report and as Hark Master Coralie swelled the club’s coffers.

On a Point

The last meeting for 2008 was a party on 1st December when Kirsten promised something different and encouraged everyone to be there as they would have to wait until Wednesday 21 January for the next meeting, the first in 2009!

Andrews said 4th Dimension felt very proud at Mapcon:

• Marius received the Young Toastmaster of the year award
• The Club is a President’s Distinguished Club (again!)
• It counts 3 Area Governor’s among its membership

He highlighted the quality of the speeches and the challenging business meeting and motivated everyone to attend the next Mapcon in Cape Town. It is planned that Helen Ziller, Richard Branson and Raymond Ackerman would speak.

Toast

Sue Munro proposed a toast to opportunity, saying opportunity doesn’t knock, it lies there and we need to recognize it.

Feedback DCP Programme

Andrew summarized the clubs progress with respect to this programme and that we are on track to again be a President’s Distinguished Club.

Induction of New Members

Danie inducted Clinton and Cheryl. He elicited a promise from them of their commitment and from the club for our support of these new members.

Toastmaster

Matthew Hindley opened this assignment by highlighting that on the road to success achieving our goals is not as important as what we become by achieving them.

He introduced the following who summarized their roles for the evening

Grammarian – Sue-Ann Joe, who challenged us to use the word Euphonious, which meant pleasing or sweet sound.

Time Keeper – Danie Roux, with his novel PC Light system

Evaluation Chair – Dave Hardingham

Hark Master – Danie Roux

The Speakers

Cheryl Koorn CC1 – Reflections on my Journey

Cheryl fascinated us with her life’s journey, its twists and changes, from a school girl with a lisp, to IT, marriage, motherhood and finally running her own company in the natural products market.

She concluded with the fact that she joined Toastmasters to overcome her fear of speaking and to gain new skills.

Andrew Timberlake – How to Become Debt Free Without a Budget

Andrew highlighted how historically he couldn’t manage money until he put into practice the three step approach to a debt free life, namely give away 10%, save 10%, for a rainy day, and plan how you spend the balance of 80%.

Andrew recommended splitting the 80% into 2 portions, one for recurring monthly expenses and the balance for non regular expenses. For the latter he recommended an old trick beloved of our grandparents: Putting the money for each expense into an envelope.

To free yourself from current debt, start to pay off one debt at a time. Starting with the smallest, as each debt is paid transfer the money you would pay on that debt to the next smallest debt until they are all cleared.

Then follow the three simple principles of money management, give away 10%, save 10%, allocate the 80% balance and you too can be debt free without a budget.

Erich Viedge – Little Red Riding Hood

Erich updated this classic tale to the 21st Century and had everyone spellbound listening to the story of today’s teenage, Red, being forced, by her mother, to visit grandmother for lunch. We lived the fear of walking through the wood, the strange smell coming from the large eyed, strange voiced grandmother lying under her duvet. However Red escaped the large teeth following her ear piercing shriek and ability to outrun the wolf and reach to the woodcutter, who chopped up the wolf with an axe, releasing grandmother who then enjoyed an excellent lunch with her granddaughter!

Bev Kluckow – Down at Heel

Bev asked us to imagine she was 30 years older, than she was. She had just stepped off a plane, after a 13 hour flight, when the heel came off her boot and grounded her to the tarmac, blocking the passage of the people who quickly piled up behind her.

All efforts at emergency first aid, e.g. hammering the heel back on, attaching it with sticky plaster, proved fruitless.

She then looked into the face of an outraged passenger. This passenger resembled an angry vicious Saint Bernard after her travel bag landed on his foot! This changed her travel plans for ever. She decided that her traveling days were over, friends and family would have to travel to see her in the future.

Table Topics – run by Mathew Hindley

Dave Black explained how he, as Father Christmas, would motivate his workers to achieve their Christmas goals.

Coralie Rutherford outlined how a lesbian escort agency for executive women would result in a 360 degree turnaround in corporate profits.

Danie Roux as President of Fifa explained that making soccer goal posts wider and reducing their height would significantly increase interest, excitement and enjoyment of the 2010 soccer world cup.

Andrew Timberlake as Pieter de Villiers explained his intensions regarding the future of the Springbok rugby team and that he would clear his name by introducing soccer coaching methods into rugby coaching!

Richard Riche a guru motivational speaker outlined why it was vital to buy his latest book, if only to prevent him bursting into tears.

Evaluation – Smoothly chaired by Dave Hardingham

Danie evaluated Cheryl, Dave Andrew Timberlake, Kirsten Erich Viedge and Richard Bev Kluckow.

The Grammarian Sue Ann, congratulated speakers on using the word Euphonious 5 times and that there had been only 13 “ahs”.

On a Point

Kirsten asked members to think seriously about setting now and / or achieving their Toastmaster goals for this year.

Mathew received his CC pin.

The next meeting, on 1st December, would be a special Christmas meeting and the first meeting in 2009 is scheduled for the 3rd Wednesday i.e. 21 January.

Guest feedback indicated a fun entertaining, but scary meeting, because of the high standard of the speeches

George – a plan was drawn up to rescue George, the traveling gavel, from Vereeniging.