December 19th 2007

Our Toastmaster Florian set the scene again. The JOY we experienced at the meeting was INCREDULOUS but true. There was high energy rushing through fun table topics, diversified speeches and fantastic evaluations. It was great to see members being continuously challenged to achieve improvements as they progress through their speech manuals. In the Table Topics session our president could not help but to share with us her xmas adventures around the globe. Jose Antonio M. volunteered as Joke Master. Our Curacao beau Ryan's Ice Breaker was full of laughs, we learnt that he is a naturally funny yet sensitive guy. Kai convinced us to consider a book for a xmas present called GTD (Getting Things Done); and all without slides! Carol Ann impressed us with a well structured speech on sign language with AMAZING & REAL live props! Running last on the line came Melinda in her jogging gears with her researched topic on cardiovascular exercises. We learnt from our evaluators (JA Hernandez, Edith, Flo, Xavi) the importance of rehearsing and timeing, to use face expression according to the flow of our speeches, to connect with the audience and eliminate the ever dependence on notes. Glad to have Chris and Marly keeping us on time and watch our AHHHS!

A small Xmas party after the session brought us all a nice get together with great wishes for the Xmas as well as another eventful and successful New Year 2008.

See you next year!
Rose

November 7th 2007

Toastmaster of the Day Edith drove the evening on history lane with Guy Fawkes, and the audience showed high motivation using English proverbs throughout the meeting. More humor from Marie, our recent Humorous Speech Contest winner, with her skit on salvaging men/women relationships. In continuation, Christian gave tips to the gentlemen on how to satisfy women (uff, hot stuff!). Back to more serious talk when Jeff in a genius way and at very short notice told us about Marcus Tullius Cicero, one of Rome's greatest orators. He shared with us one of Cicero's tips on how to memorize speeches. In her Table Topics session Marly squeezed the members' fruit of imagination by asking them - as writers - to reveal their book (fiction, travel etc.). The juice was delicious. Then a blackout, the lights went off. But Melinda, our VP Education, managed her training on How to Evaluate to Motivate without any slides. Evaluations remain the highlight of our TM sessions. Xavi, Veronika and Rose gave very constructive and motivating feedback to our speakers. Thanks to David and Jose Antonio for promptly covering the timer and ah counter roles in the very last minute.

Fellow Toastmasters, please volunteer for roles on the website! For recordings of the meeting, please contact Xavi Anguera. Thanks & see you in the next meeting!
Rose

October 23rd 2007

And the winners of this year's Fall Area Humorous Speech & Table Topics Contest are...

I Table Topic Contest

First place winner: Xavi Anguera
Second place winner: Marie Gomes
Runners-Up: Liam Tayler and Enric Pruna.

II Humorous Speech Contest

First place winner: Marie Gomes
Second place winner: Liam Tayler
Tied at third and fourth place: Marnee Benfield and Juan Carlos.

September 19th 2007

We did it again: impressing our guests with fascinating topics and high quality evaluations!
Veronika, our TM od the Day, initially counldn't believe that our location was so nice, thus deliberately skipped the building. Fortunately, she stepped back and brought us an INNOVATIVE evening. - David, our Biotech expert gave us a twist into the future with his Table Topics. Eager victims like Marie revealed a sexy encounter in Virtual Reality; Jeff fancied a more relaxing life with Living Forever and our guest Olga showed great anxiety in Reshaping her Body with Nano Robots to allow her enjoy gastronomies without ever to get fat! The audience was further ignited with Carol's energetic medicinal advise. We threw our heads back laughing at Liam defending the proper use of his mother tongue English against other cultures and lately severely attacked by advanced technology (emails, sms...). The evening continued with Xavi's journey into the beautiful Comarca de Priorat near Reus and Tarragona. We all learned some lessons from the constructive feedback provided by Maria, Jeff and Belinda; the importance of limiting details in order to avoid information overload, spending more time on preparing advanced speeches, and to have a concise introduction with the purpose of the speech stated clearly. Special thanks to Melinda for sorting out those very last minute changes in the agenda.

See you on October 2^nd,
Rose

October 17th 2007

We all faced a tough challenge yesterday. Not only it was our Area Governor's official visit, but our Advanced Silver Toastmaster Xavi had to manage a somewhat 'eventful' speech contest meeting. Everyone hailed him in acknowledgement of his seamless performance. Our humorous speech contestants Marie and Liam received instant additional feedback from the audience in order to help them prepare for the Area Contest on October 20th. It was indeed difficult for the contestants' evaluators (Melinda, Rose) to provide feedback in such a short time focusing on the speech/contest requirements in terms of quality and delivery. Tricky also for David to evaluate Kai's uniquely and well delivered ice breaker where he told us about himself indirectly via introducing three of the most important people in his life. Even harder for Edith to evaluate one of Belinda's best speeches. We ALL were persuaded not to buy commercial eggs! We also benefitted from Jeff, our General Evaluator who gave productive and honest feedback with regards to the meeting setup. Not forgetting Joan who threw knotty roles at Marly and Carol Ann with his Table Topics on creating a better environment for women at work. Our new member Adela volunteered giving a response and impressed all of us with her own view of how to encourage the women workforce. Last but not least, it was great to have our members volunteering to fill other important roles such as Timer (Jose Antonio, our new member), Birgitte (Ah Counter) and Carol Ann (we did have a Gramarian last evening)!

Thanks & see you in the next meeting!
Rose

October 3rd 2007

Our guest Olga was stressed after work but it eased off gradually in between the variety of topics and exposure to different speaking styles. In his premiere as Toastmaster of the Day, David raised our awareness about the good and bad of stress and the meeting started off quite relaxed with a group yoga chant. As our souls were at ease, Carol Ann, our Table Topics Master, took the chance and inspired us on how to create what we want. It was a moving moment when Luis braved the ice breaker through sharing his deep thoughts with us whilst Christian pointed out the new rules of cyclism on our roads. We also walked away with tips from Chris on how to present our business in 60 seconds. For those who did not attend, you missed yet another session of English humour at its finest with Jeff presenting a multitude of English accents. Our evaluation team (Xavi, Melinda, Edith, Florian, Rose and our surprise guest Area Governor Marie Coutart) committed to their role in highlighting key improvements and achievements of the speakers. As usual, the entertaining meeting continued as we adjourned in the bar next door where we did convert into football hooligans!

See you on October 16^th,
Rose

September 5th 2007

Welcome back everybody! Yesterday we celebrated our first post-summer meeting in our fabulos new location. Hopefully, our venue-driven journey has come to an end now. And what a night we had with plenty of guests, funny and ambitious table topics by Belinda, a charming Toastmaster of the Day Jeff, a broad variety of speech topics, and, above all, some fantastic evaluations. Our guests were thrilled, for instance, by the professional level of Kim's evaluation of Melinda's Hurricane speech. Kim acknowledged Melinda's ability to speak with a firm voice (it was her #5 "Variety of Voice" speech), but showed then in a very practical way that a steady firm voice has no effect on drama either. Kim started to demonstrate the impact of different voice levels and gestures, and everybody in the room felt like sitting on a roller coaster. Great job! The other three evaluators of the night - Xavier, Liam and Edith - were some tough rivals though. As far as the other speeches, Christian talked about the virtues of Open Source software, Rose in her tenth speech inspired the audience to find the path to solidarity, and Florian experimented for the first time with an advanced manual and performed a TV commentary on the current situation in Iraq. As stated above, the new venue has everything we need, and we all know that there are decent bars in Old Sarriá, which we proved right right after our great session.
fm

August 4th 2007

June 11th 2007

As those of you who attended last meeting know, the President from the Oporto Toastmasters Club, Francisco Saraiva, visited our club and also participated in many respects. He was kind enough to bring us a great bottle of Port wine, a CD with taped speeches we can watch to evaluate. He also did not forget his camera - see group picture attached. Enjoy! I have sent him our thanks and best wishes! Look forward to seeing everyone at the Spring retreat, it's the event of the year that shouldn't be missed!! We are going to drink the Port wine there!!
Cheers,
Belinda

May 16th 2007

A cozy little village close to Tarragona; the typical small village in the middle of nowhere surrounded by hordes of olive trees and almonds. Village people gossiping about boyfriends who left girlfriends, postponed weddings, village news in general. We are talking about Xavier's village. Yesterday he told us about it, performing one of his humorous speech projects. And yes, he made us laugh a lot. But this was not the only highlight of a session witnessed by German, Dutch and Belgium guests. In his 10th speech, and thus gaining his Competent Toastmaster award, Peter took us on a journey; a journey on a train running through our lives. He must have had thought a lot about all the metaphors he used to inspire us. They were great! He faced a wall of silence. But not that sort of uncomfortable silence. No, it was more a silence of expectation. In her unique way evaluator Sioux threw lots of laurels on Peter, not missing out though some constructive criticism; something Peter always requests. Frank performed another speech. Finally he was "here". He made up a story around his curriculum of presentation skills and courses, climaxing in his Toastmaster experience... "here". To round up the speech block me, myself and I were giving a training session on visionary leadership. Melinda did a great job in making the session flow in her role as Toastmaster of the day. Other credits go to our evaluators Liam, the funny Irish, and Edith, our ever active Area Governor. To include Melinda's Word of the day, the meeting was yet another confluence of presentation styles, diverse content, seriousness and laughter, ... and Table Topics of course. Maria had had the idea to let people talk about anything they wanted to; only that the successor had to follow up on the story painted by the predecessor. Funny. fm

May 3rd 2007

It is amazing to witness the level this club has achieved. This is not just some lame get-together where people occasionally meet in order to stand up and throw some meaningless rhetorical fragments into the air. No, our club has entered another level. and there is only one word for it: professionalism. You would certainly agree, if you had experienced Chris and his ice-breaking speech; a journey through milestones of his life which were not worth to be mentioned. You would also agree, if you had seen Jeff philosophizing about the way our world is changing. Every speech featuring quotes by British writers and poets are a pleasure to listen to. Our Menorca import Joan on the other hand giving his "ice-breaker" had to stand Florian's tough evaluation which was uncommonly harsh in tone and wording. But then again this is part of the word above. We cannot improve if we never listen to those kind of evaluations; always having in mind that these are of subjective nature, of course. Joan forgot about it when he joined the others for a drink at a nearby pub after our club session. Though it might be guessed that it was his last time using a written speech... - Maria talked about America and Cups. In her appealing way she took our hands and led us behind the scenes of the most prestigious sports event in the world. Before the speeches took the floor, Xavier acted as a brilliant Table Topics Master. Intelligently he put his four victims into a plot of situations where you have to search for false excuses. Friends, bosses, all of them had to be tricked. And I almost forgot to mention Rose in her role as Toastmaster of the Day. General evaluator and Acting President Angela acknowledged what everybody thought; a great performance by one of Deutsche Bank's greatest assets. When Abba stepped of the stage forever they sang "Thank you for the music". I say, "Thank you for Toastmasters, thank you for Prestigious Speakers". fm

April 19th 2007

Check out this great article published in La Vanguardia Magazine on April 15. It is about our member Kika! Congratulations to her and her exciting venture. This is great PR...

April 18th 2007

Yesterday we settled in our new venue for the first time. Thanks again to Veronika and Angela for making this happen. All present members showed their approval. The room is definitely a great solution for the time being.

President Belinda kicked off the meeting with a series of rhetorical laurels she awarded to all members who had made the Division Conference three days earlier a great success; several cheeks of front-runner Edith turned red... TM of the Day Liam smoothly carried us through the program. In one of his multiple comical remarks he pointed out that Frank's speech titled "Here" had to be discarded from the agenda because, actually, Frank was not here... Table Topics master Maylen made three of us comment on some socially critical images, one of them showing a child soldier. While doing so she fought hard with our disliked word fillers scrutinized by Maria.

The speeches. In the run-up icebreaking Carol Ann was nervously sitting next to Florian who didn't really help her with his overblown comments. But then she did a great job. No fillers, extraordinary content. We really got to know her personality well. Congratulations. Veronika made her body speak explaining to the audience why a "Kangaroo" ended up in Barcelona, and Rose practiced her vocal variety skills painting us a vivid picture of her last trip to Malaysia. Chris not only did a great job keeping the time records for the speeches, but also for the three following evaluations by Jeff, Florian and Belinda.

After some constructive criticism by our General Evaluator Peter and closing remarks by Belinda the meeting continued in a close-by tapas bar.

Hope to see you all back next time when we continue to raise the bar on May 2nd.

April 14th 2007

On Saturday April 14th we, in collaboration with Barcelona Toastmasters, hosted an excellent Division Conference here in Barcelona. Special thanks to Edith and her team featuring our ever active Melinda. Superb guest presentations on executive coaching and marketing framed the evaluation and speech contests. Our guests coming from Marbella, Mallorca, Madrid and other Spanish cities, later enjoyed a common dinner at the restaurant Flamant. Our club was represented by our president Belinda an a handful of other Prestigious Speakers. We wish all the best to the contest winners Miguel (Evaluation, Madrid) and Debbie (Speech, Mallorca) who will represent Division H (Spain/Portugal) in Gothenburg, Sweden, at the District Conference at the end of May.

April 4th 2007

Yesterday we celebrated our last TM meeting at the Barcelona Business Center. Once again, we would like to send some special thanks to our fabulous host Maylen. The journey continues at the Babylon language school in Calle Bruc 65. Steven Muller will be our host from now on. Thank you, Angela, for organizing our new venue. - In yesterday's meeting María Lluch gave her Ice-breaker; a promising talent we all witnessed there...

Our big event is approaching rapidly: the Division H (Spain/Portugal) Spring Conference. Together with our co-hosts from Barcelona Toastmasters, we are creating a multi-faceted, exciting program. Visitors are very welcome. This is a great opportunity to get to know Toastmasters.

March 8th 2007

Check out the great article about our club in the city guide Barcelona Connect...

March 7th 2007

Prestigious Speakers star again with club contestants Xavier Anguera and Peter Simons competing closely with 2 fantastic speeches! First place winner goes to Xavier Anguera for his speech ´Think in order to exist´ and Second place to Peter Simons for his speech 'ASK'. Table topics training brought out the best in Prestigious Speakers with practice in impromptu speaking thanks to the Daily Ditties by Kim Chamberlain. Congratulations to both our contestants and the clubs support for your next step in the Area contest 17 March in Alicante!

February 21st 2007

What an awesome meeting we had yesterday! We learned about Hinduism and the art of breathing, we encountered the truth behind global warming and we were thrilled to see an advanced impromptu speech on "My story with dancing" by our new member Xavier. Rose once again earned her laurels by hosting a great Table Topics session on the difficult decision whether to focus on criminal, civil or corporate law. And last, but certainly not least, our primus inter pares, Sioux. She returned and triumphed as an exceptional Toastmaster of the day. We are so glad, she is back...

February 15th 2007

Congratulations on the successful duo meeting and hats off to Marie Pierre, Rosa, Angela, Jose Antonio, Frank, and all participants from both clubs!! Thanks to Barcelona Toastmasters for hosting the event and covering all logistics to make it happen!

February 8th 2007

On February 14th Prestigious Speakers Barcelona and Barcelona Toastmasters will celebrate a special Valentine's day dual meeting full of exciting content. The English-Spanish evening will be hosted by our friends from BT at their regular venue, the EAE business school.

January 13th 2007

This Saturday morning officers from both Prestigious Speakers and Barcelona Toastmasters met in the EAE business school in Barcelona for an Officers Training session. José Antonio from Barcelona Toastmasters run a part on marketing and education, while Edith who organized the event focused on membership and retention. Minutes of the meeting will soon be available in the download section.
A direct outcome of the meeting in terms of our web presence are two new functions: the "Tell a friend" function (link in the main menu) and a better management of guest information ("Contact us").