June 18th 2008

Yesterday we moved our meeting to the bigger room which made us climb up the learning curve. In that room you need to project your voice very well in order to be heard by everybody in the room. Just a quick hint for future speakers... - The meeting once again went very well. We saw a Toastmaster of the Day rookie, Adela, leading through the night with courage and ambition. We witnessed an engaging Table Topics Master, Carol, creating difficult everyday situations and then abruptly leaving her victims, David and Jeff among them, all alone to deal with it. We admired Belinda and her great healthcare project when she was giving her 10th and final "inspiring" speech of the Competent Communicator manual. We felt the drama when Florian told the story about his friend getting almost stabbed in NYC. We laughed about the mostly entertaining anecdotes which Rose presented in her role as the after-dinner speaker (5th project in the advanced manual "The Entertaining Speaker"). We learned from our evaluators Edith, Jeff and Brenda. We warmly welcomed our guests. And above all, we all had a fabulous time! See you on July 1...
FM

June 4th 2008

Courageous was the Word of the Day, and Rose was courageous indeed. In her 4th project of advanced manual The Entertaining Speaker she had to give a dramatic talk with vivid imagery, dialogues, filled with either own or third party experiences. She described in most colorful words the cheerful, generous, hilarious character of her best friend who wanted to conquer a new linguistic horizon in Manchester where she ended up brutally murdered. One could hear a needle drop on the floor when Rose set the punch line... But that is what Toastmasters is all about; to become a versatile, multi-faceted speaker, sometimes an entertaining speaker, and sad stories do entertain a lot. A great, courageous speech about a most difficult topic. - Brenda was the Toastmaster of the Day, and with habitual ease she let through a session witnessed once again by 5 guests, all of whom acknowledged in the end the great level our club has reached. Adela ran the extemporaneous Table Topics session and assumed that everybody in the crowd had seen Al Gore's Academy Award winning documentary. But only guest Dimitri from Russia had actually seen it. No problem in a spontanious session. Adela made Christian, Dimitri and David comment on different perspectives regarding the value and impact of Al Gore's work. Apart from Rose's speech, we had the pleasure to listen to Birgitte's dream of a pollution free automotive world and to Kai's tenth project, the inspiring speech "The best investment of your life!" which according to Kai was investing into your own family. Evaluations by Florian, David and Edith and the President's address by Xavi rounded up yet another highly entertaining night.
FM

Epilogue - We never mention them, but Raisa as the Timer of the night and Joan as our Ah-Counter did a fabulous job...

May 21st 2008

What a great meeting yesterday!!! Numerous guests witnessed a session full of laughter, information and - above all - speaking and evaluation skills. Toastmaster of the Day Marie resourcefully (Word of the day: resourceful) led through the evening, introducing the speakers in the most blooming ways (My cheeks are still red from all the laurels she threw at me...). David, a genious rookie as Table Topics Master, first had to explain to everybody where the tiny village of Ebsfleet was located, before making some prestigious designers present their gigantic landmarks for that town where the Eurostar meets daylight again. Jeff, presenting a gigantic English football fan statue, made the most convincing appraisal according to a public vote. The night continued with four diverse speeches: Veronika researched her topic well (project 7) and outlined the pros and cons of Barcelona as a favorite tourist spot. Carol had the great privilege to finalize her Competent Communicator manual and gave her 10th and inspiring speech about how to better seize the moment. Edith chose a difficult path indicated by the advanced manual on interpersonal communication; she outlined the secrets of assertive leadership, presented a dummy conversation together with a resourceful Brenda, and rounded up her slot with a Q&A session involving the audience. Finally, Florian "made them laugh". In his number 3 project of the advanced manual "The Entertaining Speaker", Florian went deep into the most inner secrets of The Stag... Some thought it was fiction, others did not. - Professional evaluations by Christian, Brenda, Jeff and our President Xavier concluded the body of the session. - Our beloved friend Angela, re-joining after a year or so, stepped in as the General Evaluator and could only say one thing: "Wow!" Thanks to everybody for a great TM night. See you all in one of our next meetings.
FM

April 7th 2008

This last weekend 5 members of PS, plus one beautiful guest, went down to Valencia for the Area Contest. We had a successful and prestigious day where Florian and I won the speech and evaluation contests, respectively. Congratulations to all the participants and specially to Veronika for organizing such an exciting weekend.

The next step is going to be Madrid, for the Division Contest, in 2 weeks. Florian has already told us he will be representing us, and I am trying to do the same. Please consider joining us for a great weekend full of Toastmasters learning and fun. If you're interested in joining us, just send me a note. Enough for now, see you all soon!

Cheers
Xavi

March 19th 2008

As a result of yesterday's Club Contest, Florian and Xavier will represent our club at the area level of this spring's International Speech Contest. As stated below, the Area Contest will take place in Valencia on April 5. Veronika, Edith and Rose are sitting in the driver's seat of coordination.

February 20th 2008

Diligent was Belinda's word of the day. And she did a jolly diligent job as our Toastmaster of yesterday's meeting; a meeting which for the first time in 2,5 years lacked of any guest... Of course there is no need to worry about new members, two of which we could warmly welcome; Raisa from Finland and David from the UK. Applause... For a long time we couldn't count with a Jokemaster of the Day. Until José stood up and recited a great Holmes/Watson joke, very British indeed. The night moved on with Table Topics. Paul had prepared his session with diligent care. He called on diverse "experts" in art history and made them comment on the greatest pieces like an elephant portrait created by his 19 month year-old son, one of the most promising contemporany artists in the world. - Antonio was so impressed by a 2 cm steel construction, a mile-stone setting needle sculpture, that he could only grasp for breath, speechless. - The speeches! Kai made his body talk presenting us a fable about the external evil and why it is so convenient for societies to cultivate it. He did an awesome job, we felt like being part of the story. Then came Veronika straight from down under and gave us an extremely entertaining lecture on the little differences in terms of Australian words and expressions. And all that dressed as a sort of baywatch lady. Rose took on the challenge of stepping in the agenda on short notice. Nobody really realized the limited prep time of two hours only. She performed her third project of the advanced manual "The Entertaining Speaker" and yes, she "made us laugh". Rose made fun of all the techniques we learn at TM, like variety of voice, eye contect, body language, catching the attention and many more. Hillarious, especially her ASSet. - Evaluations and a remarkable general evaluation of the meeting by Xavier rounded up a highly entertaining evening. - fm

February 6th 2008

Carol, Toastmaster of th Day, always smiling, in her chanting way forgot about telling us the Word of the Day! In the end it was "canny" like smart dedicated to all the canny contestants at the Super Tuesday. Carol paved the way through another exciting night of public speaking. Our guests feat. front-runner David form the UK were impressed to see newbies like Adela (Ice-breaker), experienced speakers like Melinda (Visual Aids) and advanced speakers like Florian (Resources of Entertainment) stepping into the ring of exposure. Christian had led our Table Topics session before where he confronted some "volunteers" with challenges like adressing the protagonist of the Societe General scandal, negotiating with French striking truck drivers or witnessing the wedding of Sarkozy and Bruni. The highly entertaining evening continued in the nearby Bar Tomés where we could try the most famous Patatas Bravas of Barcelona. - FM?

January 10th 2008

INVIGORATING is the word to describe our first meeting in 2008 on January 8! We were honored to have had Jim Dobson (Division Governor Spain/Portugal, DTM), and Marie Coutart (Area Governor) attend our session. After the meeting we had to recharge our batteries at the bar next door with finger-licking frankfurts, alitas picantes and burgers and refreshments.

And this was what we did:

• walking down the xmas lane with Kai
• building love nest with Jose-Antonio
• head-banging with the President and her new Wii heavy metal guitar
• drinking Glühwein with our Bavarian star Florian
• season partying with Xavi
  moving into a love inspired Salsa session with Christian
• interpreting 'Sign language' across different cultures with Jeffrey,
• getting trained on leadership and coaching by Edith
• learning the right points through impressive speech evaluations from Melinda and Xavi
• not forgetting having fun with counting AHs, UMs and controlling times with Carol-Ann and Paul.

How invigorated we were! Special thanks to Belinda our Toastmaster of the evening!

Cheers
Rose