Toastmaster's Advanced Speech 10 - "Sixty Years Young"

This is speech #5 from "The Entertaining Speaker" manual, called "Speaking After Dinner". The objectives are to prepare an entertaining after-dinner talk on a specific theme and to deliver the talk using the skills developed in the preceding projects. Time allotted is 8 to 10 minutes.

Good evening ladies and gentlemen. Hope you enjoyed the dinner. If any of you is still wondering what this party was all about and why we cut that huge cake, well, let me remind you it’s my father’s 60^th birthday.  I know you all know, but making sure doesn't hurt, right?

You all know him as a devoted brother, a friend in need, a professional par excellence, and a very strict uncle who is somewhat obsessive compulsive and wants things to be done a certain way…”Don’t eat on the bed..at least put the plate on a newspaper!” “Put your shoes at their proper place” etc. But no one but my brother and i here can know him as a father. So I would like to take this opportunity to introduce you to him.

Everyone has seen a coconut, right? That green/brown thingy that has to be cracked open? Tough and hard from the outside but all watery inside? Let me explain. You know, my earliest childhood memory is when I was still crawling on fours…I learnt to walk a bit late, so I must be about an year old that time. Papa was sitting cross legged on the floor with an old newspaper and a plate in front of him, knife in hand, and ready to peel apples for all of us to eat. At this sight, I was suddenly very hungry and went up to him crying and asking for a piece even before he had started peeling it. He asked me to wait for two minutes but I kept on shouting and insisting now, now….papa lost his temper and shouted back at me. I was shocked for a moment and then started bawling...mummy ran up to me and took me away. After a while, when I was still hiccuping  papa came to me and offered a piece of apple. I distinctly remember having seen tears in his eyes then. That might have been the day when my sub conscious understood what a coconut he is...the day i fell in love with this man.

He relentlessly did what fathers are ideally supposed to do, slogging for hours to provide us a good life, a good education and secure our future. But what he also did was to inculcate this feeling of responsibility in us, well…by sometimes analyzing the phone bill with money doesn't grow on trees speeches! I remember I used to love counting currency notes, and he always made me do it, all the while sharing tidbits about the importance of savings and spending, that is now rooted deep inside me. Whenever a new gadget was introduced in the market, I know he would want to own it, but kept his own desires secondary to ours.

Perhaps the best thing about growing up with him, yes I said growing up with him – everyone grows up every day, do they not? He certainly does, and I don’t mean in age. Anyway, I was saying that he did not differentiate between my brother and me anytime – in the sense of my being a girl and his a boy. I was asked to learn to make tea as easily as to screw on a light bulb. So if there are some different set of activities that being a girl vs. a boy involves, I was not aware of them..till a long time…till I started realizing my friends in school who were girls, had not ever held a screwdriver in hand. Well..he made sure I played with dolls too…but that’s another thing.

Always open to debate, and willing to listen to a rational argument, we kids were never told not to talk about things we didn't understand, never reprimanded for speaking our minds. I have since understood that this is pretty rare. I cannot express in words what a world of difference this simple act makes and what strength of character it needs to let your children argue with you..even at times be at loggerheads with you. Then leave them to make their own decisions, acting only as a channel if they are not able to find a direction. That’s my coconut father for you.

Perhaps I have never told you before, but papa, I am proud of you. I hope you are as proud of me as well. Thank you for being the person you are, because that makes me the person I am. Happy birthday.

Ladies and gentlemen, hope I did not bore you with this somewhat emotional harangue. Enjoy the rest of the evening. Over and out.

This speech took 10:05 minutes to deliver and was appreciated for holding the audience's attention till the end.

Toastmaster's Advanced Speech 9 - "Ahilya Bai Holkar"

This is speech #5 from "Storytelling" manual, called "Bringing history to Life". The objectives are to understand the purpose of stories about historical events or people and to tell such a story using skills developed in the preceding projects. Time allotted is 7 to 9 minutes.

In the simmering heat of the month of April in the eighteenth century, hundreds of people had gathered in and around Rajwada in Indore.  All the surrounding roads laced with dust and dung had been barricaded with ropes. With sweat trickling down their bodies and faces it was difficult to see, even breathe in the dusty loo that was blowing, but everyone stood beyond the fencing, awaiting the royal elephant to emerge out of the gates. After all, it’s not every day that one gets the opportunity to witness an execution.

Good Afternoon fellow Toastmasters.

This was the year 1767. The era of Ahilya Bai Holkar. An iron lady, known for her wisdom and sense of justice.  Ahilya Bai was born in a middle class family in 1725 in a small village in the Aurangabad district. The great Holkar warrior, Malhar Rao, was on his way to Pune when he stopped at this very village for a while and saw this eight year old girl at a temple. He at once recognized her to be levelheaded and intelligent and decided to have her as a bride for his only son Khande Rao. In 1737 she was married to Khandoji and thus came to Indore. Years passed in marital bliss and they were also blessed with a baby boy, Maloji. But suddenly, like a bolt of lightening, disaster struck and Khande Rao died during the siege of Kumbher in 1754. Ahilya Bai was inconsolable, this young female even considered going Sati but her father-in-law convinced her of the futility of such an act and she gave up the idea. To quote her biographer, Malhar Rao thus "gave to the world what otherwise would have remained a Sealed Book – a splendid example of Aryan Rule under an Aryan Lady."

Till his own death twelve years later, Malhar Rao Holkar trained Ahilya Bai in matters of State and governance. He kept her informed about the political developments, such as his dealings with Najib–ud–daula and how Awadh was seeking his help, and about his own movements. In the battle of Panipat, Ahilya Bai also participated as a warrior, under her father–in–law's paternal but strict training. She captured a fort in Gwalior and then stayed there for a while to oversee the manufacturing of armaments. After Malhar Rao’s death, Ahilya Bai became the de facto ruler.

Among Ahilyabai's accomplishments was the development of Indore from a small village to a prosperous and beautiful city; her own capital, however, was in nearby Maheshwar, a town on the banks of the Narmada river. She also built forts and roads in Malwa, sponsored festivals and gave donations for regular worship in many Hindu temples. Outside Malwa, she built dozens of temples, ghats, wells, tanks and rest-houses across an area stretching from the Himalayas to pilgrimage centres in South India. There are many stories of her care for her people. She helped widows retain their husbands’ wealth. She made sure that a widow was allowed to adopt a son; in fact, in one instance, when her minister refused to allow the adoption unless he was suitably bribed, she is said to have sponsored the child herself, and given him clothes and jewels as part of the ritual.

She launched a campaign to rid her kingdom of Thugs who sought to plunder the kingdom, personally leading her army into battle. Her war time exploits became legendary. Ahilyadevi earned a reputation for administering justice fairly during her rule without partiality.

Her only concern was her only son Maloji, who had no interest in the matters of state, and was in fact showing signs of insanity. He spent his days just roaming around and playing pranks. She often warned him and employed various ways to bring him to see the right side – brought in tutors, sought medicinal help, even divine intervention, but all to no avail. She ignored many of his misbehaviors and mischief, but one day, he did something that the just ruler within her could not stand. Maloji had put poisonous scorpions in a few of her courtiers’ shoes which resulted into deaths – and murder was a capital offense.

The royal gates opened, and out came the disgraced prince screaming and shouting for mercy. The elephant followed and brutally squashed Maloji under its feet. Ahilya Bai, in her prayer room was informed that her only son had been brought to justice, just as she had instructed.

Now there is another version of how Maloji actually died…that one says he died of natural reasons owing to his health..but then, that version would not have made such a good story, would it?

Source: http://hssthistory.blogspot.in/2011/05/ahilyabai-holkar-ugc-history.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ahilyabai_Holkar

http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Ahilyabai_Holkar

This speech took 8:45 minutes to deliver and was appreciated for topic selection. 

Toastmaster's Advanced Speech 8 - "Roshni’s Deliverance"

This is speech #4 from "Storytelling" manual, called "The Touching Story". The objectives are to understand the techniques available to arouse emotion and to become skilled in arousing emotions while telling a story. Time allotted is 6 to 8 minutes.

On a dull, damp morning of July, Roshni woke up to her mother’s frantic shakes, “Roshni! Get up! You don’t want to be late on your first day in your new school, do you?”. But Roshni wanted exactly that. In fact, she did not want to go to this new school at all. She had gone there earlier for the admission interview. It was so big and sophisticated, with everyone talking in English, she hadn't understood quite a lot and had felt like a misfit.

She had spent days haggling with her mother to not send her to this alien place. “I promise I will be a good kid now, I will listen to everything you say. I will sleep in the afternoon and not bother you or ask you to play with me. Please, I don’t want to go to this school”. But Mother was firm in her decision, “It is for your future Roshni. You will thank me later.”

And finally the day had come. Roshni put on her brand new uniform, shiny shoes, bag and water bottle and set out for the dreaded place in the school rickshaw. At the school, everyone was gathered in the assembly hall and she was asked to join the line of students of her class, the third standard. It was a painful experience for the shy and reticent Roshni. She did not even know the prayer they were singing! Or that she was not supposed to carry her bag and bottle into the assembly area! She thought everyone was looking at her as if she had committed some heinous crime.

In the classroom, she quietly went and sat on the last bench alone, out of the line of sight of the teacher. All children around her were bubbling with excitement and were enthusiastically chatting away about their summer holidays, “You know I went on a trip to Shimla! Oh it is sooo beautiful!” , “ I went to a summer camp and learnt skating! It is so  much fun, you should try it!” “My cousins from America visited us! They are so cool!” and so on..

Roshni wished someone would ask her about her holidays. Or how she was. Or maybe just what her name was. No one did. However, the teacher was kind and introduced her to the class. “Students, this is Roshni. It is her first day in our school and she’ll be studying with you all now. Let’s welcome her!” Everyone clapped and that was that. She again went back to her bench and sat alone.

Then came lunch time. It was then that Roshni discovered that there were separate groups of 4-5 students each within the class, who ate in their designated areas. She wanted to be a part of a group of girls who seemed likable.  But how could she go and ask? Wouldn't it be sort of an intrusion? What if they bluntly refused to accommodate her? She was the one eating alone…couldn’t people see that? Was she so unwanted here?

All such thoughts ran through Roshni’s mind and her eyes welled up. She spent the rest of the day counting down to the last period, crying silently, with no one to console her. No one even took notice. For them, it was an exciting beginning of another school year, of getting back with old friends - they did not have time to spare for this unexceptional new comer. 

Roshni went home, barely managing to hold her tears back. At the sight of her mother she could no longer hold her emotions -  she ran to her and clutching her arms started wailing at the top of her lungs. Mother was alarmed, and asked, “Roshni what happened beta? Are you hurt? Did someone say something to you?”. Between sobs, she told her about the day. Mother just smiled and said, “That’s it? And you are taking the roof down for this small thing? Honey they don’t know you yet, do they? Once they get to know and understand you, you will be friends! For that, you will have to take the first step, go and talk to them.”

But Roshni had other ideas. With her sense of extreme self respect - that people often mistook for ego - she decided that she would not be the one approaching people or asking for their attention. After all, action speaks louder than words! So instead, she devoted all her energy and concentration into studies; went to her teachers to get clarity for things she did not understand due to the new language; and of course took her mother’s help, who was always there for her.

Six months passed away in this fashion and the day came when the class teacher walked in with the results of the half yearly exams. Customarily, she announced, the third ranking student is….Abhishek…the second ranker is Dolly..and the first rank this time has been bagged by…Roshni. Roshni stood up and walked to her teacher to collect the report card. With her head still meekly down, she took the card and went back to her seat, ears ringing with her classmates’ applause, and sat there alone.

That was the last day she sat alone.

This speech took 9:15 minutes to deliver and was appreciated for story development, dialogue and the climax. The characters could have been described better.

Toastmaster's Advanced Speech 7 - "Live In The Moment"

This is speech #3 from  "Storytelling" manual, called "The Moral of the Story". The objectives are: to understand that a story can be entertaining yet display moral values, to create a new story that offers a lesson or moral, and to tell the story, using the skills developed in the previous two projects. Time allotted is 4 to 6 minutes.

Has any of you present here ever been stuck in a traffic jam? On the top of a flyover?

Good Afternoon fellow Toastmasters.

For those of you who are not from Indore, let me tell you there exists a world on the other side of Rajwada as well, and believe it or not, it is part of this city. Till about ten months ago, I used to be a resident of that world (and soon going to be, again..back to where I came from!). Now, driving from across that part, to the office, is no piece of cake. With people constantly celebrating festivals of religions you did not even know or recognize, organizing protests and human chains, bringing out wedding processions and what not on the already clogged roads, traffic jams are a common occurrence. Add to this our city folks’ amazing sense of driving, and you can get a jam for no apparent reason at all. Because, it seems there are only two rules of driving here, one – there are no rules; and two – but nobody really wants to get involved in an accident.

So imagine my surprise when one fine day I took my car and started from my home to the office, and the roads were clear! People were actually stopping at red signals and starting only when they turned green! If they had to turn right, they were in the right lane, not in the middle one! All bicycle, thela walahs, auto rickshaws were giving me space to pass through. I could not believe my luck and had just begun to thank the stars when halfway through the journey, from the top of the Shastri bridge - you know the one where we have a Mahatma Gandhi statue - far in the distance, I saw, horror of horrors, a traffic jam. Since I was at a height, I could see way too far in the distance; all vehicles were moving at a snail’s pace, a straight one way road had become a jigsaw puzzle.

My jubilant mood at once turned morose and instead of praising the stars, I started…well...cursing them.  Honestly, you cannot drive in this city without that. While descending the flyover, all sorts of thoughts crossed my mind…this is going to take me forever..will I ever reach the other side? There will be so much blaring of horns and heated up emotions, what if someone accidentally scratched my car? Why cant people simply move one after the other in a civilized way and get rid of this nuisance. This is too much…there is no hope for this place…my day is ruined.

Going through such thoughts, I did not realize that I had come down the bridge and was in the middle of what seemed to be a nightmare from the top. The snails I had seen moving from far beyond, weren’t actually snails…it was a decent enough speed at which they were running. Sure, it could be better, but it wasn’t that bad either. The street wasn’t even so much clogged as it had appeared to me before. My favorite rock CD was playing on the music system and I was actually enjoying the sluggish ride. In fact, now I was calculating how many songs would play before I reached my destination and deep in my heart hoping that the drive took more time.

Friends, what I really want to tell you via this story is that, when we look way too far ahead in the future, sometimes things looked clogged up, nightmarish even, because we are seeing through a bird-eye view. But when we are actually living the moment, we discover that it’s not too bad (especially if good old rock music is playing in the background). So why not avoid looking at things we don’t understand, things that have not taken shape yet, and things that ruin your present and make you worry unnecessarily? Why not live in the moment?

This speech took 6:40 minutes to deliver and was appreciated for variations in pitch and volume while narrating and that the moral of the story came out from simple day to day activities. There could have been more surprise elements in the story.

Toastmaster's Advanced Speech 6 - "Innocence aka Thapa"

This is speech #2 from  "Storytelling" manual, called "Let's Get Personal". The objective is to learn the elements of a good story and to create and tell an original story based on a personal experience. Time allotted is 6 to 8 minutes.

Have you met innocence before? I have. He is 24 years old and divides his time driving people around in Leh and hibernating in Zanskar. His name is Thapa.

Good Afternoon fellow toastmasters.

Even if it has been almost a year now that I have been to Ladakh, the name still brings up a flood of memories. It was in May last year that I went to this eastern valley in the State of Jammu and Kashmir with a group of friends. We spent about a week there, struggling to breathe in sub zero temperatures, where the lowest altitude was 11,000 feet above sea level - the height from which a normal sky dive occurs. The very first day we reached there, our tour organizer allocated different cars and drivers to various groups. It was then that we first saw this 5-feet tall, young Sherpa kind of guy with his rugged jeans, careless sweatshirt and tousled hair, squatting atop the bumper of his car, picking teeth with his nails. Our first thought was, “Seriously? This guy? Cant we get someone else?”

But that was not to be. The five of us were stuck with him for the next five days, and he with us, and thus started the process of discovering this gem. Along with being a driver, Thapa could also function as a tour guide, albeit a poor one, but guide nonetheless. A worshipper of Dalai Lama, he would always turn the car encircling a shrine on the shoulder of the road. Incredulously, we would ask, “Why Thapa, there is this 6 feet wide road in front of you and you are playing such stunts?” and his ready reply would be, “For good luck madam. This is mountain road, but no accident will happen, you will see.”

But of course, an accident does happen. Apparently, encircling a shrine does not guarantee any benefit against refraining from honking on blind turns. I think Thapa did not know that there existed a horn in his car, he never used it! After prodding a bit, he sheepishly accepted that he did not honk because the poor driver coming in from the other side of the turn will get scared with such a loud noise. All we could do at this point is to request him with folded hands to also worry about poor us.

What we did not know then is that Thapa need not be told to worry about us or his fellow drivers or anyone else; he did that on his own. If anyone felt sick due to long drives on the zigzag curvy roads, he would be the first to get down helping, consoling, offering water without saying a word. If you merely mentioned you were bored with the same songs playing again and again, he would get a new USB with the latest songs, God knows from where. If you were singing along and he had to stop the car and get down in between, he would still keep the engine running so that the music doesn’t stop. If you pleaded with him to let you drive for a bit, he would get teary eyed and say, “Please..I will lose my job”, but a while later move away from the group and let you drive when his boss was out of sight.

The younger of two brothers, Thapa lived with his family in a village near Zanskar during winters and came to Leh to work as a driver in summers. As per the military tradition in his village, his older brother was the star of the family with a job in the Army, the most respectable job a man can get, and our protagonist was the ugly duckling who failed to get entry due to his physique. Nonetheless, in his girlfriend’s and his own view, Thapa turned out pretty well earning “six thousand rupees per month” as a driver. His dream was to buy the car he was currently driving and continue the same profession. Ladies and gentlemen, he wanted to be the proud owner of a vehicle, not to employ someone else and reap the benefit.…but just own the car and keep driving tourists around!

After spending five days in the company of this Kurkure-loving, god-fearing, bashful, sensitive person with a twinkle in his eye, we could not help but become his fans. On the last day, on our very last drive, we tell him about the importance of savings, opening a bank account, and how he can take a loan and fulfill his dream of buying a car and marrying his girlfriend.

At the airport, we say our goodbyes and take a last look at this guy with his rugged jeans, careless sweatshirt and tousled hair, squatting atop the bumper of his car, with tears in his eyes, and think Thapa, you are innocence personified.

This speech took 7:20 minutes to deliver and was appreciated for characterization and dialogue  The presentation could have been more dramatic.