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 5 - "Cinderella's Story"

This is speech #4 from  "The Entertaining Speaker" manual, called "A Dramatic Talk". The objective is to develop an entertaining dramatic talk about an experience or incident including vivid imagery, characters and dialogue. Time allotted is 5 to 7 minutes.

Once again, this blog came to my rescue and i narrated this story written three years ago - 

Cinderella's Story

This speech took 6:40 minutes to deliver and was appreciated for characterization and climax. A couple of sentence formations could have been done in a better way.

Toastmaster's Advanced Speech 4 - "A Software Engineer's Worst Nightmare"

This is speech #3 from  "The Entertaining Speaker" manual, called "Make Them Laugh". The objective is to prepare a humorous speech drawn from your own experience and deliver it in a way that makes the humor effective. Time allotted is 5 to 7 minutes.

I had attempted to write a humorous article a while back and used the same for this speech - 

A Software Engineer's Worst Nightmare

This speech took 6:30 minutes to deliver and was appreciated for the humor's relevance to the target audience. Voice modulation could have been better.

Toastmaster's Advanced Speech 2 - "Love And Its Syndromes"

This is speech #2 from  "The Entertaining Speaker" manual, called "Resources for Entertainment". The objective is to draw entertaining material from sources other than your own personal experience and adapt your material to suit your topic, your personality, and the audience. Time allotted is 5 to 7 minutes.

“Everything happens to everybody sooner or later if there is time enough”, said the great G. B. Shaw. Another great writer, Mark Twain, said, “The trouble with life is that there is no background music!” 

Good Afternoon fellow Toastmasters. These days I tend to agree with Mr. Shaw quite a lot and disagree with Mr. Twain just a little bit. I am guessing most of you present here would have watched the movie Main Hoo Na? Have you? Then you must know the Main hoo na syndrome; remember the scene – scenes: actually there were two – where Shahrukh Khan sees Sushmita Sen and his arms go up in the air on their own accord and violins start playing in the background? Well, that’s a blatant exaggeration. But then, for the major part of the movie the theme song keeps playing softly as if inside your head in a continuous loop – that, if you are a music lover is still believable. 

You see so many movies, read so many books, watch television, listen to countless songs, watch your friends fall in love and do things they otherwise wouldn’t; and you being your practical pragmatic self laugh at the senseless absurdity. Let me illustrate with a real life story. A couple of my friends, who are now married to each other but at a time were coping with the strain of a long distance relationship – and I swear this really happened – both used to look at the moon at the same instant! Like they show in gooey romantic movies! Yes, in the 21st century when you already have web cams, skype and video calling. Can anyone beat this Na Tum Jaano Na Hum syndrome? 

Then there is the who-will-put-the-phone-down-first complex, from the movie ‘Mere Yaar ki Shaadi Hai’: a couple is talking on the phone, both say bye, both don’t really cut the line, and the conversation goes like this: “You didn’t put the phone down”, “You too didn’t put the phone down”, “Ok, lets do it together, 1, 2, 3, cut.” And then once again, “You didn’t cut it this time either”. And we, the bewildered audience feel - someone cut the wire please and put the poor phone out of its misery. 

And there are so many others, Subodh from Dil Chahta Hai, giving a balloon everyday complex, Raj from I Hate Love Storys giving a flower everyday syndrome, I will bring the moon for you if you just say it; your feet are so beautiful, don’t put them down on the floor; the list is endless, and it makes you silently shriek..ughhh…stop it!! Stop it! 

But then one day, out of the blue comes a tall, not so dark, handsome guy, not on a white horse, but in his mini-SUV and sweeps you off your feet; all the romantic comedies you so categorically laughed at suddenly start dancing in front of you in mockery; all symptoms I just described begin to terrify you and you fervently pray not to end up as one of the examples. But thankfully, something similar to the Saathiya syndrome happens. The scene is - Suhani and Aditya are travelling in a Mumbai local and are having this conversation: 

Suhani: “So, you really love me, huh?” 

Aditya: “Absolutely. How can I prove it to you?” 

Suhani: “Jump off the train” 

Aditya: “I will. As soon as it stops.” 

Then your heart says, that’s my man. Then you start believing completely in Shaw’s Everything happens to everybody and totally discard Twain’s there’s no background music in life. Because, if you are really listening, there is.

This speech took 5:45 minutes to deliver and was appreciated for content and the ability to captivate audience. Body language could be improved.

Toastmaster's Advanced Speech 1 - "My Very Own Sky Fall"

Having chosen "The Entertaining Speaker" manual, my first project is called "The Entertaining Speech". The objective is to use vividly descriptive language and entertain the audience with a topic they would be interested in. 

Date: 15^th November 2006

Place: A private airport near Dallas Fortworth

Time: 11 AM CDT

A 90 pound version of me alights from the car shivering in the 11 degree temperature with four other, equally anxious men. A big burly man, who must be in his late fifties, greets us at the entrance, looks at me expectantly and says, “You’re gonna jump?”, I nod and he is visibly elated. He says, “Well, you’re gonna jump with me then!”

Good Afternoon fellow Toastmasters. You guessed it right, I am talking about the day I did something purely for myself, for the experience, and for the satisfaction of having dared: the day I sky dived.   

The big burly man’s name was Larry, who had an experience of about 4000 tandem skydives. So we entered the hangar, and I, being the youngest and the only female there, was given the privilege of selecting my turn. I thought, well….before I lose my painstakingly accumulated courage and start freaking out, let’s get this over with. And I volunteered to go first. Larry said, “Great! Sign these papers please.” And there was this questionnaire in front of me..do you have any heart related disease, any lung disease, whether you are under the influence of alcohol or drugs, blah blah. This was all routine..the real shocker was the undertaking – “I hereby declare that I am doing this activity of my own accord, with complete knowledge of the perils involved. If anything unseemly occurs, I take total responsibility.”

And then it dawned on me. There could be accidents, one can even die – how stupid of me to not consider this before? Suddenly I wanted to run away, but something, maybe pride, made me stay and sign.

What happened afterwards is a flurry of events, which are kind of blurred in my memory. I was asked to put on all the gear - jump suit, goggles, helmet, gloves and the works. I haven’t put on more layers of clothing till date. In a daze, I suited up, stepped into that airplane, with four people, the pilot, Larry (the tandem guy, saver of life and opener of the parachute), John (the photographer), and Keith (an experienced diver).  Larry said, “Ok girl. Off we go, now you cannot back out.” Sometime during the ride, my and Larry’s gear was tethered together for the tandem jump with me in front. I swear to God, I have absolutely no recollection of it. When i came to my senses at 11,000 feet, the door of the plane opened and a mad gush of wind came in that chilled me to the spine. Everyone said, Jump! But I could not…my ears heard their voice, even carried it to my brain, but my body was frozen at the spot. I wanted to scream, but my vocal chords did not obey. A tiny part of me also wanted to jump, but my hands wouldn't leave the door and my legs wouldn't move, and I held on to Larry for dear life. And all this while, my rational mind was shouting like crazy....why did you  do this to yourself??

You must have heard how adrenaline rush makes things move in slow motion, well, I experienced it. Finally, someone tore my hands away from the door and someone gave a push and I was airborne, falling under gravity. With the sky below my feet and the chilly wind in my lungs, I was a bird for 50-60 seconds. John and Keith had also jumped after me…while John clicked pictures, Keith, in a span of second tried to explain to me with gestures how this is so beautiful and how this moment will never come again, and how important it is to cherish and live it. So I let go, attempted to smile even when the high speed winds were as if tearing my skin away, and looked all around the amazing landscape. Then the parachute opened and brought us in a vertical position..Floating like a feather, I distinctly remember having said, “Larry! I am a bird!”. I imagine he must have smiled then.

These three minutes of my life are, needless to say, among my most treasured memories. The day I was pushed into realizing one of my crazy dreams. Isn’t that all we need sometimes, just a gentle push?

This speech took 7:34 minutes to deliver and was appreciated for choice of topic and language. However, more preparation could have been done, and expressions can be improved.