"BIODIVERSITY ROASTING!"

Today's Toastmaster's meeting at Pania Toastmasters was well led by Toastmaster, Mike in a friendly, relaxed and enjoyable atmosphere.

Linda's  introduction of the first speaker, she introduced two people! Linda also explained the speaker, Darryl, would perform ‘The Roast’ that would poke fun at a particular individual in a good-natured way with Patrick as his ‘subject’.

Darryl roasted Patrick in a very funny way and started with a well preformed mimic of Patrick’s Dutch accent followed with references to his body length, tech savvy knowledge and how Dutch spouses love to call each other “poopie”. Yes, that indeed does refer to: poo! Bah! At the end of Darryl’s roast he rhetorically questioned why Patrick is always smiling and  full of energy. Of course Darryl already knew the answer: Cookies! The authentic Dutch cookies. With some additional plant extract purchased from the well known 'coffee' shops!!

In Linda’s evaluation she commended Darryl on his humour and the way he performed The Roast in an very organised manner, without upsetting his subject!!

Graeme introduced Anna's speech, about a speech contests for children that she is organising, with regards to Biodiversity. Graeme prepared the audience to act as the aimed audience: 10 year old’s.!!

Right from the start of the speech Jen and Darryl were able to meet the criteria with ease, like this was the first moment to unleash all the saved up feelings from the moment they turned 11. Entertaining, but foremost interesting, to experience.

The main act, Anna’s speech, did explain to us what biodiversity is, how to involve people with biodiversity and how to speak about biodiversity. To assist her with the speech Anna handed out the beautiful designed A3 stencil with all the information she is using to give insights about how to plan a great talk, biodiversity speech topics and reference to more information.

Graeme’s evaluation of Anna's speech did give Anna a few recommendations which she is probably  able to use to refine her speech and he also commended  Anna on her interesting topic and the use of her abundant knowledge.

The Table Topics for today was presented by Jen and she picked the Queen’s birthday as theme.

Graeme was very upfront that he was thinking it would be a disaster when Charles takes over the sovereignty. After that Graeme shared his reflection about all the things Charles actually did that had not made it to the news and did change his mind to be sure Charles will do very well as new King.

Tamara was asked about what preparation she would do and receive when she’ll meet the Queen and Tamara is very keen on wearing a bright pink dress and also rehearsed how she would move and to be even more polite.

In his representation for New Zealand Craig would wear a Maori feather Korowai with a suit and would state that he is perfectly capable to represent New Zealand because he really IS the average Kiwi. He also would welcome the Queen to visit Napier. Craig was able to give a twist on the subject and also expressed his concerns about the ‘social climber’ Camilla.

With his Dutch background Marc was asked about the Royals of The Netherlands and he was clear that the only reason he would visit The Netherlands is when he was Knighted. The only problem with that is the bad shape of his knee and therefore Marc demonstrated when and how he would do the warm-up just before the King would tip him with his sword.

In this Table Topics we also had two persons new to table topics and performed their first Table Topics ever:

Paula was asked about her opinion if a country wanted to move away from The Commonwealth and Paula promoted that strongly. She did add, with reference to Brexit, that it would be very sensible to make that decision only if sported by a majority of their inhabitants.

In her reflection on the Royal Wedding Liz answered that she watched the wedding at her friend's place, the bride herself. Together with some good friends, all famous people of course. A wonderful experience, although she was a bit worried about the excessive speed the chauffeur was driving her friend ‘Meg’  to Windsor Castle. Well done to our two guests , who were asked and agreed to take part in Table Topics.

Kristy’s first evaluation was this Table Topics Evaluation. And what a job she did! There were a lot of speakers and for each and every speaker she had at least some commendations and her recommendations were also perfectly pitched with her explicit reason why she thinks improvement is possible. With this first evaluation Kristy made us look  forward  to the next time we are being evaluated by her when making a speech.

Meeting was wound up by General Evaluator , Patrick and Timekeeper, Laurel with their well presented reports.

Today, a swag of impressions, information and jokes, all within the 55 minutes a week  Pania Toastmasters  stands for. 

Trophies:

- Best Speaker: Anna

- Best Table Topics: Paula

- Best Evaluator: Kristy