"ORDER OUT OF CHAOS!"

This week was the  first time as a Toastmaster for our Toastmaster of the day: Sahar. She did a wonderful job and she made an exceptional well designed double sided agenda with a lot of historical information and a Persian poem from Hafez Shirazi.

After our welcome, introduction of our guests, apologies and Mission Statement Sahar asked Graeme for the introduction of our first speaker.

Graeme introduced Michael, stated the clear objectives for his speech and tried to calm down any nerves if present.
Michael's speech was titled: Order & Chaos.
He started his speech with some humour about how ordered his wardrobe is and with his second speech we have seen already most of his neat outfits.
“From chaos comes order” was the phrase where Michael started a memoir about his need to go out for a Chocolate Trumpet. The moment he walked out of the shop to his car a few ominous guys drove by in their Big Black UTE’s and stopped at the petrol station next to the shop.
Some more of the same people stopped over with their Falcons and, as it seems, even a Bullet Proof car. It was clearly Mongrel Mob with their full face tattoos and cloths. Even more cars stopped. Randomly parked all over the area. Altogether about 12. Chaos.
A small white car arrived. Slowly. Slowing down even more. Stopped. All other traffic was forced to stop as well. The guy from the white car came out of the car, waved at the other parked cars and the parked guys got in their cars and start moving. Making use of the organised clear path ahead. Meticulously ordered. On their way to their destination… From chaos comes order.
Michael told us the chances are we all are here at Toastmasters because of uncertainty and chaos. We are working hard, each and every day, to make order out of our uncertainty.
A quote from Morticia Adams: “Normal is an illusion. What is normal for the spider is chaos for the fly.”
Michael invited us to the challenge and create order in our chaos.
In Graeme’s evaluation of Michael’s speech he mentioned a lot of positive comments and ended with a summary of his evaluation.

Julie introduced our next speaker with very detailed personal notes. And even with the very welcome details Julie did not give anything away from Mehran’s first Toastmaster speech; The Ice Breaker.
Mehran immediately caught the audience’s attention with the number: 15381. What was that? The distance from here to the small town in Iran where they lived. Mehran was a very good student. Top of his class and wanted to become a lecturer in the US. But basketball became his first passion and in University Mehran focused on sports. After the university he joined the army and met his wife. They moved to a stunning Tropical Island and he worked for the University of Iran for 5 years.
After a visit to New Zealand they decided to apply to stay in New Zealand and Mehran worked for the University of Otago to obtain his PhD. After a drastic change in their lives Mehran and his wife moved over to Napier and started with their current jobs.
Mehran acknowledged how good their choice was to move to the Hakes Bay area and their lives became better and more fulfilled.
Julie praised Mehran in her evaluation for his openness and marvelous first speech and we all look forward to the interesting speeches and knowledge of Mehran.

Today’s TableTopics were presented by Craig and he asked us to tell about our newly written book for which he give us the title. About the storyline, maybe about the end and definitely trying to sell it to the audience.
Into The Blue written by Marc. Marc elucidated clearly that it was about his Trilogy. Part 1: Into The Blue Shirt. About his football career and the in depth about winning football games. The second part is Into The Blue Skydive. How he pulled on some cord from his skydive Master, got released, jumped into a time warp into the WWI where he, of course, solved the war. That definitely left us looking out for the still to be released final Part of his Trilogy.
Borrowed Time written by Paula. This very personal story from Paula was about the most beautiful funeral she experienced and it was because of Borrowed Time due to the time it took to transfer the deceased from Australia. This time was really valuable and resulted in this graceful funeral. The book ends with the recommendations to write out your wishes for your funeral to make it the most memorable one.
Days Without Number written by Leigh. This historic story is situated in England from a long, long time ago. Where the Lords in that time fought their battles quite frequently. They gained and lost land, even Kingdoms and that resulted in Days Without Number. The book takes us on a journey along the lives of different characters in the numerous wars.
The TableTopics were evaluated by Jen and she commented all the speakers about how well they performed their impromptu speeches.

After the General Evaluation from Patrick there was still some time left, due to the excellent work of our Timekeeper Carol, and Craig made it possible for our previous member David and also Benita to talk about their books as well.

Our excellent meeting was closed by our Toastmaster Sahar and  she invited the audience back for the Pania’s  meeting next week when the Toastmaster will be Carol..