Publicly Speaking

He's in the running but he has stiff competition from his colleagues. An article in yesterday's South China Morning Post lamented the public speaking skills of our politicians.

Just a great photo:

L-R: Donald Yee, District 80 Champion; Mark Hunter, 2009 World Champion of Public Speaking; Sean Lin, Division H Governor 2009/10.

World Champion 2009 : Mark Hunter from Australia, "A Sink for a green tomato".

2nd Place : Mary Cheyne of Region VII, "Naly". Mary is Hong Kong Chinese and moved to Australia at the age of 7.

3rd Place : Erick Rainey of Region I, "Feed the Right Dog".

Rich Hopkins says of the champion, "Mark is wheelchair-bound and has a sharp wit to go with a caring demeanor. From Brisbane Australia, I believe he's in D69, now Region 14? He took third in 2007, and did VERY well in 2001 despite not placing that year. The 2001 year, btw, now has 3 World Champions from its class, as well as repeat contestants Rich Breiner and J.A. Gamache. Often considered the best class ever, this certainly clinches that argument."

"Proposal A" was passed by a two-thirds majority vote at the Annual Business Meeting held this morning at the TI Convention 2009.

Despite some intense resistance, notably from Rich Hopkins in the US, the proposal passed.

This brings significant changes to Hong Kong Toastmasters.

Sheep walkers walk with the sheep. They do what everyone else is doing. They follow.

Sweet talkers do what works. They make a connection with the audience (in the context of speaking and Toastmasters).

Here are three tried and tested techniques for sheepwalking Toastmasters who want to be better than just OK.

About 40 minutes ago, the results of the Inter-District International Speech Contest were announced at the MGM Grand at Foxwoods, Conneticut, USA.

Donald Yee, District 80 contestant, delivered a new speech entitled 'Unbreakable'. And, the results:

1st place : Herminigildo Garrobo, District 75 Philippines
2nd place : Douglas Kruger, District 74 S. Africa
3rd place : Donald Yee, District 80 Hong Kong

Herminigildo Garrobo, a faculty member of theDepartment of English,
College of Human Sciences, Saint Louis University, Baguio City, goes through to compete in the World Championship at the weekend.

Congratulations, Donald. You did us proud!

Thanks to Sean Lin, reporting in via iphone!

CC Project #8 is often a low point in a Toastmaster's journey. Why? Powerpoint!

Why a Toastmaster feels compelled to use Powerpoint when the project objectives simply call for 'visual aids', I'll never know!!

The way most people use PP is almost the opposite of visual. Words and text are not visual objects. Verbal and visual information is processed in different parts of our brain.

With the humourous contest coming up, I read and watched WCPS 2001, Darren LaCroix, the funniest Champion. As a student of comedy, Darren calls himself a comedian as well as a keynote speaker and author.

Darren's website

To see the speech, you'll need to buy the DVD.



But, I just learned last week that Darren actually went overtime in his championship speech. I checked and it's true.

"I actually went overtime," said Darren. "When the red light came on I went into my close. I left the podium and sat down knowing I had stayed within the time limit.

"However, people who were using their watches or had brought stop watches, knew I had gone too long.

It turned out that there had been a timing error and the rules of the contest state that if a timing error occurs, the speaker shall be granted 30 extra seconds. I was within the extra 30 seconds.

Darren's winning speech script

Who said luck has nothing to do with it?