The WOW Toastmasters Club is a club with a difference, having meetings with a difference, at venues with a difference!

WOW Toastmasters Club meets on the 3rd Sunday of each month (but may vary) at a different venue in the Wairarapa, indoors in the winter and outdoors in the summer. Every second meeting is held at Cobblestones Museum, Greytown.

WOW Toastmasters Club is a community club with members from all over the Wellington and Wairarapa regions. Some of the meeting venues have included a winery, a brewery, a hotel, restaurants, cafes, gardens and museums, and a dairy farm.

2008 Meeting Diary

Here's a diary and photos of our WOW meetings in 2008:

Sunday 14 December

Unfortunately your reporter was not able to attend WOW's Christmas meeting as she was Santa's little helper at her work children's Christmas Party.

Sunday 9 November, Masterton

WOW Toastmasters gathered at the Hood Aerodrome for their November meeting on Sunday 9th.

Table Topics had an aeronautical theme, and the word of the day was "destinesia", which most Toastmasters agreed they suffered from occasionally.

The first speech by Dale Hartle entitled "The Black Prince" told the story of her great uncle Sqn Ldr Denis Sharp who was a WWII fighter pilot. He flew one of the planes in the Vintage Aviators Museum display at the aerodrome, and Dale was keen to get a first-hand look at the Corsair fighter. (see photos below).

Top: Dale and Andre at the Vintage Air Museum; Bottom: Dale inspecting the Corsair

The second speech by Jenny compared life between her teenage years, life today and life in the year 2040.

The final speech of the day was very special - Mastering the Toast. Glynis delivered a practice run for her nephew's upcoming 21st birthday party. She handed out grape juice for everyone to sample as part of the toast (see photo below)

Following the meeting, we enjoyed a picnic lunch, then a personal tour through the museum. The photo below shows Glynis inspecting one of the exhibits - the Curtiss Helldiver used in the movie King Kong.

Sunday 19 October at Cobblestones

The WOW Toastmasters meeting was held on Sunday 19 October at Cobblestones. The meeting opened with a tribute to Colin Perfect by Joy Ackrill. Joy outlined Colin's contribution to Toastmasters and the WOW club in particular and said he will be missed as he often travelled to WOW with her from Wellington.

Table topics followed the meeting theme of "purple", pictured below, with topics including flying purple eaters, 50s purple, purple music, purple frogs, purple prose, and balancing the purple budget. All speakers managed at least a minute on their topic with some hilarious stories - can you imagine the Queen in a McDonald's uniform? Evaluator Maureen said the mind-boggling stories were very funny and imaginative.

  

The first speaker Joy presented a 5 minute speech with 10 minutes for questions. Her topic was an adversorial relationship, where the audience were expected to be hostile to the proposition. Well if you can imagine being told you were to wear purple uniforms with fishnet stockings, what would be your reaction? The audience evaluation decided that it was actually a cunning ploy on the part of management to get all the dissenters to leave the company so they could avoid redundancies.

The second speaker Dale's speech entitled Get Blogging, persuaded the members of WOW to start their own blog. Dale outlined what a blog was, how to set one up, and recommended some popular blogs for people to blogwatch before having a go themselves. For those who want to learn how to set up a blog, visit this tutorial for beginners and wiki, and also have a look at two popular blogs:

• Random Ramblings of a Self-Opinionated Redhead by Angie Flynn (http://blog.angieflinn.com/),
• Life, Looney Verse and Everything by John Ansell (http://johnansell.wordpress.com/)

The third speaker Pip (pictured above) gave us a stomach-churning speech on seasickness, what it was, how it affected her, and some tips to avoid or manage seasickness. By the end we were all feeling a little queasy!

Lynn our grammarian reported on the use of the word illustrate, and also some of the other words she had heard during the meeting - like nanobrain, blogwatchers, redeployed, drooling, putrid, and frogless.

The timekeeper's report from Anne noted that most speakers had kept within their time, and in the general evaluation, Justin said he had loved the theme of purple and that it had been a most enjoyable meeting.

Following the meeting, we all assembled at Trends Cafe for a delicious lunch.

Sunday 21 September 2008, Martinborough

September's Spring Theme meeting was chaired by Rita, with four speakers and table topics.

Speaker 1 by Anne (first photo below) had us all licking our lips as she demonstrated how to make an apple pie. In Speech 2, Jenny (2nd photo below) had us enthralled with her humorous story about a Country Constable and what the bank manager had shot. Colin and Justin enjoying Jenny's punchline! (3rd photo below)

  

Joy, our third speaker, talked about her recent trip to the Toastmasters International Convention in Calgary, showing us her Presidential Citation plaque. Finally Lynn thoroughly entertained us with a humorous speech about Longevity. I am still trying to work out how many weeks I have left before the government reckons I will cark it according to Lynn.

Pip's Table Topics theme was Spring with Pictures, and all the speakers gave us a fascinating, funny or interesting 2 minute talk - we are still trying to imagine Colin snowboarding down a mountain with the wind whistling through his hair! What hair?

Justin's Grammarian's challenge was the word "fine" and every speaker managed to use the word at least once in their speeches with the correct meaning.

Dale's general evaluation complimented all the evaluators on the quality of their evaluations, and especially thanked Anne for arranging the venue, a historic church hall for the meeting.

Following the meeting we enjoyed lunch at Toppy's cafe in the Square.

Sunday 17 August 2008, Cobblestones

Mandy (pictured below left) very effectively chaired the meeting with the theme of 'Inspirational People'. She was completely attired as her inspirational person; Mother Teresa!

  

The 'inspiration' theme emerged in various ways as the meeting progressed. Rita, the Grammarian, had chosen 'heroic' as the word she wanted club members to use; if they could. Mandy inserted quotes from Mother Teresa into the various interludes between the agenda items and; the Table Topics session, that was chaired by Colin, used topics associated with inspirational New Zealand events or people. This latter session resulted in some very illuminating views on the treatment of 'tall poppies', the place and regard New Zealanders have of some famous criminals such as George Wilder and Joseph Pawelka, and the place of heroes in our country's past.

  

Pip gave a gripping Icebreaker speech on a favourite relative, Maureen (pictured left above) on an enthralling visit to Ireland, Glynis on the recent invasion of Georgia and the background as to why that intrusion may have occurred, and finally Jenny spoke on 'Voices from the Other Side'; this was a chiller!

Many of those present later went onto Wakelin House, a restaurant in central Greytown, for lunch and further discussions on the meeting items and 'upcoming' social activities.

This meeting's report by Colin Perfect. Photos by Glynis de Castro.

Sunday 20 July, Cobblestones

Your intrepid WOW reporter was recovering from surgery so was unable to attend the July meeting.

Sunday 15 June 2008, Cobblestones

On a glorious mid-winter's day, the WOWsters gathered at Cobblestones for their monthly meeting with the theme "World Environment Day". Our Grammarian Ben chose the word "schmaltz" as the challenge for speakers, and many did manage to use the word or a derivative of it during their speaking. This pleased Ben immensely, and in his Grammarian's report at the end of the meeting he said he was unsure how the word would be received.

The first speech by Maria was "A Russian Folk Tale", which evaluator Trish described as delightful, with fantastic gestures. It was a serious story with a moral at the end, and everyone enjoyed Maria's delivery.

    

Joy was the second speaker with a speech entitled "An Immigrant Ship" (pictured above left). She told the story of an immigrant ship which came to New Zealand in the 1870s with some of her ancestors. She used photos of the ship, a map to show where it ran aground on the Wairarapa Coast on its final voyage, and photos of parts of the ship which were salvaged and are now in museums - the wheel, bell and name plate. Evaluator Colin said he was enraptured by Joy's speech which was full of facts, and she was obviously passionate about her family history, having visited the site of the wreck, and the museums where the artefacts are located.

Lynn was our third speaker (pictured above centre). She started with a quote "Great speeches are delivered, they are not recited!" This set the scene for Lynn's message about the three components of a speech - body language 55%, vocal variety 38% and content 7%. Evaluator Jenny said she was impressed with Lynn's own body language and enjoyed the topic of "Interactive Speaking" from Lynn.

Finally Maureen presented a humorous speech called "Nights of Passion", (pictured above right) which was evaluated by Joy. As always, Maureen entertained us with her two stories about the eagle and the kiwi, and she used a Kiwi hand puppet to support her actions. Joy said she liked the transitions Maureen used between the two themes and the clever use of the word "slump" in the speech.

Pip ran Table Topics, using the theme of the day "World Environment Day", where each speaker had to compare two opposing topics, such as home grown versus store purchased fruit and veges, or train travel versus car pooling. Table Topics Evaluator Carol said she liked the personalised approach to all the topics each speaker had used, with personal experiences adding to the impact of the speaker's messages.

As the meeting was running slightly ahead of time, various members of the audience were invited to say why they liked coming to WOW Toastmasters, and what their goals were for the coming year. Pip said she had learnt a lot at Speechcraft, and had joined the committee to take on a leadership role as Secretary. Carol had a desire to improve her speaking and had also taken on a leadership role in the coming year as President. Anne had completed the Speechcraft course and had made a personal commitment to continue in Toastmasters, while Jenny had joined to help her speaking skills in her work. Trish enjoys her WOW day out, loves the friendship of the club, and has made a commitment to register an award in the coming year. Lynn said Toastmasters had given her a new lease of life, and she was considering moving into training in performing arts in the near future. Susan had learnt a lot from the evaluations she had received at Speechcraft, while Colin said he enjoys the variety of WOW meetings and the fun we all have.

Timekeeper Susan did a great job of keeping track of everyone's speaking time, and read out the times, with most speakers keeping within their allotted times.

General Evaluator Glynis commented on the diversity of the club members, and the variety of topics chosen for speeches. She reminded speakers to beware of ums and ahs, and to ensure speakers have a speech title for their evaluator's introduction.

Following the meeting, we had lunch at Salute in Greytown (their pizzas are the best!)

Sunday 11 May 2008, Featherston

WOW's May meeting was chaired by Distinguished Toastmaster Colin Perfect, and was held at St Theresa's School in Featherston, thanks to organiser Carol Pilcher. Fourteen members attended.

Being Mother's Day, Table Topics Master Justin introduced the theme of "Some Mothers Do Have 'em" by using quotes from famous people, such as "Oh Betty, I think we've got a problem", "It'll be gone by lunchtime", "The internet will never take off", "It's unsinkable", "The War in Iraq is over", "We'll be cheaper, faster and better", and "Everything has been invented". This resulted in some hilarious speeches by participants as they tried to explain the quote, or dispel the myths surrounding it. See first three photos below.

       

There were four prepared speeches today, the first being a public relations speech by Rita, who took the role of a large bank's public relations representative attempting to explain an internet fraud issue. Rita handled questions from the audience afterwards. Evaluator Dale said she handled the situation very well, and managed not to smile in such a serious occasion, but leaving the press kit handout at home was a major blunder!

Carol's speech outlined the history of St Theresa's school, how it was established back in the 1950s by the Brigidine Sisters, and how it has grown over the years. Carol used powerpoint to great effect to show photos of the old school and some of the Sisters who came from Ireland. Evaluator Joy said she enjoyed listening to a local history story and the characters involved, and gave Carol some pointers about coping with technology and its unpredictable behaviour at times.

Next Lynn brought in the Mother's Day theme by outlining the history and making of chocolate, and gave us all samples to try (See photo above). Evaluator Glynis complimented Lynn on the fabulous pictures on the powerpoint slide show and said she found it hard to concentrate on the speaker and the slides at the same time.

Finally Ben gave us an entertaining speech entitled "Who wants my cat?" He described the night-time antics of his cat - rabbits heads in the dining room, eels in the hallway, mouse in the lounge, needing food, occupying plum position in the bed, and cat loyalty behaviour. Finally Ben finished with the question, "So, who wants my cat?" No-one did! Evaluator Trish said she could relate to the nature of the speech and the topic, and said that even though Ben relaxed on the back of a chair, this was most appropriate for an entertaining speech.

Following the main part of the meeting, the club held its annual business meeting, with the election of new club officers for the 2008-09 Toastmasters year beginning on 1 July.

General Evaluator Mandy complimented the cheerful chairman Colin, and the helpful positive and enthusiastic suggestions made by all the evaluators. She said she had enjoyed the meeting immensely.

The club enjoyed lunch at the Rapa Cafe in Featherston.

Download and print Minutes of AGM Meeting.

Sunday 19 April 2008, Cobblestones

WOW's April meeting at Cobblestones was fun-filled and interactive, with three speeches and an educational. We also welcomed two Speechcrafters and two guests.

Table Topics had an ANZAC theme, with Table Topics Master Maureen posing some interesting topics for the speakers, including Hope, Adventure, Coping with Adversity, Hardship and Making Do. In the first three photos below, Colin, Glinis and Andre talk about their ANZAC topics.

          

In the first speech by Jenny Russell entitled "Rubbish", props were used to show us some of the rubbish that ends up in our landfills - plastic bags, bottles and polystyrene containers and trays. Jenny gave us plenty of tips for recycling and eliminating rubbish, and ended with a strong message: "Be clean, live green!" The last photo above shows Jenny with a plastic bottle.

The second speech by Trish Gray was a fact finding report which Trish used to great advantage by telling us 4 love stories, and invited us to work out the ending of the third story about AnaKali. Trish had us riveted to our seats as she gave us various options as to how the tragic love story ended. We still don't know!

The highlight of the meeting was the Division E representative at the District's International Speech Contest Sanjiv Jetly, who delivered his speech "Wheelies in the Rain". It was wonderful to have a speaker of such high calibre visit the club, and most of us were able to offer some feedback to Sanjiv to consider as he prepares for the District Convention in May. See photos below of Sanjiv in action. We wish him luck in the District contests.

       

Justin's educational on "How to Be a Distinguished Club" outlined the Distinguished Club goals and how the WOW club can achieve them. Justin used the resources provided by Toastmasters with Rita acting as his datashow projector complete with "zoom" functionality.

Following the meeting, WOW members had lunch at the White Swan in Greytown.

Sunday 16 March 2008, Burnside Church

The venue for the March meeting was transferred from the planned Pirinoa Marae to the quaint historic Burnside Church at Pirinoa because of sudden illness of our Marae host.

However, this turned out to be a fortuitious change, as the ten members of WOW who attended thoroughly enjoyed holding the meeting in the church, which was still decorated from a wedding the day before.

The Grammarian's challenge for the day was the word "language" and table topics followed the theme by using newspaper headlines such as "Firebird flogged", "Rhapsody in Blue" and "Less is More" as topics.

Chairperson Carol gave an interesting speech outlining the history of the 102 year old church, and the surrounding Palliser area. Lynn's "Warning" speech explained the Red Hat Society, and warned us to look out for the Red Hat girls in the area. Pictured left is Lynn in her red hat.

The final speech from Dale entitled "Virtual Cemetery" outlined the Porirua Cemetery Headstone Photography Project which she is currently completing in her role as Website Manager.

Grammarian Glynis gave her report, and acknowledged the 3 different languages used during the meeting: English, Maori and French, and how some speakers had used Maori greetings. Timekeeper Rita gave a comprehensive report of everyone's time, and General Evaluator Colin complimented Carol for an enthusiastic well-run meeting.

Following the meeting, WOW members enjoyed a BBQ lunch at Rita and Justin's house.

Sunday 17 February 2008 Cobblestones

The WOW Toastmasters Club meeting held on 17 February at Cobblestones was attended by 15 people, including 4 guests. The theme was Gone with the Wind, and this was used by the Table Topics Master Trish, who gave each speaker a topic related to "wind". All speakers gave humorous and thoughtful 2 minute speeches, and the photos below show Colin, Maria and Joy in action.

Speaker 1 was Lynn who gave a very personal story about an event in her childhood, using emotion, gestures, and descriptive language to relay her feelings about the fire which nearly devastated the family home when she was small. Her call to action was "to learn how to sing in the lifeboats".

Glynis was our second speaker, talking about the use of psychodrama with teenagers. The speech was followed a few minutes later by a question and answer session which thoroughly engaged the audience who wanted to know more about psychodrama and how it helps teenagers in their lives.

Maureen's humorous speech had everyone laughing as she told a story and described some water experiments she enjoyed with her grandchildren.

Finally Toni described how she overcame a phobia. Toni's evaluator Colin congratulated her for the understated delivery which sold the message, and that she had delivered the speech without notes.

Visiting Grammarian Rob Julian (pictured left) used the Southern theme with his word of the day "antibellum" ("Anti-" means against or opposed to, and "Bellum" means war, or conflict. Therefore "Antibellum" means to be against war), his "yee-hah" rebel yell, and led us all in a rousing rendition of Dixie.

Following the meeting, club officer training was conducted by the Division Governor Peter Scholtens, and Area Governor Mandy Grainger.

Sunday 13 January 2008, Riverleigh Park, Norfolk Road, Masterton.

The club was treated to a very warm day on a secluded lawn as well as a lovely meeting venue under a covered awning.

Maureen chaired the meeting well and added extra pizzazz to the gathering in doing so!

The image on the left above depicts Trish "holding the floor" when elaborating on her selection for "Word of the Day". She chose the word "Movement". The word provoked keen interest in those speaking and it was used many times during the meeting.

After a lively Table Topics session Justin gave a prepared speech on a sustainability issue related to farming, particularly the disposal on land of dairy cow's urine!!!! As can be seen in the second image above, Justin was able to use his inflatable cow to good effect and this resulted in generating much humour from the audience.

The meeting concluded and the majority of those present repaired to the Park's cafe for magnificent lamb and beef open sandwiches.

2007 Meetings

Sunday 9 December 2007, Cobblestones

Sunday's WOW meeting with a Christmas Carol theme, and Pot Luck lunch to follow, went well.

Trish Gray chaired the meeting.

Jenny was a guest from the Wairarapa, and a previous Dominion Post Speechcraft Course graduate. Welcome along Jenny!

Joy Ackrill as Grammarian chose 'cheer', 'cheery', 'cheers' and 'cheerful' (but not 'cheerio'; as in the sausage) as the words of the day although only a select few members managed to use one or more of them when addressing the meeting.

Justin conducted a lively Table Topics on the theme of 'Christmases, past, present and future'. Each member and guest present pulled a Christmas Cracker to get their 'folded-up' topic on the theme.

Colin Perfect gave a speech titled 'Facing the Music' about the music class at a secondary school singing Christmas carols.

Ben and Maureen both produced impromptu speeches on 'What has happened in the last month' and 'My busy fortnight' respectively. Some very useful 'pearls of wisdom' were delivered during both these speeches.

Marie evaluated Table Topics for the first time and made a thoroughly reasoned delivery for every participant.

Maureen gave a concise Timekeeper's Report and Ben a very comprehensive General Evaluation.

Overall a thoroughly enjoyable meeting with a 'creaking' table of lunch delights to follow!

Sunday 18 November, Pioneer Museum

We were outside at the Pioneer Museum at Mt Bruce and in bright sunlight (and that didn't help the photos). The club meeting was held on the freshly mown lawn alongside the Museum building. This was followed by a BYO lunch under some shady trees.

Chris Rabey chaired the meeting with aplomb. Colin Perfect introduced the words of the day: 'bunk and bunkum'. He explained that both words originated in Buncombe, North Carolina from a politician who was renowned for giving speeches that were said to be nonsense. The words, meaning absolute nonsense, were picked up and effectively used by those speaking.

Steve Bullock's table topics session got everyone into the mood of the meeting and varied from historic themes to travel in content. Maree and Lillian who were guests tackled the subjects and gave a good account of themselves with their individual topics.

The three prepared speakers, Ben (The physical language), Maria (Youth is not wasted on the young) and Toni (Alice) gave impassioned and moving deliveries on each of their topics.

At the conclusion and after lunch the members were given a conducted tour of the surprisingly comprehensive pioneer museum by the owner.

Sunday 14 October 2007, Cobblestones

WOW's October meeting theme was "Rugby World Cup" with everyone dressing in black. At this stage the All Blacks had been eliminated from the World Cup, but that didn't stop us having fun with the theme. Table Topics Master Joy posed the question "Who's Responsible?" and asked the speakers to debate whether it was the ref, the coach, the crowd, the team, the ball, the jersey or the government.

The first prepared speech from Justin entitled "Under the Radar" was a technical speech where he explained the features of the new fighter jets Iran is purchasing from Russia, and why France is worried. He used a paper dart as a prop to show the jet's amazing flight capabilities, and a map of Europe to explain why France is worried. Did I mention, France is worried?

Rita gave us a hilarious speech on "What Price an Omelette" where she told us a story of a new chicken farmer and the trouble he had building a chicken coup, all to gain two eggs for his omelette at a price of $294.71 per egg. Along the way she coined a new word "chookens"!

Carol continued the Rugby World Cup theme by opening her speech asking why three little words cause so much emotion in a nation. She then proceeded to give us the history of the rugby world cup, saying that it is the third biggest tournament after the Olympics and the Soccer World Cup, and that the USA are in fact the Rugby Olympic Champions. We all learnt a few new facts about this game during Carol's well-researched speech.

Finally Lynne showed us her humorous speech qualities by telling us to "Take Care Out There". She used gestures and body language to convince us there was a conspiracy when it came to credit cards, clothing labels, chocolate fish, the phone book, text on mobile phones and women's dressing room mirrors.

Trish was our Grammarian for the day, and she was looking for how many times we used the word "black". She also complimented Rita for her excellent use of alliterations in her humorous speech - "prime plump pullets" being one example.

Timekeeper Ben stated that all but one speaker had kept to time, and how much he had enjoyed the meeting, especially using the new timing lights.

Trish gave a comprehensive general evaluation with useful tips for all speakers. She said the theme for the day was easy, topical and fun, and complimented everyone on picking up the dress code by wearing the colour "black".

Following the meeting, we reassembled at Cafe Trends north of Greytown for a pleasant lunch.

Sunday 17 September 2007, Masterton

"Rubbish" was the word of the day, with Grammarian Maureen giving us a long list of meanings which we could choose to use, including dross, twaddle, and tommy rot. This made for some entertaining table topics and evaluations where speakers used as many meanings as they could in their speeches.

Glynis was the first speaker, discussing the benefits of joining Kiwisaver. She then answered questions about what happens to your funds when you die, change jobs or are self-employed.

"Fact or Fiction" was the title of Joy's speech. She created a sense of mystery about the history of a member of her family she had been researching, and ended by telling us not to believe all those family stories until you have verified the facts.

"Staying Safe Down on the Dairy Farm" was a Briefing by Justin about safety. Justin used a number of visual aids to help us understand the importance of safety, including showing us a full set of safety gear from gumboots to safety goggles. Then he used his main prop Daisy (pictured) to show us cow handling techniques. At the end of his speech, Justin answered questions about music in cowsheds, and the cost of the gear and who pays.

Maureen's speech was entitled "The birds in my life", a humorous speech to Warm Up the Audience. She described the antics of several generations of ducks in her back yard.

In General Business, Rita presented the club with two ribbons - one for Select Distinguished Club, and the other for the Beat the Clock promotion. She also presented Dale Hartle with her Competent Leader Award (pictured).

Sunday 19 August 2007, Cobblestones, Greytown

Today's meeting chaired by Colin, had a Spanish theme, with Grammarian Joy challenging everyone to use the word of the day "amigo". There were 11 people present including one guest Jeremy, a toastmaster from Christchurch.

Table Topics had the Spanish theme, with speakers talking about "the rain in spain", "a spaniard in the works", "origin of the word ole", "a spanish fandango" and a "spanish harlem". All speakers managed to come up with either or story or a meaning for their topic with much hilarity.

 

The four prepared speeches were all interesting and varied. Vaya introduced the real Zoro (pictured above), Chris talked about the automobile, Mandy told us about "a boy in her house" and Dale told us why Spain is special to her at the moment, with her speech entitled "El Camino". Dale's father and brother are in Spain doing the El Camino pilgrimage.

Grammarian Joy pointed out some of the unusual words we had used during the meeting: grammatise, monolinguistic, terminise, and senoritas.

Following the meeting, everyone enjoyed lunch at Wakelin House.

Sunday 15 July 2007, Buckhorn, Carterton

"Howdy pardners" was the greeting from President Lynn as she opened the meeting and welcomed the 14 members present, surrounded by cowboy stuff from down on the farm. Lynn also welcomed Vaya as our Area Governor to the meeting. Maureen as Grammarian introduced the word "important" with a short poem about 4 important men, and encouraged us to use the word in our speeches.

Table Topics run by Chris was really entertaining, taking us all back to the 1960s with topics tailor-made for the audience. Speakers talked about their memories of discipline in the 1960s, handwritten communication, the school tuckshops and candy stores, continuous pictures and movie shorts and half time ice creams. Evaluator Trish was very impressed at how all the speakers managed to remember their 60s antics with enthusiastic and humorous speeches.

We were treated to two icebreaker speeches at the meeting. The first was form Maria who spoke about her impressions of a new land when she first arrived in New Zealand 34 years ago. She used descriptive words such as emerald hills and sapphire seas, learning Kiwi language and Maori culture. Carol's icebreaker was about family ties, and she used real ties to represent family connections and influences of grandchildren, children, parents and grandparents.

The third speech by Ben was delivered in a fireside style with everyone sitting around him listening intently, nodding acknowledgement, smiling at thoughts, and shaking their heads in defiance. Ben was talking about tax avoidance and how we were all shooting ourselves in the foot!

During General Business, Secretary Dale read out a letter from the new Division Governor Peter Scholtens congratulating the club for being awarded Club of the Month for June, along with a cheque for $100 and a ribbon for our banner. General business also covered upcoming Humorous and Table Topics contests, club officer training, and confirmation of the forward programme.

General Evaluator Joy summed up her impressions of the meeting with a comprehensive evaluation, offering some useful tips for the chairperson, speakers and evaluators.

Sunday 17 June 2007, Cobblestones

WOW's mid-winter meeting was very humorous with one advanced speech entitled "Biddy or Boomer" from President Rita, and one called "Laughter" from Lynn. Rita's speech was full of wonderful sayings and received the longest applause of the day. Lynn told us to forget about going to the gym, just roll around on the floor laughing to get a good workout.

New member Toni delivered her Icebreaker speech called "Why am I here?". She credits her emigrating to New Zealand from Ireland 30 years ago to her husband to take up a job with the NZ Army, and to her friend Rita for bring her along to WOW Toastmasters.

Joy opened the meeting with a speech using visual aids by explaining to us how the Wellington Floating Crane Hikitia recently conducted a heavy lift of two concrete beams as part of the Wellington waterfront redevelopment. Joy used photographs and diagrams on an ohp to show us how it was done.

Joy also gave the meeting a short report about the highlights of the recent District Convention held in Hamilton - meeting and hearing World Champion of Public Speaking 1990 David Brookes, and the Communication and Leadership award recipient Tony Christiansen. Joy reminded everyone that the next convention is being held in Wellington in November.

During General Business Rita presented four awards: their first Competent Communicator to Justin and Maureen, and her 7th Competent Communicator for Dale. She also presented herself with a Competent Leader award. (See photo below left for the recipients)

Ah-Counter Dale commented on the verbal crutches, unusual words, great sayings and contrast/comparisons made during the meeting.

During the timing report Rita stated that most speakers managed to stay within their timing, and General Evaluator Glynis commented on the supportive audience, and excellent chairmanship by Justin.

Rita also handed over the reins of the club to the incoming President Lynn Bushell after lunch at Salute. (see photo below right).

 

Sunday 13 May 2007, Gladstone Winery, Carterton

Mother's Day was the theme for WOW's May meeting, with Table Topics posing the question: If it wasn't for your mother, where would you be?

The Club's annual business meeting elected a new Club Committee, and the club's new outdoor flag was unveiled and presented to the club, meeting rapturous applause and approval (see photo showing flag next to banner).

Two Prepared speeches were given at this meeting, held in the Gladstone Winery outdoor restaurant area. The first speech by Glynis explained the NCEA qualification system aimed particularly at employers, outlining how the grades and awards worked, and showing us an example of a Record of Learning.

The second speech from Justin entitled "Absolutely Fabulous" inspired us to think positively in small chunks, have a plan, figure out what you don't want to do, and use positive affirmations, even in the face of adversity. This was Justin's 10th speech, qualifying him for the Competent Communicator Award. Congratulations Justin!

The smell of our lunch being cooked was almost too much to bear as it wafted over the meeting area with the backdrop of autumn colours of the leaves on the vines. Wine tasting was also enjoyed by some members before the sumptuous luncheon.

View Minutes of Annual General Meeting May 2007

Sunday 14 April 2007, Cobblestones, Greytown

WOW's April meeting was held at Cobblestones Museum on a bright warm sunny autumn day. The meeting's theme was "Celebrations" so table topics followed this theme where speakers had to talk about "The best ... I ever went to was ..." by filling in the blanks with an event of their choice. The speakers talked about a soccer event, the first day at kindy, a mother's funeral, a son's wedding, and a St Patrick's Day party.

The three formal speeches were varied and interesting. Maureen told us some stories about her three grandchildren and the challenges she set for them and herself with holiday activities around the house. Rita's educational talked about how to create the best club climate, finishing with a short question and answer session. And Justin's speech described two forms of home solar heating, outlining how they worked, the benefits and potential savings.

The photo above shows President Rita using the OHP in her educational.

One of our guests Mandy was Grammarian and she used the celebrations theme to structure her grammarian report, then Glynis gave us a rundown of the speakers times. The General Evaluator Mel, who was a guest and recent arrival in New Zealand, being an ex-Toastmaster, said how much he had enjoyed the WOW meeting with all its different elements - the flowers on the table, the hats, the chocolates, the laughter, interesting speeches and great cameraderie.

Lunch followed the meeting at the Green Man in Greytown.

Sunday 18 March 2007, Pahiatua

About 20 members and friends of the Wairarapa On Weekends Toastmasters (WOW) Club came from Wellington, Hawkes Bay and from throughout the Wairarapa to attend its regular monthly meeting at 11.00 am which incorporated a conducted tour of the Railcar Museum at Pahiatua Railway Station (pictured below).

The meeting held indoors at a member's home opened with some humorous impromptu speeches having a rail theme. Members had to deal with delivering off-the-cuff speeches with such titles as being railroaded, having a full head of steam, and being derailed. Then prepared speeches were delivered on Trams in Victoria, Australia, the meaning of Waitangi Day, and the value of stress reduction through gardening of chrysanthemums.

The club members were later addressed by both Bernard Watson and Don Selby (Chairman) of the Railcar Society.

The group was most impressed with the workshop facilities at the museum as well as the professionalism and the scale of work that had been undertaken on the collection of three vintage ex New Zealand Railways railcars. It was also impressed that the visit coincided with the arrival at the station of a steam train excursion from Wellington run by Mainline Steam!

Sunday 18 February 2007, Cobblestones, Greytown

The February meeting followed the Club Officer Training session held for Wairarapa Clubs, and including one guest, there were 14 present on a fine calm Wairarapa day.

The photo below shows the participants in the club officer training session discussing membership promotion ideas.

Division Governor Mike Norden was one of those present who participated in table topics and gave an impromptu speech. Other speeches were by Clive who gave us an icebreaker/farewell speech about his goals for life, and Glynis who also gave an impromptu speech from an advanced manual. Justin spoke about Family Trusts and why we should investigate whether we should have one.

Trish's Timekeepers report followed the meeting's theme of Fashion with a Passion by indicating whether speakers were under-dressed, over-dressed, or well-dressed (right on time!)

Dale's Grammarian's report picked out a few one-liners of note, and General Evaluator Colin commented on Maureen's first meeting as chairperson, saying she had been enthusiastic, and kept the meeting bubbling along.

Our photos this month show Division Governor Mike (left) and General Evaluator Colin giving their table topics (right).

Sunday 14 January 2007, Circus Theatre, Martinborough

Nine out of 12 club members and one guest enjoyed a varied programme chaired by Dale at the Circus Theatre and Cafe in Martinborough on Sunday 14 January.

The Table Topics Theme was "Wind", with each speaker having to talk about wind in their speech, for example, "Gone with the wind", "second wind".

There were four prepared speeches, the first a humorous speech to "warm up the audience" by Colin - a very funny story about a construction foreman called "Wrecker" and two of his disasters. Next, Justin took the role of an air traffic controller in a speech using vocal variety, where he imitated some of the pilots and controllers he has heard while out flying.

Next was Maureen with a speech using visual aids where she showed us how to do woodburning, and showed us some examples of the finished product. Finally in a Public Relations - Radio Talk Show speech, Rita was being interviewed by a talk show host Justin. Rita talked about her craft business in Greytown - how it was established and how it currently operates.

Dale's Grammarian's report covered all the ums and ahs heard during the meeting, and Trish's innovative wind-themed timing report was very funny.

Following a group evaluation, we enjoyed a buffet lunch outside in the sun.

Pictured below are (left) Maureen displaying her woodburning pictures, and (right) Rita and Justin simulating a radio talk show.

Other meeting diaries

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