Congratulations to Calvin Chai and Loh Chia Hur!

Are you still single and looking to strike your first perfect date? If you are, you should consult Calvin Chai for tips! Calvin Chai from Mid Valley Toastmasters Club tickled our funny bones at Area G3 Humorous Speech Contest with his speech on how to make your first date a successful one. The hall was filled with laughters as Calvin Chai related to us how to maneuver our first date from the point when you pick up your date to the point when you are finally alone with your date at home. He left the latter part short, as he left the audience to imagine how the date could have ended. The judges were so impressed with the loudest cheers and laughters from the audience that they crowned him the Area Champion for Humorous Speech Contest. Congratulations to Calvin Chai!


Loh Chia Hur from Mid Valley Toastmasters Club did equally well as he emerged as the 1st runner-up for the Humorous Speech Contest. Loh Chia Hur spoke about his “water” experiences during his childhood days (which included an incident when he was having fun playing with water from a toilet bowl). He also related how as a toddler he was pushed into the swimming pool to learn swimming. While trying not to drown, he kicked his feet so hard that his dad thought he was a swimmer with natural talent. Most importantly, Loh Chia Hur imparted an important life lesson to the audience. In life, you may be pushed to the water and left alone to survive. But if you treat the experience as a learning experience and push yourself hard enough to swim faster, you will eventually survive and be a tougher man.

Loh Chia Hur did not only excel in the Humorous Speech Contest, he also excelled in the Evaluation Contest and emerged as the 2nd runner-up. Congratulations to Loh Chia Hur.

The full results are as follows:

Humorous Speech Contest:
Champion: Calvin Chai (Mid Valley Toastmasters Club)
1st runner-up: Loh Chia Hur (Mid Valley Toastmasters Club)
2nd runner-up: Jason Moi (Help Toastmasters Club)

Evaluation Contest:
Champion: Jason Moi (Help Toastmasters Club)
1st runner-up: Meyyappa Manickam (YSP Sah Toastmasters Club)
2nd runner-up: Loh Chia Hur (Mid Valley Toastmasters Club)

Congratulations again to Calvin Chai and Loh Chia Hur! Both of them will be representing Area G3 for the Division Level Humorous Speech Contest on 25 September 2010. We wish them the best for the Division Level Contest!

P.S.- If you would like to see them perform, drop by at our next meeting on 13 September 2010, 7pm at 5th Floor, Cititel Hotel, Mid Valley City.

Going the extra mile

We believe in going the extra mile to achieve improvement. Recently on 30 August 2010, we conducted an additional meeting to provide more opportunities for our members to attempt their project speeches. Special thanks to Ang Chee Yong (Vice President Education) for organising and securing the meeting venue.

Mid Valley Toastmasters Club Humorous Speech and Evaluation Contests

If you would like to achieve significant improvement, you have to push yourself to the limit. In Toastmasters, we participate in contests to test our limit, and to see how far we can go. By being competitive, you will force yourself to perfect your public speaking skills to perform at your best. Ultimately, you will find yourself to be a much improved speaker after participating in the contests.

We organized our Club level Humorous Speech and Evaluation Contests on 23 August 2010. We had record breaking number of participants with 8 contestants for Humorous Speech Contest and 7 contestants for Evaluation Contest.

The Humorous Speech Contest went on smoothly with laughters bursting out as we listened to speeches peppered with jokes. The Evaluation Contest was equally good with our evaluators providing analysis and recommendations for improvement to the test speaker (Priya from Sai Masters) who delivered a speech entitled "Positive Beliefs Produce Positive Results".

Congratulations to our winners!

Winners of Humorous Speech Contest
Champion: Loh Chia Hur
1st runner-up: Calvin Chai
2nd runner-up: Sky Chan

Winners of Evaluation Contest
Champion: Loh Chia Hur
1st runner-up: Keith Ho
2nd runner-up: Moses Wong

SkyTrex Adventure

Do you feel butterflies in your stomach when you speak in public? It is a normal reaction of your body to have butterflies in your stomach when you are nervous or anxious. However, with practice, you will be able to control the butterflies and let them fly the way you want them to. As Toastmasters, we are trained to do exactly that- to control the butterflies. By controlling the butterflies, we can then focus on our speeches and deliver the speeches with confidence and conviction.

On 21 August 2010, a bunch of us from Mid Valley Toastmasters Club had a different set of butterflies to control. We challenged ourselves to the extreme by embarking on a scary journey at SkyTrex Adventure Park, Shah Alam. We climbed up trees, swung ourselves from one tree to another, walked on ropes high up in the sky, and tried flying fox. This was an experience of a different kind that we have not been trained to do, but we took up the challenge nevertheless, and successfully completed the challenge with smiles. The girls did it well, looking like Lara Croft in training. The guys did it well too, with some looking like Tarzans.

As a reward for all of us, our Club treated us to good food in Klang.

We learnt one important lesson from the SkyTrex Adventure challenge:

“If you are faced with challenges in life, stop concentrating on how daunting the challenges are, and how impossible it is to overcome them. Instead, focus your energy and mind on the immediate challenge facing you, and walk through the challenges one by one. Before long, you will realize that you have reached the finishing line.”

P.S.- Special thanks to Loo Cheaw Lee for organizing the event. For more photos, join our Facebook group (search for "Mid Valley Toastmasters Club").

Welcome to the new members!

We conducted the induction ceremony for our new members recently on 9 August 2010. The ceremony was conducted by our Vice President Membership, Travis Lai. Welcome to all new members!