From Ajit Kulkarni, Area 59 Governor
- Food, Wine
- Speeches
- More Wine & Food
- Some More interesting speeches…
- Some more Wine & Food… !!! ???
Probably, you would guess this is a cut from the regular Christmas Dinner agenda, typically a chic Fundraising gala event. Nope. It was actually the agenda of the Area 59 Humorous Contest and Table Topics Contest held at Speakers Corner, McGraw Hill (S & P Capital IQ), Canary Wharf on 2 October 2014. Crafted well by the Host Club President William Hagerup along with the Contest Chair Ajit Kulkarni (A59 AG). The evening started at around 6pm with drinks & food served into the Atrium located on the 7th floor giving a backdrop of the breath-taking Canary Wharf views. The contestant sign-up and briefings happened without much notice in the background.
The meeting started with the very talented, host Club President William Hagerup doing his opening act with his hilarious one liners, which got the audience into the right mood for the Humorous Speech Contest.
As expected, the evening presented some high quality humorous speeches which sent the audience into a fit of hysteria. The breakout happened at the scheduled time leaving the audience time to have a quick dash to quench their spirited thirst!
The second half of the evening was all about Table Topics. The contestants were in for a surprise with a tough Table Topic to deal with. The Club Champions that they are, they were up for the challenge and came up with very interesting answers. Just when the evening seemed to be headed to the usual contestant interviews, the meeting sprung back to life presenting Paul Carroll, the Table Topics guru on stage. What followed was over 20 minutes of table topics thrown randomly at the audience, with the guru himself taking up a table topic thrown back to him at the end of the session. Contestants are pictured above with chief Judge Katy Woolcott.
The meeting concluded with presenting the results of the contest and awards which were as follows:
Placed |
Humorous Speech Contest |
Club |
1st |
Adolfo Tunon |
Citi Criers |
2nd |
Abdoulaye Diallo |
Trustmasters |
3rd |
James Jeans |
Speakers Corner |
Placed |
Table Topics Speech Contest |
Club |
1st |
Adolfo Tunon |
Citi Criers |
2nd |
Nneka Idam |
Meridian Speakers |
3rd |
Neal Sullivan |
Trustmasters |
Picture L to R: William Hagerup and Adolfo Tunon
After which, some of the TM’s and guests stayed back to continue where they had left on their “spirited mission”. All in all – it seemed like someone had poured a potion of life into the Area Contest without taking away sanctity of the TI Contest. We hope the guests will soon convert into members having got the impression of Toastmasters International as a fun, cool organization which can present some seriously competitive, high calibre speakers. Special mention to the HR at S&P Capital IQ (Speakers Corner ) for sponsoring the event!
Please come and see Adolfo and the other Area winners in the Division K contests on 21 October.