Colors, hangers, and mystery

Jelena began the previous session highlighting the power of differences, and showing how something as simple as a work email can lead to cultural differences that we don’t expect. And cultural differences is what we could find in the three new guests that introduced themselves; coming from Russia, France, and Barcelona.

The past Toastmasters session flowed around the topic of movies. Maria Luisa, the toastmaster of the day, asked us about our favorite film and actor/actress. This is a part of the session that I always really like. In my opinion, hearing the answers of the different people in the room helps us to know them better. After that, she introduced the team that would take care of the time, the crotches, and the grammar during that session: Hugo, Enrique, and Claus, who, making a joke about The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, presented the word of the day: Nevertheless.

Then, the speakers began with their awesome speeches. Words full of hope, of motivation, of power, begin to fill the room.

The first speaker, Isabel, showed us how to rock a first speech, the Ice Breaker. She really broke the ice opening herself about her nervousness of being there, her personality, and the color that matched the several parts that compound it, creating a full color palette. 

Julia, the second to speak, remind us something that sometimes we seem to have forgotten: that Impossible is nothing. Through her own story about a summer-job in a store, she advised us on how to deal with difficult people, about being the order in the chaos (a really nice expression, by the way), and, at the end, we all learnt how to correctly hang training clothes.

For the third speech of the evening, Oliver played with our curiosity and brought a Mystery Box. Using several visual aids, he spoke about mystery, and summarized three points that define it: Reality, Challenge, and a final Twist at the end. Using his own strategy, his final twist was showing us how a small box can contain a watermelon.

After that, the evaluations came. This part is, at least for me, a very enriching part. You can learn a lot from other people’s speeches and from the comments they receive; not just about how to be a better communicator, but also about giving your evaluation in a nicer way, being always respectful, and remembering that there are no good and bad things, but good things and things to learn from.

For the Table Topics, M. A. brought us a “Karaoke” session. Nevertheless, this karaoke did not have cheesy songs from the 80s, but slides with random images with any relation at all between them. The brave “volunteers” did it really well, with slides about gigantic fishes, Maziner-Z, and Chinese people in motorcycles. Moreover, despite of the surrealistic mix, their speeches had a general motto, which encouraged us to enjoy life and learn from experiences.

At the end, the general evaluation was given by Catalina, who reminded us to use the “I technique”, not saying what people have done, but what we think about it. Last but not least, Jelena reminded us about the Christmas party (yeeeei!) and closed another great session.

By Maria