Summary of Nov 8 2010 Meeting

Gilbert delivered a speech on a topic he is passionate about - Energy Efficiency. But from the title of his speech you would never have guessed that were about to learn how Hong Kong has to do more to enable the SAR to achieve the energy efficiency targets it has set for itself.

Our new member, Bill Ng revealed to us through his dreams that he is a computer game geek and a Tae Kwon Do martial artist, and currently working on his next dream of marrying the love of his life.

And our own master chef, Kenneth, gave us a memorable parting speech about cooking a great sirloin steak using the 3M (Meat, Method, and Magic) recipe (or was it really 6M - as someone quipped, it could also include Music, Mood and Money). What a shame that we did not get to taste the actual steak. But Kenneth very expertly teased the senses such that we could almost taste the actual meat, since we enjoyed the cooking process so much.

Our table topic speakers contributed many ideas to help us be more energy efficient, for example, switch off the lights when you leave the room, change to energy saving bulbs, lobby for the building of more green buildings, parents show good examples to their children with their good habits in conserving energy, learn more from Energenz, etc., etc., etc. Jo humorously reminded us that we ought to save our own energy by talking less and in a lower volume and not shout while having conversations. That would certainly make dining out a lot more pleasanter, don’t you agree?

Ben evaluated Gilbert and gave him some useful tips on how to attract audience attention to his slides and the web address. Bill impressed Edwin a lot as he managed to deliver his ice breaker speech without using any notes and cleverly used the dream stories to let us know more about him. We have often heard that a picture paints a thousand words but Joanne pointed out to us that Kenneth used words to arouse all the 5 senses (signt, hearing, touch, smell and taste) in us. Wow.

Our guest General Evaluator, Charles Law, the President of HKUST MBA Alumni Toastmasters Club gave us some commendations on what we do well in our club and also gave us some good suggestions for improvement. Thanks Charles.

Rita provided a hilarious moment when she commented that since our theme is on energy efficiency, we ought to be efficient with our use of unnecessary sounds. Paul relived how his parents in the past has given him a complex about keeping time and he asked for our understanding in advance if he was strict with his timekeeping. And he sure was strict. There were several more funny wisecracks uttered during the meeting, but I must have enjoyed them so much I forgot to record them down.

The winners for the evening’s speeches:

Best Speaker – Kenneth McNamee

Best Table Topic Speaker – Jo Manning

Best Evaluator – Joanne Chuk

At this meeting, we bade our farewells not just to Kenneth who is leaving us to join his wife back in the United States but also to Bobby Leung, our fairly new member who is moving to a new job in Shanghai. Please join me in wishing both of them all the best in their move and in settling into their new country and new life.

Best regards,

Ong Ai Ai

HKTMC President 2010-11