EUNOIA
My Journey With Toastmasters
By Shristi Samal, TCS Maitree Bhubaneswar Toastmasters Club
Just like a Feng Shui Ying
Yang ball has black in white
and white in black, my
initial impression about
Toastmasters’ was ultranegative. It goes back to the
day when I excitedly took a
friend of mine to attend the
session as guest, only to be
locked out for 15 minutes
by Toastmaster Ashish, the
then Seargent-At-Arms, a
term whose meaning I
didn’t even understand
then. After getting back, I
grunted, I sniffed and even
complained to my friends
asking them, “What is
Toastmasters’ is all about?’
After a long time and quite a
good number of persuasions, I
returned to the club as a guest
and started listening to the
speeches. The best thing that
happened thereafter was I
joining the project team of TM
Amrapali Patnaik, the Area
Director of area H4. It was
followed by my registration into
Toastmasters’, active
participation in all subsequent
sessions, ensuring my presence
in all of their Whatsapp and
Facebook activities and taking
up different roles; grammarian
being my all-time favorite, with
immense enthusiasm and ultrapositivity.
I really wonder today what
made tears roll down my big
round cheeks, when during
the recent Humorous &
Speech Evaluation Contest; a
fellow TM from another Club
came up to me with a friend
of hers and said,” You know,
she is the best grammarian I
have come across till date,
she listens to each and every
sentence you speak and
points out your errors. Even
though I have completed my
P 10; I wish all my speeches
were evaluated by her”. I
guess that is the power of
Toastmasters’!!
SEP 2016
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EUNOIA
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16