2007/11/20 Lillian Tseng's C8 speech

Many years ago, there is a man wants to dating with me. When he knew I can play golf, he tried to create a connection between him and me. He told me that he always went to driving ranch to practice. I was so happy and curiosity that we have same interest we can talk about. I ask him which golf club is his favorite golf club, he was speechless. He doesn’t know there are many golf clubs in one set. Actually, he doesn’t know anything about golf. Therefore, I never went out with him again.

Ladies and Gentlemen

When I first learn how to play golf, I started learning from how to hold my golf club and tied and feel comfortable. Then I start to learn how to swing my body from top to bottom, let it looks like a semicircle shape. Then try to aim and hit the little white ball. In the first month, I did the same practice over and over again. Due to the practice, the opportunity of hitting ball becomes grater from 10% to 80%. Are the entire ball well hitting by me? Of course not. Most of the ball I hit was ground ball. Next step I learn is to practice different # of golf club. I try to adjust my stand position little by little to suit the different golf clubs, because each clubs has different height and different angle. After I learn the skill of hitting ball, I started to add power when I swing my body and hit the ball. How long have I spent on this process? 1 month? 3 months? 6 months? I spent a year to learn the basic skills. But I am still not qualified to go on golf course. I admire Tiger Woods. He started to learn golf since he was 5 years old. He is ranking #1 professional golf player in the World when he was 22 years old. He is still continuing to practice, to attend golf tournament.

Thomas Alva Edison said “Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration”. Being successful, there is no short cut way, you must do it, review it, and improve little by little. Apply to the Toastmasters; first, you must step out your comfort zone. Stand on the stage, tried to conquer y our nervousness, tried to speak out to 20 people. It’s just like how to hold your golf club tie and feel comfortable. Second, you have to follow the manual to learn how to sell out yourself to audience. Third, you need a good opening to attract audience’s attention. Then, you have to pay attention on the eye contact, facial expression, body language, gestures, voice volume, voice pitch and emotion while you are speaking. It’s just like practice different # of golf clubs, try to adjust your position to suit the gold club. Think back my C1 speech in 2005, I actually fail it because over time. A year later, I did my C2 speech, I finished it on time, but I saw my script most of time. When I heard my evaluator giving comments, it’s hurt but will help me getting better. However, we still need to do C3, C4 and go on. But you need to beware the eye contact, body language, voice volume to present a well speech. It’s just like add power when I hit little white ball. I want to let the little white ball fly far and fall into right position. It really takes times to practice to achieve this goal.

In the beginning, you may shake your hands and legs; you may have shake voice; you may have unstable eye contact; you may have unorganized speech. It’s alright. It’s just like you can hit the little white ball 50 yard at first time, 80 yards at second time, over 100 yards after third time. See yourself getting better and better each time. You take one step forward, it shorten the distance to your goal. There is no short cut way to success. Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration.

2007/11/6 Shuni Hamamatsu's C1 speech

Ladies and Gentlemen: Have you ever wish you can stick a note on your back, describing who you are and what you do, so everyone can read it and get to know you? Well, we all want people to know who we are, don’t we. But, we don’t really want to stick a note on our back, so we invented uniforms to let people know who we are. You see, doctors automatically look so smart in their uniforms, and Wang Jian Ming looks so handsome and tall in Yankee’s uniform. They are lucky bastards, everybody know them.

I wish I can wear a doctor uniform and I wish I am as tall and popular as Wang Jian Ming, but I am not. So I really need this opportunity to express my amazing inner beauty to you. So, let’s get rolling.

Do you know the liberal and conservative spectrum? Well I will put myself right over here, on way left to the liberal side. So, what is a liberal person? I think if I were born 100 years ago, I would be a communist. Liberal person like me, we accept and respect diversities in society. For example in Taiwan, we have ethnic diversity in Taiwanese, Chinese, Hakka, Aboriginals and some new south Asian wives. Then of course we have the gender and sexual difference in man, woman, straight and homosexuals. I don’t even want to get into the differences in our religions. Well, my point is, despite all the differences, I believe we can all live in peace. And I believe we can learn to respect and be considerate to our differences. Do you know why I become this way? Well, I have been a minority for my entire life. Don’t worried, I am not going to come out of the closet and tell you I am a gay. You see, I lived in Japan as a little Taiwanese boy, because my father is a Taiwanese. Then I went to the America and studied as an Asian student. Now I am back in Taiwan and I am Lisa’s Japanese husband. Right, I have always been a minority. Luckily, wherever I went, everybody treated me nicely. Anyway, discrimination is not my issue here; the importance of diversity is my issue. In college I enjoyed a great deal of diversity. I had a great womanizing roommate from Honduras, a really lazy roommate with a big heart from Japan and a hard working, gentleman from Ethiopia. I have dated girls from America, China, Russia, Japan, Taiwan and Burma. I was like a kid in a candy store. There are so many new and exciting things to learn from these people everyday. I’ve never had a boring day in my life.

This is why I like to come to the Toastmasters. Although most of you are Taiwanese, but you still form a great diverse group. I love to continue to come here and hear your crazy ideas and opinions. And I hope we can be open to talk about politics, religion and sex too. I don’t think I will feel offended in any topic.

Now, woman in this room must be getting jealous of Lisa, why only she gets to have such a wonderful husband. Well I tell you, I am not that perfect. In fact I am quite a male chauvinist. How can I be a liberal guy and a chauvinist? It’s very contradicting. Well, logically I am a liberal minded man, but biologically I am a male chauvinist. Logically, I know women are just as capable as man or even better and woman reserve equal right. But, I cannot stand losing to a woman. I also don’t like to listen to women. When I was living with my American host family, my American mother once slapped me across the face so hard because she was very frustrated that I only listen to my American father. At home, I have never helped Lisa with housework and I think educating the kids is her job. All I do at home is drinking beer, watch sports channel on TV and download porn movie with my computer. Well Lisa let me get away with all these because she admit that she didn’t see this side of me when we got married. Well the truth is, Lisa knows I have a good heart, and I really love her and admire her.

Finally, everybody, I might not be very discreet when I talk. Sometime you maybe offended by me. But remember, I never have bad intentions. So, let’s laugh and joke together for years to come.

Photo Album of 2007 Toastmasters International D67. Fall convention

Photo Album of 2007 Toastmasters International D67.

Fall convention