11 March

Speakeasy Toastmasters Mallow

Club International Speech Contest

The club’s speech contest was held last Thursday night, 4th March, with a large gathering of members and guests in attendance. The contest commenced with a speech delivered by Elizabeth O’ Brien entitled ‘Some mother’s son’ – the story of how a mother chose to carry out the final, desperate request of her young son who wanted to die rather than face a hopeless, helpless life. The second speech of the night came from Gerry Kelleher and described the wonderful ‘Kate Lynch’, a born storyteller, who was an inspiration to all who really knew her. In a speech called ‘The little engine that could’, Dierdre Linehan inspired us all with a very thought-provoking speech about the importance of encouragement and praise to the self esteem of children. On a somewhat similar theme, the next speech, ‘A sporting chance’, by Angela Sheehan, described the importance of physical activity and sports participation in preventing overweight and obesity in children while nurturing positive self-esteem and healthy social, moral and physical development. Brian McLoughlin surprised all present with a speech entitled ‘Just shopping’ which was not quite what was expected from the title. If you can imagine a tale about the mystique and mystery surrounding the ordinary act of shopping (by women), which transcends the ordinary and brings about a self-awareness and empowerment which might ordinarily be brought about only by meditation – or something like that! The audience was taken back to ‘The war years’ by Vivien Buckley who described life for a young woman in the preparation and training for active duty, and her time entertaining the troops. While it was a terrible time there were moments of humour, excitement and fun in amongst the terror and fear for self and family. The final speech of the contest came from Ray Ryan entitled ‘My best friend’, which was about a man describing another man whom he met in 1905, and with whom he shared a love of music. They moved to Vienna to study music and fine arts and shared some interesting times and many a discussion about music, architecture and politics. Finally, at the end of the speech Ray identified ‘his’ best friend - as Adolf Hitler!
First place in the speech contest went to Dierdre Linehan with Ray Ryan in second place. Congratulations to both and the very best of luck in the Area Final to be held in Charleville on 20th March.

As usual, guests are very welcome to attend our next meeting on 18th March, which will start at 8:00 pm. We ask everyone to be at The Hibernian Hotel (Chapel Lane) at 7:50 pm.