20050118 The Kota Kinabalu Toastmasters Club’s International Speech and Table Topics Contests

The VPE of the IEM Sabah Toastmasters Club, Azlina Abdul Jalil, CTM, attended the Kota Kinabalu Toastmasters Club’s International Speech and Table Topics Contests on 18 January 2005. She shared her observation (in italics) as follows:

First of all, a short recap of the KKTMC International Speech and Table Topics Contest which was held last night at Beverley Hotel. There were 7 contestants in the International Speech Contest and 9 in the Table Topics Contest. Kevin Lim is certainly on a roll this term! He emerged as the Club Champion again in the International Speech Contest with his speech entitled "Chicken and I." Congratulations to Kevin...told yah you were good! I think Kevin has managed to chase away that chicken by now..what with his 8 trophies won so far.

In the Table Topics Contest, the contestants were posed with a very complex question – “How Do You Keep Yourself Happy?” Do not be fooled by the seemingly simple and innocent exterior of this question, for sometimes, it is the simplest ones that are harder to answer! Not so for Stanley Joibi though! Stanley gave a superb answer about how to keep yourself happy you have to cultivate happy thoughts, which would lead to a happy mind and a happy body. Wonderful answer!

Congratulations again to all the winners from KKTMC:

International Speech Contest:
Champion: Kevin Lim - Chicken and I
1st Runner Up: Amran Aliamat - My Father, My Trophy
2nd Runner Up: Chong Tzu Jiun - Time and Tide

Table Topics Contest:
Champion: Stanley Joibi
1st Runner Up: Amran Aliamat - He has 11 trophies to date from speech contests!
2nd Runner Up: Jeremy Pinso

The contestants for the International Speech Contest were Chong Tzu Jiun (Time and Tide); Paul Mathew (Never Before); Florence Majanil-Liau (Lesson From A Black Dot); Amran Aliamat (My Father, My Trophy); Kevin Lim (Chicken and I); Jeremy Pinso (Waste, Pass, Spend) and Dora Dany (My Choice). The Contest Chair was Yee That Hian, ATM-S

The contestants for the Table Topics Contest were Solomon Chang, Chong Tzu Jiun, Lawrence Lee, Cecelia Matuya, Stanley Joibi, Jeremy Pinso, Kevin Lim, Ronald Tang and Amran Aliamat. The Contest Chair was Abu Bakar Sheriff, DTM

The Chief Judge was Ann Gilong, CTM and the Judges were...... sorry, we don’t know.

The Organising Chairperson of the very successful event was TM Shahar Banon. More than 100 people attended the contest, of whom more than 50% bought their tickets directly from TM Shahar Banon. Indeed, that's direct selling, the Toastmasters' way.

Congratulations to all!

Meanwhile, to give the readers a historical perspective to the contests, the following are the past champions of the KKTMC's International Speech and Table Topics Contests:

International Speech Contest – Past Champions

1994 – Brendan Wong
1995 – Francis Tham
1996 – Iskandar Ahmad
1997 – Francis Tham
1998 – Alex Kitingan
1999 – Richard A. Gontusan
2000 – Yee That Hian
2001 – Richard A. Gontusan
2002 – Richard A. Gontusan
2003 – Francis Tham
2004 – Jasmine Leong
2005 – Kevin Lim

Table Topics Contest – Past Champions

2000 – Yee That Hian
2001 – Richard A. Gontusan
2002 – No contest held by the District
2003 – Louis Tham
2004 – Louis Tham
2005 – Stanley Joibi

The big turnout at the event	Contestants calm and collected before going on stage	Left to Right, Contest Chairs Yee That Hian and Abu Bakar Sheriff, President John Liew, Chong Tzu Jiun, Kevin Lim, OC Shahar Banon, Stanley Joibi, Amran Aliamat, Jeremy Pinso and Division Governor Richard Gontusan	President John Liew presents a Certificate of Appreciation to the 5-star Organising Chairperson Shahar Banon