Toastmasters international convention

While in Las Vegas for two work-related conferences, I was able to go to part of the Toastmasters International annual convention at Bally’s casino.

I got to hear some of the keynote address and pick up a free copy of the speaker’s book; watch some of the semi-finals of the World Championship of Public Speaking (with the winners of the district International speech contests); and participate in the Business meeting.

It was exciting to watch Toastmasters from all over the world give great speeches, although I found some of the speeches to be a little lacking in substance and some speeches to be over the top in terms of volume and body movement. (More speakers than I would have expected also told stories, skipping the standard three-point speeches that I’m more used to.) The winner of the semifinals session I saw most of was a Maori man from New Zealand. I ordered a DVD of this session, and I’ll hope to show at an upcoming Peace Speakers meeting speeches given by two women who covered similar themes and were both quite good.

Probably the most memorable aspect of my Toastmasters convention experience was meeting other individual Toastmasters, including:
- A group of Toastmasters from Australia, with whom I had dinner. Several of these were women from southeastern Australia who were on a five-week round-the-world trip for which Las Vegas and the convention were just one stop. These folks were really fun.
- A long-time Toastmaster and fellow Floridian who is chairing the planning committee for next year’s international convention, in Orlando. The international convention in two years will be very near us, in Cincinnati.
- A new Toastmaster from a club in southern California that is a wine-tasting club, with wine-tasting as part of their meetings.

I also saw half a dozen Toastmasters from our own District 11, and chatted with Walter Wolfe, the New Albany (IN) Toastmaster who is district governor, who said he’d be in touch with us about visiting a Peace Speakers meeting. And I saw a convention facility peppered with lots of examples of the new Toastmasters International logo and the new website.

-- Perry