On June 3rd, Gurgaon Orators Toastmasters club
celebrated its 75th meeting. Considering GOT, it had to be grand.
After attending exhilarating sessions at Oration, Chandigarh; expectations were
high for the 75th meet.
The meeting was kicked off by the ebullient Sergeant at Arms
TM Aparna Gopakumar who set the tone
high. This was followed by an inaugural dance performance by Deepak who is a former Dance India Dance
(DID) contestant. Deepak took over the
stage and delivered a rocking performance on many latest numbers. He glided
smoothly with the move and swooned to audience to get a thunderous applause.
Next, President TM Ankur
Yadav delivered his Presidential address loaded with emotions. He
acknowledged the hard work put up by club members and shared his personal story
of how Toastmasters helped him get over difficult times. His speech was
peppered with dosages of humor and earnestness.
Then came in the CGD elect DTM Jennifer Ghosh. With her vivacious smile and her and unending
energy, she inspired the audience. Now, it was the club found President TM Megha Gupta who took over next and
shared how much impact Toastmasters has had on her life. Her speech brought
alive the memories of the initial days when the club had just started. Up next,
it was immediate past President TM Anurag
Chauhan. Anurag also spoke about his journey as the club President and how
much GOT as a club means to him. Then it was the DD elect DTM Pallav Verma who enthralled the crowds
with his inspiring vision for District 41. Finally, Table Topics contest
champion 2017 DTM Ayan Pal swept the
audience with his thoughts on progress.
After a huge round of speeches, it was time to have fun. TM BhaweshUpadhyayand TM Bhavya Bansal revved up the energy with
a group activity ‘AD-MADS’. The entire audience was divided into 6 teams and
each team was given a unique product. The task given to each team was to
perform a 3-minute-long skit to sell the product. Sounds simple, isn’t it. But
there is a catch. Each team was given 5 minutes to prepare the skit and present
it. Also, since it’s a Toastmasters “contest”, there were anonymous judges. The
acts were nothing short of hilarious and the audience was left in splits and
was highly energized.
Now came the time, everyone was eagerly waiting for. A
poetry session with SahityaAkademi award winning poet NilotpalMrinal. Nilotpal’s poetry had an earthy touch to it. Adding
to the fact that he is a Hindi poet, he charmed the audience with his electric
presence and grounding authority on the subject. Yet, his simplicity and
sparkle in the eyes wowed the audience that they kept asking him for more.
Dressed in a simple white shirt and dark jeans with a small stole around his
neck, his poems were rooted in times before the storm of technology took over.
Simple yet profound, his words and his message of sticking to ones’ roots is
going to stay on, for a long time.
Finally, TM Naresh
Kantoorshared his experiences and feelings and reminisced his Toastmasters
journey and quoted lovey couplets from Nilotpal’s poems. A toastmasters meeting
is incomplete without Presidents closing address. The President recognized the
contributions of members who took efforts to ensure the event went successfully
and handed out awards. A 75th meeting is nothing short of a
birthday. The audience joined GOT in cutting a massive delicious butter-scotch
cake which was followed by servings of hearty sandwiches, crispy pakoras and
soft drinks.
All in all, it was a grand scintillating event with lots of
fun, frolic and learning. GOTs innovative special meetings are something that
we all look forward to.
