Translators' Toastmasters and Linguists Meetup

Learn a language, translate a speech, understand a foreign language - do any of these interest you/ Have they been a challenge in the past?

I have attended these Toastmasters clubs meetings:

Problems
1 An all-Mandarin club in Singapore
I could not understand a word, nobody could translate, and I had trouble finding the toilet. (Plus problems finding a public telephone, ordering a taxi home, and telling the taxi where to find me.)

2 A bilingual club in Singapore
A speech entirely in Mandarin. How could I vote for the best speaker, when two species were in Mandarin and two in English.

Successes
As 'secretary' cum translator into English in the typing room, surrounded by men who all jumped to their feet when I entered, at a conference at a hotel in India. I had to correct the English handout which translated a speech from French into English, for a Belgian lady.

I spent about three hours trying to understand the handwritten three page original. First it was in French, with lots of technical terms. Secondly, it had various crossings out and insertions and arrows for reversed paragraphs.

I spent some time trying to type it up. Then with the writer, another hour or so asking her about each sentence. She tried to explain, looked words up in a dictionary, then revised what she had originally said to make it clearer or because she had second thoughts. We needed up with at least six pieces of paper marked version one and version two.

Then I spent another two hours typing the translation with the correct punctuation in French. Finally another hour or more on the English translation.

Angela Lansbury, B A Hons, CL, ATG, English teacher, speech writer and speech coach.

Bilingual Clubs and Translation

In Singapore I went to the Francophone club where the meeting was entirely in French. I once went to a Mandarin club where nobody spoke English, except for one girl who spoke half a dozen words. Simple questions such as 'where is the toilet?' were a major challenge, involving several people and phones and drawings.

In the bilingual clubs I have been to in Singapore, people spoke rapidly in one language, and no translation was given to those members of the audience who spoke another language.

I would like to see bilingual clubs with translators.

In real life you are often talking to an audience where some of the people do not speak English fluently. At conferences you may be speaking to audiences where the speaker and audience speak different languages, so you have to pause constantly to wait for the translator.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9FHU_WRc80

I speak English (British English), and French.

Angela Lansbury. 

How do you do the catering at your club or area event?

Clubs and events cater in three different ways:

1 A catering manager all year. HOD Speakers' Club in London did this for a while. So did Harrovians. In HOD the man who was president one year, SAA another year, organised all the food for club catering, and Club Officer Training events at the club. As a retired restaurant owner, he had a card for a wholesale catering outlet which could be used for big events. Milk was bought, and top up biscuits on a weekly basis as needed. This was for HOD club which provided sweet and savoury biscuits for evening meetings, sandwiches and or/ savouries such as dips for big inter club meetings which ran over lunch times (when visitors from afar had to leave home before lunch although we began after lunchtime for those who lived nearby.

2 A different caterer every week.

3 One person provides drinks, another favourite, another sweets or desserts.

4 Pot luck.
You might make a list and ask people to choose which item to bring. Or simply to say whether they will bring sweet or savoury to ensure you have a mixture.

Angela Lansbury ACG, CL>

Bukit Panjang Bilingual Club - Angela's Winning Evaluation on Language

The best thing about the ribbon is that Bukit Panjang Bilingual Club writes their club name and the date on the back of the ribbon in gold pen.

2/3/2016.

The club meets on the first and third Wednesday every month. That reminds me which club I visited, how long ago I visited the club, and the day it meets.

When you win your first ribbon you can remember which club and where.

By the time you have been in Toastmasters for ten years you have several ribbons and want to be reminded what you said to whom and when.

Why did I win? Was it just because I was a new face? Or an English speaker at a bilingual club where many speak Mandarin as their first language and English as a second language? That could have helped.

But it's worthwhile for me and others to remember the advice I gave.

I was evaluating a speaker who had reached the project on Vocal Variety. Word of the day was extol.

I said:

I must extol the speaker for her excellent vocal variety as well as wonderful gestures and research. Her speech, Water is Precious covered three aspects of her subject. We started with why we need water, then the impact of rivers in three different countries, finally what we can do to conserve water. She used great gestures to hold our attention and count off numbers.

Now let's consider how the subject fitted the manual project vocal variety. When you do a speech, you can approach it either of two ways. You can write a speech on a subject you like, then try to fulfil the objectives of the project, vocal variety.

Or you can pick a subject which enables you to practise vocal variety. I've completed this manual twice. The first time I contrasted different languages. You might contrast your language and another, such as Singlish and English. Or Indian English and English. (Or American English and British English).

The second time I used family conversation to contrast different ways  of speaking: a (loud deep-voiced) angry father; a scolding, tutting mother; a quiet pleading, shy child.

The speaker fulfilled the project objectives of correct speech. If you ever evaluate a speech you'll find three columns which you tick to say the speaker did well, average, or could improve. I ticked did well for all the categories, including sufficient volume and use of pauses.

I noted only two words which could be pronounced differently. One was the word tibetan. The speaker swallowed the middle syllable, pronouncing it as tibb(y)-tan. It's an extension of a word emphasising the second syllable ti BET.  So the word becomes ti-BET-an.

Angela Lansbury, B A Hons, CL, ACG, English teacher and author.

My Ribbon-Winning Impromptu Speech On Selling at Ifpas Toastmasters Club

I volunteered to speak in a table topics session. Table topics are impromptu speeches, sometimes from topics picked at random from cards face down on a table.

I love doing table topics. But they are meant for giving an opportunity to speak to members of the audience who are not performing planned speeches nor doing roles. I was the General Evaluator, granted a long slot at the end to evaluate the people not evaluated (the evaluators themselves). I hung back to allow others to have their moment on stage.

Then I saw that the impromptu speakers were rewarded with an orange. We eat fruit for breakfast and I wanted an orange. So I volunteered.

The topics were mostly related tot he evening's theme of Chinese New Year. We had begun the evening by being asked to say what we were doing to celebrate Chinese New Year.

People said: visiting relatives; giving 'hong bao' (red packets containing money given to unmarried relatives); receiving hong b a o and counting the money, haven reunion dinners with family, organising reunion dinners in restaurants.

My topic was: ' "You have to give a little to receive a lot." Do you agree? '

I said:

Yes, this is obviously true. Shops and manufactures are always offering buy one get one free and I fall for it every time. So does everybody, most customers are tempted by a free gift. I am a sucker for free gifts. I saw an advertisement for milk this week in Singapore. The ad said: buy two and get a free glass. I told my husband. He said, 'But we don't need two cartons of milk. And we don't need a free glass. It's an oddment. We have too much clutter already. I was so disappointed. I love free gifts. When I see a free Lego toy with a cereal packet, I want to buy the cereal packet. I don't have grandchildren, or children the age for Lego. I don't need it. But it's free and I want it.

The same happens when I go to buy a dress in Singapore, or China, or India. I buy a dress, pay and turn to leave the shop. The manager bows and smiles, and gives me a free scarf. You know what that means. I've paid too much. He says, 'Because you are a good customer.' He means I paid full price and didn't bargain hard enough. I'm now under an obligation. Anybody from Singapore or China knows what that means. He now wants to show me another dress, dearer, or cheaper, than the first one. He will of course give me another free scarf.

Yes, the salesman knows, you know, I know, you have to give a little to receive a lot.

Angela Lansbury, B A Hons, CL, ACG.

Clubs changing venues - Angela's Report as GE to IFPAS - a new venue

Ifpas is a financial advisers' group. Their website and Facebook page look good and the Toastmasters International website and District 80 Directory list them as meeting in building near Dhoby Ghaut and Rochor MRT train stations in Singapore. What could go wrong. Their Facebook page shows a smartly dressed group, in shirts and ties. What could go wrong?

However, because of developments in their original building, they have been floating about. I received a confirmation from the Sergeant At Arms confirming the time and day. However, on the day, I picked up the website information as it has links to find directions. Fortunately I emailed two people to ask them to confirm the nearest MRT, then discovered I was going to the wrong place!

I'd already wasted a lot of time checking directions to the first supposed venue, along with printing out directions. Then I had to search for directions it all over again.

A bus took me almost door to door. I was worried about finding the stop. But I had checked the bus stop number at the destination.

When I arrived at the meeting the SAA started by apologising and her charm completely disarmed my irritation. Instead I felt sorry for the poor club members, struggling with uncertainly and changing venues, no club banner, possibly losing potential visitors or members.  It shows you need clear directions on the day emailed to everybody likely to attend, drawing their attention to the new venue in the email, as well as directions correcting the Toastmasters International site.

For attending members, at Chinese New Year, and all occasions, it's essential to phone somebody in the club to ensure the meeting is actually taking place at the time and venue specified. The printed District 80 directory does not have any provision for changes. Perhaps Toastmasters International needs a page for directory or meeting venue updates.

What else do clubs need? Arriving at the building, the concierge in the skyscraper office blockers ground floor desk had no knowledge of our meeting, nor the company, nor individuals working in the building. I was quite relieved not to be asked for a passport nor photo ID. In house clubs are often in places where you cannot get past the desk without surrounding an identity card. Nobody wants to give their passport or NRIC or driving license to an unknown person on a desk.

(You can come back, staff have changed shift, and your ID is nowhere to be found. Come back tomorrow. Oh, yes, that's all I want - a night of anxiety, a two hour round trip tomorrow, and if it's lost, a huge fine from NRIC issuing authority because every time you lose your card or have it stolen the fine doubles.)

Anyway, we arrive in the venue. An indoor, windowless room. No light. No fire escape through a window - you can't even wave to say you are trapped or safe. Claustrophobic and oppressive.

In the UK in a communal building for area or division contests we have a welcome to Toastmasters sign inside the building entrance door, a sign with an arrow at any point where there's a choice of directions, and a welcome to Toastmasters sign on the door.

The club has no banner to display in photos, no mechanical lights, but the pastel coloured cards for the timer work well enough as he is sitting right in front of the 'stage'.

On the plus side, we enjoy a room small enough to feel cosy with our small numbers, yet an abundance of spare chairs if anybody else turns up. Also handy, a drinking water machine outside by the toilets. Another plus point is the toilets are nearby and on the same floor.

We are not short of speakers but have four, including one slide show presentation.
We also have both a screen to write on, and another screen for projecting slides.

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, speaker and author, CL, ACG.