Every time we deliver a speech, that is an opportunity to improve ourselves, as we try something new, explore different ways of doing things, in order to uncover powerful techniques that you had never believed would work for you.  It is a chance to put the theoretical into practice, so we can verify first hand the advice given by experts or textbooks, or even the Toastmaster Manuals.   It is my hope that all of us at CHIC can embrace this mentality with every precious stage time given to us.

For me, delivering a Mandarin speech is quite special:  I could put myself in most of your shoes, because I’d be speaking in a second language.  I would be able to experience what you experienced, from the difficulty of speech writing, to rehearsal, and all the overwhelming emotions during the delivery.  I hoped that through this experience, I could verify how much of the speech technique is translatable across different languages and culture, and whether the language gap is an obstacle that is worthy of our worries.  We just had our Mandarin Humorous Speech contest this past Wednesday.  There were four techniques I wanted to test out:

There are the slides.

For the past month, we have experimented with 2 sessions specific to the CHIC Toastmasters Club.  These are: Making Fun of Myself, (Self-Deprecating Humour) and Humour Around Me.  The objective is to use two types of humour effectively in two minutes, as a practice to integrate it to a longer speech.

After one month, it is clear that a critical element that can be learned in these two minutes is how to frame a piece of humorous story around a point.  This revelation coincides with what I learned from Ed Tate at the Shanghai Conference in May 2010.  In his session, he mentioned the framework of story telling:  People, Please, Action and Resolution (the lesson or message).  I wrote a small piece about this earlier.  Delivering a humorous story can be much more effective if this is followed.  And the most important element is the ‘Resolution’:  What did you learn from the story.   The championship speakers have always repeated a mantra about the secret of making messages memorable in a speech:  “Tell a story, make a point.  Tell a story make a point.”   And it is no different with a humorous story.  The point doesn’t have to deeply philosophical, or fully inspiring, or specifically poignant.  It can also be humorous, light, and entertaining.   For the purpose of the two CHIC roles, it is important that the speaker identify the point of the story, and frame it accordingly, within a simple introduction and conclusion.

Last meeting, Lisa took on the role to tell 'Humor Around Her'.  This is the first time we implemented this role, and it proves a great opportunity to use this opportunity to analyze the humor: What can we do to improve it?  Below is her story:

I have a colleague who was somewhat overweight, that she has around her belly a bulging layer of fat, that has a shape of  a lifebelt/buoy(救生圈).

One time, we took an international flight for a business trip. When we arrived at the airport, the customs officer asked my friend, pointing to her bulging fat around her belly:  What do you have under your shirt?  My friend answered, ‘This is meat.”  “Meat is not allowed through customs.”  My friend replied: “This is MY meat. 肉”

We can all agree that the story as we picture it is quite an embarrassing and humorous situation.  First, there is a funny image of the fat around her belly.  Second, there is the fact that the officer had mistaken the bulge around her belly as smuggled goods.  The reaction from the audience is, “yeah…the bulging belly does look like she’s smuggling.”  Second, there is the double-meaning (double entendres) of ‘meat’ which refers to the smuggled meat, as well as the friends’ own ‘meat’. 

A further analysis of the story reveals some areas that can enhance the humor in the story.