The penultimate meeting of the Fermoy Toastmasters Club as we approach the summer break was marked by no sense of winding-down but instead an effervescent atmosphere and large enthusiastic attendance that ensures a most memorable and entertaining evening. The bay windows of the River Room of the Grand Hotel were filled with the ever lengthening brightness of this time of the year and the air carried the sweetness of early summer.
Our dear President Mary Whelan extended a most cordial and gracious welcome to all and drew the members’ attention to the Certificate of Honour the club has received from World Headquarters celebrating the forty-fifth anniversary of its establishment way back in 1970. The early founders and pioneers of those times would be ever so pleased and delighted to see the club they then inaugurated so strongly flourishing and a centre of gaiety, recreation and personal growth all these years later. It is a very great and living achievement that continues to give so much inspiration, pleasure and enrichment of life.
Our Toastmaster was Kieran Connolly who guided proceedings along in a very focussed and effective way with geniality and charm, introducing the speakers and leading seamlessly from each phase of the meeting to the next, fostering a relaxed and pleasantly warm feeling that ensured the best from all present. There were two hugely entertaining topics sessions, before and after the tea break, with our topicsmaster David Walsh serving up in a relaxed, affable and humorous manner a selection of themes and ideas that were later described by General Evaluator Fanahan Colbert as ‘sensational’. So many and so spirited were the contributions that it was possible to reach just five topics altogether that spoke volumes for the level of active participation and the degree of enthusiasm shown by all.
gladly smiling!
One of our newest members Claire Guy was asked to describe the most beautiful scenic view she had ever seen and she responded by painting a vivid and wonderful word picture of a spectacular deep river gorge in central India that she had visited some years ago. The very welcome visiting President of Mallow Toastmasters, Liam Flynn, followed on with a lovely evocation of the Yosemite Valley in California that he visited last year. Nothing so gives a sense of the sublime than to behold at first hand the greatest wonders of the natural world or to share the experience with others who can thus travel there in the firing of the imagination. Claire won the ribbon for Best Topic for her evocation of her journey to the exotic glories of the sub-Continent.
One of the very special delights of our meetings is the midway tea and coffee break when members and visitors can relax and enjoy the pleasures of genial conversation and warm human interaction. It is always so great to hear the room filled with the buzz of conversation punctuated by bursts of hearty laughter. In fact the sound of people enjoying themselves – just simply enjoying themselves and having fun, in relaxed mood and sharing good cheer in each other’s company – is one of the most beautiful in all the world. Our celebration was greatly enhanced by another of our very special and most welcome visitors from Mallow in the person of Helsa Giles who with such remarkable and extraordinary generosity brought to us a lovely surprise with a delicious chocolate cake that she had baked herself only earlier that day. As these rich and lovely slices were handed round, we all shared the delights of a sweet tooth and in the great kindness of Helsa who has become a very dear and cherished friend of all of us here in Fermoy Toastmasters.
Four truly varied and memorable speeches were the centrepiece of a truly great and very successful meeting. Eddie O’Sullivan brought us on a historical tour of the village of Ballyhooley, an English transliteration of the Irish meaning literally The Ford Of The Apples. This served as the title of Eddie’s compelling and very well-researched speech, especially interesting on the enlightened outlook of the local landlord, Lord Listowel, who took care of his tenants during the terrible Famine years by planting seed potatoes on virgin soil as well as detailing the eccentricity of Lady Listowel who not being able to see the trains from her principal country residence when they first came to Ballyhooley in 1860, had a three storey house specially built so she could admire these hissing steam monsters roar down the Blackwater valley. All of that is now long gone but was brought vividly back to life again through Eddie’s mild and pleasant storytelling style.
Frank O’Driscoll presented a fascinating talk on the history and development of the British NHS from its genesis in the Beveridge Report during the darkest days of the Second World War and its post-war promotion by the tireless efforts of the Labour politician Nye Bevan, creating a comprehensive health service to all free of charge, becoming such a deservedly popular institution indeed that not even the Conservative Party and other vested interests in the medical profession could subsequently uproot it. Frank contrasted this with Ireland’s familiar two-tier health system with its chronically overcrowded and crisis-ridden public sector driving many people into the arms of hugely expensive private health insurance providers. It was a very thought-provoking and incisive analysis from Frank, with a powerful conclusion on how a great opportunity of much needed reform was missed during the financial crisis.
From there we had a very fine speech from Kevin Walsh with a reflection on the problem of suffering in the world with a particular emphasis on a remarkable series of events that occurred shortly before the death of his mother, Margaret Anne in 2003. Finally, we had a riveting presentation from Liam O’Flynn, Mallow, indeed a very brave speech telling of his personal battle against depression some years ago and how he emerged from a very dark place after joining Toastmasters where he received the encouragement and support needed to make a far better, healthy and rewarding life. It was a speech that carried a most inspirational message of inner healing and renewal, pointing the way to renewed confidence and the joy of hope.
Evaluation is essential for speakers in the development of communications’ skills, to honour achievement and to offer encouragement and positive suggestion of further improvement building personal growth and helping each other to make our inner light shine out into the world, a task so well done on the night by Helsa Giles, Johanna Hegarty, Mairead Barry and Kevin Walsh with a very fine General Evaluation from Fanahan Colbert.
May 5th 2015. Mary Whelan proudly wears the Chain of Office and sits among a section of the members she has led with such distinction, charm and grace during an outstandingly successful Presidential year.
On Tuesday evening next, May 19th, at 8.15 pm, we look ahead to our Annual General Meeting in which there will be no set speeches but all members will take part in the topics session. Afterwards there will be a discussion of club business and then the election of the Officers’ Committee to plan and guide the club’s future for another year. All are welcome to a celebration of a very happy and cheerful time for Fermoy Toastmasters. For further information, please contact Fanahan Colbert at 086 8239007 or Kevin Walsh at 058 60100 or log on to toastmastersfermoy.com.