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Toastmasters from across the island came together at Ahlia University for Kryptostar, a national level story-telling competition, which featured tales with a moral.
The fourth iteration of the competition, which started in 2014, attracted six experienced public speakers packing in head, heart, humour and heavy duty into individual five-to-seven minute speeches.
The Toastmasters community in Bahrain is a wide, yet close-knit one, where events like these give attendees a chance to reconnect with long-time friends and new members.
The speech contest, a brainchild of Krypton Advanced Toastmasters (KAT) conceived in 2012, is unique to Bahrain, unlike the International Speech Contest, Table Topics Contest, Evaluation Contest and Humorous Speech Contest, which are held under the prime directive of Toastmasters International.
Organisers typically pick a specific learning module or manual from the Toastmasters International educational programme. The previous Kryptostar competition featured speeches from the Entertaining Speaker manual, while this year’s contest committed speakers, who usually are advanced members of multiple clubs, to the Storytelling path.
Contest chairman Dr Khalid Amin said: “The first Kryptostar competition was the reason I became a member of KAT.”
KAT, part of the international not-for-profit Toastmasters organisation was found in 2010, initially as a club for experienced Toastmasters, those who had completed the Competent Communicator manual, but now it is open to all interested parties.
KryptoStar, open to Toastmasters in all clubs across the kingdom, was sprinkled with lessons about life’s tribulations, friendship and heartbreak and was judged by a group of peers lead by Ahmed Rizvi.
The winner was Ferhaz Farook, with his speech entitled Curse of Prabhakaran, followed in second place by Guraz Wankadia weaving a tale about Raj and Rony. Third place was snagged by Claire Cosgrave, who weaved a cautionary tale with her Don’t Lose Your Heart speech. Norman Dass, Thomas Thomas and Ratinder Nath also participated in the competition, entertaining the audience with anecdotes about endurance, conspiracies and perspective
Khalid also invited readers to check out Toastmasters clubs and KAT. He added: “KAT meets on the second Monday of every month at 7:30pm to learn and laugh together, while overcoming our fear of public speaking.”
