Just a week ago, I visited a Toastmasters club somewhere in the north-east of Singapore. The last time I visited the club (two years ago), it gave me a cold reception. No welcome, no handshakes, no cheery greetings by at least someone from the club. And the worst part was that I was invited as their Language Evaluator. How disturbing.
Fast forward two years later, I was invited back to their meeting. Remembering full well the cool reception I received, I cringed at the thought at sitting through another cold session. But I braced myself - hey, it was Christmas time and the best time to re-assess their warmth. Perhaps I was mistaken the last time. Perhaps I came at a time when everyone was miraculously depressed at the same time. Perhaps I was too shy to approach anyone at the meeting back then. Perhaps...oh, never mind!
So I cheerfully went about buying sparkling juice and a nice card for the meeting. Fortunately, Cold Storage still stocked on bottles of them (it was a few days nearing Christmas) and I grabbed 2 bottles for the Christmas cheers at the meeting. And to add oomph to my contribution, I rushed over to Popular to get a nice-looking paper bag to hold the sparkling juice. And a cute little Christmas card.
Unfortunately, I had to wait 30 minutes in the queuing line!
I arrived at the meeting just as it started...the Sergeant-at-Arms (SAA) was at the lectern leading the introductions session. No one even bothered to take so much a peek at me struggling with the heavy bottles of juice. The SAA merely gave me a leery eye and continued with the introductions without acknowledging my presence. I meekly tip-toed in and plonked down on a chair. The Introductions continued with the rest of the participants stating their name, their home clubs and their hopes for Christmas. No laughter detected.
It was further chilled with the SAA's authoritative and unsmiling attitude. Goodness! This is a meeting, not a courtroom hearing!
"
Yes, thank you. Next person please introduce yourself."
Thankfully, the Toastmaster-of-the-Evening (TME) who took over after the Introductions was rather humorous and saved the day with her jokes and enthusiastic poise. She went on to introduce the different speakers and evaluators plus the appointment holders.
As the meeting grated on - the speakers gave rather boring speeches - and I sat there in stony silence trying to enjoy myself, it all came to a grateful end. The last speaker finished his complicated speech on some metaphysical concepts...and the whole lot of us relaxed our burrowed eyebrows trying to understand his presentation.
Refreshments followed suit. I tried moving around to get to know the club members but the strange thing was that they seemed so absorbed in their own conversations. No one took the initiative to approach me - their exalted guest! - and start a conversation.
I almost felt as if I was some sort of invisible wallpaper. Or some sort of meeting filler to make the session look packed.
But the biggest irk of the evening was when the club officer requested everyone to pick up their Christmas presents after the meeting. I was hoping for a festive cheer - the reason for the 2 bottles of sparkling juice. Hey, not only was there no cheer or yam seng or anything like that, the 2 bottles were simply casually handed over to another club member for personal consumption.
"
Hey, we didn't have time to drink it. Take it. You can drink it at home."
And with that, the club officer nonchalantly handed over the bottles to the club member.
I was flabbergasted!
It made my queuing up at Cold Storage and Popular almost seem like a waste of time!
No wonder their meetings were such cold affairs and their membership keeps dropping. Clearly, the lack of gratitude for members'/guests' contributions was the main culprit.
As I slowly began my journey back home, I thought:
"
Visit them again?"
No way!
RSS Feed (xml)