A Tuesday in Futian
The room fills up a little before seven. The flags overhead have been there for years, and so has the banner: Shenzhen Toastmasters, Club No. 594537. Sixteen or so people on a normal week, more when word gets round.
Meeting #1029 →
RMB 5,700
A collection, taken at a meeting. The slide lists every donor by name: twenty members and five guests, plus Joanna's friend, Lilian's friend, Cherry's colleague, Frank Lee, and Share's mother. Afterwards the president handed out certificates. The club captioned the photo “Together!!”.
Around twenty-five people, one banner
Taken in the old room on the sixth floor of Xinghua Building, and posted with the line “Looking forward to our 436th Meeting”. Half the faces are laughing at whoever is holding the camera.
Meeting #436 →
Best speaker, best evaluator, best facilitator
Three awards at the end of every meeting, voted by everyone in the room. The ribbons are small. People keep them.
Meeting #1026 →
Happy to be a member
New members with their certificates, and the row behind them applauding. Everyone in that photograph joined the same way: turned up as a guest, came back, spoke twice, filled in a form.
The 434th meeting
The theme that evening was Balance and the word of the day was Prioritize: decide which are the most important and do them first. Nearly six hundred meetings later, the club is still running the same format.
Meeting #434 →
The part that is not on the agenda
Shenzhen Bay at sunset, on a Sunday in July. The club has a long-standing weakness for dinner; the word “eating” has come up in the group chat more than two thousand times.
Outings →
Distinguished guests
Somebody produced a selfie stick. The banner behind them is the same one that still comes out of the cupboard every Tuesday.