BRATTLEBORO — A contest winner from BrattleMasters, the Toastmasters club in Brattleboro, may be headed for Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia in August if she wins the next round of competition in Portland, Maine.
Susan Cummings won the local club contest with her speech, “Men!,” which is based on material from her book, “Adventures of a One-Breasted Woman.” The same speech was a winner in the next two levels of competition in the area and division contests.
In Portland, Cummings will be competing against the winners in all the Toastmaster divisions in Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine and in Canada, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick.
The winner at the International Speech Contest in Portland receives free round-trip airline tickets to Kuala Lumpur for the final world competitions. That winner will be considered the best speaker in the world this year, according to Toastmasters.
Toastmasters International is a nonprofit organization incorporated in 1932. It is designed for people who want to improve their public speaking and leadership skills.
Previously, Cummings has worked as an environmental writer for the EPA, electric utilities and a consulting firm. She has also worked as an actress in New York City, she said recently in an interview before leaving for Portland. In the future, Cummings would like to perform a one-woman show about body image.
Cummings said giving a speech in front of people is very different from acting. “You are trying to connect with people in the audience,” she said.
To prepare for the contest in Maine, Cummings said, “I've been meditating, reading Buddhist material, doing breathing exercises and dancing around the house."
A second member of BrattleMasters, Kamana Adhikary, is also going to Portland, but she is not sure if she will compete. Adhikary took second place on April 26 in the Table Topics competition, which is a contest that requires little preparation. It is an exercise in extemporaneous speaking when contestants are asked a question out of the blue and have two to three minutes to answer.
In case the first place winner from the April division contest cannot make it to Portland, then Adhikary is ready to step in, which is allowed according to Toastmaster International rules. The winner of the Table Topics contest will not receive any free airline tickets. Only the winner of the International Speech contest has that perk.
At the April contest, Adhikary was asked a question about her plans for retirement. “I like the impromptu,” she said afterward. She works at Roads Scholar and is also on the board of the Brattleboro film Festival.
Regarding public speaking, Adhikary said, “I love it. I want to use it more in my job, maybe in human resources training or to inspire people."
Unlike many people, Adhikary says she is comfortable standing in front of people. At the local Toastmasters club, she has “learned how to give evaluations, be more positive and communicate with people."
In the future, “I'd like to be really good at prepared speaking,” Adhikary said. “I found a venue that brought out a talent and a love of mine that I didn't know I had and wasn't totally realized."
For more information, visit http://brattleboro.toastmastersclubs.org.