Toastmasters Hsinchu: from ashes to phoenix part I

When I arrive in Taiwan back in 1999, the first thing I did was to check whether there is Toastmaster club in Hsinchu. To my delight, there was a club in the Science Park. The club was lead by Mr. Chang, an engineer from Windbond. The club had about 24 members; mostly engineers from the Science Park.

As I became more and more familiar with the club I realized that Hsinchu members, with the exception of the president, have never participated in any Area, Division, or District events. The Distinguished Club program was largely ignored. One of the members quoted: "We are happy as we are, we couldn't be bothered with other clubs in our Area, let along the Division or the District". As far as the District was concerned Hsinchu club was just a name; a number in the District roster.

As President Chang’s term came to an end, I was asked to assume the role of president for the term from July 2000 to June 2001, largely because of my experience as the past president of Sensational Salesman club in Tustin, CA. On the day of my inauguration, 11 members decided to quit. I was left without a complete officer team and dwindling attendance. Looking in retrospect, my term of presidency coincided with the biggest Hi-tech down turn and our members (largely engineers) simply were not in the position or the mood to participate in the Toastmasters activities.

Lack of memberships meant no revenue for the club. Fortunately, we were able to get the venue for free at First Conference Room in the Science Park Administration building. The venue was in a really bad shape. Chairs were stained and hinges needed repair. Sound system did not work, and worst of all, the entire room were filled with mosquitoes and other critters I care not to mention.

For a while an attendance of 10 was considered good, 7 was the norm. Guest of 1 or 2 every other meeting was a blessing. The major complaints I had from our guests were bad traffic and the notorious Science Park Street signs; they simply do not have street number on the buildings.

To make matter worse, VP of education got relocated to Linkou and had to quit. VP of membership got laid off, he had to quit. Sergeant at Arm, well his story was a positive one, he got promoted to the deputy Director of the Science Park, he had to quit also. Suddenly I found myself taking the responsibility of all the officers. I was all alone and the job of the president turned into a nightmare.

The worst finally came, our memberships got so low that it had fallen below the minimum required by the Headquarters. The provisional District 67 wanted to send a “specialist” to fix the Hsinchu club (which I flat out refused). It looked like the club was on its way to an inevitable death and I was to go down in history as the president who killed it.