When you meet a person, you are actually being introduced to three different individuals. One is the person he is; one is the person how he wants people to know him and one is how we really sees himself.
Good evening fellow Toastmaster and guests.
I would like to give a brief introduction of myself, Surely, you will know more about me eventually. It’s not easy to talk in front of a lot of people. It’s always during those moments when you wish you could just disappear in a snap.
My name is Mayeth but please don’t think that I was born on May 8th. My parents have thought of my name so brilliantly. Being born on the month of May and having a mom named Juliet, they came up with such; but you can call me May for short.
Half of my life was spent here in the kingdom. I came here when I was thirteen. Now, I am in my thirties. I wonder if I will spend my sixties here, too. But I definitely do not wish that I will reach nineties in this place. I have a ten-year old son, a daughter born on a leap year and married to self-made man who I was only teaching how to use a floppy-disk before but has now become an IT specialist and earning more than I do. Anyway, that’s the genius part of it, I still get his earnings. I am a wife who eats a lot but doesn’t cook, a mother who confiscates iPad so I could get my turn to read, a bossy sister, a hard-headed daughter, an outspoken friend, a perfectionist colleague, and someone who was recently diagnosed manifesting early signs of OCD. Sounds like a dangerous person, but no, I’m compassionate and a bit reserved; that’s why I joined Toastmasters, for me to slacken off a little. I spent my high school days here in IPSR. I am proud to say I am one of the products of Toastmaster’s Youth Leadership Program in 1997.
I have always wanted to be a communications specialist but I didn’t want to do the talking. I would rather be writing than speaking. I would rather be behind than in front of the camera; working on the consoles, the cables. I was fascinated with being a back support. So I took a degree in electronics and communications engineering. But I didn’t take a licensure exam because at the time I finished college, I already got a license and a certificate – a marriage license and the birth certificate of my son. My first job was in a call center in the Philippines where I worked as a technical support representative for a year. Then, they took me in as a quality assurance specialist where I was introduced to the whole essence of communication skills.
But that didn’t last long as I had to come back to the kingdom. Just a month after giving birth to our daughter, I was offered a job in King Saud bin Abdulaziz University for Health Sciences of National Guard Health Affairs. I work as an administrative assistant for one of the Deans in the University. Working in such environment triggered my long overdue aspiration of pursuing graduate studies and so I did. Some fellow Toastmasters shared with me the adversities of getting a Master Degree in Development Communications which we just got last year from the University of the Philippines Open University. We grooved on deciphering ambiguous questions from reputable UP professors, we freaked out on deadlines, we delighted ourselves in meditating so we could participate in online discussions and arguments; the Internet became the courtyard of our minds. Good thing it was an online study, Google was very helpful.
Now that I have such degree but with the limited engagements we, expatriates, are expected to conduct here in the kingdom, I am finding ways on how to utilize my knowledge as a development communicator. I look forward to having a chance of giving back to the community, to be of service to others. I hope that I will gain more than just communication or leadership skills from this group. I am actually expecting myself to do a lot in this organization.
Fellow Toastmasters and Guests, I am also looking forward to getting to know you all of you.
