Ranjith Venkatesh | Speaker Shine

Two left feet I was born a great dancer. Let me show you some sexy steps. Contest chair, fellow toastmasters and guests! I firmly believed I was a great dancer. Don’t you think so? In the last year of university, we had one chance to dance with women. The dance that we had to do was a step to the left and step to the right. Sounds easy, doesn’t it! This is how, it looked on me. Step to the left and step to the right. Step to the left and step to the right. Step to the left and step to the right. Every time I took a step to the left, my right went along. The dance club members made fun of me and said - No, you cannot dance. You have two left feet. They even called my dance moves “the duck walk”. Until then I thought I could even do the moon walk. Thank you. Has anyone told you that you can’t dance, that you can’t do something that you love? After un...

My name is Ranjith. I come from India and of course I do IT support . How many doing IT support here? Okay, How many software consultants here? (Pick one and ask what they do. Do you have neck pain?) I had neck pain last year. So, I went to my house doctor. How many of you have heard of the term “house doctor”? In Germany, your family doctor is called the house doctor. The first time I heard it, I thought the house doctor is the one who treats you at home . When I called my house doctor and asked him when he could visit me at home, he said that would not be possible. I made an appointment with him for my neck pain. He checked my neck and said, you are Indian – Do Yoga . I said, I am Indian – that is why I do not do yoga . Yoga is what we export to countries like Germany . I tried Yoga in Munich once for 90 minutes. They did Yoga for 90 minutes. No talk, no messing about, just plain Yoga and I was half-dead by the end of it. In India, i...

Let me tell you a story which takes me back to the year 2000, 17 years ago. I was living in India. I come from Tamilnadu in the South of India. My university was in Rajasthan in the north-west of India. My university was in a small city called Pilani. Friends from bigger cities in India felt trapped in this small city with 40000 people. The closest civilization was Delhi the capital of India around 6 hours by bus. A group of five friends from the South of India decided to go on trip. A trip to Simla in the north of India with snow. I had never seen snow in my life and this would be a wonderful opportunity to do so. We found a jeep and driver who would take us to Simla. He was bit of a crazy driver. But sometimes you have to be crazy to drive the roads of India. We came to the mountains and the way he was accelerating and swishing left and right felt dangerous. I was not sure if my driver has a license and if he had ever driven on mountains. The weather was chilly. We had all th...