“Find a hobby or join a group so you can make friends.” That’s one of the most common pieces of advice people give when you’re wondering how to meet new people, and I decided to take it.
I had just moved to Fukuoka after my job hunt as a post-graduate and a friend introduced me to the local Toastmasters Club. I joined in 2020 and remained a member until 2022. Although I knew almost nothing about the organization, I saw it as an opportunity to expand my social circle.
I had no idea that what began as a simple search for friendship would introduce me to such a unique community, one where people of different ages, backgrounds, and nationalities could connect beyond Japan’s usual social boundaries.
- What is Toastmasters, and why is it popular in Japan?
- How does Toastmasters work?
- What was Fukuoka’s Toastmaster Club like?
- Two years of Toastmasters
What is Toastmasters, and why is it popular in Japan?
Toastmasters is an international nonprofit organization that helps people develop their public speaking, communication, and leadership skills. It was founded at a YMCA in California in 1924 before gradually expanding around the world.
What surprised me was Toastmasters’ history in Japan.
The first clubs in Japan were established in both Tokyo and Fukuoka after World War II. Initially, membership was limited to U.S. military personnel stationed on American bases. But over time, the organization expanded beyond the military community. It originally started as a men-only organization, with women not being admitted until 1973.
Living in Fukuoka, I found it fascinating that the organization’s roots were closely tied to both the city and the postwar U.S. military presence. Because I grew up on U.S. military bases across Japan, discovering this connection made me feel more comfortable joining.
How does Toastmasters work?
Fukuoka Toastmasters Club followed the standard Toastmasters format: we met every two weeks at the AIREF Building in Fukuoka; each meeting had a theme, and every member was assigned a specific role. Members took turns giving prepared speeches, answering questions on the spot, and evaluating one another’s presentations. The roles rotated at every meeting, giving everyone the opportunity to speak, provide feedback, and help run the club.
Meeting structure
1. Opening
The Toastmaster welcomes everyone, introduces the theme of the meeting, and explains the schedule.
2. Table Topics
Members are asked surprise questions and given one to two minutes to respond. This helps them practice speaking confidently without preparation.
3. Prepared Speeches
Usually, one to three members deliver speeches that they have prepared in advance.
4. Evaluations
After the speeches, other members provide feedback. They explain what each speaker did well and what they could improve in future presentations.
Meeting Roles
Each member is assigned a role that helps the meeting run smoothly.
- The Toastmaster leads the meeting and introduces each section.
- The Timer keeps track of how long each person speaks.
- The Grammarian listens for effective language use and grammatical mistakes.
- The Evaluator gives feedback on a prepared speech.
- The Table Topics Master prepares and asks the surprise questions.
The roles change at each meeting, so everyone has the chance to speak, lead, evaluate, and support other members.
What was Fukuoka’s Toastmaster Club like?
Although Toastmasters clubs generally follow the same meeting format, it is the members who give each club its own personality.
The Fukuoka Toastmasters Club had an unusual mix of members, including retired Japanese men, local Japanese professionals, JET ALTs, international students from Kyushu University, and people affiliated with the Sasebo Naval Base.
There were significant differences in age and life experience as well. The youngest member was around 22 years old, while the oldest was over 70.
Everyone had joined Toastmasters for a different reason. Some retired Japanese members were looking for a new challenge, while local professionals wanted more opportunities to practice English. ALTs wanted to become part of an international community outside of work, and university students were mainly interested in improving their public-speaking and presentation skills.
I joined around the time Covid started. Members could come to the meeting in person or join online through Zoom. Many of the club leaders were older and had never used Zoom before, but they still learned how to set everything up. I thought it was nice to see how much effort they made to keep the club going.
Differences in age and life experience
Because the members came from such different generations and backgrounds, their speech topics, interests, senses of humour, and ways of communicating varied widely. A university student in her early twenties and a retired man in his seventies naturally had very disparate ideas about what made an interesting or relatable speech.
Each meeting the members talked about such a range of topics that you never really knew what the day would be like. The subjects ranged from personal memories and practical advice to finances, politics, and international events.
I remember one member giving a speech about how he had spent 40 years working as a salaryman for a paper company, while another gave a presentation about his love of Japanese cuisine, specifically conveyor belt sushi. Other speeches I particularly recall were:
- “What Is Effective Body Language?”
- A talk about NISA, which the speaker argued was a political trick
- A presentation about the Beijing Olympics
Honestly, it was not one special speech that made me keep going back. I liked the feeling of the club itself.
At times, the differences between generations made it difficult for everyone to relate to one another. However, they also introduced me to lives and experiences that I would probably never have encountered within my normal social circle. The variety of stories and perspectives in the room was one of the main reasons I continued returning.
Differences in English levels
At first, it felt strange to have my English speeches evaluated by someone who was not a native English speaker, even though I did not believe that being a native speaker should be a requirement in an international setting like this. However, I still felt that a high level of English was important for giving clear and useful feedback.
Sometimes I struggled to understand the feedback I received, and at other times I questioned whether the evaluation would actually help me improve. This made me wonder whether there was a reason for me to continue attending the club. It was also difficult to give feedback to others, because, to be quite honest, there were times when I simply could not understand what they were talking about.
Eventually, the differences in English ability became a topic of discussion among the members. Speakers and evaluators began to be matched more carefully according to their levels, although this was done quietly to avoid offending anyone. I saw this as a very typical Japanese approach to preserving harmony.
Evaluations also started to focus less on grammar and vocabulary and more on elements such as confidence, pacing, humour, storytelling, and audience engagement. Sometimes, we also had the chance to give speeches in Japanese, which made the experience more inclusive and allowed members to express themselves more comfortably.
This helped a bit, but I still didn’t think it was best suited for what I wanted in terms of improving my own speech skills. However, I began to accept the club for what it was.
I particularly enjoyed listening to some of the older Japanese members. Their English sometimes sounded as though it had come directly from the 1970s. Their vocabulary was formal, old-fashioned, and unexpectedly posh, which gave their speeches a distinctive charm.
Breaking down the hierarchy
Toastmasters felt completely different from my nine-to-five job. At the time, I worked at a private Japanese all-girls high school, where age, seniority, and professional position shaped almost every interaction. As a young, newly-employed teacher, I was very careful about how I spoke to senior teachers and I would never have openly criticized someone above me; it would have felt deeply uncomfortable.
At Toastmasters, however, those relationships could be temporarily reversed. A university student might evaluate a retired professional. A non-native English speaker could tell a native speaker that they were speaking too quickly. Younger members could openly point out weaknesses in the speeches of people old enough to be their parents.
The evaluator had to be confident enough to criticize someone who might normally have greater authority, while the speaker had to accept advice from someone younger, less experienced, or less fluent. The rotating roles gave members permission to do this.
Still, the usual hierarchies did not disappear completely. I sometimes sensed that a speaker’s reaction depended on who was giving the feedback. For example, one member who was a doctor seemed to value feedback from native speakers regardless of their age, but appeared less receptive when the evaluator was Japanese. Even in a club designed to make everyone equal, status and personal preferences could still shape whose opinions were valued.
Toastmasters did not completely erase Japan’s traditional social hierarchy. Instead, it created a temporary space where people could step outside it. Compared with my workplace, where I constantly considered age and seniority before speaking, the freedom to openly evaluate one another felt unusual and sometimes uncomfortable, but it was also what made the club so interesting.
Life outside the club
At first, I mainly knew people through their assigned roles. Someone was the Toastmaster, an evaluator, or the person who had given a speech that evening. Through dinners, drinks, and other gatherings, we gradually began to know one another beyond those roles.
One retired member in his seventies enjoyed farming and invited everyone to help dig potatoes during the harvest season. It was a simple activity, but it was also the kind of experience I would probably never have had with my usual group of friends.
They also put a lot of effort into holidays. For Halloween, some members would come dressed in costumes. Every year, the club also held a Christmas party at a small local restaurant. The restaurant usually had a buffet and an all-you-can-drink plan for a reasonable price. We played games like White Elephant, and there was dancing and singing too. These events made the club feel more like a real community and not just a place to practice speeches.
These gatherings did not mean that everyone suddenly became close, but they made the differences between us easier to understand. Outside the timed speeches and formal evaluations, we were able to interact more casually and see one another as people rather than simply as club members.
Two years of Toastmasters
There were plenty of meetings I did not enjoy. Sometimes I could barely understand the feedback I received. Other times, I understood it perfectly but did not find it useful. Not every speech was interesting, and not every evaluation made me a better speaker.
Despite this, I continued attending for two years.
I expected Toastmasters to be another activity on my calendar. Instead, it gave me access to a small social world that I could not have found through my job or everyday life in Japan. In the end, I may not have stayed because I loved every speech—I stayed because I became curious about the people giving them.