Speech by Tim Taylor

Speech Type: Best man
Speech Creator: Tim Taylor
Speech Date: Jun2007
Introduction

Hi, sorry to take you away further from your eating and drinking but we just want to see a few words…don't worry this is the last speech…

My name is Tim and this is Paul, it gives us great pleasure as the bestmen to say a few words about the Groom, Mr Shailesh Mistry.

As you can see there are 2 of us performing this duty as best man for Shai, don't worry you're not seeing double just yet…These days it is quite common to see a Groom with 2 best men. The usual reason for this is that the Groom looks around at his friends, sighs, and realises that he'll have to settle for 2 f-a-i-r-l-y good men than actually being able to have a “best” man….Again, sadly this was the case.

Firstly would like say how radiant Lisa looks today.

Also we would like to echo Shai's words and say how lovely Nikki looks today and what a great job she has done helping Lisa.. On behalf of Nikki, I would like to thank Shai and Lisa's Dad's John for their kind words.

When i found out i was going to be the best man along side Paul for Shai and Lisa's wedding day, i considered the history of our friendship and based on the fact we met at University and respecting that history i wanted to write this speech in a style true to this.

Subequently i set out with the best intention of completing my part of the speech weeks in advance of the wedding date. I went straight on to my laptop, connected to the internet for inspiration…… got sidetracked, checked my email AND found out some trivia on the life of ants. I then watched a DVD, decided to go to the pub to watch the football. THEN on to a nightclub with my friends returning early the next morning.

This pattern of behaviour re-occured for the next 3 months right upto todays deadline.

I finally completed my part of the speech with the help of food delivery services,many cups of coffee and the loss of a nights sleep. So apologies for my tired looking eyes.

When i met Shai

I met Shai on my first day of university nearly 10 years ago. I wandered into the introductionary lecture for our course and sat down next to Shai. It wasn't long before everyone was chatting about where we were from and our background and the like.

To be honest, at first I struggled to understand Shai's brummie accent as my only other encounter with people from the Midlands was a vague memory of seeing Crossroads when i was very young but once i got could understand what he was saying i could tell he was a friendly and genuine guy. How long it took Shai to undstand my Mancunian accent is another question and i sometimes feel he still struggles.

When the first lecture had finished Shai suggested that we all go and get some food. This was my first ecounter of Shai's fantastic organisation skills. My second ecounter was when Shai opened his bulging wallet to suggest where to go. Don't get me wrong this wasn't Shai offering to buy everyone lunch as his wallet was stuffed with vouchers and sadly not money. Shai already had all the fast food coupons cut out of student pages and was reading them out for suggestions of where we could go.

Now students love discounted fast food or ANY food that they don't have to cook themselves. This is only equalled by their love of alcohol and when i mentioned to Shai that i knew where the students union bar was Shai's eyes lit up and i think the foundations of friendship can be traced to that day.

When Paul Met Shai

I first met Shai, along with Tim, in the first week of our university course. As Tim mentined, it took a little while for us all to get used to all our different accents, but it was the universal language of alcohol that brought us all together. Although being in the same class was how I came to meet Shai, it was our shared attitude to work, or more importantly our shared attitude to avoiding work that became the basis of our friendship. Over the years we perfected our techniques of sneaking off to play pool all day and those days became some of my happiest memories of my university days.

Stories about Shai

In our final year of university Shai Tim and I lived together in a house on Sheffield's Pomona Street. The house was ideally positioned within minutes of 3 pubs, was equiped with a state of the art alarm system, made up of 100”s of toy soldiers that Shai recruited from the pound shop, and was equiped with great tools for procrastonation. It had a big TV, a stereo, a DVD player and Shai's favourite toy the Playstation 2. Here Shai showed off his passion and skill for driving games! Many-a-day Tim and I would leave for a lecture while Shai would get prepared for a hard day of endurance racing, returning hours later Shai would still be driving, and although trying to convince us he hadn't been sitting there all day the tell tale indentation in the sofa would always give him away. Despite all this Shai managed to pass his degree and get a job.

&ltask Shai to stand up, put his hands in the air and sway!.&gt

One of my favorite memoirs of Shai was on his 23rd Birthday, many drinks had been drunk throughout the night and we had ended up at the nightclub as per usual of a night out. I remember I was with our good friend Barry at the time, somewhere on the dance floor when suddenly I see him laughing his head off and pointing at something… I turn around to see Shai, live on stage, dancing his heart out. It took a few seconds for us to work out what he was doing up there, but eventually it became apparent that Shai was taking part in a dancing competition that was taking place on the stage ! Now while his main competitor was going for the break dancing approach, Shai adopted a kind of side to side motion as demonstrated by Shai here

Now what Shai lacked in dancing ability he certainly made up for in personality, with his simple side to side motion and some gentle mochary of his rather more adept opponent, Shai managed to not only win the crowd over but also win the dancing competition outright! His prize… A bottle of Champagne, but walking away with his winnings, it was clear to everyone, including the nearby bouncer… that that the majority of that bottle wasn't going to make it inside anyone… Shaking that bottle for all his life, the bouncer gently warned him… you spray that … and your out! Shai complied… until the bouncers back was turned and pretty much ignored what was told to him 2 seconds ago..… That stuff was spraying everywhere… All over us… all over anyone around and yes… all over said bouncer! Needless to say the night came to an abrupt end, but Shai managed to hold onto his winnings and we all shared the remains of the prize outside in the cold. It was worth it though, an awesome, memorable night was had by all and the night ended with a story to piece together next day during our hangovers!

Shai Meeting Lisa

As I mentioned before I first met Shai in the first few days of University, however I only really knew Shai as a single entity for a short while. It was November 5th 1997 when Shai met Lisa… The night obviously went with a bang! I remember Shai coming into university the next day, the night in question had been a night at the Pulse &amp Vogue nightclub… With a big grin, he proceeded to tell us all about the wonderful time he had had, and all about this girl that he had met, he remembered, the dancing and the talking, he remembered that she was from Essex, and that she had blonde hair.. He also remembered her name was Selena..The next few days, Shai mentioned Selena quite a few times, it wasn't until Shai saw this girl again that he eventually found out her name was Lisa… The rest as they say is history…

Meeting Lisa…

Although I heard a lot, from Shai, about Lisa it was actually quite a while into their relationship when I first met her. But she certainly lived up to the build up that Shai had given her and I could see straight away that there was a chemistry between them. Over the years it became clear that they certainly had a close bond and it's no surprise to be here today on their wedding day.

Advice

On your wedding day as best men we feel we should offer some advice to the bride and groom

To Lisa Men are like a fine wine, they start out as grapes and have to be walked all over at first, then if you wait a while and eventually you'll have something decent to have you dinner with.

To Shai,

Now you're married, in every conversation you have with Lisa you will always get to have the final word. Lisa will say something and you'll then be able to reply with the words “YES LISA”

Summary

So just to summarize Shai is organised, can't remember girls names after a drink and when he is given a free drink he throws it everywhere, his dancing technique is questionable and is lucky to have a degree with all the time he spent playing playstation 2 driving games.

On the other hand though I must add that Shai is a guenuine, kind and all round lovely guy who always has time for everyone in his life. In Lisa he has found the love of his life and it is obvious to anyone that meets them how much in love they are and that they compliment each other well. On behalf of Paul and myself we wish you health, luck and happiness.

Paul and I have been an honoured to be your bestmen and all that is left now to do is to toast the Bride and Groom. So we would like everyone to charge their glasses and raise a toast to Shailesh and Liza raise glass as you do this. ….TO Shailesh and Liza