Yes, the long awaited post, lol.

I owe lots of people this post, and not that I'm going into details (maybe I am without realizing it), but just that this trip is worth going into much detail about, cos it's the most memorable so far, for reasons good and sigh, of course, the bad).

Day 1 - 11/04/2008

Reached school around 7.45. Came late on purpose as I was in no mood to go for the practice debates prepared by hers truly Miss Nav. Motions were advertisements bring more harm to the young and sportsmen should be awarded financial rewards when they win. Proposed the motion for the first one and opposed the second together with Jasmine. My time sort of improved to three minutes, which wasn't really that much of an improvement after all.

Set off at 11.10. Halfway through the journey it was then I realized I left my jacket in school at Anjung. So you can guessed my only apparel for the 6 day trip that can provide me warmth was my blazer that can survive winter conditions according to my brother, haha.

So, since the junior bus conductor was driving, it was already a whole full THREE hours and we just arrived at the Ayer Keroh R&R. But yeah, have to admit his driving's reeeaaally stable. And I saw Fatihah there. She was my classmate from last year and I only got to know that she moved somewhere else earlier this year. So, we exchanged contacts in a very awkward way, since it's been so long since we ever talked and I wasn't that close to her like the others in the first place.

Continued with our journey. Watched Disturbia and 27 Dresses courtesy of Sherylee on the way there.

Reached Selangor around 4pm. Took us some time to reach the campus itself. And by the time we finish up with the registration and stuff, it was already 6+ when we reach Al-Ameenah, the hostel which was new as I heard we're supposed to stay at. Room number's 3:3.

The view from the bus while waiting for the registration to be done:


Erm, I thought university students don't really cheat? Oh well, haha. I'm totally inexperienced about university life, so pardon my mistake if I'm wrong, which is most probably a yes to that question.

Next, some camwhoring outside the bus with the junior team:

Naomi looks good and Jasmine just looks ah-dorable here? Lol.


I love us so much X)

Naomi's favourite, but definitely not mine. Hehe.

Our dedicated bus drivers, staring at something called the...

...bulldozer at the construction site nearby. Interesting indeed.

On the way to the hostel, the junior team, consisting of Naomi, Jasmine, Gurpreet and me were moaning and gone all depressed as we just got the so-called good news we were also competing instead of just watching and gaining experience. Michelle said I was so pale at that time, but seriously, though I wasn't whining, I was halfway into freaking out, as I had never debated officially before, but only the reserve during the district level debate competition back in JB, as the scriptwriter and researcher who was the laziest among the rest. Ask Sherylee, she'll be whacking my poor head for productive ideas, haha.

So, we reached the dorm at last and started preparing for the opening ceremony. Took a few shots, but in my humble opinion this pic is the one where everyone looks nice, excluding me of course.

Tadah! Them looking sweet and sophisticated while I'm looking like a human that had never posed for pictures before. Embarassing sial. Haha.

Off we go to the CAC, where the ceremony was supposed to be held. I was starving at that time, so it's with the camera I go to distract me.



The current surroundings at that time.

Next, was this presentation which shamelessly stole the main plots from Star Wars. It's the theme for this year anyway. So, we watched a couple of people strutting their stuff trying to be the next Hans Solo and Darth Vader. The jokes were lame, but still, pretty funny. Haha.

Then, there was this really awesome slideshow which gave me this tingly feeling. The graphics and the sound effects were pretty cool. And when they introduced the schools that participated this year, of course, with the booming SIGS spirit, we cheered loudly when we saw 'SMK (P) Sultan Ibrahim' right there as one of the schools representing Johor. Heh.

Then, on and on with the super boring speeches and us going on with how hungry we were. Seriously, what could be far more worse then having the food right in front of you but you can't start gobbling down everything until the stupid VIPs finish off what they want to say about this prestigious event, yada yada yada.

And then, finally at around 9pm, or was it 10pm, the feast started a whole long last while there were some other performances to keep us entertained, but too bad, nobody was watching cos everybody was too busy chewing and munching. Hello, who wouldn't?

But, there was this one performance that this senior student from UIA sang and was well received by the female audience, lol. We'll see why.

Najwa's HAWT+CUTE+TALL+HAWT boyfriend. She wanted me to actually get his number and email! Of course, I didn't do it. Why should I let my darling husband flirt with other guys and thus abandoning me? Hahah, she's already like that so..We'll leave it at that X)

Rushed out when the dinner was over, walked back, or more like ran back, baju kurung and all, to the dorm, and had a prep talk with everyone led by Michelle. It was then decided that I, Jasmine and Naomi are in for the first round the next morning. Plopped on the mattress, and snored my way into SleepLand.

Day 2 - 12/04/2008

Woke up unwillingly, as I felt like I haven't even slept yet. Decided not to shower for the whole trip in the mornings as the water was ice cold, just like what Sarah had mentioned in her UIAM posts. Yes, debating without showering and feeling fresh, I wondered how I did it now that I thought of it.

Wore the stupid school uniform on the first day. I sorta asked everyone to do that cos I thought first impressions matter. But..Apparently, the committee that organized the whole event was going that the dress code was free for us, school uniform's too formal or something, as long as you have modest dressing there's no problem wearing casual at all.

Right. Hehe.

So, we had two workshops. Before that we had a mock debate by some of the experienced debaters there. The motion was THBT trials involving celebs should be behind closed doors, with the trainees as the government and the trainers as the opposition. Well, I have to say that the opposition was far more interesting and witty and of course, WAY better than the government, I couldn't even understand the points they were saying for goodness sake.

Then, Round 1 began.

The theme was smoking and we got the motion which is THW hold parents liable for underage smoking. We're the opposition and our opponent is SMS Sultan Abdul Halim from Jitra, Kedah in Room 27. Initially, the plan was to run there while deciding on the rankings of the motions but since the usher was so selamba, it took us almost 5 minutes or more just to get there and you may have not seen it, but I was pretty pissed off already at that time.

After the 30 minutes prep, it was literally courting death for me. Like seriously, I was telling the rest to relax and do our best while I was literally brain-dead? But anyway, the pictures from the first round, which is also one of my favourite, heheh.

Us looking all tensed up, lol. Jas as the Prime Minister, moi as the Deputy Prime Minister, as Naomi as the Whip.

The opponents, from right to left, Kak Azia, Hafiz and Add who's the third speaker and speaking =)


After the debate and the results, from left to right, Hafiz, Kak Yun, Add, Kak Azia, Mastura or mostly known as Chua, and us!

And surprisingly, more like not surprisingly, we won our first round. But it was only because they got the motion wrong so they were actually contradicting themselves for the whole debate! Naomi was right next to me, going non-stop, "They got the motion wrong! They got the motion wrong!" and I was like, almost jumping for joy for crying out loud but we never knew, cos all of us in that room were literally super bengang and confused so I was half unsure whether our team was right or not. But anyway, it was really an easy win for us, they were really good actually!

The adjudicator for our round, of all people, is Mastura, or I rather call her Chua. Naomi and I weren't very sure of what happened when we saw the feedback form and the head adjudicator's name, plainly written there, was 'Chua'. One of us went, "Chua's a Chinese, but we don't know any Chuas here, so why such a super experienced adjudicator for our first round??" Another went, "Maybe she's a representative, I think Chua can't come for our debate." Little did we know Chua = Mastura and how did we find out? When Jasmine went up to get her number for any questions and doubts we have about any of the future debates we're involved in, so there. But anyhow, she's the NICEST and BEST adjudicators out of all the rest that judged for us. Like seriously, I'm not exaggerating. She didn't harshly criticize the SMSAH team for the mess up, she was asking why in such a patient and nice manner. She even went, "Did you really got the motion wrong, or were you just being naughty, trying to confuse the other team?" in a very humourous manner. Lol. As for us, she said we were really good for first timers, and all we had to do was to up the confidence factor. How much I miss this round. Sigh =)

So, next was Round 2 and I can honestly tell you it's the suckiest round and motion we got for the entire debate. Motion was THW legalize performance-enhancing drugs for sports and we were government for goodness me. We were in Room 8 (but not for long). The theme was sports and we lost miserably due to personal reasons and complications. Like hello, we actually got some fairly okay points but not long after our confidence dropped from the highest peaks of any mountain and there goes everything. Damansara Jaya B weren't that good, but due to the clear disadvantage in the motion for us, we lost. Lesson learnt : Do not ever be the third speaker till I had more practise. And people actually said I had more talent being the third speaker. Please take back what you'd said till I'm better. Haha. And yes, the adjudicator was Khalidah Nazihah, the first trainee speaker for the mock debate earlier. No more would be said.

If there's anymore events on this day, I can't remember, so off to Day 3!

Day 3 - 13/04/2008

This is what happens when you procrastinate your updates. I can't remember much already but anymore, these are some pictures I took in the morning.



The pondok where everyone waits for the bus, lol.

Wore casual today. After the speech on our free dress code, we had a wardrobe change immediately the next day, lol.

A candid of me arranging my notes taken by Michelle, haha. See how selekeh I am in the mornings, hahah.

I started to not take the breakfasts from Day 3. Especially the drinks. Fact, I love the smell of coffee but I'm not a big fan of the taste. Lol.

So, the next round's theme was on education. We were government again with a not so bad motion which was THBT pre-school education should be made compulsory against TKC A in Room 17. We lost cos we didn't elaborate enough. But it was fun pointing out the third speaker's mistake that she defined the age of children wrongly. The look on her face was priceless XD The adjudicator was Nabilah Lokmal, the head editor for The Ratio. This round wasn't really outstanding anyway.

Some had said I looked really professional in this picture? Lol. Couldn't say so myself X)

I seriously panicked during the start of the fourth round, with the motion THW limit the air-time of foreign entertainment with the media as the theme, cos I really didn't understand the motion at all at that moment. With the pure fact I was going to be the first speaker for the first time. And yes, we were oppostion against Melawati A in Room 31. At first we were slightly freaked out, but after hearing the first speaker spoke, we sort of got our confidence back. And it was the best round for the all of us. Even Michelle was proud of us for goodness sake, and she's the experienced one. I was proud of us too =)

But due to the stupidest adjudicator we ever had, named Zaimah who's actually a welfare lady came and made her verdict according to her own opinions and not of the debate. Even Melawati A was shocked. I was speechless. I felt like killing her on the spot. Our points were so solid and we had examples and stats so what's her stinky problem??

Anyway, I'm honouring my reply speech here =) The debaters should know why ;)

A few star moments for the debaters in that round:

Star Moment 1 happened when the first speaker of Melawati said this, "Tell me, who actually watch more National Geographic than MTV?" (FYI, we were suppose to oppose the motion saying that foreign entertainment is limited enough, so it's shouldn't be limited anymore, while they should say that we should limit them, but obviously, both National Geographic and MTV are foreign entertainment so he's contradicting himself. Another glamourous POI for me V(^^)V ) He was also going on and on about the song Candyshop by 50 Cent and hell that was annoying. I wanted to kill myself for not mentioning that there are good songs that have moral values in them too. Ugh. Oh yeah, I DID mention examples of other Malaysian channels other than your stupid AstroRia okay. I even counted them with my fingers to show how many there were in case you're amazingly stupid in Maths. So there.

Then, Star Moment 2 came when the second speaker was ragging on about the same stupid freaking song, about a guy bringing his girlfriend to the same candyshop and do so and so, and hell was I even more annoyed. He even said that, "...yeah, my first speaker had said it, I can't remember so yeah, moving on..." That is freaking dumb.

Now now, I loved Star Moment 3 when the third speaker who dumbly said, "Therefore, the motion today shall fall and would not stand. Thank you." Please note that SIGS B was the opposition and they were the government, so she was so really embarassed by that. By the time she corrected herself, it was well 5 seconds after she sat down.

Naomi was super directly sarcastic to them, and they took her saying for real literally. "The stolen fruit is always the sweetest" is an English saying for goodness gracious and they were going, "The stolen fruit had gone bad, what for do you want to steal it?" or something like that. Ask Naomi for full details on this event. Anyhow, they were contradicting themselves a lot. Jasmine also fought well and took a lot of POIs which she CAN answer, so we were all impressed with ourselves. It was the best round ever. Lost with glory I shall say. Michelle wrote an essay on the feedback form and we all complained without any care to that nice adjudicator who said he'll leave a note for us and Nabilah, our previous adjudicator for the third round. Jasmine also secretly informed Chua without telling us, and when she replied and said that she got bummed out by the head adjudicators we were LITERALLY jumping for joy.

The guy in yellow is the one who helped us gained justice at that time. We thank you, sir!

I was again pissed off by him who didn't allow me to rant at that stupid Zaimah. It's not wrong ranting, we all worked so hard for that round, and it's obvious we should win and still, he didn't even allow us to voice our disagreements. That kept me really moody till the next round was over.

Round 5's theme was humour, and I seriously loved the motions, cos they were seriously funny and we were actually supposed to debate on these topics! This round was the only round where I can actually memorize the three motions listed out at the beginning of each round. Motion 1 was THBT Donald Duck should put on a pair of pants, which we got in the end, motion 2 was "THB that debating is a waste of time" and motion 3 was "THB that the opposition team should win". Venue was Room 43 (see how much we dropped, the room number shows it all, sigh) and we were opposition again against the SWING team. Another thing that you should know, the SWING team consists of voluntary reserves from the other teams that would like to debate as we didn't have enough teams in the end due to certain misunderstandings, which caused a few schools to pull out. That's what I heard anyway.

Before prep, we were suppose to cancel off two motions and rank them. Actually we were suppose to go with motion 2, but cos Michelle said it wasn't funny, Rauf, he's from MRSM Balik Pulau by the way, said that it's okay to go with the Donald Duck motion! Now, that was seriously nice of them, no kidding. Rauf and the rest, which was Shahira and Adie said they'll try to laugh at our jokes and we'll have to try and laugh at theirs too, to make us look good. The reserve was Ahmed by the way, and he was freaking tall. Like seriously, I was only as tall as his shoulders. Okay, I digress.

Things were really awkward during the debate, but we were fine I guess. Another lesson learnt is that I am seriously not funny and witty enough in this round. In fact I looked stupid but what the heck. And with Kalam, the head adjudicator of that round with his thick accent said that we won, Naomi and I gave our bengang faces till he had to say it again to let us hear the verdict. Actually, we sort of knew we were going to win but we just weren't that sure. And he said that all of us weren't funny, thank you for the really direct comment, and he judged us based on logic and the basic etiquette of a debate. With him was this Mat Salleh guy and this lady. Owh, whoever.

I felt really sorry for the SWING team, especially Rauf cos he was really depressed, as they had not even won a single round from the 5 rounds that all of us went thought already. So all of us exchanged contacts and we were glad we lost the media round, or we wouldn't have met another friendly team =) SMSAH or the Jitra team as we always call them actually were the other team that we managed to make friends with through the whole debate competition =D

So after that he wanted to see Kak Ayu, so off we went to the hidden canteen and we left not long after to avoid being light bulbs there.

The pictures shall do the talking:




I loved the history of this picture. Please go to Michelle's blog for the story =)

I still love us =)

Dinner at the Econs cafe! There's this routine I and Jasmine have. We have lunch downstairs while dinner's at the upper storey of the cafe. So anyhow, we had a visitor who loved Guppy's bag a lot XD

Meet Guppy..

..and meet the culprit XD

I remembered about a trip to the stadium, but I seriously don't want to be reminded of any events concerning that again. To Michelle, I'm really sorry about the insects thingy, I know how much it could harm your skin, but obviously he didn't understand when I said a brighter and safer road with less pests. And guys, I know I seem super close to him but actually, I couldn't let Jasmine come to any harm. Yeah..Get the full story from Naomi if you guys want details. I'm truly sorry once again. I won't speak about this any further in this entry.

Day 4 - 14/04/2008

Round 6 begins. We were fooled. All of us! What we first saw was the theme neo-political economy which I hardly know the meaning of it and being the first speaker again, had to copy the first motion. But what I got was this super long motion that goes something like this, "THBT post-cold war 21st century real politics symbolism in the first world countries is a phantom.." and that's all I got till the next slide we got was a "Just kidding" from the committee and boy, didn't the crowd go MAD! So the next slide was a "Here's the REAL motions..." and the theme is sadly still politics with our motion THW make all electoral candidates sit for an aptitude test and we were government against SBPI Selandar in Room 36. Horrid round and guess who's the head adjudicator for this round? The same Mat Salleh guy who judged for our humour round. He seriously knows our weaknesses, so it was a bad idea he was there. Anyway, I sucked big time in politics thus causing the downfall of my team as the first speaker. Sorry guys. I could have crapped better.

Round 7's theme was economics with the shouldn't be motion for that round THBT true democracies is the only way to ensure sustainable economic prosperity against Seri Chahaya with us being the opposition once more in Room 40. These people are lowly creatures that cheat to get the motion they want, they changed their rankings at the last minute after hearing ours, with him blabbing out our rankings a little too early. So, instead of the motion we were originally aiming for which was "THW not sell national aircraft carriers to international companies", we got that other motion which we hardly prep for outside. Oh yes, in every debate the government have their prep in the nice air-con room while the oppo suffer in the scorching sun. It depends on the weather and how cold is that room really. So, we left Jasmine's points blank and walked through the doors of doom.

Lowly cheats. They were so disorganized they delayed the debate by a few minutes. First of all they didn't set the freaking boundary, so I did it. All they gave was a lot of bullcrap examples which weren't really supported by any argumentations whatsoever. They didn't even define the damn motion properly for goodness gracious, so I did it. And they were practically throwing accusation after accusation at me and only me, or mainly me, and I was fuming at that moment. They were freaking rude I tell you. He said that the boundaries were mentioned which is Israel and Palestine which were actually his examples, and when I POIed him, he just said fine fine, whatever and such. Useless idiot. Anyway, being ridiculously argumentationless, both first speakers from both teams were seriously under time, and amazingly after that everybody exceeded the six minute limit. And the third speaker was so lame. Just because she was an AngMohLui that doesn't make her any better. She said a whole lot of crap which didn't support her team's case at all, and she ended her speech by saying, "Oh, since the third speaker from the Opposition team has not made her speech, I can't rebut any further, so I shall take my seat and the motion shall stand." How much more lamer can she get?

So, useless as I'm already am, I can't finish my post perfectly as the autosave function ain't working, so I shall continue the misc. issues another time, which will be soon I hope.

Please pardon me for any grammar or spelling errors.

..to be continued..

0 comment(s):

Post a Comment

                                                   

It’s not an English name I came up with for myself. My mother is indeed a genius in coming up with such a splendid name for me. Although my name has been unfortunately mutilated (nicknames are excluded) over the past years, full credits to my mum for my current identity.

I’m certainly looking forward to changing the word ‘patient’ to ‘survivor’! If you’re interested to read about my journey in battling lymphoma, you can click here to proceed to my cancer blog.

Ironic, I know; this blog is mainly pink instead. I like all colours actually, but I find myself having an affinity to the colour green. In fact, I can safely say that green is my soul colour.

Languages, music, fashion, photography, cultures, dance, literature, writing; just about anything, really. The arts truly intrigue me, especially thought-provoking pieces. Of course, the arts play a major role in inspiring me in my everyday life.

I don’t have a favourite genre – I read any book that interests me!

I am a trained right-hander from young, since apparently being left-handed is considered ‘wrong’. Basically, I’m ambidextrous! No wonder I find it easier to air guitar using my left hand than my right; I simply relate to the arts than subjects that deal with logical thinking better, too.

A stubborn Bull I am, too. I abhor being rushed. I prefer doing matters at my own reasonable pace. I don’t particularly like changes in my routine, but I can adapt quite easily. I’m a very practical person as well. I enjoy the beautiful things in life, but that doesn’t make me shun ugliness at all. Besides, it all depends on how one perceives beauty. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder!

Still am, but I’m slowly learning to accept imperfection into my life. Also, I’m doing my best to erase the many expectations I have so I could one day master the art of letting go and freeing myself to simple happiness and joy.

Compared to before, I’m less dramatic nowadays. Language-wise, I attempt to blog flawlessly in English and speak proper English online with my peers. Call me a Grammar Nazi all you want, but that’s how I roll. I only converse in perfect English in formal situations and during my dramatic outbursts. Otherwise, I’m absolutely capable of communicating like the average Malaysian!

It’s a different issue altogether when you’re forced to learn for the sake of getting good grades, though. Other than that, I’m open to new information and knowledge anytime! I especially would like to learn more languages and pick up new musical instruments.

…are just some of the things I would love to do in the near future, hopefully!

the basic rules apply. If you respect me, I’ll respect you. If you happen to be someone who has low EQ skills, I’ll try to be tolerant but my patience is definitely limited. I’m observant when it comes to human behaviour. I’m a person of many opinions, but I don’t voice them out unless I trust you enough; I’m very honest and candid when it comes to the people I can trust. Even though I trust very easily, not everybody can prove that they’re all that nice. Hurt me, and I’ll only defend myself if necessary. Hurt my family or my friends – you won’t find me holding back.

Is there anything else you would like to know about me?
Throw me your questions and/or doubts here! I honestly have nothing to hide, so you’ll expect the truth and nothing but the truth.

It’s only how I phrase my answers that you’ll have to be aware of.
Or…you can click hereto go back to reading!

Yes, the long awaited post, lol.

I owe lots of people this post, and not that I'm going into details (maybe I am without realizing it), but just that this trip is worth going into much detail about, cos it's the most memorable so far, for reasons good and sigh, of course, the bad).

Day 1 - 11/04/2008

Reached school around 7.45. Came late on purpose as I was in no mood to go for the practice debates prepared by hers truly Miss Nav. Motions were advertisements bring more harm to the young and sportsmen should be awarded financial rewards when they win. Proposed the motion for the first one and opposed the second together with Jasmine. My time sort of improved to three minutes, which wasn't really that much of an improvement after all.

Set off at 11.10. Halfway through the journey it was then I realized I left my jacket in school at Anjung. So you can guessed my only apparel for the 6 day trip that can provide me warmth was my blazer that can survive winter conditions according to my brother, haha.

So, since the junior bus conductor was driving, it was already a whole full THREE hours and we just arrived at the Ayer Keroh R&R. But yeah, have to admit his driving's reeeaaally stable. And I saw Fatihah there. She was my classmate from last year and I only got to know that she moved somewhere else earlier this year. So, we exchanged contacts in a very awkward way, since it's been so long since we ever talked and I wasn't that close to her like the others in the first place.

Continued with our journey. Watched Disturbia and 27 Dresses courtesy of Sherylee on the way there.

Reached Selangor around 4pm. Took us some time to reach the campus itself. And by the time we finish up with the registration and stuff, it was already 6+ when we reach Al-Ameenah, the hostel which was new as I heard we're supposed to stay at. Room number's 3:3.

The view from the bus while waiting for the registration to be done:


Erm, I thought university students don't really cheat? Oh well, haha. I'm totally inexperienced about university life, so pardon my mistake if I'm wrong, which is most probably a yes to that question.

Next, some camwhoring outside the bus with the junior team:

Naomi looks good and Jasmine just looks ah-dorable here? Lol.


I love us so much X)

Naomi's favourite, but definitely not mine. Hehe.

Our dedicated bus drivers, staring at something called the...

...bulldozer at the construction site nearby. Interesting indeed.

On the way to the hostel, the junior team, consisting of Naomi, Jasmine, Gurpreet and me were moaning and gone all depressed as we just got the so-called good news we were also competing instead of just watching and gaining experience. Michelle said I was so pale at that time, but seriously, though I wasn't whining, I was halfway into freaking out, as I had never debated officially before, but only the reserve during the district level debate competition back in JB, as the scriptwriter and researcher who was the laziest among the rest. Ask Sherylee, she'll be whacking my poor head for productive ideas, haha.

So, we reached the dorm at last and started preparing for the opening ceremony. Took a few shots, but in my humble opinion this pic is the one where everyone looks nice, excluding me of course.

Tadah! Them looking sweet and sophisticated while I'm looking like a human that had never posed for pictures before. Embarassing sial. Haha.

Off we go to the CAC, where the ceremony was supposed to be held. I was starving at that time, so it's with the camera I go to distract me.



The current surroundings at that time.

Next, was this presentation which shamelessly stole the main plots from Star Wars. It's the theme for this year anyway. So, we watched a couple of people strutting their stuff trying to be the next Hans Solo and Darth Vader. The jokes were lame, but still, pretty funny. Haha.

Then, there was this really awesome slideshow which gave me this tingly feeling. The graphics and the sound effects were pretty cool. And when they introduced the schools that participated this year, of course, with the booming SIGS spirit, we cheered loudly when we saw 'SMK (P) Sultan Ibrahim' right there as one of the schools representing Johor. Heh.

Then, on and on with the super boring speeches and us going on with how hungry we were. Seriously, what could be far more worse then having the food right in front of you but you can't start gobbling down everything until the stupid VIPs finish off what they want to say about this prestigious event, yada yada yada.

And then, finally at around 9pm, or was it 10pm, the feast started a whole long last while there were some other performances to keep us entertained, but too bad, nobody was watching cos everybody was too busy chewing and munching. Hello, who wouldn't?

But, there was this one performance that this senior student from UIA sang and was well received by the female audience, lol. We'll see why.

Najwa's HAWT+CUTE+TALL+HAWT boyfriend. She wanted me to actually get his number and email! Of course, I didn't do it. Why should I let my darling husband flirt with other guys and thus abandoning me? Hahah, she's already like that so..We'll leave it at that X)

Rushed out when the dinner was over, walked back, or more like ran back, baju kurung and all, to the dorm, and had a prep talk with everyone led by Michelle. It was then decided that I, Jasmine and Naomi are in for the first round the next morning. Plopped on the mattress, and snored my way into SleepLand.

Day 2 - 12/04/2008

Woke up unwillingly, as I felt like I haven't even slept yet. Decided not to shower for the whole trip in the mornings as the water was ice cold, just like what Sarah had mentioned in her UIAM posts. Yes, debating without showering and feeling fresh, I wondered how I did it now that I thought of it.

Wore the stupid school uniform on the first day. I sorta asked everyone to do that cos I thought first impressions matter. But..Apparently, the committee that organized the whole event was going that the dress code was free for us, school uniform's too formal or something, as long as you have modest dressing there's no problem wearing casual at all.

Right. Hehe.

So, we had two workshops. Before that we had a mock debate by some of the experienced debaters there. The motion was THBT trials involving celebs should be behind closed doors, with the trainees as the government and the trainers as the opposition. Well, I have to say that the opposition was far more interesting and witty and of course, WAY better than the government, I couldn't even understand the points they were saying for goodness sake.

Then, Round 1 began.

The theme was smoking and we got the motion which is THW hold parents liable for underage smoking. We're the opposition and our opponent is SMS Sultan Abdul Halim from Jitra, Kedah in Room 27. Initially, the plan was to run there while deciding on the rankings of the motions but since the usher was so selamba, it took us almost 5 minutes or more just to get there and you may have not seen it, but I was pretty pissed off already at that time.

After the 30 minutes prep, it was literally courting death for me. Like seriously, I was telling the rest to relax and do our best while I was literally brain-dead? But anyway, the pictures from the first round, which is also one of my favourite, heheh.

Us looking all tensed up, lol. Jas as the Prime Minister, moi as the Deputy Prime Minister, as Naomi as the Whip.

The opponents, from right to left, Kak Azia, Hafiz and Add who's the third speaker and speaking =)


After the debate and the results, from left to right, Hafiz, Kak Yun, Add, Kak Azia, Mastura or mostly known as Chua, and us!

And surprisingly, more like not surprisingly, we won our first round. But it was only because they got the motion wrong so they were actually contradicting themselves for the whole debate! Naomi was right next to me, going non-stop, "They got the motion wrong! They got the motion wrong!" and I was like, almost jumping for joy for crying out loud but we never knew, cos all of us in that room were literally super bengang and confused so I was half unsure whether our team was right or not. But anyway, it was really an easy win for us, they were really good actually!

The adjudicator for our round, of all people, is Mastura, or I rather call her Chua. Naomi and I weren't very sure of what happened when we saw the feedback form and the head adjudicator's name, plainly written there, was 'Chua'. One of us went, "Chua's a Chinese, but we don't know any Chuas here, so why such a super experienced adjudicator for our first round??" Another went, "Maybe she's a representative, I think Chua can't come for our debate." Little did we know Chua = Mastura and how did we find out? When Jasmine went up to get her number for any questions and doubts we have about any of the future debates we're involved in, so there. But anyhow, she's the NICEST and BEST adjudicators out of all the rest that judged for us. Like seriously, I'm not exaggerating. She didn't harshly criticize the SMSAH team for the mess up, she was asking why in such a patient and nice manner. She even went, "Did you really got the motion wrong, or were you just being naughty, trying to confuse the other team?" in a very humourous manner. Lol. As for us, she said we were really good for first timers, and all we had to do was to up the confidence factor. How much I miss this round. Sigh =)

So, next was Round 2 and I can honestly tell you it's the suckiest round and motion we got for the entire debate. Motion was THW legalize performance-enhancing drugs for sports and we were government for goodness me. We were in Room 8 (but not for long). The theme was sports and we lost miserably due to personal reasons and complications. Like hello, we actually got some fairly okay points but not long after our confidence dropped from the highest peaks of any mountain and there goes everything. Damansara Jaya B weren't that good, but due to the clear disadvantage in the motion for us, we lost. Lesson learnt : Do not ever be the third speaker till I had more practise. And people actually said I had more talent being the third speaker. Please take back what you'd said till I'm better. Haha. And yes, the adjudicator was Khalidah Nazihah, the first trainee speaker for the mock debate earlier. No more would be said.

If there's anymore events on this day, I can't remember, so off to Day 3!

Day 3 - 13/04/2008

This is what happens when you procrastinate your updates. I can't remember much already but anymore, these are some pictures I took in the morning.



The pondok where everyone waits for the bus, lol.

Wore casual today. After the speech on our free dress code, we had a wardrobe change immediately the next day, lol.

A candid of me arranging my notes taken by Michelle, haha. See how selekeh I am in the mornings, hahah.

I started to not take the breakfasts from Day 3. Especially the drinks. Fact, I love the smell of coffee but I'm not a big fan of the taste. Lol.

So, the next round's theme was on education. We were government again with a not so bad motion which was THBT pre-school education should be made compulsory against TKC A in Room 17. We lost cos we didn't elaborate enough. But it was fun pointing out the third speaker's mistake that she defined the age of children wrongly. The look on her face was priceless XD The adjudicator was Nabilah Lokmal, the head editor for The Ratio. This round wasn't really outstanding anyway.

Some had said I looked really professional in this picture? Lol. Couldn't say so myself X)

I seriously panicked during the start of the fourth round, with the motion THW limit the air-time of foreign entertainment with the media as the theme, cos I really didn't understand the motion at all at that moment. With the pure fact I was going to be the first speaker for the first time. And yes, we were oppostion against Melawati A in Room 31. At first we were slightly freaked out, but after hearing the first speaker spoke, we sort of got our confidence back. And it was the best round for the all of us. Even Michelle was proud of us for goodness sake, and she's the experienced one. I was proud of us too =)

But due to the stupidest adjudicator we ever had, named Zaimah who's actually a welfare lady came and made her verdict according to her own opinions and not of the debate. Even Melawati A was shocked. I was speechless. I felt like killing her on the spot. Our points were so solid and we had examples and stats so what's her stinky problem??

Anyway, I'm honouring my reply speech here =) The debaters should know why ;)

A few star moments for the debaters in that round:

Star Moment 1 happened when the first speaker of Melawati said this, "Tell me, who actually watch more National Geographic than MTV?" (FYI, we were suppose to oppose the motion saying that foreign entertainment is limited enough, so it's shouldn't be limited anymore, while they should say that we should limit them, but obviously, both National Geographic and MTV are foreign entertainment so he's contradicting himself. Another glamourous POI for me V(^^)V ) He was also going on and on about the song Candyshop by 50 Cent and hell that was annoying. I wanted to kill myself for not mentioning that there are good songs that have moral values in them too. Ugh. Oh yeah, I DID mention examples of other Malaysian channels other than your stupid AstroRia okay. I even counted them with my fingers to show how many there were in case you're amazingly stupid in Maths. So there.

Then, Star Moment 2 came when the second speaker was ragging on about the same stupid freaking song, about a guy bringing his girlfriend to the same candyshop and do so and so, and hell was I even more annoyed. He even said that, "...yeah, my first speaker had said it, I can't remember so yeah, moving on..." That is freaking dumb.

Now now, I loved Star Moment 3 when the third speaker who dumbly said, "Therefore, the motion today shall fall and would not stand. Thank you." Please note that SIGS B was the opposition and they were the government, so she was so really embarassed by that. By the time she corrected herself, it was well 5 seconds after she sat down.

Naomi was super directly sarcastic to them, and they took her saying for real literally. "The stolen fruit is always the sweetest" is an English saying for goodness gracious and they were going, "The stolen fruit had gone bad, what for do you want to steal it?" or something like that. Ask Naomi for full details on this event. Anyhow, they were contradicting themselves a lot. Jasmine also fought well and took a lot of POIs which she CAN answer, so we were all impressed with ourselves. It was the best round ever. Lost with glory I shall say. Michelle wrote an essay on the feedback form and we all complained without any care to that nice adjudicator who said he'll leave a note for us and Nabilah, our previous adjudicator for the third round. Jasmine also secretly informed Chua without telling us, and when she replied and said that she got bummed out by the head adjudicators we were LITERALLY jumping for joy.

The guy in yellow is the one who helped us gained justice at that time. We thank you, sir!

I was again pissed off by him who didn't allow me to rant at that stupid Zaimah. It's not wrong ranting, we all worked so hard for that round, and it's obvious we should win and still, he didn't even allow us to voice our disagreements. That kept me really moody till the next round was over.

Round 5's theme was humour, and I seriously loved the motions, cos they were seriously funny and we were actually supposed to debate on these topics! This round was the only round where I can actually memorize the three motions listed out at the beginning of each round. Motion 1 was THBT Donald Duck should put on a pair of pants, which we got in the end, motion 2 was "THB that debating is a waste of time" and motion 3 was "THB that the opposition team should win". Venue was Room 43 (see how much we dropped, the room number shows it all, sigh) and we were opposition again against the SWING team. Another thing that you should know, the SWING team consists of voluntary reserves from the other teams that would like to debate as we didn't have enough teams in the end due to certain misunderstandings, which caused a few schools to pull out. That's what I heard anyway.

Before prep, we were suppose to cancel off two motions and rank them. Actually we were suppose to go with motion 2, but cos Michelle said it wasn't funny, Rauf, he's from MRSM Balik Pulau by the way, said that it's okay to go with the Donald Duck motion! Now, that was seriously nice of them, no kidding. Rauf and the rest, which was Shahira and Adie said they'll try to laugh at our jokes and we'll have to try and laugh at theirs too, to make us look good. The reserve was Ahmed by the way, and he was freaking tall. Like seriously, I was only as tall as his shoulders. Okay, I digress.

Things were really awkward during the debate, but we were fine I guess. Another lesson learnt is that I am seriously not funny and witty enough in this round. In fact I looked stupid but what the heck. And with Kalam, the head adjudicator of that round with his thick accent said that we won, Naomi and I gave our bengang faces till he had to say it again to let us hear the verdict. Actually, we sort of knew we were going to win but we just weren't that sure. And he said that all of us weren't funny, thank you for the really direct comment, and he judged us based on logic and the basic etiquette of a debate. With him was this Mat Salleh guy and this lady. Owh, whoever.

I felt really sorry for the SWING team, especially Rauf cos he was really depressed, as they had not even won a single round from the 5 rounds that all of us went thought already. So all of us exchanged contacts and we were glad we lost the media round, or we wouldn't have met another friendly team =) SMSAH or the Jitra team as we always call them actually were the other team that we managed to make friends with through the whole debate competition =D

So after that he wanted to see Kak Ayu, so off we went to the hidden canteen and we left not long after to avoid being light bulbs there.

The pictures shall do the talking:




I loved the history of this picture. Please go to Michelle's blog for the story =)

I still love us =)

Dinner at the Econs cafe! There's this routine I and Jasmine have. We have lunch downstairs while dinner's at the upper storey of the cafe. So anyhow, we had a visitor who loved Guppy's bag a lot XD

Meet Guppy..

..and meet the culprit XD

I remembered about a trip to the stadium, but I seriously don't want to be reminded of any events concerning that again. To Michelle, I'm really sorry about the insects thingy, I know how much it could harm your skin, but obviously he didn't understand when I said a brighter and safer road with less pests. And guys, I know I seem super close to him but actually, I couldn't let Jasmine come to any harm. Yeah..Get the full story from Naomi if you guys want details. I'm truly sorry once again. I won't speak about this any further in this entry.

Day 4 - 14/04/2008

Round 6 begins. We were fooled. All of us! What we first saw was the theme neo-political economy which I hardly know the meaning of it and being the first speaker again, had to copy the first motion. But what I got was this super long motion that goes something like this, "THBT post-cold war 21st century real politics symbolism in the first world countries is a phantom.." and that's all I got till the next slide we got was a "Just kidding" from the committee and boy, didn't the crowd go MAD! So the next slide was a "Here's the REAL motions..." and the theme is sadly still politics with our motion THW make all electoral candidates sit for an aptitude test and we were government against SBPI Selandar in Room 36. Horrid round and guess who's the head adjudicator for this round? The same Mat Salleh guy who judged for our humour round. He seriously knows our weaknesses, so it was a bad idea he was there. Anyway, I sucked big time in politics thus causing the downfall of my team as the first speaker. Sorry guys. I could have crapped better.

Round 7's theme was economics with the shouldn't be motion for that round THBT true democracies is the only way to ensure sustainable economic prosperity against Seri Chahaya with us being the opposition once more in Room 40. These people are lowly creatures that cheat to get the motion they want, they changed their rankings at the last minute after hearing ours, with him blabbing out our rankings a little too early. So, instead of the motion we were originally aiming for which was "THW not sell national aircraft carriers to international companies", we got that other motion which we hardly prep for outside. Oh yes, in every debate the government have their prep in the nice air-con room while the oppo suffer in the scorching sun. It depends on the weather and how cold is that room really. So, we left Jasmine's points blank and walked through the doors of doom.

Lowly cheats. They were so disorganized they delayed the debate by a few minutes. First of all they didn't set the freaking boundary, so I did it. All they gave was a lot of bullcrap examples which weren't really supported by any argumentations whatsoever. They didn't even define the damn motion properly for goodness gracious, so I did it. And they were practically throwing accusation after accusation at me and only me, or mainly me, and I was fuming at that moment. They were freaking rude I tell you. He said that the boundaries were mentioned which is Israel and Palestine which were actually his examples, and when I POIed him, he just said fine fine, whatever and such. Useless idiot. Anyway, being ridiculously argumentationless, both first speakers from both teams were seriously under time, and amazingly after that everybody exceeded the six minute limit. And the third speaker was so lame. Just because she was an AngMohLui that doesn't make her any better. She said a whole lot of crap which didn't support her team's case at all, and she ended her speech by saying, "Oh, since the third speaker from the Opposition team has not made her speech, I can't rebut any further, so I shall take my seat and the motion shall stand." How much more lamer can she get?

So, useless as I'm already am, I can't finish my post perfectly as the autosave function ain't working, so I shall continue the misc. issues another time, which will be soon I hope.

Please pardon me for any grammar or spelling errors.

..to be continued..

0 comment(s):

Post a Comment