Bye bye bye

Okayyy so, I meant to post this like 2 months ago, but logging into the account, typing and posting was too overwhelming for me.

I hereby declare this blog dead.
:D

It's all OVER

FINALLY. So the day came, dooms day, speech day, whatever you want to call it. I was prepped, or so I thought. It hadn't sunk in yet that TODAY was the day.

Anyway here's what went down:

9:00 - WOO BLAZER. It looks hot. And Mr. F has just told me, the other dude pulled out of the competition... lovely. Just me now ):

11:35 - Hopped in the taxi, with this Indian driver. He bothered to tell me his life story, about how he grew up in India, is studying English and Hospitality and how his asian Girlfriend is pressuring him into extending the 'see each-other 2 days a week.'

11:55 - Arrived at Yeronga State High after much stopping to look at the map, where it also caused the fare meter to rise considerably.. sneaky Indian..

12:00 - After avoiding classroom after classroom-full of stares, I made my way to the 'Common Room' where interviews were held. Felt like screaming 'I KNOW I'M IN THE WRONG SCHOOL YOU F***TARDS," after passing the last classroom. *breathes*

12:10 - Found out I was 1 hour early (joy). The admin lady asked me to stay in the room and 'soak in the air con,' and proceeded to leave before figuring out the air con wasn't on.

12:40 - Sitting here bored still, and really hot due to the stupid woman forgetting air con.

12:55 - FINALLY. HUMAN BEANS! This smart bean in particular turned on the air conditioner. Met the first judge, a really nice lady called Pat (short for Patricia). Then came Steph, one of the contestants. She was pretty bubbly.

1:10 - Still waiting for the other 2 judges, and where the hell are the other two contestants?

1:30 - Nice, nice. Half an hour late Judges. >_> Anyway, the other two are nice, bit intimidating. Steph and I got moved down to the makeshift library (Yeronga is pimping up their current library). Did maths homework (yum-yum log-log) for a long time, till it was my turn for the interview

2:30 - Mad, interview time! They asked basic questions from my application form, plus also a few general knowledge questions. Just so no one else asks, they were:

1. Should the drinking age limit be raised to 21?

2. Do you think the governments insulation plan was successful?

3. Should Australia put a cap on coal export?

4. Are the Winter Olympic games relevant to Australia?

I guess I answered most of them appropriately, but failed at the coal question.

3:00 - Back to the library.. read some comics and fell asleep.

5:30 - Aw disturbed from my beauty sleep. The lady judge, Pat, wanted to take me home, since she didn't want me hanging around alone. .. I'm scared.

6:00 - What the hell was I scared for? She's sweet :o and so are her kids and grandkids. Her grandchildren have american accents (born and raised in NY), so cute :D Had dinner with them and got some pointers from Pat (for my speech, lol)

6:40 - Omg, now I AM scared. Arrived at the RSL early, but later than everyone else. And HEY! There's Daddy :) & also, the president of Ekebin club.. where have I seen that face..

7:00 - I'm shakin'. But not from the nerves, oh I'm fine, but shakin' from the full-blast air conditioning. What did they plan to do, freeze me to death before I could die on stage?

7:20 - IMPROMPTUUUUZ! Surprisingly easy questions - I was prepared for the worst. Once again, for sake of not repeating myself, the questions were:

1. Are drivers of today adequately prepared for the road?

2. Bullying and violence, are they on the increase?

I reckon I did okay, got past 2 minutes for both with no problems. Just wished I had something more.. intelligent to talk about? Rather than just 'oh.. violence, yeah kids these days are killing each other.'

Shooop

7:35 (I lost track of time, so these are all made up estimates) - Schhhweet prepared speeches. When it got to my turn, it felt so much easier than I had anticipated. Honestly, I felt more relaxed than speaking in front of my class. Yesterday I visioned myself terrified, shaking, mispronouncing every word and forgetting lines. Well, some of that did happen just now, but it was unnoticeable. Unfortunately though, I spoke TOO slowly (bad thing, good thing?) and had to cut a chunk out of my speech to and skip straight to conclusion to make it under 5.5 minutes.

Then again, what am I complaining about, glad it is over. :)

8:00 - So cold.. the other speeches were wonderful. Right about now, I wished I could read the judges expressionless faces. Dad kept whispering to me that he was hungry too. I felt him jump when the president announced there would be finger food.

8:15 - -Heavy sigh of relief- Mingling time LOL. :D Started it off by demonstrating my fail skills at cutting cheese with a dorito (what the hell was I thinking, cheese doesn't even taste good with doritos). I also literally ate half their plates of cucumber (I heart that stuff) while chatting to the club members. After much staring and thinking, I figured out who the club president was.. THE BUTCHER WHO WORKS NEXT DOOR TO ME! ^_^

8:30 - Oh my god. Results O_O

Part of me wants to win (human condition okay?) and part of me didn't, on the grounds I'd have to redo this ordeal in zone level. Anywayyy, a girl from Yeronga won, both overall and public speaking (wow IKR pro). Afterwards we went through all this phototaking, hand-shaking, congratzing business.. so bugged at this point. During the handshakes, Pat bothered to tell me I came in 2nd. WHY! Sure, others may be happy about this news, but I feel as if I've just got another B10 for English. So close yet so far, I really despise this feeling. I left as soon as they closed up the night with Dad (he was ravenous, poor guy).

8:40 - Endured a long car ride home with Dad going on about how Public speaking is so 'cool'

8:45 - Fell asleep to the buzzing of his voice

All in all, it was a great day, I don't regret a second of this. My poor brother is definitely getting forced into this later. :)

Love,

moi.

Speaking in Public

Wow kay, first of all, it's been 2 months since I've so much as glanced at this page. Cleaned out the posts I made while I was bored stoopid annnd starting again!

So, school has started, and I'm finally top of the school food chain (year 12)! For the first time in my 12 years of education, I'm going to go home, do my homework and nerd it out till the suns long gone. Seriously.

Getting to the point of this blog.. Public Speaking (le gasp!). I was "heavily persuaded" late last year to participate in a public speaking competition. God was I nervous just hearing about it.

Basically this competition requires we do a 5minute prepared speech (sounds easy enough) and 2 2 minute speeches on the spot (this is where a part of me inside died listening). The prepared speech could be on ANY topic we wanted, however, we had to keep in mind:

1. We're speaking to a crowd of grumpy, elderly residents
2. Talking about sex or politics is a sure way to lose
3. Going over the 5 minute mark, even by a little, will drag our mark down. (;~;)

So, referring to the first two points, WHAT THE HELL AM I GOING TO TALK ABOUT? I spent the entire summer holidays thinking of things to talk about. It had to be something I could really elaborate on without the speech turning into mindless anecdotes and bullshit, and it also could not be about sex (saadly) or controversial issues which could well turn political (adieu whaling :[ ). It also had to be something slightly intellectual, cause a roomful of old folks aint gonna love a speech on the different ways you could eat Vegemite.

31st of January, my brain turned on.
In a sudden brainstorm I thought up 3 topics.

1. Australias justice system, compared to that of other countries (especially communists)
2. How generation Y lacks the morality, appreciation of life and respect people once had in older times.
3. How the media is the greatest influence in youths.

*Kudos to Wittey for the first idea. ♥

I went with the last option, after having googled the first two topics and coming up with very little. I struggled these past days to even start writing the speech, all I have down is "Dear ladies and gentlemen.." no kidding. I had to take in consideration, the people or "ladies and gentlemen" were elderly 80-year olds. How could my message and sense of humour get through to them? They obviously lived in an older time, with a completely different view on life and opinion. I'm scared they'll see me as just 'some teenager whining about media issues.' *cringe*

1st of February, I had a vision.
I saw/imagined (I'm no see'er) the elderly folk of Lions club keel over dying from a heart attack after hearing exciting parts of my speech.
Now, to be honest I wasn't totally shocked. A part of me was impressed my would-be speech was that exciting and entertaining that people would die from shock listening (I know right).
But, that just told me another guideline I had to follow in my speech: Keep it .. tolerable, not too exciting and flashy, yet also enough to keep the judges awake.

My track record in speeches hasn't been fabulous, and this competition being my first time publicly speaking. Till year 11, my speeches have usually gone like this:

1. Prepare speech night before assesment
2. Appear inconspicuous in class to avoid being chosen to speak
3. Make a lot of palm cards during that time
4. Speak quickly, only make eye contact when teacher is watching, mumble lines I forget and pause every now and then to fill up the time limit
5. Overall: Fluke an A/B

I'm improving though, just pray I've improved enough to live through the competition.

~ still thinking, still writing.
♥ Ice-cream eater