somenonsensewritings x)

Well I really wanna make it a long and detailed post like the first part, but huhm boredom strikes back and I feel kinda lazy to write it actually…but in the first part I already put that ‘promise’ of making the 2nd part, so well yeah, I can just post this and wait. xP

KNOCK OUT ROUNDS

Monday, 21st April 2008

Octofinal - vs SMAK Tarakanita Jakarta A

Brown side (us) versus Green Side (them) (that’s what I said in my reply speech : “so the winning should be given to the brown side, and not the green side. Thank you”), girls versus girls and it was a relatively standard debate I think. They questioned our definition upon the motion THBT Gov Should Disclose The Names of Products with Compromised Quality. We defined “compromised quality” as products that have been proven that they contain dangerous substances, and they said it must had been “products that haven’t been proven that they are dangerous”. HEH??? And I read in one of a participant’s friendster profile that a member of TarKi said they lost because of SMA 3’s lame definition. Hmmmm. Let’s take it as a form of her freedom of speech, shall we? Haha. The most important thing is we launched to the quarterfinal with a pretty good margin (I actually forget the number, precisely).

Quarterfinal - vs SMAN 3 BANDUNG B!!!!!!!!

Bah. Again and again this ‘curse’ happened. I dunno, SMA 3 has a tendency to meet their own brothers and sisters in one of the knock-out rounds. Take a look at some of it : Aloy 2007 (Quarterfinal, my team lost); AECS UPI 2007 (Octofinal, my team lost again); Aloy 2008 (Quarterfinal, my team won); ALSA UI 2008 (my team……won or lost? haven’t been to the end of the story yet. heheh).

So it was an impromptu motion. I forget the motion…hmmm…THBT Journalist Can be Forced To Reveal Their Sources for Law Enforcement Purposes, am I wrong? Yah it was about journalist-something, and luckily me and my team watched Varsity Debate on Sunday. Although we just watched a half of the debate between ITB B and BINUS, we still remembered some of the arguments and it really helped in our casebuilding time. So there we were, as the affirmative team brought the definition of law enforcement purposes as investigation in corruption cases, and that the journalists are not forced to reveal their sources OPENLY in media, but just in front of interrogators, so that the interrogators can be sure that the news about corruption cases are actually true. Well I admit that it wasn’t a very good definition but we thought it was reasonable enough to be debated, and suddenly…….

Our dear little bunny Afifa Ayu came up nervously and said “so we as the negative team want to challenge their truistic definition”. WHOA? My first definitional challenge debate ever! Hahah, I thought “this is gonna be fun!”. But then again, something weird happened. They did challenge us, but Afifa didn’t state clearly what their new definition was (even if I didnt hear it, but the adjudicators also didn’t, they said in their adjudication). Their definition was clear enough in Gichie, but he was the third speaker negative. And personally I think they did clash with us…I mean it was like a normal debate with accepted definition, so I was actually a bit confused, was it a definitional challenge debate or not?

Huhm…the adjudicators took a VERY LONG TIME to decide the winner. Even when people had gone to debaters’ hall we hadn’t had our adjudication. After a long time waiting, they gave us a pretty clear assessment but then again it was hard to guess the winner because the adjs gave a “hidden-meaning” in their adjudication (oh, marini and ega were glad because that good looking adj in our first prelim was adjudicating).

So again and again, in Balai Sidang. and sim salabim abrakadabraaaaaaaaaa……….

SMAN 3 BANDUNG A EVENTUALLY WON THE DEBATE!!!!!!!!!!! HOORAY!
So now that curse turns good for us. It was a tie 2-2 now! ^_^ (Both competitions in 2007 were for Afifa’s team and both 2008 competitions for me and ega’s team. huehe).

Tuesday, 22nd April, 2008

Here we were…as a semifinalist getting near to our dream of being a champion…
The debate was held in a room named…I forget…a room beside S.J. Latifa or something…it was totally cold in that room. So the semifinalists were Bandung (us), Jakarta, Tangerang, and Balikpapan.

Bandung vs Tangerang, Jakarta vs Balikpapan. Canisius told us to beat Tangerang because of the loss of SMAK 1 BPK Jakarta (Bobbi said : Egaaa…Marshaaaa…Mariniii…kata Ignes “bob, balesin dendam gw ke tangerang”).

Nah, this was a flaw in the plan (heh?). The heading was about International Issues and huhm, the chosen motion was THBT Every Country Should Have The Same Rights To Build Nuclear Weapons. HA HA HA, funny thing how me and Ega did see it as “right to build nuclear facility” and we put that motion in our first consideration during the Motion Preference. Little fools (we over-synchronized ourselves that time, buddy. heheh).

So after we sat in our “usual-holy-position” (hheh you won’t understand this! ask me for further explanation) suddenly we realized that it was nuclear weapons actually. That explains why the tangerang team was a bit confused we put that motion as our first consideration (we were government again).

But nasi telah menjadi bubur, we tried to dig up our minds and I congratulate my team for making pretty fine arguments. Little did we know about Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty that Pandu told us after the debate, otherwise the debate would change.

Well personally I did think we could win that time. Not to undermine tangerang of course, they played well too and it didn’t hurt us that much, yah…a lil disappointment but well, we had been trained to be strong, by those “mental-practice” we received in ITB…and we also had been trained (by ourselves and SEF pepol) not to blame adjudicators…blame ourselves, that’s the right thing to do. Heheh. Don’t debate me on saying “that’s the right thing to do” ya. For this case it was ourselves that should be blamed. Well I just regret that our balance-of-power concept were not elaborated well (thanks to Ega for popping this idea out in the middle of the debate), but it was a tight debate, split 3 to 2, the chair adj and the native-speaker adj gave the winning to us so it wasn’t a crap.

Yeah…that was the end of our looooonnnnggggg journey. It all began from a little dream of a little girl in a big big world…it’s funny how life works…

FINAL ROUND

CANISIUS A vs SMAN 1 TANGERANG A
Bobbi, Stef, William vs Fahmi, Yoyo, Ghea

Na na na na na. Huhu. ITB has lost the last day in Octofinal (for further mocking and additional curses upon this please directly contact one of SEF ITB people. heheheh) and now we sat in the spectators’ seat wondering how would it be if we were on the stage. halaaa.

*to be continued.

7 DAYS OF MIRACLES

It all began with a dream of a girl with no hope of reaching her dream. 2007 was a year full of complicated things, where I transferred myself to a more rebel one coz frankly I was really tired with my monotonistic life. When debate came to my aid and changed my life, ALSA UI was one of a thousand dreams of mine. I couldn’t go there coz I was a real beginner and I didn’t have enough confidence to begin with.
Thanks to my masters at ITB, little by little I started to gain confidence and started to have a better goal in competitions. I used to have a goal of “just break to the next round” , but since I had practices with them (since November 2007) I had my spirit burning inside my heart and found myself a more skilled debater (although, still, I’m not really good).
At the top of all my dreams, this national competition, ALSA UI. I obviously couldn’t participate in ISDC (that chance had been grabbed unfairly from me), so this is just my last hope of joining a national competition.

At first, my honourable coach, Mr. Uphie, defined the first team as Me, Ega, and Gichie because we passed the InterComp. After several “magical spells” (not to mention being spoiled kids), me and Ega managed to change it into a more comfortable x) one : Me, Marini, and Ega. Yeah! Luv my teammates so much! We’re so synchronized each other folks!

Wednesday, April 16, 2008
17.00 – Went to Jakarta by Xtrans (is it important?)
Really sorry for the other passengers, but well we three were so noisy..talking about boys and love and friends and first world countries and Beijing Olympic and ASEAN Charter…almost everything, and suddenly arrived in Jakarta (about 20.00) and slept in one of Ega’s cousin’s house.

We also talked about debate matter and I adjudicated a debate between Ega and Marini about Teacher Certification Scheme. (don’t forget…we were also gossipping…yeah! Long live gossip! Haha. THBT Gossip is one of the most important part of a debater, I’m pro).

Thursday, April 17, 2008
I thought it was the day of technical meeting. But well, it was just intended for opening ceremony. Hwaaa…I had just realized how big this competition was. Not too narsisstic when the committee claims that ALSA UI is the biggest English competition in Indonesia. It is.

Met with our LO, Agan. He was ex-student of SMA 3 and really cooperative, altho I don’t know whom he was when he was still being SMA 3 student.

The opening ceremony, held in Balai Sidang, was actually great. But well, just for footnote, there were too many unneeded speeches in the opening ceremony. Hey, what’s the point of telling the audiences that you’re married for the 2nd time at the present? xP

The opening ceremony ended at…before noon I think. Me, Ega, Marini, and the other SMA 3 team (Afifa, Aria, Gichie) plus St. Angela Team (William, Agus, Debora) wanted to have a sparring at first. But when we ended up at Wisma Makara and lied on comfortable beds and spoiled by air conditioner, that incentive changed T_T. Rather than spar each other, we took photos (being narsisstic…again and again…this sickness x) , exchanged gossip (again and agaaaaiiiinnn), watched TV… I had a small talk about blog and law enforcement with Aria and Agus but after that no serious talk happened again. (I was “distracted” by SMSes from my crush, though xP).

Went back ‘home’ at 13.00. Brainstorm with Ega and Marini (filled with some unimportant talks at YM) and ended our day with a hope and pray that we’d be at our best the next day.

Friday, April 18, 2008
The first day of competition! Yeah!! Gathered at Auditorium Djokosoetomo. Almost every seat was fulfilled. Lil’ lil’ girl in a big big world. Felt a feeling that you only feel when you start your first day of debating.

First opponent, Santa Ursula Jakarta. Several gossip came to our ears that they were really good and Canisius spars with them. But we tried to ease that fear (in my mind was : those who are good is the level of Uphie and Masyhur. Wahahaha. It was effective, though).

It was a flip-stance debate, but we tried to stick to our real stance. Almost no clash, we were afraid that we were gonna lose,,coz we were on the negative side whose job is to clash with the affirmative. But then again….

WON! Split decision 2 to 1. First adjudicator (adj) gave the winning to them (margin 1). The chair adj gave it to us (margin 1). The 3rd adj…margin 7.5 to us! Hahaha…thank God. (btw, Ega and Marini said that the chair adj was good-looking…but I didn’t think he was, at least at first. He seemed more attractive at the last day for me ^_^).

That was the only debate for the first day. SMA 3 B won too. Watched Varsity debate between ITB B (Elfa, Tyson, Pandu) and UNILA. My alliances, ITB, won xP

Went back home with a glimmer of hope.

Saturday, April 19, 2008
2nd day of debating.
SUCKS. Haaah. 2 rounds. Both lost.
2nd in tabulation, had to face Canisius A. Altho we were the government side and the motion was THW Limit Professional Work Force Migrating From Developing Countries, we lost. Aaaarrrggghhh. I’ve long wanted to beat Canisius since my first loss in ALSA UNPAD! Huhuuu. But well, I have to say that every debate with Canisius Team is always fun. ^_^
Boby, Stef, William! Someday you’ll feel my revenge. Haha. Just kidding guys, you’re nice. Well, revenge in debate is not revenge in the real world.

After that, hmm. Top of the 1VP-ers. Next opponent…WSDC (World School Debating Championship) A. Dennys, Grace, and Dimas. Impromptu motion. Nyaahaa. THW Give Quota For Ethnic Minorities in Parliament. Halah. I didn’t even know the issue, Marini hadn’t read much about Malaysia although it was her job, and Ega tried to be calm but still frantic.

I had the WORST casebuild ever in my life! Ega couldn’t concentrate, and couldn’t ‘stimulate’ me and Marini to think as usual. Marini tried to bring this case to Malaysia but then again no further explanation. After a bit this and that (freaking Opera Mini!) we decided to bring the case to UNITED KINGDOM. Okay, it was a TOTAL DISASTER. Blah. In addition to all of this, I didn’t have the same perception as Ega. I thought it was A, and when I delivered A in my speech, Ega blamed me because she and Marini had been thinking about B. Sh*t! I was always synchronized each other with my teammates! Hell!

While remembering every little oath that I took about “no crying thingy”, I tried to be strong. Hmm, personally I think maybe I can beat them…in some better occasions (not to mention I had my worst there). But who knows…

Yeah…as predicted, lost. Aaaarrrrgggghhhhh. Lost with 4 margin. Ended up the day with some curses BUT not tears. Tried to be strong. When we got home we promised to do our best the next day. Coz what else could we do? We HAD TO win. Cleansweep for the next day!

*btw, ITB A lost twice too that day. ITB B had a blaze of glory.

Sunday, April 20, 2008
Yeah well. WE COULD NOT LOSE. NO WAY WE COULD LOSE.
We really had a BIG pressure…well if we lost just once that day, we couldn’t go to the next round. We couldn’t break, and WE DIDN’T WANT THAT.

Again, top of the 1-VP-ers. First opponent, SMAK 3 BPK Penabur Jakarta B. Their first speaker’s face was so like me in many ways (but I have to say that I’m pretty much sweeter, ahahah. At least I’m friendly to new people, she wasn’t). THBT Wikipedia Should Weed Out Trivial Entries. We were…negative. Yeah! Why the hell should Wikipedia weed out trivial entries, heh? The definition brought up by that so-called “my twin sister” was really funny. Trivial entries: something that should not be in encyclopedia, because what should be in encyclopedia is only SCIENTIFICAL RESEARCH THAT HAS BEEN PROVEN SCIENTIFICALLY. Hey, even scientists themselves have different opinion and we can’t be sure where the truth is!

Well, we took that definition to our advantage, of course. Asking continously about “the limitation of right and wrong” made everything good for us. Won with 4 point something margins, and the best speaker(s) were THE THREE OF US. HAHAHA. The most memorable part of the debate, well: Debating about whether or not NARUTO is in wikipedia! Ahahaha! Hey FYI, I saved every little thing about Naruto that I found in Wikipedia. Even I knew that Itachi died in Sasuke’s hands because of Wikipedia! HUAHAHA.

Nah, this is the toughest part. After smiled and laughed because of the existence of Naruto in a “scientifically proven encyclopedia”, now we really had to win.

Once again, we were the top of the 2-VP-ers (always became the top of the losers, eh?). Had to face…SMAN 1 Depok. Somebody said that the third speaker was bitchy. Ah, I thought, he couldn’t’ve been bitchier than Dimas, rite? Ahahah, I’m used to weird species, don’t worry (sorry Dimas, this is not intended to mock you. Eheheh).

Well, the motion was THW Disarm Its Citizens. Ah, I remembered the first time Uphie came to SMA 3 and began coaching…trial version it was…that beautiful (hehehe sorry) skinny man with green shirt, tried to make us understand about THW Abolish The Constitutional Right To Bear Arms and he said it was one of AUDC’s motion…

Enough flashbacking. Huhu, how nice he was when he began coaching. No heartless at all. But as time went by… T_T

So thanks to “The Holy Bible” of Pros and Cons: A Debater’s Handbook and digging up the old memories about Uphie, we successfully brought the case to USA and the negative seemed didn’t expect us to bring it to USA. But they were good. Eventually we beat them in the end, and, waow.

The atmosphere of Auditorium Djokosoetomo was quite unfriendly. Everybody was waiting for their names to be displayed on the big screen as the Octofinalists. I was quite confident that my team would be one, coz even if we had only 3 VPs but our team score was high. At the end of the day, yes, we launched to Octofinal! With THE HIGHEST TEAM SCORE OF ALL! HOORAY!

That’s all for Part 1. Next will be the 2nd part: Knock-Out Rounds. ^_^