A Dream Come True : State Champion Finally!

A long time ago, Chung Ling took the coveted state champion throphy, but that was a long time ago, and for a number of years, every effort by each year's debating team seemed futile. But not this year, this year, we have made history again for the second time. We have made it as state champion.

Words cannot begin to describe my feeling as I write this, remembering back to the first day when I joined the Chung Ling English Debate team. Our goal back then was simple, to take back what was ours rightfully, but for the past few years that goal seemed as far away as a cure for cancer. Our only consolation was having been the M1 district champions for the past 3 years.

This year, we have finally achieved what our predecessors have dreamnt off - the covted state champion throphy. We have endured tremendous hardship, presevered in times of desperation, and I can finally say this now: It was all worth it.

Yesterday, we were up against PFS. And we were totally unprepared. Call it lack of confidence, but we never expected ourselves to be in the finals. Though we secretly hoped for it, it was never within our grasp. But yesterday, all that changed as we prepared to create history. I still remember how late I stayed up the day before just to prepare the script, and how early in the morning that day we were all still rushing to complete our scripts. A scene of total chaos I may say.

We drew government, which was a side that we were not that prepared (which may surprise some) Why? Well, surprisingly, we found the oppostion side easier to tackle. The motion was "Advancement in Modern Technology Contributes to Teenagers' Moral Decay" We thought the oppostion had an equal, if not better chance at winning this. Most would have surely believed that this motion is a bit one-sided, depending on what you believe in.

The preparation during the quarantine was one of the most productive ones we've ever had. This was it, we thought, for glory or for nothing. We were dead serious, though we still couldn't help cracking some jokes. Chung Ling Kias, you know, already scripts not fully written and not fully prepared, still got the nerve to crack jokes. xD

All throughout the debate, I have to give credit to the PFS team for pressuring us. After all, that was what the opposition was supposed to do. I've got to say that Nicholas was the most aggressive of them all, with him POI-ing all the time. We were under attack from all sides and with a not-so-solid script, I personally found it hard to keep my cool and stance.

But we all remembered what our coach told us, which was to fall back to the very fundamental of the motion and our stance. We knew that we've manged to keep our cool before against the very agitated Jit Sin debaters, and we knew this time, we would be able to do it again. And so we kept our cool, stuck to the stance, not letting their relentless rebuttals and POIs waiver our confidence.

I unfortunately was bestowed upon the heavy responsibility of the doing the reply speech. And thankfully, I managed to keep my cool. It was not easy, but I managed to tear myself away from being absorbed to the concept of disagreeing just to be disagreeable, instead just sticking to our stance as adviced by our coach and reaffirming again and again about the fundamentals and our 3 points.

By the end of the debate, the most anti-climatic thing to happen had to be knowing that we'd have to wait 2 hours later for our results to be announced as there was still another pantun competition. Right then, I seriously did not know who would win. With a sense of uncertainty but knowing deep down that whatever result we would obtain later wouldn't matter as we had already done our best, we left the auditorium for some well deserved rest.

Yes, but well deserved rest, I meant sleep, and yes, in Methodist Boys' School's Canteen

In the end, after enduring through the long wait by reading the newspaper over and over again, sleeping, playing games on their handphones (Pokemon!) and watching ourselves debate in video, and also me having lunch....

...we finally headed to the hall where we treated with some performances which included a choir performance by MBS...

...and finally the results were announced. Here's the group pic:

To top it all, to my surprise, I was announced as the best speaker! Woah, that wasn't something I had expected at all. That's really the icing on top of the cake.

Benjamin, we have made you proud. We have finally brought back the state champion throphy, the one that you guys should had won 2 years ago. Mdm. Ang, thank you for all your training and effort, it all finally paid off today. And to our dear coach, Reuben, it's because of your recent trainings that we could finally clinch this. Too bad you couldn't be with us during the announcement to share our joy. Mdm. Choong, thank you for believing in us and letting us come out of class to practice. It was because of all those practices that we have improved so much. . And to our doubters, we have finally proven what most people didn't expect us to achieve, and to those who believed in us, I thank you.

This is a day that I'll never forget in my life, and I'm sure as I look back years from now, it'd be one of my cherished memories.

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