"If it doesn't CHALLENGE you, it doesn't CHANGE you" -- Anonymous
In the following month after club speech contest, I went to the area level. The difference was simply due to the contenders, in which I had to compete with other contestants from other clubs in Area I-4. Their speeches were exemplary good, they spoke clearly and performed confidently. The contest rules applied the same like ones in club contest, the speech time is limited for 5-7 minutes for each contestants, which I was pretty sure my speech would last only for 6 minutes. The feeling was much the same like last one, butterflies came flying in my mind, but I managed to relax a bit. I had nothing to lose, in fact, I enjoyed every minute of it. There were numbers of audience seated before speaking stage, it was full house. I drank water and glanced to the audience several times before my speech turn. I tried to recognize new faces, but failed to recall names. I just hoped that my speech won't bore anyone. I prepared new speech topic, not about durian tree, but a story I once posted here. I made several revisions to make it more interesting to hear, but the original idea stays the same. I tried not to laugh during speech, at least not to make myself look awkward. My speech was deliberately composed to entertain and the challenge was not to laugh to own jokes J
In my speech turn, I started with smooth opening, the audience laughed which ease me to take short pauses, to make my speech even more dramatic. Until I noticed a wince from audience face. Oh no! It must be my high pitch tone, I lost control in managing vocal variety! Each time I got excited and wanted to speak louder, my voice become squeaky. At that very moment, I realized that speaking is similar to marathon. We can run fast in the beginning, but say after 5 kilometers, we run out of breath and the running speed gets slower. So is speaking, I could speak fluently in the first 3 minutes, but after that I couldn't help to stutter and couldn't afford to make impressive closing. After speech, I sat back exhausted, wishing I could have done better than this.
Long story short, surprisingly I got 2nd place! The first winner goes to contestant from other club whom I salute his performance. He is first timer, a new ace in club area, who is proceeded to division level contest. I went home with trophy I had no idea where to place it, but I know exactly where to put lessons learned and change myself into better speaker.
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| Contest time |
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| Hall of fame |
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| Certificate & a nice trophy |
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