I still remember my first debate tournament. It was at a private Islamic school somewhere in downtown Pekanbaru. It were of Asian parliamentary format, which means that there are three debaters facing another three. It was held for two (or three?) straight days during school week, which means that all the student participating would miss classes back at school because there is no chance to going back, the tournament starts in the morning til afternoon. I was in my tenth grade of high school, a freshman. My teammates were a more experienced sophomore, and another (innocent) freshman.
I know nothing about debating by the last hours I stepped into the school. I wasn’t prepared. The sophomore who invited me told that all we need to do is arguing. We have no idea what the rules are, we have no freaking expectation who will we face and what we are going to debate. In my usual procrastinating style, I don’t even remember that I need to go to the tournament until someone from the English Club reminded me.
Suffice to say that it was a recipe to disaster.
I wasn’t really intimidated, though. The school where the tournament were held, I used to won an academic quiz there back when I was in junior high. I got some friends there, of course. The spectators weren’t really a problem for me.
But the biggest problem was myself. When I entered the debating chamber — you know, they always gather the debater at one special room for announcements after each rounds — , I completely freaked out. I can speak in front of a group of people, sure. But it should be a group of people I really know, I really understand. But delivering argument and persuasively convincing a judge — a stranger — to defeat argument of the opposition team — often completely strangers, too — ? Heck, no.
I reserved five minutes for myself to be freaking out. That’s it.
One lesson I learned from many, many years of participating in anything competitive, that it is okay to completely shocked or freaked out. You might be really nervous for your first competitive debate; heck, everyone are, at some point. You might think you will end up embarass yourself in front of the judge, in front of the strangers.
But the key is to control it. Give it a limited amount of time. I gave myself exactly five minutes to control my nerve whenever I need to face something huge, important, or possibly life-changing: first debate tournament; first interview as journalist for the school magazine; student exchange interview; even swimming. Five minutes is all you need. Then, you need to get over yourself. Like, really get over yourself.
The tournament was supposed to resemble a round-robin format, but I’m not quite sure of how things work at that time. The participants were from all over the city. There were team(s, they sent like three) from a neighbouring school who for last five years had excelled themselves from being one of the most excellent (and snobbish, to some extent) school in the city. There were team(s, again) from the school where all Pekanbaru’s bourgeoisie class gather with their (snobbish, to some extent) behaviours. One of them had represented the province for national debate competition.
Now I could barely breathe.
Lesson number two: if you can’t think, make up something.
Like really. Our first motions were really, really crazy. We got debate motions that sounds, at very least, like this:
THW allow construction of brothels at military bases
Like, WHAT?
Believe me, there is no debate prep guide that will prepare you for motions allowing construction of freaking brothels at freaking military installation. Believe me.
But boy, being a debater means that your mind must be prepared for the worst, for the craziest motion they will give you. Use your genius brain to think something. If you can’t, make it up. Seriously, make it up.
I don’t know whether it is a good idea to have brothels at military base. I don’t even know whether
military base should be an appropriate place to build a brothel. I seriously don’t know.
But if you don’t know, make it up. Come with something genius.
I began by lining out what should we define this. Is this brothel public or private-run? Why should military bases? Why not here, here, or here? Can we relate it with something that sounds more convincing? Sexual diseases, maybe? HIV outbreak? When it is time to present my argument, I sounded really like a WHO official presenting a world-class presentation to some European military on why should they build brothels at their offshore military bases. Seriously.
The point of being a (novice) debater is to be quick-witted. You cannot complain on the subject you’re going to be debate; often, moaning and complaining are the worst way to express dissatisfaction and protest. You’re going to complain in vain. Instead of complaining, why don’t you make something up with your genius brain?
And do y’all know what the final result was? We ended the journey at quarterfinals, kicking out two teams in process, and learnt the lesson of our lifetime.
Debating is easy. Just control your emotion. Just be quick-witted. Don’t complain. Use your brain. There is no need to be upset. Just enjoy yourself, and you’ll be fine.
23:57 PM, Indianapolis. Slowly being cold here.
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