During my high school period, both my team mates Fauzi and Umar joined NSDC National Level in Indonesia University, Jakarta. The other member was our junior named Fafa. All the club members helped raising donation because the school couldn't provide all that we needed. Fortunately we managed to raise some sponsorships. I saw those three went off and at that time in my mind I thought of how I also really wanted to go on national level competition.
With determination, guidance, and hard works; I was finally able to participate in national level debating competition. It started on 2011. The first event that I participated was National Polytechnic English Debating Competition or NPEDC. Quick note regarding NPEDC, it was an English debating competition held annually by Bakorma or Badan Koordinasi Mahasiswa. The participants were varsity students of polytechnic all around Indonesia. Back in 2011 was the 10th NPEDC. It was held in State Polytechnic of Sriwijaya, Palembang, South Sumatra.
Turned out, my college, State Polytechnic of Malang was the reigning champion of NPEDC for 8 times in a row! So the image was there and it was a little bit pressure for my team. About my team, I got teamed up with Fauzi and Adi. Our coach at that time was Mas Widey. He paired us in a team and trained us. We had weeks of intensive training. It was a lot of effort for all parties involved. My team was all in same grade. We were considered "newbies" for national event.
There were 5 of us who went to Palembang, my team plus one of our senior and one of our teacher or lecturer. We had one more lecturer who went but he didn't go together with the rest of us. I was the only girl in the group.
I shared the same experience of travelling by airplane with Fauzi and Adi. We were so giddy and excited to be in a plane for the first time in our lives ever. We took off from Surabaya to Jakarta for a transit then we flew from Jakarta to Palembang. We arrived in Palembang late at night so we missed the technical meeting conference.
The competition took a whole week and it ended with a very happy ending. We won first place! So awesome! 😄 We were adding our wins into 9 times in a row. I also ranked 5th on best speaker category. There were take turns trophy for NPEDC, I don't know since when. The trophy was tall, more than half of my height. We had to disperse the parts so that we could bring it with us. In hotel room, the night before the first day of competition we assembled the parts. But then, we got to bring back the trophy 'cause we won. LOL. We also got money price. It was 3 million rupiahs and we divided into 3 for me, Fauzi, and Adi,
In Palembang we didn't just competing but we also went relaxing and sightseeing. The governor of South Sumatra at that time invited all participants and companies to a dinner at the governor's house. We were served with huge buffet of wonderful meals and treated with great live music. We also went on a ship that sailed above Musi River and went under Ampera Bridge. We did that at night! So the view was really amazing.
To sum up the whole experience, it was EUPHORIC. As far as how English debating works, I will tell details on another posts.
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