YES, YES, YES!!! I won the Toastmasters' International Speech Contest at Division level! Finally!
All thanks to the cockroach.
It took me close to three days before the idea that I had won sank in. That explains why I did not blog about my success until now.
I. Am. Elated. Exhilarated. Euphoric.
It has been a long time coming, so please bear with me if I am in the mood to gloat. No, I shall not. But it is a victory which I cherished a lot.
In all the Toastmasters contests that I had participated in, I didn’t quite make it. I cleared club-level and even Area-level but always, I ended up either as the first runner-up or second runner-up at the Division-level contests.
I started participating in contests in 2009, a year after I joined Toastmasters. And I came close on a number of occasions:
- SEP 25, 2010: Second place (Division B Speech Evaluation contest)
- MAR 19, 2011: Second place (Division B Table Topics contest)
- MAR 30, 2011: Second place (Division G International Speech contest)
- OCT 21, 2012: Third place (Division G Humorous Speech contest)
- APR 06, 2013: Third place (Division B International Speech contest)
- OCT 05, 2013: Second place (Division P Humorous Speech contest)
My breakthrough came on Saturday. Like the cockroach in my speech, I did not surrender. Instead, I worked damn hard at it. Didn’t I say “what does not exterminate me, makes me stronger”? I am a survivor, after all.
And at last, I triumphed. I got FIRST PLACE in the Division G International Speech contest on March 29, 2014.
I am grateful to my BFF (Incidentally, that was my speech title, “My BFF”), the cockroach because it was the reason I won.
Next stop is Kuala Terengganu. District-level. And if I win it, the world stage is mine to conquer.
I shall dream a new dream. As Walt Disney said, “If you can dream it, you can do it”.
Hmmm, I wonder if cockroaches dream?
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