:]

you.

if you stare at something long enough it starts to shrink. and then the lines blur and it's just this mass of colors. your eyes dry up and attempt to water. everything else moves in slow motion. you can see your chest rise and fall with every breath. you stop thinking. but only for a moment.

before it starts up again.

i don't understand. and now i just feel stupid.

Well here it is. My goodbye.

Allen Tran, UCIrvine; Candace Frazier: Simmons; Jessica Ayunani: Cerritoes; Joanne Yuan: Cal State Long Beach; Judy Park: Harvard; Kristen Bang: Emory; Mathangi Suresh: UCBerkeley; Michael Pham: UCBerkeley; Prema Rahman: Boston U; Sherrae Adams: Cal State Long Beach; and me: UCSan Diego.
Impressive, huh? Yup, these are our graduating Speech and Debate seniors. But getting here wasn’t easy. We’ve all had 24 hour days peppered with 2 hour naps, low test scores followed by high ones, or in some cases, even lower ones [COMP SCI], study sessions that waste at least 60% of the time but the 40% that is spent studying is all we needed anyway. But whatever’s been going on at school, Speech and Debate has pretty much always remained a constant. Practice every week, and a tournament at least once a month. Now, for you non-speech and debaters this might seem like all fun and games but trust me, it’s not. We all have spent too many hours on our Speech and Debate work. We’ve researched news articles, searched for scripts, and constructed boards through the middle of the night just so that we have a chance at competing at the level we’re expected to compete at. Oh and don’t get me wrong, Oxford’s team is the best. We may not be the most “united” in the way we dress [fullerton], or have debaters that appeal to all lay judges [northwood], but we do have the nicest [steffi], most innocent [Sophia], wildest [Ibrahim], loudest [prema hitting Katie with book], shortest [evan], and hottest [jessica, sherrae, me] team members OR SHOULD I SAY NINJAS [SHAINA]. And not to mention, the best coaches. But really we rock [rock].
Oh, and if you’re wondering about the boards, I figured that since I went to state three years with expository speeches, it would be my best bet for making this speech. Hence the random, yet effective, posters.
So first, we'll sign up for a lesson on our memories, next compete for the impacts the team has made on our lives, and finally win and collect our rewards.
Speech and Debate has always been a high priority. Though some always thought that it was too high of a priority, I’m glad I kept it up there. And I’m proud to say that I’m not alone in my priority order. Before our Sonora Tournament, our LD’ers [FLIP] were all up until 4 am on AIM arguing but working on our cases. We were all so delusional ,and everything, including jury nullifications, was funny. After all that, you would think that we’d have learned our lesson, but when State Quals came around, we were doing the same thing, except this time, it was not all online. We were are piled in my family room. But just because we weren’t at home, did not mean that we couldn’t stay up late. Almost everyone left around midnight but Prema and Kristen decided that they never wanted to leave. We all stayed up in my family room and they ended up having to sleepover. So we all finished our cases and studied for our gov test and then slept for 2 hours. Regardless of the few hours of sleep, that was one of my favorite speech and debate related nights that I’ll never forget.
I’ll never forget searching for donuts, cookies, cupcakes, and red velvets, people thinking Ibrahim and I are twins[FLIP], playing big booty and blocking other people, daring each other to do embarrassing and slightly inappropriate things[FLIP], Levin Luong beating Justin Pierce in an LD round, Mr. Marijuana sleeping in the hallway, our boys putting on make-up to look better, like some “united” clothing team, Daniel drinking the tea and Tiffany loving the sugar, Sherrae and I discovering dead bodies in college basements, and running through the rain in our heels.
I’ll never forget Steve pushing people under the bus, Ciera’s driving, AJ’s rants, Kathy bringing us taco bell, and Nancy’s southern drawl.
I put all of my events into perspective based off of Speech and Debate events. My math project is due the day of the Official Banquet, Prom’s the weekend after the Unofficial Banquet. Sherrae jokingly said that I’m not going to know when anything is after I graduate. That’s when I realized how pathetic I was.
Speech and Debate has been a huge part of my life and though I have sacrificed countless things to compete and do well at Speech and Debate, I don’t regret it.
I've learned how to speak coherently, think logically, eat quickly, argue aggressively, make weird noises, and love strangers.
I feel like I owe a series of thank yous.
Thank you AJ and Ciera for coaching all of us even when we clearly did not practice over the week or research articles. Thank you Kathy for deciding to coach the team; we all love you. Thank you Nancy for not getting fed up with us and spending your free time with us and loving us.
But mostly thank you mom [and dad]. [Mom,] I know I say that you like to put me down for your own weird enjoyment, but you’ve always given me the encouragement I needed. You’ve never said no to driving me to tournaments and practices, judging and working at Bingo when I’ve asked you to, or complained about never letting you see my pieces. But your support doesn’t stop at just Speech and Debate and I want to thank you for everything. I love you. [And to my dad. You really are the best person I know. Thank you for not saying no when I ask you to bring home checks with ridiculously high amounts of money as frequently as I ask you to. You are patient, kind, and honest. I love you.]
As for you all. Thank you for joining Speech and Debate, for practicing, competing, laughing, meeting Charlie (the jelly fish), throwing Ronald's phone everywhere, singing Korean songs, dealing with my email-frenzied phases, and taking a bajillion pictures. I can confidently say that this year, our team really did seem like a family. I love you all. And I’m going to miss you, way too much.

I like songs.

The kind that you hum without even knowing what it is or why you're humming it.

The kind that you've always known.

i hate you.

i'm not strong enough to make myself that weak.

25 more days.

i'm tired of the guilt.

i'm not doing anything wrong.

i feel the blame.
you don't say it

but you mean it.

stop.
stop.
it'll end.


fuck you.

for me. it happens all the time.

it's a quarter after one, i'm a little drunk and i need you now. and i don't know how i could do without. i just need you now.

we need a song.

time falls away

i found my golf ring. i didn't think a time would come when i would miss golf season. and all the screaming complaining asian girls.


All of my regret
Will wash away somehow
But I cannot forget
The way I feel right now.