1. My parents for having me ofc, taking care of me, teaching me, loving me and ofc driving me back and forth to and from tournaments and for picking me up everyday after school after a two hour long club meeting so I can get home fast enough to finish my homework. Also, considering I'm a Chinese girl who happens to be born during the time the one child policy was enacted, I sure as hell am glad they didn't ditch me at an orphanage somewhere and am extremely thankful for them putting up with me for so long.
2. My little sister who always brings light and happiness into my workaholic lifestyle and helping me relax after a stressful tournament. I'm also thankful for her as she is the reason I try so hard to succeed - all the work I do and the end goal for my life I have in mind is for her.
3. Food, shelter, water, medicine, furniture, a bed, clothes (especially my debate suit), and WiFi and my laptop for allowing me to research MUN topics and brush up on background issues to use in debate. Also, keep in mind the stuff i just listed aren't available to more than two thirds of the world population.
4. My school - I owe everything to my school. All the clubs they offer, all the fantastic role models who have inspired me to achieve beyond my wildest dreams before... all that is accredited to my beautiful, wonderful, amazing and talented school and all the teachers and students i have grown to love.
5. All my clubs. I'm so thankful that I'm very involved in the extracurricular activity at school and in being a part of a large variety of clubs - it has allowed me to meet and make friends with such a large variety of people and to explore so many skills that i wouldn't have developed otherwise if I didn't join the clubs I did.
6. Debate - when I was in elementary school and early grade nine, i had next to no friends literally. I guess it was because of how different or weird I was compared to the other kids (I liked arguing and was rather aggressive for a girl, preferring to be results oriented in school work and academics instead of considering other people's feelings thus earning me a lot of nicknames like "know it all" or "nerd" or "loner". The whole clique thing that girls did in elementary school didn't work for me at all since I butted heads constantly with the Queen Bees - this situation only worsened in grades 7 and 8 when the idea of cliques is reinforced further with all the girls in a particular clique wearing a particular brand of clothing like Abercrombie and Fitch - a brand I was then unable to afford, thus making me the outcast in their eyes since i never fit in. Now, looking back, I'm actually astonished at how brutal and shallow kids are - whoever says children are like little angels is utterly wrong or fooled - children are even more vicious than adults considering their still dominant id and lack of self restraint). So yeah, I entered high school with practically no friends and was basically friendless and hopeless in ever figuring the complex matter of interpersonal relations until i joined debate club and found a group of people like me - intellectual, argumentative and passionate at public speaking. That's when I realized; there is a place for me in the world - I can excel by letting my true self forward - I no longer have to be afraid that every time I open my mouth, I'll be criticised for being me, that people will ostracize me for being different. Debate truly saved me.
It saved me in another way too - I'll admit that I was quite depressed at the time and also obsessive compulsive (I had to always flip my book pages the exact same way and repeat if there was any error, the same recurring thoughts of terrifying scenarios that could befall upon me and my family running through my mind continuously, causing me to always analyse why i had thoght that thought and to repeat the arguments for dissuading me that the thoughts had meaning). I was quite emotionally unhealthy at the time and struggling with a whole bunch of issues - the preteen years of 11 - 13 were tough, long story short.
And all that changed when I got into debate and the schoolwork level in school rose up. My ocd before (my parents knew it existed and never took me to a psychologist due to the stigma against mental illness and the fact that they were scared I would be put on meds. However it was pretty obvious I had it and it was pretty severe, after checking the symptoms on a variety of mental health websites, it was confirmed that I definitely had it) had come through due to lack of busyness - as per the saying "An Idle Mind is the Devil's Workshop". Once I was able to put my overactive mind to good use through something challenging enough like debate, my OCD level dropped dramatically and to this day, I haven't suffered an OCD attack to the level like the ones I used to have back in middle school.
If my depression had gone on and OCD had not subsided and if I didn't join Debate Club and met people I connected with and made friends that didn't make me feel like such a loser, I actually don't think I would be alive today. Had my depression and OCD continued on throughout high school and had the social bullying from middle school extended into my high school career (since the same people in middle school are in my high school and some still continue to be my classmates to this day - for a matter of fact, I've forgiven them but haven't trusted them again) without my protective bubble of the debate family supporting me, I think there was actually a high possibility of me becoming just another statistic for teenage suicide.
So for that, I'm eternally grateful for debate for saving my life.
6. On a lighter note, I'm really thankful for my friends and debate family as well as for my MUN family for being with me through thick and thin and for all the amazing memories made. There were really crazy moments yeah like at debate parties (less nerdy than you think) and at overnight tournaments (especially the ones without teacher supervision in which the debaters just go WILD) and really sweet moments too and despite all the drama that goes on there, I love them all.
7. My debate and Model UN binders (cue Mitt Romney's "binders full of women" comment!)
8. Freedom of internet - thank goodness this isn't China with all the web censoring or I'd never be able to get my research for debate club done. Actually, this blessing that is freedom of internet and net neutrality might not last long unless we do something about it... more info here http://www.forbes.com/sites/frankminiter/2014/09/18/limbaugh-is-right-net-neutrality-is-an-attack-on-free-speech-so-why-is-comcast-for-it/
9. My life :) after countless hours of research for Model UN position papers and prepping for resolutions on world issues for debate, I truly see how blessed my life is in comparison to so many of others. We (at least probably most of you who read this page) are living the life of paradise in comparison to the lives of billions of others around the world. There are wars raging in the Middle East, children too scared to go to sleep because they fear not waking up next morning, famines abounding and dehydration killing in Africa. There are vast slaughters in the Central African Republic right now, people dying from the fighting between the rebels and the government in Syria, women and girls terrorised out of school and the public in so many other countries. ISIS is rearing it's ugly head and mindlessly massacering thousands, videotaping its gruesome atrocities. Ebola is fraught in Africa and rapidly spreading, people are terrified that they and their loved ones would be the next victims, and the disease just keeps spreading. Girls are sold into sexual slavery all over the world, used and abused just because they have two X chromosomes, they are neglected, left to die, killed off as babies, uneducated, treated as chattel and demeaned simply for being born. There are all these problems in the world and IT. IS. NOT. RIGHT.
2. My little sister who always brings light and happiness into my workaholic lifestyle and helping me relax after a stressful tournament. I'm also thankful for her as she is the reason I try so hard to succeed - all the work I do and the end goal for my life I have in mind is for her.
3. Food, shelter, water, medicine, furniture, a bed, clothes (especially my debate suit), and WiFi and my laptop for allowing me to research MUN topics and brush up on background issues to use in debate. Also, keep in mind the stuff i just listed aren't available to more than two thirds of the world population.
4. My school - I owe everything to my school. All the clubs they offer, all the fantastic role models who have inspired me to achieve beyond my wildest dreams before... all that is accredited to my beautiful, wonderful, amazing and talented school and all the teachers and students i have grown to love.
5. All my clubs. I'm so thankful that I'm very involved in the extracurricular activity at school and in being a part of a large variety of clubs - it has allowed me to meet and make friends with such a large variety of people and to explore so many skills that i wouldn't have developed otherwise if I didn't join the clubs I did.
6. Debate - when I was in elementary school and early grade nine, i had next to no friends literally. I guess it was because of how different or weird I was compared to the other kids (I liked arguing and was rather aggressive for a girl, preferring to be results oriented in school work and academics instead of considering other people's feelings thus earning me a lot of nicknames like "know it all" or "nerd" or "loner". The whole clique thing that girls did in elementary school didn't work for me at all since I butted heads constantly with the Queen Bees - this situation only worsened in grades 7 and 8 when the idea of cliques is reinforced further with all the girls in a particular clique wearing a particular brand of clothing like Abercrombie and Fitch - a brand I was then unable to afford, thus making me the outcast in their eyes since i never fit in. Now, looking back, I'm actually astonished at how brutal and shallow kids are - whoever says children are like little angels is utterly wrong or fooled - children are even more vicious than adults considering their still dominant id and lack of self restraint). So yeah, I entered high school with practically no friends and was basically friendless and hopeless in ever figuring the complex matter of interpersonal relations until i joined debate club and found a group of people like me - intellectual, argumentative and passionate at public speaking. That's when I realized; there is a place for me in the world - I can excel by letting my true self forward - I no longer have to be afraid that every time I open my mouth, I'll be criticised for being me, that people will ostracize me for being different. Debate truly saved me.
It saved me in another way too - I'll admit that I was quite depressed at the time and also obsessive compulsive (I had to always flip my book pages the exact same way and repeat if there was any error, the same recurring thoughts of terrifying scenarios that could befall upon me and my family running through my mind continuously, causing me to always analyse why i had thoght that thought and to repeat the arguments for dissuading me that the thoughts had meaning). I was quite emotionally unhealthy at the time and struggling with a whole bunch of issues - the preteen years of 11 - 13 were tough, long story short.
And all that changed when I got into debate and the schoolwork level in school rose up. My ocd before (my parents knew it existed and never took me to a psychologist due to the stigma against mental illness and the fact that they were scared I would be put on meds. However it was pretty obvious I had it and it was pretty severe, after checking the symptoms on a variety of mental health websites, it was confirmed that I definitely had it) had come through due to lack of busyness - as per the saying "An Idle Mind is the Devil's Workshop". Once I was able to put my overactive mind to good use through something challenging enough like debate, my OCD level dropped dramatically and to this day, I haven't suffered an OCD attack to the level like the ones I used to have back in middle school.
If my depression had gone on and OCD had not subsided and if I didn't join Debate Club and met people I connected with and made friends that didn't make me feel like such a loser, I actually don't think I would be alive today. Had my depression and OCD continued on throughout high school and had the social bullying from middle school extended into my high school career (since the same people in middle school are in my high school and some still continue to be my classmates to this day - for a matter of fact, I've forgiven them but haven't trusted them again) without my protective bubble of the debate family supporting me, I think there was actually a high possibility of me becoming just another statistic for teenage suicide.
So for that, I'm eternally grateful for debate for saving my life.
6. On a lighter note, I'm really thankful for my friends and debate family as well as for my MUN family for being with me through thick and thin and for all the amazing memories made. There were really crazy moments yeah like at debate parties (less nerdy than you think) and at overnight tournaments (especially the ones without teacher supervision in which the debaters just go WILD) and really sweet moments too and despite all the drama that goes on there, I love them all.
7. My debate and Model UN binders (cue Mitt Romney's "binders full of women" comment!)
8. Freedom of internet - thank goodness this isn't China with all the web censoring or I'd never be able to get my research for debate club done. Actually, this blessing that is freedom of internet and net neutrality might not last long unless we do something about it... more info here http://www.forbes.com/sites/frankminiter/2014/09/18/limbaugh-is-right-net-neutrality-is-an-attack-on-free-speech-so-why-is-comcast-for-it/
9. My life :) after countless hours of research for Model UN position papers and prepping for resolutions on world issues for debate, I truly see how blessed my life is in comparison to so many of others. We (at least probably most of you who read this page) are living the life of paradise in comparison to the lives of billions of others around the world. There are wars raging in the Middle East, children too scared to go to sleep because they fear not waking up next morning, famines abounding and dehydration killing in Africa. There are vast slaughters in the Central African Republic right now, people dying from the fighting between the rebels and the government in Syria, women and girls terrorised out of school and the public in so many other countries. ISIS is rearing it's ugly head and mindlessly massacering thousands, videotaping its gruesome atrocities. Ebola is fraught in Africa and rapidly spreading, people are terrified that they and their loved ones would be the next victims, and the disease just keeps spreading. Girls are sold into sexual slavery all over the world, used and abused just because they have two X chromosomes, they are neglected, left to die, killed off as babies, uneducated, treated as chattel and demeaned simply for being born. There are all these problems in the world and IT. IS. NOT. RIGHT.
So that's why, as a citizen of am Old Core country, I'm grateful for my life, my opportunities and everything that I have. I'm grateful for both my problems and my achievements because I'm glad to have these particular problems and achievements instead of having much bigger problems and smaller achievements if I was one of the havenots.
It's purely through the lottery of birth that we are born privileged today - let's not forget to be thankful for everything given to us. :)
It's purely through the lottery of birth that we are born privileged today - let's not forget to be thankful for everything given to us. :)
Happy thanksgiving guys!
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