UT Mara No Frills Tournament

Some one-day tournament for those who are interested.
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Dear People,

The tournament would be held on the 19th of February 2005.

We encourage as much participation as possible. Grab this chance to send in as many teams as humanly possible. Good development platform for junior-senior combination. Composite teams are more than welcome.

For institutions/individuals coming from Klang Valley please be in UiTM Shah Alam by 0915hrs. Runners would be at main guard post to guide you to the venue. Attached together with the e-mail are UTMARA campus map and routes to UTMARA Shah Alam.

For teams coming from far south and far north (that includes teams from Thailand and Singapore) we need your reply no later than 31st January 2005 in order for us to sort logistic arrangement.

Pre-packed breakfast and lunch, bottled mineral water and canned drinks would be available for purchase throughout tournament.

Tournament Schedule
0930hrs - Common briefing and Roll Call
0945hrs - Release motion round 1
1130hrs - Release motion round 2
1300hrs - Lunch break
1400hrs - Release motion round 3
1600hrs - Announcement for teams breaking to final
1615hrs - Release motion for final
1745hrs - Final results
1800hrs - Tournament end

Please confirm your institution participation by sending details to sharoffs@yahoo.com as such:

- Institutions
- Institutions Rep (Name, Contact number and e-mail)
- Number of teams and adjudicator
- Accommodation (on Friday night and Saturday night)
- Transportation (Arrival details if any)

See you in Shah Alam!

Cheers,
Shamaredza Sharoff
Convenor
+6012 358 4790

All-Asians

The dates and website for registration for the All-Asians are out. Do check out for the link on the left. I'm a bit curious, though - wasn't the Chief Adjudicator supposed to be Chandran?

Dare to Dream

I've placed up some new links on the left for upcoming tournaments. The most juicy one has got to be the Europeans, but it being held in Cork and all, is a little too expensive for me. Sigh. Bloody debating tournaments in Europe.

Interestingly, I think this was the tournament that began the run of the Singapore team that reached the Worlds Final.

Being jobless and bored stiff out of my mind (and not to forget that I'm procrastinating from doing real work), it's nice to see that on Flynn's site, the weird ranking system he uses for universities places SMU in at 41. That's not too shabby for 3 years of Worlds.

Finally, the theme for Westers 2005 (see left) is "Dare to Dream". That's Renhua's favourite mantra, wonder what he would have to say about this?

Banks

Hardly the most creative titling of a blog entry but then, creativity isn't my forte.

On the debating front, we've had a number of guests over the last 2 days, and it's actually quite interesting. Well, actually it's been some rather nice sessions. We've had guests on both debating and adjudicating fronts and besides the positive learning experiences, it also is quite amusing to see the level of bad humour that circulates around in the Singapore debating scene.

Incidentally, it's almost a given that just about half the world wants to work in a bank. We've had NMK and Amit, and we've got Divya and Sushil wanting to work in a bank. Then there's half of the SMU Debating squad, of course. And if you go generations back there's Rahul Ghosh and Mirza (if I'm not wrong). What's with debaters and banks?!

Of Worlds and NUS Exhibition Debates

Despite the fact that I'm on fairly decent terms with a number of debaters from the other two local institutions, I can't claim to have that much interaction with them outside of debate tournaments. So it was really a rather pleasant surprise to hang out with a whole bunch of them today (albeit for debating purposes).

Now, since most of these peeps are likely to be surfers of this weblog, it would be particularly impolite to start slamming them here (not that I really do care - being politically incorrect is a debating thing). But oddly enough, despite gathering a bunch of people with potentially a huge pool of idiosyncrasies, the 'meet-up session' (in preparation for an exhibition debate - can you believe me that yours truly is supposed to set an example for younger debaters?) turned out quite brilliant, surprisingly - it had the usual recipe for a fun time: a dash of intellectual talk, lots of insults, jibes, some semblance of humour and Shaun speaking more Econs than I could understand.

Just an odd observation - it seems that NTU debaters embrace Singlish much more readily than SMU debaters. Which reminds me, I was supposed to talk to people about that upcoming article for the ST. Shit.

Rotterdam Open

I've pasted a link on the left for the Rotterdam Open. It's in the BP style, and to be quite honest, with a whole term of Asians coming up, I'm really going to miss the dynamism that comes with BP debating. Not to diss Asians or Asian debating but it's just so much less fun.

Incidentally, Renhua, the mad Singaporean who speaks at 200 words per minute, suggested that if I ever start a bank/hedge fund and call it Song & Partners, my motto could be "The New S&P 500". It's true - you can take the Singaporean out of Singapore but you can't take the bad jokes out of him.

UT Mara Pre-Asians Tournament

As received on the All-Asians Mailing List.
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Greetings to All Asian Debaters,

As UM has yet to announce their final dates for The 12th All Asian, we think it is best to make this announcement now;

UTMARA Malaysia plan to host Pre-Asians Debating Championship on 12th -14th May 2005 (assuming UM All Asian would only begin on May 15th). It’s a great warm up session right before the 12th All Asian and furthermore UTMARA is just 30 minutes away from UM.

We promise you competent adjudication, 4 rounds of competitive debates, plenty of edible food, bottled water, decent accommodation, free transportation and our very own halal social!

A perfect BP detoxification program after MMU Worlds!

A great warm up on All Asian 3 on 3 format!

Vital details of the tournament are as such:

Adjudication
Chief Adjudicator – Suresh Gnasegarah (a.k.a. Tubby) from Multimedia Malacca

Rego fee
RM 30.00 per person* (flat rate apply across the board)
Rego would basically cover meals and drink on 13th and 14th
*debaters, adjudicators, observer

Accommodation
For those who’ll require accommodation, 2 options available;
A- Hotel UiTM (Run by UTMARA very own Tourism Faculty) for RM80.00 per night per room. (Double sharing basis, inclusive of breakfast)
B- Student residence for RM 15.00 per person for entire tournament.

Transportation
We would provide for gratis:
A- Airport and railway transfer from KLIA and KLSentral to UTMARA Shah Alam
B- Dedicated buses from KTM Komuter station Shah Alam to UTMARA campus on registration day
C- Transportation from UTMARA Shah Alam to Universiti Malaya on 15th May
D- Transportation from hotel to tournament venue

Schedule
12th May 2005 (Thursday)
1400-1800hrs – Registration

13th May 2005 (Friday)
0800hrs – Late registration
1000hrs – Round 1 starts
1200hrs – Lunch break
1315hrs – Round 2 starts
1515hrs – Round 3 starts
1730hrs - Dinner

14th May 2005 (Saturday)
0900hrs – Round 4
1200hrs – Lunch break
1300hrs – Breaking announcement Semi final
1330hrs – Semifinals begin
1530hrs – Final starts
1730hrs – Barbeque dinner and result announcement

15th May 2005
0900hrs – Check out
0930hrs – Depart to UM

We’ll put up more updates soon with regards to confirmation. Grab the chance by reschedule your institution arrival to 12th May and we’ll be happy to accommodate you!

Any inquiry, please direct them to preasians2005@yahoo.com
Or call me at +6012-3584790.

Kind regards,
Shamaredza Sharoff
Communication and registration
UTMARA Pre-Asians 2005 Debating Championship

I need a job

The title is rather self-explanatory, but tell me, does anybody know any school which needs coaching? Let's see now, I've, erm, reached the ESL semis? Lame, I know, but it IS some form of credentials...