Undergraduate /
FEAR - Comm App short answer about extracurricular activities. (1000 maximum) [4]
*Please help me trim my essay. It is about 100 words too long. Need your help!!My face is turning pale, sweat is pouring like rain all over me and my body shivers in every limb and in my soul. All these are just some of the symptoms of the greatest fear that faced by all mankind far above the fear of death and disease. Reports and surveys show us that this fear is the number one of all global fears. Odds are that out of four, three will have it. What am I talking about? Not fear of spiders. Not fear of darkness. I am talking about fear of speaking in public. I have been battling it since I was young and I want to tell you about my battles with fear today.
Let's start with the reason of why I am afraid of speaking in public. My first public humiliation came during my singing performance when I was six; I froze for about 2 minutes and had to be escorted out of the stage. Kids are crueler than any other species of animal because they are just so brutally honest about anything which resulted in me hiding for weeks. Maybe that is the reason why I was so shy and had low self-esteem when I was young. Luckily things change soon after that.
One day, the English teacher asked our class to join a sketch competition in the school. All classes are required to participate in it. So, we reluctantly join it and my friend, Shah wrote the script and gave me a minor role. I actually was happy that I had a minor role with very little lines but I still screw up during practice. Somehow, I just cannot remember the line "What causes the anger of the rain god? There are no rains for months. "It was just 14 words and I still cannot memorize it. My friends just ask me to calm down and ask me to not be Wai Kin but be the village boy, Motahai and luckily I barely able to say those fourteen words during the competition. Surprisingly, we even won the whole thing and our class was asked to represent our schools to compete in a drama competition with other schools in the city. Since we are representing our school now, a advisor, Mrs.Zuriati was assigned to be our advisor. She gave us a lot of tips and tweaks the script a bit. She even gave me a bigger role and more lines. I wanted to leave the team because I afraid that my incompetence might cause the downfall of our school but thanks to the encouragement by my friends and my teacher, I stay in the team. So, in order to not disappoint them, I practice really hard in front of the mirror every night before I sleep and in addition to the practice I did with my team after school every day, my confidence grew as well.
Finally, it is the day of the competition, and we drew number one and was the first one to perform. This time is not like before, this is a more intense competition with representatives from other schools coming to win and not only to participate. When it is my turn to step up into the stage, I sense the eyes of the audience staring at me. Limbs began to shake, sweats begins to pour but I able to turn those fears into adrenaline and able to say and act my part perfectly. The audiences all laugh at my jokes and my acting. I left the stage feeling great and we all feel great because we felt we did the best we could and we won first place again. The feelings of victory this time felt different from before. I felt surprised during my first competition victory because I participate in the competition just for the sake of it but our victory in the competition between schools is even sweeter because we worked our ass off for it. Moreover, our school has never won a drama competition before and we are the first champions; we make history in our school. Our luck continues and we represent our city and won the state level competition too. So this is it, we have only one more competition to win and we could be the best in the country.
Our confidence was off the scale and we left the school on a bus to the airport with no fear in our eyes at all. Why shouldn't we be confident, we were champion of our state, Pahang? Unfortunately, shit happens. Despite we left early to the airport, we were caught in a traffic jam caused by a car accident. We reached at the airport late and had to rush in order for us not to miss the flight. We even left a luggage in the airport. That bag contains some of the costume and props that we were suppose to use in the competition. We had to make some replacement for the costumes and we did it poorly due to lack of time and equipment. Nevertheless, we did the best we could despite falling rock bottom and we believe our only way is up now. Next morning when we were on our way to the hall, we were stuck in a elevator minutes away from performing. Some of us began to be more nervous and one of my friend, Jay make a joke "Everyone stop breathing, maybe there is not enough oxygen later" Somehow, it calm our nerves and we giggled a bit. The elevator soon works and we are not feeling nervous anymore. It is like a rainbow after a heavy rain and we perform our act into perfection and gain a loud applause from the audience. So the moment of truth has finally arrived and the judges were to announce the top three. The second team and the third team winners have been announced. One spot left and only one more team will advance to the final round the next day. We were praying in our hearts with our fingers crossed. The judge took his sweet time said "The final team is P...P...Penang!" We were shocked and at first we thought it was Pahang, our state but it was Penang. Some of us were shocked, some cried and I just felt that I hit rock bottom.
In my dreams I hear again the applause of the crowds, the scolding from our advisor, Mrs Zuriati and the judge final words, Penang. I took that experience and became a better man. I still have fear before going up the stage to perform or giving a speech. But, I will always choose to face them now rather than running away anymore.
* So, what do you guys think? Just be honest and let it all out. :D 