My Amateur Speech

0830 hours on Sunday, 22nd April 2012 at Pusat Pemulihan Penagihan Narkotik (PUSPEN), Papar.

The Master of Ceremony announced. I may now invite Candidate A25 to deliver her speech. *hands clapped. I stood up and I went to the designated spot. In front of me, there were 15 other candidates, 4 panel Judges, the committee members and a good number of audience. I was NERVOUS to the MAX.

"Thank you very much Mr Chairperson..

To the well respected Judges, the Committee Members and members of the floor - Happy Morning and Happy Sunday. I am glad to meet you all again this morning and I hope you all had a good rest last night *I smiled but still feeling nervous.

Without further much ado, my name is Sylvrina and I would be speaking about an environmental issue - on how to conserve it *I smiled again , and this time my nervousness is decreasing, gradually, though.

Ladies and gentlemen..

There are many signs of environmental degradation which includes the global warming, thinning of ozone layers, the unpredictable climate changes and pollutions - both air and water. And it gets even worse when our water source is filled with toxic substances. Who to blame?? Is it the animal? Is it the act of God? NO. It's YOU and I, the irresponsible human beings on earth. Therefore, steps must be taken to mitigate such impacts. It is surely about educating our ownselves, the younger generations and the public.

In Malaysia, we have heard and we have been practising the 3R Concept to conserve our Mother Nature. 1st R - Reduce, means we decrease the use of the items. 2nd R- Reuse, to use the same thing over and over again. And the 3rd R is Recycle which is the reproduction of the items.

Reduce. Undeniably, we can never eliminate the use of plastics - be it the plastic bags, the plastic bottles and so on. But, we can actually decrease the use of those items- simply because they are non-biodegradable to the environment. It takes a thousand of years to demolish them.

Reuse. I am sure each and everyone of us here have ever bought foods outside and bring them home. When you do that in the future, bring your own containers from your home. Use them again and again. Try not to let the restaurant workers or the Owner to "offer" you the polystyrene. Do not be ashamed but be proud instead.

Recycle. Ladies and gentlemen, as we aged from day to day, I am sure we have tonnes of used books, magazines, newspapers and maybe A4 papers. Do not just dump them into your trash bin but go and throw them into the designated Recycle bins. Why? So that the authorities could come and collect them, and do some reproductions. *Bell rung. At this time, I hit the 4th minute. I have another 1 minute to wrap my speech.

Apart from that, disposal of waste should be done at proper waste sites. In Kota Kinabalu, we have one in Kayu Madang, Telipok. "Gotong-royong" should be done regularly to clean up the environment they live in.

Thus, in a nutshell, to recap my topic for the day, it is very important for everyone to really look into this matter. The responsible of conserving our Mother Nature does not lie on your shoulders only, but it is actually EVERYONE. The government, the public sectors, the private sectors, and EVERYONE. Last but not least, LET US NOT TURN OUR EARTH INTO A DUSTBIN.

Thank You Very Much.. ."