Brennan Morris
Finally, on the last day of Harvard (omitting the travel on Tuesday), we had some time to relax a little bit. The Public Forum students went on to watch the PF semi final rounds and the PF final round. The Speech students had time to get work done on the internet and visit the Harvard Bookstore. We had a lot of fun that day. Then, later on around 5:00 pm, we went to have dinner at Grafton Street, which is a very nice restaurant right off of the Harvard Campus. We enjoyed a nice meal and conversed about our amazing experience at the tournament. There was a lot of joy and general light heartedness at the meal. That night we had fun relaxing and packing up for travel the next day.
FGLDS President
Harvard, it’s day three and the first day of competition. We woke up bright and early at 6:00 am, went through our basic hygienic motions (I hope), got dressed, and headed to the bus. All the while eating breakfast between said actions. Once we were on our way to the Harvard campus, the Public Forum students began to check out their cases and talk amongst themselves about what they could do to win the day. The Orators went over their brand new lines and there were a handful of jokes told to keep up the good mood. When we arrived at the campus, we all unloaded the bus and shuffled our way through the crowds to double check our postings. When everyone was sure of their rooms and we had all acquired our flow-pads and water bottles, the PF students went off to their rounds while the Orators and Extempers awaited their rounds to begin about an hour later.
Once our rounds had gone off, there was a great relief in having finally begun the competition part of the tournament. After the round, we convened as a team to discuss how our rounds went and to grab a bite to eat. The Public Forum students discussed their arguments and how the rounds took place, while the Speech kids had a few hours to catch their breath before their next round. Many people exclaimed: “Wow, we have a lot of time before our next round.” Because of this, most speech kids had plenty of time to reunite with friends from past tournaments, and students who went to GMIF, a summer speech program (Gigi Baughman, Tyler Solley, Martha Galewski, and Brennan Morris) were able to catch up with a tight knit group from the camp this past summer. Finally, the last rounds of day one went off, and after that we met up at the bus. We went out to dinner to replenish ourselves after a long day of hard work. Once we had returned to the hotel (read Air Force Base), we all took a moment to relax, before finally going to bed.
The next day, we repeated our basic beginnings and headed out again for the Harvard campus. This day would include the rest of PF preliminary rounds, two more OO pre-lims, plus OO Octas and Quarters, Extemp’s fourth pre-lim, and the same out rounds. The day started out strong as all the orators were reporting a good third round, and the PF kids were saying the same. We all continued through our next rounds, getting food when applicable and moving strong through our competition. Before we knew it, it was time for Extemp to post Octafinals. As we all hoped he would, Brennan Morris broke to Octas, and later that day, to Quarters in Extemp. Then there was OO. Tyler Solley, Martha Galewski, and Brennan, all broke to Octas in OO. In the late evening, Public Forum broke to Triple Octafinals, and due to stiff competition, none of our PF teams broke. However, seeing as they are all first year PF teams at one of the top 5 hardest tournaments of the year, it was definitely not a loss. Most of our teams had a 3-3 record, so they got pretty close. Overall it was a rather successful tournament as far as competition goes.
Finally, on the last day of Harvard (omitting the travel on Tuesday), we had some time to relax a little bit. The Public Forum students went on to watch the PF semi final rounds and the PF final round. The Speech students had time to get work done on the internet and visit the Harvard Bookstore. We had a lot of fun that day. Then, later on around 5:00 pm, we went to have dinner at Grafton Street, which is a very nice restaurant right off of the Harvard Campus. We enjoyed a nice meal and conversed about our amazing experience at the tournament. There was a lot of joy and general light heartedness at the meal. That night we had fun relaxing and packing up for travel the next day.
In the end, Harvard was a great experience. We had a ton of fun and we were very successful as a whole. The team truly came out of this tournament closer than we had ever been before. We learned that by working together, we could make a tournament that was extremely close to not happening, happen in a fashion that was nonpareil to any other team in the nation. It was an amazing experience that I believe we will all remember for years to come.
Pictures available at: http://pbase.com/fglds
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