5月27日下午，作为外文节固定项目的周恩来杯英语演讲比赛在一号楼六楼报告厅如期举行。高二以及高三的同学一同在现场感受了灵感火花之迸发与头脑思维之碰撞。

本次比赛的主题是“On The Edge Of Unknown”,在很大程度上是整个外文节的大主题“Beyond The Limits”的延伸。参加本次演讲比赛的八名高三选手分别为魏添歌、俞懿轩、朱佳仪、单煜清、顾云起、孙晨舒、李沐芷和虞佳丽。在选手们上台前，主持人分别播放了各位选手的介绍视频。这些片段有的严肃正经，有的诙谐幽默，不过都充分展现出了选手们的风采。在比赛过程中，选手们开动脑筋，充分发挥主观能动性，从不同角度切入命题，阐述观点。他们或在历史的长河中搜集真相，或从自身的经历中寻找灵感，与我们分享自己对未知的理解与感悟。

在临近尾声之时，高三大预班的王豫和陈俏文同学分别演绎了来自Joni Mitchell的《Both Sides Now》和来自Ariana Grande的《Just Look Up》。曲终之际，全场气氛热烈，掌声雷动。

最终俞懿轩和单煜清同学分别获得了男生组和女生组的演讲冠军。

时光太细，指缝总宽，一转眼中学生活即将画上句点，而一个全新的，也更加广阔的世界已在向我们招手。就像“极限之上”的未知一样，我们即将面临的未来也充满不确定性。在新世界的边缘，我们该如何做出选择，我们该以何种姿态面对的问题或许没有终极答案，不过就像选手们所传达出来的理念一样——多一份自信，多一份坦然，放手去寻吧！

                                                  （高三大预班 章施诺供稿）

On the Edge of Unknown

Good afternoon. My name is Jason.

About a month ago, I was editing this book, Future in Hand, which included the university application experiences of graduating students. It brought me back to the stressful days when I was still uncertain about my future college. I wasn’t on the edge of unknown, I was IN it. Then suddenly, I found the book kind of useless for everything is unknown in the coming year, because we never know whether the policy will change, and, oh no, there’s COVID-19.

Looking at the whole world, it has also been bothered the by uncertainties brought about by COVID-19. My studying tour to France was called off, Trump somehow got infected by the virus and loads of areas were locked down abruptly. As confirmed cases grows, economy downturns, there are countless people sitting in their home alone panicking for they don’t have a single idea about what will be happening tomorrow, or, to speak further, how their future will be.

I, as well as you, am one of them. There has been over 1000 times that I ask myself how my life will be without the virus. It seems that if the virus is eliminated, so will uncertainty. We would have had our school spring trip as planned and all of you would have much more club activities this semester. No more lining up for PCR tests and expresses can be delivered on time. We, as human beings, aspire to certainty. And the virus has seemingly deprived us from it.

But the question is, will our future be certain should there be no pandemic? Though sounding depressing, I want to say that the future will always remain unknown, even in decades without the virus.

In 1970, new undergraduates of Yale walked into the campus in which they would spend the coming four years. Though there wasn’t a virus called COVID-70, there were many movements all over the world and it was quite turbulent. They were students as we are now, they stood on the edge of unknown as we do now, and they were worried as we are now, but they became determined after graduation, and facing their future, they were not afraid. So why?

Part of the answer has been given in the principal speech of Yale in 1970, in which he told the students to do what they are supposed to do at the present moment. This did help them leave the problem out temporarily, but they could still be worried whenever they dug deeper into it. The moment their worries were finally dispersed came when they realized that they were not the only one being concerned about the unknown future. There is a prevalent empathy and universal connection between their fellow schoolmates, and even humankind, so everyone was facing the future together.

I’ve never witnessed the empathy and connection more closely than in the season of university application. In the days full of struggle and confusion, I had my teachers and friends, and ‘Future in Hand’, which included advices directing my way, stories calling my resonance, and lessons keeping me aware. Furthermore, the empathy and connection can go beyond time and space, reminding us that although we can be separated by time or space, sometimes both, we are not struggling alone—Oscar Schindler’s actions of kindness in the past certainly can’t cease the conflict in Ukraine now, the supplies donated to lockdown areas may be little to eradicate the pandemic, but the empathy and connection lie in them. Although some of us have started coping with different problems in society while the rest of us are still preparing for tackling them, we are in the tide of history together, we face the unknown future together.

John Donn once wrote in his poem, ‘no man is an island, entire of itself’. Standing on the edge of unknown, confronting our future saturated by uncertainties and problems, we can say that we are not lonely fighters due to the empathy and connection that give us courage and power to move ahead.

Future may be tough, but since we stand together, we are tougher.

Thank you!

                                            Yu Yixuan

Honorable judges, dear teachers and fellow students:

Good afternoon!

Before entering high school, I was more than just content with how I had my subsequent campus life planned. It was a rosy picture, and I had all these splendiferous arrangements: to read ten extracurricular books each semester, and to expand my English vocabulary up to 20 thousand words. The ambitious to-do list could go on and on. Unfortunately, as what happens goes beyond what I know and falls short of my own expectation, the rest of the story is all about the poignant experience of losing my own hair.

Perhaps I could ascribe the failure to peer pressure and something that came up unexpectedly, but looking back, I come to realize what made the plan intolerably excruciating was my ignorance of the future uncertainty. It dawns on me that acknowledging the existence of “the unknown” is a foot in the door of tackling it. Since there are predictions and hypotheses as regards our future, getting aware of the unknown will help us find the appropriate way leading to our destination. That is how we essentially get started.  

Now imagine you are an explorer standing in front of a dark forest, with all your necessary gadgets in your packsack, and all you see is an untrodden path among luxuriant trees, what would you consider as the unknown? Well, I bet you could think of numerous things, including but not limited to the sights along the way and your own safety. More specifically, what you may gain from this expedition. Will you hear birds chirping? Will you collect samples of florets? Will you be hunted down by a bear? Will you find a wooden cottage and meet the owner with great hospitality? There are boundless possibilities that make the unknown electrifying as they activate our adrenalin, trigger our anticipation and ignite our interest. Nevertheless, it is imperative that we should view the unknown dialectically. Examples abound that fear and worry go hand in hand with the unknown, let alone hidden threats, predicaments and hurdles which made it an arduous task to march on progressively. We are bound to go through the trials and tribulations, encouraged to leave no stone unturned, and hopefully, to conquer from within. And when we coalesce the two parts, the unknown not merely causes hesitation, self-doubt, and the loss of one’s nerve, but also induces passion, motivation, and fairly inexhaustible vigor. Although clichéd it may sound, the unknown is what makes life a box of chocolate.  

So, after all this thinking, you embark on the journey in the forest, and we are coming down to coping with the unknown. There are actually plenty of alternatives, for example, would you A. determinedly step right in and make efforts to suppress your trepidation, B. draw up a map of all the scenarios you may encounter and accordingly list various back-up solutions, or C. somewhere between these two extremes of the spectrum. Well, it’s not always mediocre to choose the intermediary one. As some may try to obliterate the downsides of boldness and some may radically attempt to eliminate indeterminacy, we should attach importance to the true idea of “the unknown”, which indicates infinite possibilities as well as unstable conditions. It is not always wise to think “leap, and the net will appear”, and it also makes no sense to wrack your brain every time you make a decision. If we summon up our courage and get mentally prepared, the unknown will be less intimidating; If we chew the cud and get unshackled from some pointless anxiety and distress, the unknown will be less indefinite. Thus, bravery and resolution are required to help build up strength and will; discretion and scrupulosity are in need for smoothing the way.

It quite echoes the situation I’m now in. I am “on the edge of the unknown”, literally having no idea what will happen after finishing the speech and what comments I will receive after the contest, but with faith in myself, I stay calm and deliver my genuine thoughts. Last but not least, I have you, 400 plus people with me on the edge of the unknown, so what to panic and worry about?

Thank you

                                                Shan Yuqing