Is there a regular and well-organized college student speaking contest in Ameircan? not debate, just speech of which debate may be a part

Where can I find native-english-speaker debating competition? I want to do a contrastive study between the stance-taking in native-english-speaker debating competition and that in chinese learners english debating competition. Can u tell me where can I find videos or transcriptions of native-english-speaker debating competition? (not political debates) Thanks a lot^^

NEW TOPIC^^ <a href="http://www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/Print.aspx?Id=74e64026-32d9-4038-a281-e1440d845eda">www.hindustantimes.com/StoryPage/Print.aspx</a>

I came across this article very accidently. It is not a piece of news actually,  just a kind of life story.

Topics like:   When did you get your first mobile phone?
                        Can u still remember how your first mobile phone influenced your life?
                        Have u ever been or are u addict to your mobile phone?
                        If u lose your mobile phone, will u buy a new one as soon as possible or enjoy several days without a mobile phone?
                        How long can u hold out without a mobile phone?


Maybe we can also disccuss sth about computers, cause computers' role in our life is very similar with that of mobile phones^^

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Sorry guys, lots of members will be busy this sunday(2009.6.14), so we feel very sorry to tell u we will postpone this discussion to next sunday. The schedule is following:

Date:  June 20, 2009      Sunday Evening (Beijing) / Sunday Afternoon (London)
Time:                                 9:00 ~ 10:00pm                  /  2:00 ~ 3:00pm

All guys, please inform each other, thanks very much!
Sorry again and have fun this weekend.

>>>>Edited by MG, 2009.6.13

" I' m up short ." Is this a complete sentence? What's the meanig? Thank u^^ it is a line in the movie "Payback"

what does "son of a hey" mean? (hope it is not dirty talk ^^)

I am a child of the movies. What does this sentence mean? what's the relationship between "child" and "movie"

any other ways to express our gratitude? Thank u, Many thanks. thank u very much, thanks a lot, I appreciate it very much, i am deeply grateful, i feel very much indebted Besides these expressions, are there other ways to express our gratitude?

Details about how we do our group chat As Neal suggested, each week one of us is responsible for choosing a short English language news or magazine artice (any subject except religion or pornography, etc.) that can create a discussion.

Once you find your article, please present it here as soon as possible ( if the article is available online, you can just give us the hyperlink, if it is not, please post the whole article) together with the topics you find from the article.

Any other teammates,  who have ever read an article which is closely related to the recommended one, can follow to post the related article as a related topic. (please go to my post entitled "<a title="Let‘s get started----details about our skype group chat" href="../../groups/1751/topic/11424.htm">Let‘s get started----details about our skype group chat</a> " for reference )

BTW, your effort will be greatly appreciated if you can present your article together with some relevant vocabulary ^^

All members are expected to read the article and think about it and prepare your discussion, and finally we can get together once a week and have an efficient chat^^

Anyone who has any confusion about our group chat please come to me and feel free to ask me any question^^

Thanks for your attention!

Let‘s get started----details about our skype group chat Hi, Dear friends

Thanks to Neal's great idea, Sophie's enthusiasm and your kind attention, the topic and time of our first  skype group chat has been settled down, here are the details:

Time:   London Time, 2:00-3:00pm, Sunday
             China Time, 9:00-10:00pm, Sunday
             Friends from other countries please look up the time in your area accordingly, sorry for that i am really bad at math and calculation^^, so that i  can't calculate all ur time for u.

Topic: The first article (recommended by Neal):
             http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/8060681.stm 
             Topics like: Would you do the same thing?
                                  How much would it take for you to do such a thing?
                                  If you had $10million, what would you do with it?
                                   What will happen to the people when they are caught?
                                   etc.

            The second article (which is colsely related to the first article and recommended by Sophie):
             http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/1668687.stm
            Topics like: What do you think of this man's position: is he right or wrong in your eyes?
                                 etc.

Please do not miss this enjoyment. Thank u all^^