• Teen who stole the show

Teen who stole the show

By Laila Nasry and Ruhanie Perera

Nilakshi Parndigamage is definitely not your average seventeen-year-old. In the few years that she has spent on planet earth, she has achieved much. The weekend of July 16 will forever be etched in her mind. She had three speech competitions on consecutive days-the Roy Morgan Plain English Speaking Competition, the Light of the World and the Toastmasters Best Speakers Contest and she won them all.

"All the events were important, but I concentrated most on the Best Speakers Contest because that's what I found most interesting," says Nilakshi whose first memory of taking part in this competition is when she was just ten. Though she got nowhere then, it whetted her appetite for public speaking. Seven years later, as the old saying goes - she came, she saw and she conquered.

Public speaking is Nilakshi's forte. Her life during the past years has been one success story. She was placed second in the Effective Speech Contest, she won the primary and junior categories of the Light of Asia competition and also came second in the Light of the World contest when she took part for the first time.

That's not all. Nilakshi has done Lanka proud through her oratorical skills. She was chosen to represent Sri Lanka at UNESCO's Forum on Conservation of World Heritage in 1997. Later she flew to Paris for a world youth forum on UNESCO's ideals, this time representing Asia Pacific. UNESCO invited her to discuss a youth action plan for the development of its cultural policies. Here she was one of two who were chosen to make final representations to the whole gathering on behalf of the other participants.

"I was just a little girl with a very big mouth," she laughs. To a person for whom public speaking is a breeze, debating seemed the next natural option. Her mother was always keen that she should debate in school, but Nilakshi confesses "that she was not very interested" until she was thrust into it at 13 as a result of her "ability to bluff to an extent".

She took an immediate liking to it, however. By the time she was fifteen she was captaining the Visakha Vidyalaya Debating Team. Visakha won the Keells Rotaract Debates, in 1998.

She entered the drama scene through her school Inter-House Drama Competitions and has won the best overall performer at the Royal Interact Drama Competition. She also loves writing poetry and short stories based on "real life experiences with a twist".

Nilakshi is a rare jack of all trades but for sure a master of more than one. She was a young gymnast at Visakha Vidyalaya and then went onto take up swimming. Then her attention was diverted to the more creative variations of swimming - water polo and water ballet. At present she is the synchronised swimming controller for Sri Lanka. "I have yet to make my mark in the arena of singing," laughs Nilakshi who loves singing- and judging by the fact that she has won some competitions, one can say that she hasn't done too badly in that field either.

Remarkably down to earth and modest, she is both intelligent and independent. Her independent spirit saw her write most of her speeches for her competitions and go ahead with her winning speech '4ft 11"' despite her mum thinking it childish. She enjoys doing her own thing. "I listen to my parents but keep an open mind." There's no one person who inspires her totally. "I don't emulate anyone," says this Miss Free Spirit. Yet there are those who inspire and encourage her and they have a very special place in her heart.

For someone who "is a last- minute person who is not very organised," she needs all the support she can get. Her parents are her inspiration, her speech and drama teacher Ms. Azhira Esufally is her fount of knowledge, the principal of Visakha Vidyalaya is her encouragement and her friends (fondly known as the G8) are her strength and support.

All the support however, cannot take away the essential human weakness of "nerves". But the winner that she is, she gets over it by either singing to herself or using the tension in a positive way for her benefit.

She's young, bright and beautiful and like all teenagers she too has her dreams and aspirations. "I want to be the Director General of UNESCO," she says. Seeing the fire in her eyes and the determination in her voice, one is left with the feeling that this won't be such a hard task after all.