Smoking Issue

訓練中の語学クラスでのスピーチ原稿です。スピーチの中で大半を占めた"er,,,"や"eh,,,"などは省略しております。
The today's topic is to quit smoking. I'm afraid if it's suitable for today's first speech, I mean, this should be the best to hear in the middle of, when everyone's gotten tired of hearing speech and everyone has little interest about it, though, anyway I'm going to talk about this.
Now, I have a habit of smoking, around 10 or more cigarettes per a day. But in Bhutan, smoking is prohibited. You know, Bhutan is the only country that bans smoking cigarettes. To tell the detail, it's prohibited to sell any cigarettes in Bhutan, and also prohibited people to smoke in public places. That is, it's nearly impossible to smoke in Bhutan. So I have to quit smoking after going to Bhutan.

I knew the fact soon after JICA send me the acceptance letter of JOCV with my place of assignment. And when I knew it, I though it was going to be a good chance to quit smoking. I've tried some way in order to stop smoking since I started smoking. But all way I've tried ended up in the failure.

Now, I'll explain 3 examples about how I tried to quit smoking and how did these failed.

First, I've tried to reduce the number of cigarettes. It's the ordinary way for all smokers because they think it doesn't cause so much pain. Suppose someone who smokes 20 cigarettes a day has made up his mind to reduce the number to 10. He might be able to restrict himself for a couple of days, but he will soon be borrowing some in advance from tomorrow's 10 cigarettes, thinking he will return them tomorrow, and will end up smoking the cigarette which is supposed to be smoked in 4 weeks time. Of course he can persuade himself to feel he has succeeded in reducing the number on the grounds that he is only borrowing future ones. But it causes the problem that the calculation will become more and more complicated and he will have difficulty in remembering how many weeks later the cigarette he is smoking now was supposed to be smoked.

There is another method not to be recommended. This is to restrict oneself to smoking a cigarette after each meal. I can say from experience that as a result of this method, you will have 20 meals a day, which will ruin your health. However, you might be able to persuade yourself that your broken health is not due to smoking.

Like I mentioned so far, it's difficult to accomplish to quit smoking in Japan, but I believe I will be able to quit it. Because it's restricted environmentally, I supposed even I could do this.

For the conclusion, Mr. Akashio always said to us;
"The patience is bitter, but the fruit is sweet."
In this case, I believe it's mean that if I can accomplish to quit smoking, food will become more delicious, air will become more refreshing, and above all, cigarettes will become much tastier.

Thus the fruit doesn't end up in only the physical effect but also we can get mental fruits. I can stand on the side of justice and glare at a man who is smoking. It is a spiritual revolution from always feeling guilty to feeling healthy and confident. I can even devote my life to promoting the right to avoid passive smoking.

Lastly, if you have a habit of smoking or you have a plan to start smoking in the future and after that you want to quit it, I think it's the best way to overcome it is coming to Bhutan. You can get a great experience to overcome the smoking habit. I mean, only people who have a smoking habit can get this precious experience that you can get just only once in your life.