Sport's Day 2008, no doubt.
In school, we had an essay competition in which we had to tell about our most unforgetable day in our lives. I wrote about Sport's Day. Got second, Kay beat me to first... I think one of the reasons I lost was because I spelt 'unforgetable' wrongly.... Oh well, rest assured this will be a better story then the one written during the competition.
It started with the usual things you would normally do. Brush teeth bla bla bla, I'll skip to the part where we're in school. I doubt anyone will want to hear about me brushing my teeth anyway.
So, I arrived in school with my parents. My parents took their seats and I went off to join my fellow Red House friends to prepare for march past. Skiping all the boring details, we grouped behind the buildings surrounding the school field. No one could see us, which was good, since nearly everyone was nervous. I was at the back of our March Past constigen. I was on the left, Navin and Sue were somewhere near to me (I can't remember, we had so many practice runs in the days before where we had different positions so my mind is a bit jumbled up). The music started and slowly one by one we started marching out. Green House went first since they were first in the previous year overall, followed by Blue, Yellow and Red. By the way, Red House was not last actually, we were third. The thing is, people were so used to seeing Red House losing that they had the idea that were always last.
So after marching around the field and going through all the ceremony things and such, we finally got back to our House headquarters which was located by the field. There was a lot of running events and such, but frankly I didn't care. My teammates and I set our sights for the last event of the day - Tug-O-War, and trust me, it's more serious than it sounds.
To let you see how important winning the Tug-O-War event was, I shall take you back in time to prove my point.
A) We got second for it in 2007. Blue House got first
B) We got second for it in 2006. Blue House got first
C) I have no recollection of Red House winning it since the day I was born. Blue House always gets first
D) In the 2006 march past I took part in, the teacher commented on how Red House always got second in Tug-O-War. And Blue House always gets first
E) WE ALWAYS GET SECOND AND THOSE BLUE HOUSE DUDES ALWAYS GET FIRST!!!!! ARGHHH!!!! *VENTS*
But things have changed, in the previous years, we always lost to Blue House in the preliminaries but always made up for it by beating the other houses. This year though, we tied with them. We actually stood our ground.
It was going to be a tough fight. Our team was strong, but so were theirs. There was no clear winner here. Everyone in the tug-o-war team was feeling nervous, and there was no use covering up. Our seniors last year came to school to see the results of the match. Sure, how could we possibly get anymore nervous?
Well, we wasted time waiting for the Tug-O-War finale match. One reason why I can't forget Sport's Day 2008 is because its still so clear in my mind.
I remember:
Carrying a potted plant with Navin to the outside of the dewan. That potted plant was big man, we had to go through staircases and large crowds of parents. And we were barefooted...
Navin bringing his phone to school and showing me some song on his phone.
Navin, another friend I can't identify and I shared some energy drink before the Tug-O-War match.
Travis told me he had eaten chocolate to boost himself
Eating nasi lemak provided by our House teacher.
Anyways, after much agonising wait, it came. Tug-O-War. It's not funny ok! In the premliminaries, we had scraped into finals with the Blue House by defeating Yellow House in a insanely-close-to-losing match. On the first round, we defeated them, ok good, but we needed 1 more point to get into the finals or else we have to fight some other House. On the second round we nearly lost, but pulled our way back. We were this close to losing: || <---Something like that.
The fight was agonising and frustrating and definitely long. After winning, the judge teacher was laughing to himself.
So, here we were. I was in the front while Navin and Travis were at the back. A gigantic crowd was swarming around us. Our opponents were right in front of our eyes. Some V.I.P guy came up to start the match. Our teachers were by our side.
Then it started. The whistle blew and we pulled as though our lives were depending on that rope. The roar from the crowd was deafening. I remember my ears blocking up. Those people don't care for your hearing.....
We pulled our guts out (figuratively speaking of course) but we lost in the end. The first round went by. We switched sides.
The second round was intense. If we lost this round, we lose everything. The whistle blew once more and we pulled once again. The results were better this time -We Won.
So finally, the moment we've been waiting for. The Tie-Breaker round. Winner takes all. In my mind I was hoping I could tell the teacher in charge : "Excuse me teacher, could we continue this tommorow when we've taken a nice nap and got rid of the mud stuck in between our feet so we don't die?" but it didn't happen. My mouth was too lazy to speak. I trudged myself over to the other side together with my teammates.
Everyone was exhausted -including the spectators who had used up their voices. I could barely grip the rope without falling over and dying. Everyone had 50 aches in their back, not including the 5 000 000 others in all our bones.
The whistle blew again. Pitiful.
Everyone in our team fell over and collapsed. Some persistant ones like me held on to the rope like no tommorow. The only thing we could hope is that our combined body weight would be too much for our opponents to drag along. Too bad, our opponents managed to drag us to the other side. The only thing I remember then was trying to formulate a plan to use my teacher's shoe (which was beside me at that time) to regain my balance and pull the rope from a better angle. The judge must have saw our pain and blew the whistle early.
Now, some of you must be saying "WHY ARE YOU BLOGGING ABOUT LOSING!!?!??!?!?!" Well the fact is, it was fun. I got a cool stain on my PJ t-shirt, a few aches and pains which persisted for a week or so and the fun of sliding over mud without any effort on my behalf.
Well, I've gotten over losing.
To finish of the story let me tell a small short story.
In Standard 6, Sue and I were Ketua Kebersihan in our class. We were sitting right in the back. You see, our dust pan was hung up while our rubbish bin was below. People liked to sharpen their pencils and put their dirt on the Dust pan. You see, this proved a problem since the dust usually blew away and dirtied up the class again. We usually told the people to stop throwing dirt into the pan. However after Sport's Day....
"Travis, don't throw your dirt into the pan..."
"Aiyoh Aaron, after Tug-o-War my back pains la. I can barely bend down..."
I let him off. I couldn't bend down either.
