Day 2 - Oct 16, 2006: The War Begins

I woke up at 0530 because breakfast is at 0600 and the bus leaves at 0700. After getting ready, I headed down for breakfast at the restaurant at the lobby. As I entered the restaurant, was immediately given the ticket for the opening ceremony tonight. With the opening ceremony being held tonight, today would be a day of events. In the morning, I'll have my first event, which is the weapons (categorised as "Double Apparatus" because it's a pair of weapons that I'll be playing), the hand form will be in the afternoon and the opening ceremony of the championship in the evening. And guess what... the ticket cost RMB 400 each. That makes up to about MYR 200. I couldn't believe my own eyes when I saw it.

I was in a quite confident mood having already found out from the night before that my first event will only have 6 competitors. I will not do myself any justice if I do not win any medal in the first event.

Once done, it was time to leave. In every competition, we always have our teammates to accompany those competiting not only to give moral support but to help take care of the stuff when competiting. So the 2 gals would have to accompany me eventhough they don't have any events today.

As we arrived, I was amazed with how beautiful the place is. This is how the place looks like.















Believe it or not, this is actually a residential middle school, something like a lower secondary school in Malaysia. And all public schools here are named using numbers. I'm not sure whether all public schools throughout China or is it just this city that has such naming policy. But this is school no. 47. I heard that only private schools are named using names.

The competition arena was held in the gymnasium of the school.

Left: This will be where I'll be competing on. I'll be competing in Arena 2, which is the top left carpet.

My event will be the 3rd event this morning.

The decorations around the gymnasium. I managed to snap a few before I get myself ready.
















While taking these photos, I can't help but felt injustice because the rest of the competitors had a training session the day before while the whole Malaysian team arrived only last night. It didn't seem fair. But that feeling soon went away..... fortunately.

During the whole competition, we will be assisted by 2 volunteers (every competing nation are assigned 2 volunteers). They're the ones who will coordinate and interprete things for us. So in one way or another, I'd like to put it that they're our "baby-sitters" where the championship is concerned (hahaha, I sound so bad and mean).

Left: The 2 pretty volunteers I just mentioned. The one on the left is Liu Jie and the other one is Xi Lei. Both local uni students.

Anyway, I've been mentioning quite alot of the 2 teammates of mine. Here's the photo of the 2. They'll be my little pets... oops, I meant pet sisters for the whole week. Beware of them. They kick asses.

The one on the left is Yi Qian while the other one is Tiffany (our self-proclaimed Crystal Princess, and she acts like one too) Hehehe... she's a real cutie... a really adorable gal.

Being a "princess", she would naturally have an evil side of her. So beware of her sinister smile.

Left: Me waiting for my turn. Photo taken with Xi Lei.

If you notice the background of the last 3 photos, it was where we did our warm up.

The open space covers 6 basketball courts, 3 tennis courts, and further to the other end is a football field with stands. The 2 big buildings behind me are the hostels. You can just imagine the facilities they have there.

The best thing is that the floor covered with the hard rubber like those used in athletic tracks, not cement like those in Malaysia.

For the first event, my turn came, my turn gone. I was the 3rd to enter the carpet for my event. Because I hadn't tested the carpet, I tried stepping at one corner of while the participant was the other end. Getting used to the carpet is important so that you will not slip or fall when you're performing. All I did was to try rubbing my shoe sole on it a little, hop a little and spin a little. That was all I could do.

When the 2nd person entered, I knew from that moment on, my chance of finishing first place is beyond reach. So I could only fight for the 2nd place. But I was quite confident of myself until I saw my score. I couldn't believe it. I only got 3rd. I felt I was underscored but nothing much that can be done. Well, looking on the bright side, getting 3rd in a world event in my first world competition is something I should be proud of. Anyway, time to focus on the next event.

During the gathering for the award ceremony, I was suprised to know that I'll be getting silver. The first 2 is getting gold. Surprised? Myself included. It was then that I realised that the medals are awarded not by the score you got but by the standard you show over the number of competitors. The organisors also want to ensure that everyone returns home with something. So everyone will somehow get a medal. It was pretty even up for my event. The first 2 got gold and the next 2 got silver. Had I finished 2nd, I could have gotten the gold already. I was so looking forward to tell the others, "First event, first gold", but it seems not to be.

I was partially hidden in the photo, but that was me on the podium getting my first medal.














This is me with Damien, who got 4th in my event but also a silver. He's an Aussie. Some of the Australian team had been training in Beijing for the past month prior to this competition and he's an Optometrist by profession.














Other miscellaneous photos.














I could have taken more photos had my camera battery not died.

We had to go back to the hotel for lunch before returning here for the afternoon event. So the routine is pretty much the same. I waited for my turn, I got on the carpet, I performed. And when I'm done, I left the carpet and waited for my final score. But this event had been a long wait with almost 36 people competing. I did pretty well myself, finishing 8th or 9th. I can't really remember what position I got. In fact, after I entered as participant no. 8, I was leading until about participant no. 20 or so before one by one started pushing me down the list.

This time, the award ceremony was postponed so I have absolutely no idea will I be getting a medal. With almost 40 people in this event, I got a pretty good chance for a bronze at the very least.

So we headed back to the hotel to prepare for the opening ceremony. We all wore a batik for the march past but I didn't take any photo of myself because my camera battery has very little left. I did not get the chance to charge them full before I came. So I had to snap with care. You'll see me in my batik when I get the photos from another teammate. He couldn't stop taking photos that night.

I was the flag bearer that night. After marching past the VIP, I had to go seperate ways with the rest because the flag bearers must remain on the tracks while the rest adjourned to their seats. Darn, I had to stand still the whole time for 4-5 people to make their speech. And since I'm already at it, I might as well snap something.

The photos from the flag bearer's view.

Below: The stadium stand. It was a full house that night. But I'm not sure what's the stadium capacity.














Below: The dancers who performed earlier. I didn't get to see them perform. They stood behind
me.














Below: Another group of the performers. They too stood behind me, beside the group of dancers above.














Once, the whole thing ended, I found my way to my seat to watch the rest of the performance. Or rather, one of the volunteer found me and took me to my seat. Hehehe... it was pretty exciting to be part of the march past at a world stage. Just look at the crowd cheering. It's phenomenal.

From my seat, the view of the stage below. Many of the Shaolin temple students and artist from China and Hong Kong performed. The pictures did not come out nicely. It was pretty dark, but you can still the stage. There were fireworks the whole night.















Here's the performers who performed but I could only recognize the Hong Kong duo TWINS.


















And on the way back, we lost our way while looking for the bus. It took us a long walk and our legs were tired, we're all tired and sleepy, and the next day would be a trip to the Shaolin Temple. We need rest, and a good long one too.

End of Day 2