Had this competition today. It was at St Xavier’s School, New Delhi and it was Interface 2007. It was nothing major at all, all Code Warriors knew that, just that…my hands were itching to scribble at a competitive quiz again.
Our first event for this year then, started on a bad note. Very promising and new team, new people in with loads of talent, and this was the perfect opportunity to test them out. It was pretty much at the opposite corner of Delhi, so we wanted to start off at 8 am. It’s just that we we found out that the bus we’d been allotted was supposed to go for some other competition – a fancy dress competition at Carmel Convent for primary kids. To top that off, our transport incharge was on leave, so it took a good 20 minutes before someone sorted the mess out and allotted us a new bus. That didn’t end it though – the guard at the gate had gone of somewhere for tea or whadev, and we were stranded for 15 more minutes while people tried to track him down. Anyway, it was so far off that it took us an hour to reach that area, and even then, we couldn’t find the school. We were frantically trying to look it up on Google Maps, which doesn’t have very close up info on roads; trying to figure out a disfigured MapMyIndia.com printout; and trying to decipher what out teacher escort (who’d reached the place directly) was saying about which road to take to reach there. Me and one of the Code Warriors were then reduced to running around on roads with the bus following us, trying to find out where the bloody school was. I’ve noticed this thing though – in Delhi, if you ask ANY person for directions – and by that I mean people who live in that area or are people who’re supposed to know like rickshawwallahs – they’ll either act as if someone had just asked them how to go to the Gare de Lyons in Paris; or more frequently, say “Seedha jake left le lo” (go straight ahead and take a left turn). And I find it amusing and / or irritating (depending on the situation) that in these cases someone will tell you to take a particular road, and when you reach that and ask someone else, they’ll invariably tell you to go in the opposite direction. These insights are what I have gained from years of going to schools at god-forasken places which I’d never even gone to / heard of earlier.
We reached at 10 am – 1.5 hours late – and by that time, the quiz prelims had been conducted, the finalists declared, and lists put up. Plus, other events had started off too. We pleaded with them to consider our case – we were coming halfway across the city too! The HoD gave a very sweet smile, and allowed me and Vivek to attempt the quiz paper, only tell a few minutes later that ‘it won’t be considered since we’ve announced the results’. And then after speaking to a few more people in their club they said they would consider – and then they said they won’t – and then they said they would – you get the idea, don’t you. Our other CW guys had problems too, having reached quite a bit after their event had started. The saving grace was that Arjun got first position in the crossword, and Sid got second position in flash animation.
As for the quiz, it itself was pretty idiotic – we easily got about 20 out of 25 correct. As for the rest, the paper instruction has said that there was negative marking. Only later did we find out that that rule had been scrapped. Sheesh! I’m sure that the stage rounds too would have been yucky, because they’d given such kiddie stuff in the prelims.
In all, a badly screwed up event, which we could have bagged, only if the circumstances had been better. Frankly, I’m pretty angry with their computer club president, whom I’d informed beforehand we might be late and he’d assured that wouldn’t be a problem. I also think that some of the Code Warriors who went there need to work harder, much harder, to ENSURE wins at subsequent events.