Since day 2's description is just a few lines, maybe I should continue with day 3. Day 3 was the big day - the main reason why we came to Hong Kong in the first place. It was none other than the competition day. During the start of the Individual Contest, I was feeling very nervous, just like what I felt during any competition. I felt like going to the toilet, but after a while, I felt like not going anymore. Initially, I found the 15 questions a bit difficult. I skipped some of the questions and went back to do them after I finished the easy ones. Some of the questions also required a little of Guess and Check, which took a while. I thought that they would take our question papers, so I wrote the answers on a blank piece of paper. In the end, they only took the answer sheet. After that, we went a few levels down to have our lunch. I could see that the queue was quite long, so I waited, hoping that the queue would become shorter. I left all my papers and water bottle on the table. After a while, the queue became even longer, so I quickly joined in the queue. Halfway, I went to the toilet. When I came back, all my stuff on the table was missing, except for the blank paper. I kept searching high and low, but only managed to find the water bottle. My pencil box was missing, AGAIN!!! (I lost one in Hwa Chong during the APMOPS) I could not have lost it. Maybe it was in the classroom where we took the exam.
Next was the Team Contest. We returned to the classroom and my pencil box was there! I thought that I had brought it down with me. We were given instructions. We had 5 minutes to discuss which questions who should do. There were 8 questions and I took questions 5 and 6. Then we only had 45 minutes to do the questions, we were not allowed to discuss with one another. Apparently 45 minutes was more than sufficient to do only 2 questions, so I had plenty of time to check. After that, they gave us questions 9 and 10. We only had 15 minutes left! Luckily, we managed to solve both of them on time. For questions 1 to 8, each of us did 2 questions. However, the Hwa Chong team, 2 of them did 2 questions each, 1 did only 1 and the other one did 3. Our teacher had the answer key. It turned out that I had gotten full marks for the Individual Contest. It seemed almost impossible. One of the Hwa Chong team members also got full marks. The prize presentation was not held at Po Leung Kuk, instead, it was held at the Panda Hotel -- our hotel.
During the prize presentation, I thought that we would win something. But we did not win anything at all (the big trophy above was given to every team which took part). What a shame. Even the Hwa Chong team won some trophies. However, at the airport on the last day, my teacher gave me my certificate (First Class Honour for Individual Performance).
To be continued... (again!)
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