As the chief of the Department of Physical Education (D.P.E.), I
cooperated with chief P.E. teacher Jung-Mira to plan “Three-Generation
Athletics Competition” which was to be held on 9/15. This event was the first official
school event that I took in charge of throughout my seventeen years of life.
When I was first assigned to this onerous task, I was worried because every
member of D.P.E. malingered whenever I ordered them to work. However, their
actions were understandable because only work that D.P.E. did was setting up
chairs for various ceremonies and to most of the members including myself,
setting up chairs didn’t seem worthwhile. It seemed as if there was no way that
I could encourage members of D.P.E. to work with passion.
With a bit of apprehension left on my head, I began setting up programs
for the competition. Last year’s Three-Generation Athletics Competition was
very unsuccessful because majority of students could not participate in major
events such as basketball, soccer and relay. I tried to form a competition
which everyone could participate in. So, I extirpated all the elite sports such
as basketball and soccer. Instead, I added team sports such as 공 튀기기. Also, I included somewhat bizarre obstacles in relay so that
running fast is not a problem but passing the obstacles is.
Another problem of last year’s competition was that it failed to
make students cooperate. Since students had no actual reason to cheer for their
team because nothing came back to them even if their team won and most of the
sports weren’t very fun unlike watching professional players play. To solve this
problem, I modified all the two-sided competition into a class-to-class
competition and gave materialistic rewards instead of scores so that students
could at least cheer for their own class to win the prize money.
After planning all the events and recruiting players from each
class, it was time for me to confront the final ordeal – encouraging members of
D.P.E. to do their assigned job. First, I gathered all the members of D.P.E. by
threatening them with penalty points. Then, I explained the significance of
this competition on D.P.E. by explaining that it’s the only work that D.P.E.
does other than setting up chairs, and for the D.P.E. to be assigned more
meaningful works in the future, we must show that we can work out these
official sport events with finesse. I tried to make them imagine a day when
students actually look forward to another sport competition, a day when D.P.E.
could be appreciated for its work just like other departments, a day when they
could feel proud of their own department. But I failed to persuade the
disinterested members; maybe I wasn’t eloquent enough. So I wrapped up the
meeting by forcibly assigning tasks to each member one by one. Although my
primary plan to make the members work actively mostly failed, I did succeed to
persuade two members – a girl and a boy from the 17th wave. They told me that
they were moved, watching me fighting alone to make this competition successful.
I changed my plan; Instead of making members of D.P.E. servile
followers by giving an impressive speech, I would rather inspire them to work along
with me by working harder than anybody else at the site. This method seemed fit
for both my character and environment; I was inarticulate and only two members
of D.P.E. were ardently supporting me.
On the D-day, Just like I planned, me and my two loyal co-workers
worked and worked, ran and ran, shouted and shouted all morning. Watching us
passionately work, one or two members of P.D.E. started to say “is there
anything else I could help you with?” I was surprised, because among those
members who wanted to help me out, there was a member who kept on saying “this
thing is shit” all the time. Eventually, most of the members started working. With
the help of other members, I was able to carry this complicated and condensed event
all the way to the closing ceremony without even a slightest problem.
After cleaning everything up with D.P.E. members, I sat on a hill.
Under the blue sky, students were gathered together in classes and were eating
chicken. They were laughing. It was such a sight – I regret not taking picture
of the scene. Looking at the scenery, something crawled up to my throat. It was
from somewhere deep down. I started crying. I cannot forget that moment. The
days I skipped sleeping to create documentations of this competition, the moment
students chastised my plan, the words that the two seventeenth waver told me
went through my brain like a panorama.
I reclined on the hill, looked up to the
blue sky, and smiled.
