three generation "athletics" competition

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.