Geoff vs The Korean Army

This post is all about determination in the face of certain destruction, bravery in the face of trained killers and tried in and tested skills in the face of... well just in the face.

This is a post about Korean Sports Days.

I experienced my 1^st Sports Day (Like inter house events back in SA) at Gokyeon MS recently and I had so much fun it was great!

GoKyeon is small. 23 students in total. It is not like some of the schools my friends are at (E.g. Dan in Pohang – his school has upwards of 600 students). Therefore if just one student’s doesn’t feel like putting in the effort, it affects their team’s chances of winning dramatically. Thankfully this was not the case on this warm autumn day. I arrive at school knowing I have no classes to teach for the day and that I will, at the very least, be playing volleyball at some point during the day. The school is decked out in it’s best colours and all the student’s top work is laid out on display.

It looks great and man can some of these teens draw!!! One section is dedicated to caricatures of the teachers and it looks great, dead ringers almost! After walking around a bit the PE teacher hands me a lumo green shirt that fits me perfectly... in the width. The length and arms though are a little short (oh well). That meant that I was on the green team for the day.

From receiving my kit I was taken upstairs to receive my war paint. I chose to have a cool little symbol/crab thing, on my cheek with Korean written on it. I wanted a dragon on my forearm but there was not enough time.

Then it was time for the opening ceremony. The formality in the day was really interesting to witness. It was almost like the opening to the Olympics or the Commonwealth Games or for that matter the Asian Games. The two teams line up behind there banner carrier and marched in single file to stand in front of the podium.

They then sang the national anthem and did a couple of other things, such as warmed up to this really terrible music. It was really amusing to watch as even some of the teachers got into it – star jumps, jogging on the spot and stretching – the lot. In hindsight I should have done the same as the next day i was very very stiff. Finally the day was opened by the headmaster and a shot from the starters gun. (A pictorial summary of some of the events can be seen in the pic collage at the end)

1^st Event: GIANT Skipping Rope

I was first put in the jump team but after 4 failed practice jumps – 3 of which were my failing, I was “promoted” (I think they got the “pro” mixed up with the “de” sounds) to the guy how holds and rotates the rope. There were 3 rounds and my team won them convincingly as we got up to 13 jumps as a collective while the Pink team could only get to a maximum of 5.

Team Green 15 points – Team Pink 10 points

2^nd Event: Tug-o-war

Now when I have done this in SA there has been strategy. Biggest guy/Gal at the back who ties the rope around their waist and there are rhythm calls. No such luck here. I was stuck at the front of the cue of a very light weight pack. We got murdered in all three rounds.

Team Green 10 points – Pink 15

Running Total: Green 25 – Pink 25

3^rd Event: Soccer Volleyball (Boys event)

This was one of the events that I was not asked to take part in. Essentially the event is as the name says. Use your feet and heads and knees, anything but your hands, to get the ball over the net (allowing a bounce on either r side and or a bounce between players of the same team before the ball goes across the net. 2 bounce consecutively or if the ball bounces out of bounds then you lose the point. I noticed soon after that start that it was Team Green or TEAM GLASSES against Team Pink or TEAM SIGHTED as all the boys on my team wore glasses and all the Boys and 1 Girl on the other team did not. Interesting dynamic. It did seem that in this spectacle – a challenge of finesse, intelligence (glasses wearing crew), and size (non-wearers) was in the offing and it was the Spectacled Team (My team) that came out trumps in the end even though the play was not all that impressive.

Green 14 – Pink 20

RT: Green 39 – Pink 45

The tention is just too much to bare...

4^th Event: Relay Race

Again I was more photographer than participant in this one. It did get interesting though because the elementary school children joined us for this race. The track I think was about 300m long and it was split in 2. On the one side of the track you had the Elementary children (with 2 Middle Schoolers to make sure of even numbers) and on the other side you had the Middle Schoolers. So in essence the track was split into 2 halves of 150m each. The Elementary children would run half way around the track to hand the baton to a Middle Schooler and he/she would then run the rest of the track to hand off to another elementary child etc... until you get the final pair of Middle Schoolers running for the tape. This took a while to organise as there were a lot of bodies (and in particular – easily distractible little bodies) to organise into lines and prevent anyone from cheating, so at this point I will introduce an interlude to demonstrate in time just some of the time it took to sort out the students – here is a song called “Pizza Day” By the AQUABATS. I found it recently and seeing that I eat school lunches I thought it was rather appropriate (follow with the lyrics if you so choose)...

PIZZA DAY - THE AQUABATS - (Click to listen to the song)

Pizza Day Lyrics

Welcome Back. I hope you enjoyed that rather amusing song. So the race...

It was all going horribly for my team we were behind by about half the track but then the pink team had a bigger than normal Middle School girl, healthy is what I shall describe her as, going up against a hyped up little elementary school boy and he closed that half track gap and opened up a useful one for out last runner to storm to an unexpected victory!

Green 15 – Pink 10

RT: Green 59 – Pink 65

It was now down to the last event – the girls dodgeball (which obviously because I am a manly mister man, I never took part in). However it was time for a break and now comes my big event of the day...

Geoff _{(and Gokyeon Middle School Boys)}  vs  The Korean Army in a soccer match.

I think it must have been about 25-30min per half. With our nimble, slightly built, side, we had speed the speed to storm into a 3 – 0 lead. I had a hand in setting up 2 of the 3 goals. Half time came and went with a brief stretch and a sip of water and then the game got interesting. The much bigger Army lads stormed right back to level at 3 – 3. Our defence was taking a pounding but through some opportunistic tackling from one of our players we caught the keeper pretty much literally napping as he was staring at a butterfly or something when his shot came in and we were 4 – 3 up. Incedently that was this boys hat-trick! Back in the lead. The final act of the game I sprinted onto a loose ball and it was just me and the keeper. I looked him dead in the eye and ever so coolly slotted the ball home with my left foot, keeper left standing in awe of my sheer brilliance.

It may have been that these guys were taking it easy and using the break as a nice fun time away from basic training but that is a side issue – I MEAN THEY HAD BOOTS AND EVERYTHING! So we won 5 – 3 and on the balance of the game I would say it was well deserved.

Back to the competition...

With one event to go things were tight and it was down to my girls Dodgeball team to pull off a win if we were to win the day. I couldn’t quite follow what was happening, all I know is that one girl broke a finger but MY TEAM WON!

We were the Champions! (Cue Freddy Mercury and Queen...)

Victory Music

So Sports Day was finished.

No not quite. After wondering around for about half an hour I went outside and found that a massive Buffet picnic had been set up and was called up to the festivities.

I have no clue why this was happening – I think it was because the Elementary School was having a festival but I sat and ate a bunch of Korean goodies and was eventually called upon to help defend my school’s honour in a game of Volleyball against teachers from 2 other visiting schools (Presumably they were visiting because of the festival). We won both game of Volleyball 21 – 16. I managed to get in a couple of good blocks at the net and I even spiked home one winner!

Just as I sat down to have a drink and chat with other teachers form my school, Mrs Won YANKS me away and demands I go catch my bus – it will be here in 2 minutes. I wish she could have told me I was still taking the bus home... sigh...

So that was my 1^st Korean Sports day and what a fun day it was. The next day I was in so much pain but that is another story for a more winey blog...

More from Geoff’s Asian Adventure soon with Paragliding AND Daejeon Deli Tours, Halloween Folly and A day of peace and reflection coming soon