By Tay Yek Keak
Sunday Times, Life!
Thrill of victory, agony of my feats
I competed in high jump once.
I ran straight to the bar, jumped up and went right under it.
If you check my school's track and field records, my feat may still be there, officially recorded as a low jump. This is a true story. I once thought that I could be an athlete.
That was before I discovered the Fosbury Flop - that's the jumping technique whereby you go over with your back to the bar - wasn't actually abuot a real flop, like mine.
The high jump is an exacting sport.
People are supposed to jump so high, twist their bodies so much and sail over in midair like that. Only kangaroos, stilt-walkers, Shaolin monks, Jet Li and a guy running like hell from his loan shark can go over such a height.
As you can tell, I'm excited.
The Olympic Games are upon us, starting on Friday.
The athletes are limbering, the starter's gun is in position, the medals are shing and the steroids are all stashed out of sight somewhere.
I'll tell you how the event affects me.
I'm always at my fittest during these Games.
There's an Olympic-size swimming pool downstairs.
In keeping with the Olympic ideal of health and fitness, I swim in it once every four yeasr.
I do the 4x100m individual medley.
I start with the breaststroke, backstroke, then freestyle and finally the butterfly fingers.
The last stroke is my invention, since I can't do the butterfly very well, especially when I'm sinking and grabbing people.
Swimming is tough.
It's so tough, it's tougher than slimming.
I marvel at the people who can combine both and also play the piano, give tuition, chew gum, drive BMWs, party at Zouk and show off their hot bods in Her World and His World.
Those folks are remarkable.
They should get a gold medal for over-achieving. In fact, everybody should get a medal at the Olympics. Why do they need to be elated by the thrill of victory and deflated by the agony of defeat?
Why should a person run for four years everyday, do 500 push-ups with a sack on his back, put up with cod liver oil, promise his Mum a gold medal, tell everybody in his hometown to watch him on TV, and then lose to the stranger beside him in the next lane?
That's a bummer, I tell you.
It needn't be this way.
Especially when the difference between gold and silver can be so minuscule these days.
As Jerry Seinfeld commented once in his sitcom Seinfeld, in a photo-finish, if the second-place guy had a pimple, he would've won.
I say we give every competitor a trophy so nobody goes home empty-handed.
That fork and spoon stolen from the cateen at the Games don't count.
I say, instead of gold,silver or bronze, we give the thousands of participants dsetined to become the thousands of losers something zinc, something tin or maybe something wrapped in a cheap aluminium foil.
Wouldn't that be sweet?
Obviously, every single one of those souveneirs needs to be numbered so that it can be authenticated later in a mass sale on eBay.
But collectors, don't rush.
Take your time.
I guarantee that, like Soviet-era heroism medals, some of thsoe beauties will end up at the Sungei Road flea market for sure.
Now, I've been watching Olympics ever since I was a kid.
I can't keep track of the dates but I remember the Games by the countries they're staged in. When you talk about Munich, I remember Mark Spitz the swimmer going regal with seven gold medals.
When you talk about Seoul, I remember sprinter Ben Johnson going illegal with steroids. When you talk about Montreal, I remmeber the city going bankrupt.
Now when you talk about Athens, I know the Games are going home. Greece is, of course, the birthplace of the Olympics.
The Greeks are very gifted people.
They have just won the Euro football championship when even Zeus himself betted on the other team.
Those fellas are the clearest proof that you can combine studies with sports.
Back in the old, wise days when the Parthenon was just a blueprint, they were chatting about democracy while running the 100m dash.
A friend tells me that the original running track is still there at Olympia, the site of the ancient Olympics.
He's seen and touched it.
He says there are no running lanes, finishing line, scoreboard or giant electronic stopclock over there.
But he's not sure though about those flea-market medals.
Adapted from The Sunday Times, Life. August
8 2004