Reflection on Sukan Sekolah Komputeran 2020 (SUSKOM20) Activity
On March 2020 I had participated in two small competition from Sukan Sekolah Komputeran 2020 (SUSKOM20) event that is organized by school of computing faculty’s club, Persatuan Mahasiswa Sains Komputer (PERSAKA). The event was held inside our own university, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM). The event is always held once every year. In 2019 I also did not waste the chance to join. The event is exceptional only for student from school of computing. The event also includes opening ceremony and closing ceremony besides the sport activities. In addition, there are three categories of the sports which are e-sport game, indoor/outdoor game, and also extra games like Tarik tali, fun run and explorace and sukaneka. The event was conducted about a week from 1st to 7th March 2020. Since there are many activities held throughout the event, so it was done at multiple places within UTM. Although the event was in March but to participate, students were required to register and pay the registration fees since January. Following that, the event was publicize through flyers and Whatsapp group. I also did not take long to register after seeing it on Whatsapp group.
The competition categories that I participated was in e-sport game, Player Unknown Battleground (PUBG), and for indoor game I participated in badminton match with my partner Ain Afiqah as I entered for Women’s Doubles. For PUBG, it was a team of four and my other team members also include Ain Afiqah and my other two friends which are Izzah Nurhana and Adila Farahiyah. We are all from the same course from school of computing. For badminton match the fee was RM8 per person and for PUBG it was RM25 per team and we divided it equally among four of us. The first match started with PUBG competition that is conducted at player’s own place on 1st March at night and it was finished right away. Luckily, we won second place for that. As for badminton match it started on 3rd March for first half. The match was conducted at Sporthall 1 near the Kolej Tuanku Canselor. Gratefully our team managed to go to the second half on 5th March after defeating one of the team out of 3. But unfortunately, our third match which was the determining match for final, we got defeated by just a few points. However, we still managed to get third place after winning the last game defeating our senior from another course of computer science. So, we had total of four matches for badminton.
Beforehand, by entering these two competition, although it just a small match but I still able to learn new key aspect such as leaderships and teamworking skills for my graduate attributes. Besides, I was on my second year at that time but even so, it was still not too late for me to strengthen my communication with team members and having a good communication with each other. I had to be honest that sometimes those qualities cannot be found easily on normal basis without joining activities like this. Even while doing course project, we do not really communicate that well among all of us. Besides, being a leader while doing such project also did not help much since we are not really leading the project but instead doing our own part. It is crucial for us student to experience a true leadership moment and effective communication skill to survive the working life after graduated.
Throughout the week of the competition, there really are so much thing going on that was eye opening to me. In addition, it is quite a hectic schedule for me since I had to balance between studies and extra activities for a week. I had 4 badminton matches and 3 rounds of pubg matches for the event. Personally, I felt that all experiences that I got by participating this event has taught me a lot of things that are so precious. For example, for badminton match, the tension before every match started was a new type of feeling that I have had ever felt. I used to have the nervous feeling but that time it was a different one since I have stopped entering sport matches after high school and had not play with a lot of people around for so long. I realized how much responsibilities I need to hold, and I need to do well for every match since I was playing with my partner, so we need to rely on each other. So, even before the event started, I must put some effort and did some training. Every evening after coming back from the class my partner and I went to the sport hall to practice and if we could not do so we did some jogging to increase our stamina. Although it was just a small competition, but we still tried our best.
It was the same for pubg match and more actually because at least for badminton I am already quite good at it, but I am bad at playing pubgm. My other team members are a great player so to not disappoint and burden them I tried to give extra focus while playing. Same as badminton, I also make some time to practice playing pubg even at night. I was quite thankful to my team members for being patience and sacrificed their time too to help me to practice. So, I did not waste all the opportunity to get better. I could see the differences clearly when I played without training properly compared to when I got proper training. Not to forgot that for both competition, badminton and pubg, my team kind of has one person that leading the team. For badminton I take the lead and quide my partner to make sure our team are synchronized and for pubg, my team member, Izzah Nurhana lead the team as she was the best at playing.
Besides, this situation reminds me a lot to when I entered previous pubg competitions in UTM. Before this I am also not very good at playing the game and unfortunately my team never got to go to many rounds as we keep getting knock out at preliminary round. But the difference was now I learnt from all those mistake and tried to stay calmer while playing the game. The result was now we could survive longer in the game and even win a place. I could see that this time our team communicate better, everyone stays together and move according to each other’s instruction instead of playing and move around on our own. Meanwhile, for badminton match it was the same to when I participated in sports competition on my school days. Although I was more active when I was younger but somehow after I started to enter sport competition again after a long time, I still have a high spirit. Surprisingly, I got better at handling my nervousness and focused more on the match.
Afterwards, as for the badminton match that we lose and why we could not get the first place for pubg competition, I think the problem is not really coming from lack of communication between my team members, but it is more to not enough preparation from us. Although all of us are in high spirit but somehow that alone is not enough if we want to be the top winner. It was not a surprise actually since we did the preparation in a short time only because we were so occupied with other projects at that time. However, it was better since I did put some effort by practicing even just a little bit. I understand that I was competing with other participant and they come from various background. So, I should have taken them more seriously. For example, one of the badminton match that we lose, I was so surprised with the opponent team skills. My team were obviously not at the same level as them as they were coming from netball team, so we were easily defeated. For another match that we lose, it was a close one but this time I think the reason was because my partner and I started to get more emotionally because of exhaustion. That match was the determination match for final and we got carried away to win it so much until we forgot to play calmly and communicate well. But overall, all of us have tried our best and do it full heartedly, our friends who came to support also was proud of us.
As for the conclusion, I realised how important it is to have a good team members that understand each other and great leadership skill to make sure that the team does not fall apart in any situation. I have learned that if we are not good at communicating with our team members and cannot deliver what is in our mind, then we cannot do well even in sports competition. It is not enough to enter sports competition with talent only especially for team competition. Besides, having someone to lead the team is also important to make sure everyone is in the right direction and in the same mind. My team could have done better but I take this as our small achievement before moving to a bigger competition in future. Reflecting on this event that I have participated; I now know what to do as a next step if I want to enter any sport competition again. For me I think although we did not win first place, but I did not have any regret at all.