2016-02-25

【Aiden in English】

        When someone calls you a nerd, it can be taken two ways. A) It means you stick your head in a book every hour of every day, or B) you’re smarter than the guy calling you a nerd. It’s no bad to be a nerd, although it must just trash your social life. There’s really nothing you can do if you’re selected to represent Pennbrook MS in the Upper Bux-Mont. Academic Challenge/Competition based on the teacher’s recommendation. Apparently, Pennbrook always gives students a choice, but the pressure put on the selected few across the 7^th and 8^th grades is extremely immense, like peer pressure. Besides, according to mom, this could somehow, in another universe, contribute to me entering Harvard, MIT, Stanford, Oxford, or Montgomery County Community College.

        Well, I can’t deny having learned something. Now I know that the thread-like vegetative part of fungus is called hyphae which make up mycelium, and that the founder of the first US bank was Alexander Hamilton. Okay, I knew something, but they didn’t always come to mind. For example, what is the wind that forms a thirty degree angle with the equator? The answer is trade winds. Apparently, I was supposed to know it because I did experience the trade winds myself in Aruba when I was six years old. Why do these questions ever help me achieve my life goal? I have no idea. All I know is that I can piss off a lot of my friends with my amazing geography textbook in my brain. The competition took place at Pennfield, one of the three middle schools of North Penn School District. There are three qualifying rounds, in which you face off with another team in Jeopardy, where there are six categories, each with a 50, 40, 30, 20, and 10 point question. The categories contain Spelling, Geography, History, Math, Science, and Language Arts. Unlike Jeopardy, there is no deduction of points to a wrong answer, but the opponent can steal. The top eight teams with the most cumulative points with face off in a tournament style bracket, seeds 1 and 8, 2 and 7, etc. The winner wins absolutely nothing except a mental certificate for you to go out into the world and torture it with your profound knowledge of the cool/useless things. There would be a bunch of people I bet waiting for you to explain the properties of a hypercube. I wasn’t really a crazy guy for this kind of thing, but it should be cool. At the time, I had no idea that the night was about to get exciting.

        After the first two qualifying rounds, my confidence was shaky. I mean, on average, it takes around 1050 points to get into the final eight. With only 640 points after the 2^nd round, it was getting a little too close to, not mine, but mom’s comfort. It’s alright, though we totally didn’t blowout the final team by stealing most of their questions, and gaining, wait, let me do the math…… 60% of the questions, which by the way, was A LOT. The only thing I was good at was math and geography, since geography was basically asking you things on a map, such as the key of scale. It put us with 1180, well above the average marker. So we ate our dinner in happiness.

        A thing I sort of left out was the fact that Pennbrook sent four teams. I was on Team B. Teams C and D didn’t reach the average thousand marks, falling in the 900’s. But Team A had 1190 points, which scared me. Although many didn’t seem to realize it, the points were only apart by ten, and that’s dangerously close. If the two Pennbrook teams face off in the first round, that would suck. Hey, as if someone finally decided to give me a birthday present, here it came from the announcer. And last but not least, Pennbrook A, the number four seed, versus Pennbrook B, the number five seed. Great. Awesome. Amazing, Stunning.

        Ummmmm……? There was an awkward silence in the room of the Pennbrook Quarter Final Showdown. Although everyone’s aiming for number 1, I’m pretty sure some people here just wanted to prove who the king of Pennbrook is. In practice, we’ve blown them out of the water before. I think they still remember that. The game was a back and forth battle, and it was decided in the small point values in the end. Team B, we, controlled the big guns, hauling in three 50’s, taking a fifty point lead. The forty’s treated us poorly, allowing Team A to close the gap. So far throughout the competition, the strategy for us has been Math first, since there were two MathCounts members on the squad, and then Science if Math was taken. Our star kind of knew everything, especially science, and it sort of worked. Now it seemed like playing our mirror image, as they had the same game plan. What’s really funny was how neither team could really spell. So far on the day, we had yet to choose a Spelling question. This game was won in the Spelling category, as they answered most of the Math questions with ease. The two strengths of our team were put out of commission for that round, and so with other skills, we kept up with every correct answer on the other team, keeping the lead for literally the entire game. I can give Team A credit on coming close, though. At one time they were within twenty, but the amount of points was just too little, and the gap couldn’t be closed.

        Well, we lost the next round, which we should’ve won. But I was proud on how we did. I’m not even a nerd, and look at the progress. Going past the quarterfinals was enough, as my brain had stopped sending electrical impulses after the third mention of the founding father Alexander Hamilton. So I guess I’m coming back next year, right?

【紅霞譯文】

        假如你被冠以書呆子稱號，那麼可以從兩個方面詮釋其含義：第一，你整天無時無刻都在看書；第二，你比叫你書呆子的人聰明。身為書呆子沒啥不好，儘管有損於你公眾形象，但假如老師推薦你代表賓溪中學參加巴克斯與蒙哥馬利兩郡北部學區百科知識競賽，你根本無法左右社會輿論。當然校方一向尊重學生個人“選擇”，對於少數入選並同意參賽的初中二、三年級學生來說，同輩壓力心理負荷都相當可觀。另外根據媽媽的思維邏輯，百科知識競賽可以激勵我展望哈佛、麻省理工、斯坦福、牛津大學乃至蒙哥馬利社區學院未來之路。

        該項競賽是檢驗我知識面的試金石，現在我知道一些以前不知道的東西，譬如真菌中線狀營養結構被稱作菌絲，而菌絲體恰恰由這些菌絲組成；亞歷山大·漢密爾頓是第一家美國銀行的創始人。同時還包括一些即使知道也答不上來的東西，舉例來說，與赤道構成卅度角的風叫什麼？六歲時我曾去過加勒比海島國阿魯巴，那裡可是東北信風盛行的地方。了解這些背景知識究竟對我來來人生道路有何影響？我如墜五里霧之中，不過有一點我十分清楚，正因為自己熟知地理教科書本，我才能從眾多同伴中綻露頭角。競賽設在北賓州學區三所中學之一“賓田”舉行，前後共分三輪，採用益智問答遊戲《危險邊緣》的形式，兩支校隊針對六門學科進行較量，每道問題各按50分、40分、30分、20分和10分不等來計算成績，內容涉及拼寫、地理、歷史、數學、科學以及語言藝術等六個領域。與《危險邊緣》不同的是，答題一方答對了得分，答錯了不扣分，但對方可以“偷”答你答錯的題目，若答案正確，對方意外得分。積分最高的前八名再進行淘汰賽，第一名迎戰第八名，第二名出擊第七名，以此類推。冠軍隊除了贏取一張榮譽證書之外沒有其它任何獎勵，即便如此，參賽者個個使出渾身解數，恨不能把腦袋瓜里看似了不起、實際毫無用處的淵博知識全部挖掘出來，我敢打賭恐怕有不少人指望聽你娓娓道來如此高精尖的超方形屬性吶。我壓根就不是這種滿腹經綸的才子佳人，要是真沾親帶故該有多酷。不管怎樣，我萬萬想不到今晚的比賽竟然高潮迭起甚至達到白熱化程度。

        前兩輪資格賽下來，我逐漸喪失信心。單就平均分數線而言，欲想進入八強，你手中起碼要有1050分左右在握，而兩輪角逐之後我們僅得了640分，其實我倒滿不在乎，可媽媽卻不以為然。好在還有機會，儘管我們未能給最後一輪對手剃個光頭，但連“偷”帶“搶”豪取不少分，讓我來計算一下……回答了60%的問題，說起來真夠過癮。我的強項集中表現在數學和地理方面，因為地理基本上僅限於地圖常識，譬如比例尺。我們以1180總分反倒超出平均分數線。三輪預賽結束，我們總算可以開開心心地吃頓晚飯。

        有一件事我前面隻字沒提，那就是賓溪中學總共派來了四支隊伍，我代表B隊；C隊和D隊各得九百多分，未能達到一千分平均標準,而A隊在資格賽上一舉拿下1190分，害得我緊張半天。也許很多隊友沒有意識到，A隊與B隊之間只相差10分，彼此可謂勢均力敵。倘若賓溪中學兩支隊伍在初賽中相遇，結局慘不忍睹。嘿，好像有人終於決定送我一件生日禮物，這時播音員開始公布成績，最後但同樣重要地，排名第四位的賓溪A隊將與排名第五位的賓溪B隊對壘，多牛嘞，真棒呀，酷斃啦，驚喜哈。

        嗯……？在八強賽教室里，賓溪兩隊的隊員尷尬地坐在一起互不搭腔，誰都想爭第一，沒準兒有人巴不得做上賓溪頭把交椅。平常練習的時候，我們B隊曾給他們A隊來過下馬威，想必對方記憶猶新，但這回彼此比分交替上升，直到最後才以微弱差異決出勝負。我們B隊掌控大局，一氣奪得三個50分，在50分賽項上領先，可在40分賽項上卻出師不利，結果A隊步步緊逼，把比分拉得很近。到這裡為止，我們採用的戰術之一就是先向數學開戰，因為本隊有兩名隊員是學校參加初中數學競賽的選手。之二，實在不行再盯住科學不放，隊裡有位明星如同萬金油一般無事不曉，尤其在科學方面表現出色。好笑的是，兩隊風格雷同，實戰手段也非常相像，雙方的拼寫水平向來很弱，大家不得不儘量避免觸及拼寫軟肋，但無論對手多有本事橫掃數學問題，最終我們還是以拼寫勝出。比賽中，我們兩科優勢一點沒有發揮出來，因此只好利用其它優勢，爭取把對方答錯的題目一一答對，以便確保自己始終處於領先地位。我必須承認A隊相當優秀，否則不會跟B隊難分伯仲，一度間，他們把比分追成不足廿分之差，可惜題目份量太小，無法迎頭趕超我們。

        接下來我們輸掉不該輸的半決賽，不過我為本隊表現深感自豪。我不是什麼書呆子，在這項活動中可以說收穫連連，作為一位連開國元勛亞歷山大·漢密爾頓都說不清道不明的參賽者，能夠闖入四強已然叫我無比欣慰，想必後會有期，明年再來？