I don't know how sport became a part of my life or how I got so good at it. I wasn't trained at a young age nor did my family have any sporting background. I guess I was like any other kid who developed an interest in sport from a young age and continued to enjoy it for a long time.

I still love sports. I just don't have access to them anymore. School gave me the facilities and opportunities to play, train and learn whereas now I don't have anything to play with. No court, or field, no bat, ball, teams, referee etc.

If I was to trace back to my earliest memory of playing sport it'd be... year 2. I think. Wait. let me think more.. .. Nope year 1. Okay yep year 1. So when I was 6.

There was this boy called Philip. Super duper cute. I had a major crush on him and his older brothers found out and started questioning me. I was 6. I felt interrogated lol But I loved it because it was that whole crushing stage. I can still feel I how felt back then.. and let me remind you I was 6. Who the hell goes crazy on a guy at 6? Anyways he was in my class and normally during our lessons the teacher would take us out to do laps around the field and he was always the fastest. I accepted that he was the fastest but I wanted to see if I could beat him. So everytime we went out to do laps as a class, I would always try my best to catch up to him. That's the first time I got into running. (I think) Well it's my earliest memory...

The second time was in year 2 when I was 7. Philip had moved to another school and I don't remember him leaving but it was strange because he only left and his brothers stayed. I was in a new class and discovered that this time there were two fast people in the class; Jamie and Danny Nguyen. There were sooooo fast. I swear, I remember thinking everytime we did laps it was impossible to catch up to them. And I never did.

By the time it was year 3, I was eligible to join PSSA. I tried out for T-Ball but decided I didn't like it because I've never done T-Ball in my life... I should do a sport I'm more familiar with.. And from then I was never associated with team sports or PSSA til year 6 which sadly was the last year of primary.

Between then I was interested in Athletics. School, like always, offered Cross Country and Athletics and I did both. Always tried it and got in every year. Because year 3 was my first year, I was uncertain of how well I would do in both CC and Athletics and surprisingly I did well. When I made it to Regional CC and Athletics for the first time I felt so proud of myself because I had no idea that it was going to be like that. I had made it to Regionals at 8. Wth.

Then the big moment happened when I was 10, I made it to State. I've always only made it to Regionals and never intended on making it to State because that was for professional sportspeople but when I was competing at the 10 year old girls High Jump at Regionals, I was doing it for myself to see if I could jump over that bar. Not to see if I can make it to State. I was like playing a game with myself to see if I could really jump over it. I wasn't going to be bummed if I didn't make it over. I just wanted to test my ability to see if I learnt anything from the recent years. And so when I jumped over the bar and it stood still between the two poles, I was like yeeeeeeeesss!!! And when the event had finished and they told me I came 2nd I was like yessssssss, then they said 'Collect your certificate and your permission slip for State Championships' I was like 'nooooo. I don't want to go. That's too intimidating'

I literally made up my mind on the spot that I wasn't going to go. But the school got mad and demanded I go. I was like yeah even if i wanted to go i'd have to buy the uniforms, drive to the venue, do everything independently as a 10 year old with asian parents who know nothing about athletics at a professional level and that was stressful. SO the school helped me out and bought the uniforms and my parents actually drove me to Olympic Park.

On the day of my event, I was terrified that maybe I would turn up late and the event had started and I missed my chance. I got up so early and packed everything like I was going to a picnic with the fam and left a lil after 7. Got there at 8; the ride felt forever. Parked the car, walked out and see allllll these white people with tight elastic shorts and cropped shirts with braided hair walking around when there's me with the Sydney South West (SSW) cap, jersey and baggy shorts. I went to find the SSW group which was a combination of the Zones + Regional teams soooooo a loooootttt of peopleee + all the other regions within the state so THAT JUST ADDED MORE INTIMIDATION AND STRESS. But my parents were there and they didn't know jack like me which made me feel good lol My event was really early and on the other side of the field. My parents walked me over and sat on the grass area that overlooked the actual sporting ground to have clear vision of me jumping. The bar was set high. These girls were tall, white, skinny, wore spikes, looked like they had years of experience and as every girl had their turn, each one made it over. I didn't. At that point I was bummed. I wanted to make it over once but it was the first height and I didn't make it over. It was a complete waste of day because my parents drove me there and sat for probably a total of 1.5 hours before we headed back home. I was disappointed.

Sometime during that same week I reassured myself that making to State was probably one of the best achievements I could ever have and doing bad isn't so bad.

After that was year 6 and I got into sport real hard. Every term I did a sport. For Term 1 and 4 I did basketball. For Term 2 and 3 I did softball. Basketball literally came out of nowhere. I don't know how I came to love it so much. And I still do. My year 6 teacher was the coach for the team and I guess she had an influence over that because she taught me skills and how to do better in certain areas but man, basketball shot out from the sky LOL I honestly have no idea why I loved basketball. I think it was because it was really competitive and I loved the whole rush of running down one side of the court to the other side and stealing the ball from the opponent. Also dribbling and shooting came so naturally for me that it made learning the sport relatively easy. Man I love basketball. I wish to see a good NBA game before I die btw.


So that was the first decade, and one year. LOL 11 years in total of my sporting existence.
Add 6 years to that and what do I get?
High school.


tobecontinued.


Tuesday, May 13, 2014 9:58 PM