A Water Rocket Tale

If you guys are wondering why have I stopped updating my blog so frequently since the pass few days, let me tell you the story behind my laziness :P

1. I m totally exhausted everyday after I came back from the water rocket competition that lasted for THREE DAYS CONSEQUENTLY!! (which was kindda fun :D :D)

2. I wanted to update the water rocket competition in one post (which is what I am doing now)

3. My inertia just stopped me from updating my blog these few days. I would like to remain at my relative stationary pose. xD

Alright, enough for rubbish, let's move on to... PICTURES AND DESCRIPTION of my DAYS!

A Water Rocket Tale

DAY 1 - 27.5.2013

Kirrthana and I had prepared everything and we were ready to.. DIE OUT OF SHAME!! MUAHAHAHA..>< LOL. Not literally, but yes we'll die out of shame. In the morning, Teacher Krencana fetched us from the school to Teknik Tunku Abdul Rahman. We were in quite a mess because we did not have enough raw materials and we forgot to bring some of the things needed. But luckily, everything went on smoothly which meant not as bad as we thought it would be. 

Made water rockets in one of the school's dining hall

Had our lunch at a nearby Malay food stall

Our water rockets.. HOHOHO..

Water rockets presentation afterwards.. Nervously trying to read everything in the book and hoped that everything will go into my head

Got to know two new friends. The Indian boy is Kirr's another camp's friend from SMK Methodist while the other boy who looked cute was Jacob from Chung Ling High School. I love candid shoots :P

So the first day was not bad at all. The presentation went on well although we were quite blur about certain question the judges asked us and definitely found it hard to explain Physics theories that relate to the making of water rockets. But oh well, I managed to say a few points and just splatted out whatever I knew regardless it was right or wrong. And Kirr played a good sidekick role and helped me whenever my mind went blank. A day full of laughters with our teacher, new friends and even the judges/interviewers. Especially with my acquaintances. We blended into topics very naturally as though as we've met each other for a long time. Awesome day! :D :D

DAY 2 - 28.5.2013

Today was a bit awful than yesterday. It was a red letter day - the day we launch our water rockets. So we made two types of water rockets, one without the parachute (which launches at 45 degrees) and another one with a parachute (which launches at 90 degrees). We initially did not bring the most important thing - scissors. Oh God.. 

The live scene

The sky just grew dark suddenly and Kirr noticed that there was a faint rainbow hanging in the middle of the sky. Maybe our apocalypse wasn't coming after all :P

There were two tents provided for participants to launch their water rockets. The emcee called out the name of the schools participating one by one and the participants walked to the tents respectively. The 1st launch of our water rocket (without parachute) was terrible. It just went into the air and spun a little which looked very faulty and only lasted for like.. 5 seconds, then THUMP! It landed straight onto the muddy ground. But we wasn't the school with the worst water rocket though :P After all the schools tried their water rockets, we were given 10 minutes to repair/ modify our water rocket. Kirr and I were so helpless as we could not think of anyway to make our water rocket better. Physics theories were hopeless for us, so I went for the common sense instead. I was thinking of something like fish fins. If fish could swim in the water and resist the water pressure, then the same theory should be working on water rockets as well. So, teacher helped us to cut the fins smaller into what I called them as fish fins (but one of the judges said the fins looked like butterfly wings) and we were given a second chance to launch our water rocket. I thought we really had to die out of shame this time, but Godness gracious! Our water rocket flew higher, further and definitely better than our 1st attempt. God bless us!

After the 1st session, we had 2 and a half hours of break for lunch. We took our lunch at the same Malay food stall again, then headed back to the school. Out of bored, we began to read the novels that we had bought along to kill the time. Yeah, literally "kill" the time. And I actually finished the whole "Beautiful Creatures" novel at there =.= Then, Kirr and I loitered around the school because it has huge school compound. Plus, the break time left was still in abundance. 

Me: boyish . Kirr: ladylike

Hmm.. Lady who? xD

There was some kind of exhibition

Had our thumbs printed on the "I love archeology" board

There was some kind of performance after the break which was very impressive. I think they were trying to recruit members into the astronomy club or something.

Then.. It was the nervous breakdown part - the launching of water rocket with parachute. We didn't prepare very well for this and so eventually our parachute did not open during our 1st trail. But after the 10 minutes of modification, our parachute opened perfectly although it landed very fast. I really had to thank Jacob and his partner for their willingness to lend us their scissors, powder and stuffs. They were really good and in-need acquaintances/friends.

DAY 3 - 29.5.2013

Today was the last day of the water rocket competition. And it was the most exciting one - free style. HOHOHO.. That means, we can unleash our creativity in this section. Unfortunately, ideas are always better than reality. I've got wonderful ideas and Kirr gave some ideas as well. We made the water rocket just in the nick of time and I got car sick by the time we reached the Teknik school. 

Today, it didn't feel like it was a competition at all. We were just sitting there with no nervous breakdown or muscle cramps or artery failure xD Haha.. Our design was special (but not outstanding enough) because our water rocket had three parachutes. Two on the head of the smaller bottle by the sides and one on the body which included a big 100 plus bottle with the two smaller bottle by its side. We even mixed water colors with the water although the effect was not as prominent as we imagined it would be. But yes, our water rocket took off with pride and the parachutes did come out too, but only two did. One parachute did not open and fell to the ground with a lot of powder poured out from the head of the bottle. 

BRAVO! Haha >_<

Actually we were suppose to wait at the tent until they announced the 5 chosen best groups for a second launch to choose the best 3 groups out of the 5 chosen ones but obviously we were not one of the five groups. So, after we launched our water rocket, we went to have our lunch at Four Seasons shopping mall since it was just a stone's throw. We couldn't decide which restaurant we should go. In the end, Teacher Krencana made a decision and the beautiful photos below were born.

 

Yes! We went to Winter Warmers. I had not given a single thought that I would enter Winter Warmers for the 1st time with Teacher Krencana and Kirr. Fabulous! :D :D

 

HA HA HA HA.. Self shot

Our beautiful Teacher Krencana :D :D

We took our own sweet time because the break time was just too long. But we enjoyed it being so long though. The food at Winter Warmers were pretty good especially the baked macaroni that Kirr had ordered. But my Fettuccine Carbonara was not that good as the sauce tasted a bit too sweet and it was just not the type of taste I would like. 

When we got back to the school after our wonderful lunch, it was the time when the closing ceremony started. It started around 2.45pm and the speeches were delicate, but to us, it was always too long as usual as the part we looked forward to the most was the prize giving ceremony. Although our school didn't get any single prize (because the water rocket competition was the only competition our school sent representatives to compete), but it was still a pleasure to look at the joy on the winners' face. Chung Ling High School was the biggest winner this year. In fact, I heard it from Jacob that his school won in every single Science & Technologies competition apart from the water rocket competition. But frankly speaking, I'm sure everyone tried their best and there shouldn't be any blaming on anyone's failure to gain a placing. It was quite competitive I'd say. 

So this is where my water rocket tale come to its end. Hope you guys enjoyed reading my post :D :D