That was the general, rather stifling atmosphere in the school hall during the not so brief, but intense, period of time when World Maths Day (Or should I say Days?) was our sole purpose of living. (Mind you, when I say sole purpose, I do mean SOLE purpose. We lived and breathed nothing but numbers. I believe that some of us even dreamt of numbers.)

For three days straight, from the 3 March till the 5 March, we did nothing but type numbers into a little flashing box on screen. School work? Set aside. Tuition? Skipped. Eating? Sleeping? What did those mean again? Everything and anything that mattered was the numbers. That and the precarious position of each team on the looming scoreboard projected at the front of the hall. (‘To motivate us’ had been the reason given. I must say that it worked very well.) Every once in a while, someone would furiously exclaim, “They’ve caught up with us – work FASTER!” “Come on people, go, go, go!” “OH NO. THEY’RE JUST BEHIND US!”

Intakes of air. Furious typing and encouraging remarks. Then sighs of relief.

“Alright, we’re increasing faster than them now.”

Or, once in a while, sighs of despair.

“We’ve gone one rank down, they’re above us!! QUICK, WE CAN STILL CATCH UP!”

Many teams took part from our school, but the ones who answered the most questions were asked to stay back in school, long after school had ended and aim for the top 10 spots. They did so most enthusiastically. Some of the participants had already started answering questions the second World Maths Day was officially started, to get a head start on the other teams. Others stayed up late into the night trying to keep their team’s position on the scoreboard. Some of them woke up hours earlier doing the same thing. Most of us skipped our meals and tuitions. The really dedicated ones made shifts.

Yes, shifts.

However, it wasn’t the thought of a grand prize or the promised satay party which motivated everybody to try as hard as we did. Well, maybe that helped a little, but what really drove all of us for those three gruelling days was something bigger.

We all really made the effort – for our teams. For the proud feeling we got when we saw our team in the top three rankings (of the world, mind you!). The encouraging words we sent to each other. The shared frustration and tears, and laughter, the fun we had even when the atmosphere was demanding and stressful. We did it because we enjoyed the teamwork. We enjoyed the healthy competition. We enjoyed the rush that we could only get from overtaking said competition. We loved every second of it.

And our outstanding teamwork and determination has been proven through our spectacular results. Cempaka dominated the scoreboard, taking the first five places and appearing here and there throughout the next 45 slots on the board. We managed to answer over 4,000,000 questions, roughly 60% of all questions answered in the world.

So, all we ‘World-Maths-Dayers’ can be proud of ourselves for our achievements for this year – and start preparing ourselves for next year’s World Maths Day Competition, because the competition will definitely be even tougher than it was this time round.