My life has been surrounded with lots of competition. Competition inside the house from among my many siblings over one piece of apple or the last spoon of ice cream or who gets to have a new shoes first. In school, there was competition as to who gets the best grades among my best friends in high-school, who gets to dance with the dashing senior at the prom, who receives the first love letter, who gets to go to the best university in the country, who gets to finish college with honors and sorts.

One of the most common competition I had was to win in a quiz show. I had a fascination for quiz bees, not only because of the prize but because of the challenge and the character I felt slowly building inside me at the end of each show. The prizes ranged from a funky t-shirt, to a case of coca cola, to a one year supply of toothpaste (seriously!) to my first plane ticket to the country capital.

I never took any quiz show competition lightly. I always prepare for it like a gladiator staking his life but only, almost always, triumph in the end. It was all almost an easy feat, after all, I was the most prepared contestant.

Until one day I met my match.

There were more than 100 contestants in that very cramped room. The hot tropical afternoon sun made everyone hate the malfunctioning air-conditioner more and more. The rules were tough as the prizes at stake were high: every mistake you make on each question will disqualify you. The winner will take home a hefty cash prize, a trophy and a free roundtrip ticket to the big city.

After only three questions, only half the number of contestants were left. One contestant after another left the room with heavy shoulders as each question was announced. I sat there quiet and confident in one corner. I know I would remain. I have to!

A few more questions and there were only two of us there, the judges and the host. I had several friends waiting outside and cheering for me. The other contestant seem to have brought his own share of fans. He also seemed to have more confidence and knowledge than I had (from the way I looked at him, at least!). Every question, we both have the same answers, even some of them were wrong. There was no other way to break the tie and end the competition than for the judges to come up with more questions. In the end, there would only be one winner and that winner takes all. Well, I was not about to give him that chance!

It was 1995 but I still remember the question up to this very day,

“Who is the world’s richest man according to the latest issue of Fortune Magazine?”

For the first time, our answers were different: I answered Bill Gates; he answered Sultan Bolkiah of Brunei.

All of you computer users would fairly know that after the upsurge of Microsoft software around that time, the Sultan of Brunei was upstaged by the Microsoft mogul. I had won the competition to the cheer of the crowd.

And how did I know the answer to that? I was randomly reading the latest copy of Fortune Magazine released in the library that very same day despite the nagging of my coach/teacher to focus more on reading some quiz Q & A’s she compiled for me.

This writing exercise is fueled by the writing prompt “competition” at Sunday Scribblings.