Destination Imagination 2018 regional tournament
Alright, so I’m going to save you the time of reading the whole 2000 word blog post and give you the highlights right here, its like shmoop,
the websites that summarizes the book that you defiantly dont want to read, but for my blog post! Lets start…
Highlights of the Destination Imagination regional tournament
Wake up at 7 on a Saturday
March into a gym with 74 other teams at 8:40, mostly younger children
Wait around for 3 hours, while other teams brag about the fun of having the presentation over
Practice for 30 mins at 11:00
Waiting to get on the stage, and one of the DI people tell us that our team choice element is probably not going to elegable to use
The DI person is just kidding and I am now shaking
About to present and our other team choice element is actually not a team choice element
Finally we present, the speaker stops working, and decides to turn off and on throughout the presentation.
Finish presentation and I am finally calmed down by 1:00, an hour after we finished.
Do absolutely nothing productive for another hour and a half.
Meet at the instant challenge at 2:20
Fill out our forms, loose one, we find it and run up to the instant challenge
*&*^%*((&$^#%^$#%@$$%*^(*^(%#%$!#!$^%*%()&%($&^$@%$#!$!#^
(not aloud to talk about the instant challenge till may)
Wait around till 4:45 and venture into the gym for the awards ceremony.
Become the most embarrassed I have ever really felt, when I receive a text from my dad, who is sitting on the bleachers below, asking if he can join the just dance group on the floor, or if its to embarrassing
Award ceremony starts and it takes a while to get to our category, but we end up getting 3rd and that makes the whole 10 hour day worth it. Heres a video of us receiving our medals
Ok now I’m going to go into more detail, and talk about how my team and I made it to that third place spot!
This is my first year in DI and I was shocked! It can be crazy stressful at times! The first step of DI for us was our team placement. I was grouped with, Melika, Marshall, Kailey, Daniel, and Luca. The next step was to figure out our challenge and really try to memorize it!
We were gifted with the Unlikley Atraction challenge, in this challenge we had to create an attraction that opperated in an unlikely location. Our unlikely location is planet Phoebe (a dream planet), where our main character travels when he falls asleep in class. Our attraction on the other hand, is a fidget spinner. Don’t ask me why, I honestly think it was just one of those really great ideas in the moment and then all of a sudden you got a blue fidget spinner as your ride! I do love our ride though, and I think it portrays our individual creativity!
Next step was script, we brain stormed ideas in class about what our story was going to be about and what the problems and resolutions were going to be, so I decided since Melika and Kailey were painting the backdrops, and Daniel, Marshall, and Luca were mapping out the fidget spinner, that I would take the task of writing the script. Just like usual me, the script turned it to be way to much and we ended up cutting out at least half of it, oh well, its better to have to much then to little! 
We then had to put all the steps together and create a creative, but informative play, which on the first test run through, we did not succeed in! We failed on our test run, and I could practically feel Melika shaking! We knew then that this was actually pretty serious business, and our casual way of getting out work done, might not get us onto the podium. Another thing that this practice run showed me, is that we have to put in work, and so its pointless putting in work you know is going to fail, when you could put in the same amount of effort and do an amazing job!
Anyways we ended up forgetting to do our team choice elements till last minute, talking about amazing jobs, but I worked really hard and completed 4 masks equipped with lighting with the help from Daniel. These masks played a part in our presentation, because we wanted something to diffencite the normal class room from the dream land, also we chose masks because they are like sleeping masks. And it makes a nice connection to our story!
Our next step toward presenting was a ton of practising. Any free time we had we were running through out lines, working with staging and blocking, which exits were for when, and how much time you could have for costume change (definitely did not nail that one!) and after we have practiced endless times we were prepared to present!
Destination aimagination snuck up on me, and all of a sudden it was Saturday! The beginning of the day went along slowly. I watched some of the seycove teams, like the constellations, and ending on a high note, and I was super proud of both of there teams, you guys did amazing jobs! My team met at 11 to practice yet again. And then all of a sudden it was our turn and we were up on the stage. I was pretty nervous to preform in front of all my friends and family, but I had to keep telling my self that after eight minutes it would all be done for a month!
The timer started and we set up our backdrops and props on stage. My line was the first line and once that one was over I felt much more comfortable up on stage. We switched scenes and all of a sudden our team choice element stoped working. Don’t worry it wasn’t the masks, it was the music. We had created a personalized soundtrack to resemble the nonchalant noises on planet phoebe, but it was cutting in and out. It was a shock to all of us because the audio had worked well in all of our test runs, and the one time it counts it decides to falter. Anyways we pulled through and finished our presentation within the time frame, and I personally think we did really good!
We then had another few hours to kill, and I wasted my money on junk food from the cafeteria. I also watched a few improv teams, and boy does that require courage! I was told I had to meet my team at the bottom of the stairs at 2:20. We headed upstairs to our instant challenge, but I can’t tell you what went on in the instant challenge room until May, but don’t worry reader, you didn’t miss out on anything important!I wasted some more time and then all of a sudden people were ushering me into the gym for award ceremony. I stepped into the gym and people were dancing to just dance. I think it was nice for all those people too let loose after a long day of competition, but it was not my way of letting loose! Anyway me and my friends were sitting on the bleachers watching the just dancers, when I received a text from my dad who was on the bleachers below. His text read,
I didn’t have the heart to tell him yes so I just went replied, “go ahead” I was saved though because just dance ended right after sending that text and my father did not have time to get up and dance! Now it was award time. There were quite a few categories before us, and I was really happy watching seycove take home the W in almost every category. Go seycove! Too soon it was our category. I was extremly nervous. It was a shock to hear our teams name being called up for 3rd place, I was so so happy! I was super proud of my group and it made the whole day worth while!
Now DI is not all fun and games, and there was a lot of room for improvement, so I would like to mention these items with you.
Improvement
Obviously our music was a major step back, but personally I think that the sound producing methods, were not up to par. We lacked points in that category, and if we up those points we may have slid into second!
Another thing we could improve on is our instant challenge. We got the lowest score for our instant challenge and I think that our team has the capability to win this category. For next time we just need to figure out what give the most points and focus on those items, not spend time on things that will not reward us in the long run!
One last thing that me and my team can improve on for the next tournament would have to be our improv skills. Some times during presentations something might go wrong or there might be a mess up in the script, so I would feel more reassured if my team and I prepared for these mess ups, by creating little signs to say you’ve messed up, or adding in extra sentences to help ease the conversation along!
Anyways thanks for reading this!
Adlih
