Heh… I’m not sure if I recall exactly what I went through in the past 48 hours… but I’ll try.

Saturday
0930 - Arrive at Atrium@Orchard (next to Plaza Singapura). Meet Vivien Tan, formerly of Showbuzz fame. Can’t get over how good she still looks.
1000 - Get shown the nearest toilets. Given a break to get breakfast, pee and whatnot.
1030 - After finishing a packet of Berry Juice from Carrefour, arrive back at the registration booth.
1100 - Supposed to begin, but are delayed due to some unforeseen circumstances.
1110 - Balloting for seats begin. I get seat number 1. Feel really good about getting number 1.
1120 - Marathon begins with about 10 minutes of Discovery: Health. Interestingly enough, it’s a program about a double amputee.
1130 - Discovery: Health continues with family stories - about IVF babies and stuff. Hardly bored.
1230 - Replay of England VS Portugal. Knowing the score beforehand as well as the exact time the goals came helps to keep me awake for the whole match. I call it the WWE syndrome.
1400 - E! Entertainment begins with a biography on Jenny McCarthy. Naturally, I hang around for the whole show. At the end of it, have new respect for Jenny.
1800- Another E! True Hollywood Story, this time on Heather Mills McCartney.
1830- Turn around, see my mother standing there and wave to her. It would be the last time I see anyone in my family for 24 hours.
1900- Don’t remember much here.
2300- The “judges” rotate. Don’t quite like the new set of judges. They’re all male.
2335- Judges show us “The Sum of All Fears”. This is the first of several times they bend the rules, not showing us programmes from the Digital Tier.
Sunday
0135- Girl next to me quits soon after the movie ended. I am amazed.
0245- The match between Sweden and Netherlands begins. Rooting for Netherlands until Davids gets substituted, then rooted for Sweden after that.
0337- Receive my first “yellow card”, a penalty for being caught sleeping for more than 5 seconds.
0355- Go for my one and only toilet break. The winner is judged on the least amount of breaks taken, so this is all part of the strategy.
0400- Amazed that WWE Smackdown! is still on. Catches a few minutes of it.
0600- We watch an episode of the Powerpuff Girls. I’m not sure this is legal.
0615- We watch a little bit of the New Adventures of Winne The Pooh. Now I know this is DEFINITELY not in the schedule.
0725- A Malay contestant, the last non-Chinese among the group, quits.
0730- One of the judges suggests that they change the channel to EastCity (Channel 56) to watch I Not Stupid.
0748- Receive my second “yellow card”, for the same reason as the first. Hey, they were showing commercials in CHINESE. I fell asleep when the commercial belt began to repeat.
0800- I Not Stupid begins. It’s a good show, but highly overrated. A good way to spend 2 hours without sleeping.
1000- I Not Stupid ends. Now I’m actually worried about falling asleep for the third time and getting disqualified.
1130- Yesterday’s judges return and we go back to watching the new channels.
1200- Mrs. Pollifax — Spy on MGM is a fun, 1970s adventure movie filled with chauvinistic, politically incorrect ideals. A fun watch for the next 2 hours.
1600- One of the people I’m “competing” with gets disqualified. This was horrible and stressed me out to no end.
1700- Where Eagles Dare was a decent movie, only if I could see anything. The combination of a rear screen projector, the midday sun and a black and white movie equates to me watching a black screen 90% of the time.
1830- The cameras are being set up and there’s an air of excitement around. But, we have to watch a Golf show on Discovery H&L first.
1900- This was the original ending time, but unfortunately, since we started late on Saturday morning, they’re going to prolong it for another 20 minutes.
1920- The end! Celebrations are muted among the ten remaining contestants because everyone’s so damn tired.
1924- Make a call home after realising that there’s no one I know around. Find out everyone’s still at home.
1945- The prizes are being distributed. There’s talk about a tiebreaker. Now I’m worried that I did not win first or second place. I’m regretting going for a toilet break at all.
1948- It’s down to three guys. I’m expecting my name to be called next for the “3rd prize” (which is the same as the 6 before it). Then the magic words: “break for 5 minutes” is mentioned by Vivien Tan and my heart leaps. It’s not me!
1949- I’ve won a 27″ LCD television at least! It’s a tie between first and second places at 3 minutes each!
1950- The tiebreaker is a game of Mastermind, utilising one of Digital Cable’s several in-built games. My opponent goes first.
1951- Receive a call from Andrew. Refuse to receive it immediately because I’m trying to figure out my opponent’s answer.
1953- Discover that my family has rushed down to see me win! I feel so amazingly blessed.
1955- It’s my turn. I have to solve the puzzle within 5 tries (my opponent’s ‘record’). If I solve it in less, I win. If I take 5 tries to solve, then I have to get 3 correct in the 4th try. It’s not easy, and the pressure’s building.
1957- It’s the 4th try and I get 3 correct! I also realise much later that I could have solved it by the 4th try, but I was too nervous to realise.
1958- I get it right on the 5th try! It’s still a tie!
2000- The challenge is now to get it in the least amount of time! As well as the least number of tries and all.
2010- My opponent solves it after slightly over 10 minutes. I feel relieved that I have that much time to beat.
2012- I do not get off to a good start. After three tries, I still have not ascertained any of the four colours, or their places. My brother is trying to help me out, but he’s also unable to ascertain anything. Could I have lost the Grand Prize just like that (a 2D/1N all-expenses paid trip to Bali - stay-in at the Ritz Carlton hotel and a spa package)?
2013- I make my 4th guess on my own. My brother’s shouting for me to wait a while longer, but my nerves are wracked. I do a quick check to ensure I didn’t make the same mistake I did in the first round, and then I take the final plunge.
2014- It was right. I had won the competition and the Grand Prize. My head was spinning. I barely knew to raise my arms in victory. Not even a shout escaped my lips.

I had won.