Archery National Team/ Junior World Championships Qualifiers

On the 27th, 29th and 31rst of August, trials were held at Sugathadasa Stadium to qualify for the national archery team as well as qualifying for the Junir World Championships (only under 18 participants).
The distance was two sections consisting of 6 rounds of 6 arrows each, at a distance of 70M.
I was the only person under 18 participating and many of the people who were competing do archery for a living so i wasnt expecting to win but as practice for the Nationals which are next month, but i faired much better than i thought, and the results arnt in yet, but i think that i might have scarped a qualification for the national team.
A very good score would be 300-310 out of a possible 360 points per section.
On the first day my scores were 242 and 243, which i was not dissappointed about considering the little amount of practice i did in preparation.
My scores on the second day weere much better and on par with the scores of the more serious adult competitors: 284 and 287.
My scores on the final day were better yet and it is these scores that might get me a place on the national team because they don't average your scores in consideration but take you two best scores from the three days in consideration: 290 and 304.
This experience greatly increased my awareness of my strengths and areas for growth  through my drastic improvement through the course of the competition, and I  developed new skills through the experience i gained, learned to better  work collaboratively with others despite the fact that archery isnt a team sport because i was able to interact with people who i usually would not, such as people that do archery for a living, most often on contract by one of the armed forces.

Karate Tournament - 1rst Place

Recently, I competed in the Kenseikan All-Island Karate Tournament. To clarify, Kenseikan Karate is a sub-sect of Karate (almost like different teams), where there are subtle differences with other sub-sects of karate, such as Shotokan or Wadokan. therefore the tournaments is organized not by the Ceylon Karate Association, but by the smaller Ceylon Kenseikan Karate Association. Only practitioners in Kenseikan Karate can participate, and it is seen as an opportunity to rank the practitioners in each sub-sect, which is used in decisions such as which members from the sub-sect will represent the sub-sect in larger tournament to come, such as the Western Province or All-Island.

In this tournament, I came in first place for Kumite (sparring) in the under 18, brown belt division. This was my second tournament. In my first tournament i did not do as well as i wanted but afterward i trained very hard for this tournament, and it payed off.

My plans for the future include attempting to qualify for the All-Island Tournament, which can only be achieved by ranking in the top three in my division in next years Western Province Tournament, which will be very difficult due to the fact that there will be nearly 200 participants in my age group alone.

Through this achievement and the training that led to it, I have undertaken new challenges by varying and further intensifying my training routine, increased my awareness of my strengths and areas for growth as I have now become much more comfortable in the tournament atmosphere and have identified and fixed flaws I observed in my first tournament,  and developed new skills, also through my additional training, as well as training specific to skills needed for tournament sparring.

Summer Vacation Goals

Rugby: This is a sport that i have not played seriously in a very long time and hope to gain some skill in over the holidays. I have currently enrolled in the CR&FC (Ceylon Rugby and Football Club) Rugby Academy, which holds lessons weekly on Saturday mornings. I will be reporting on any developments in upcoming posts.

Karate: There is an upcoming karate tournament which i hope to participate in and hopefully achieve medals in both sparring and forms competitions.

My Youtube Guitar Lesson Channel:  I hope to make a series of lessons for the COMPLETE arrangement of Cliffs of Dover by Eric Johnson. This will prove to be a daunting task because there is no accurate arrangement on the internet so i will most likely have to learn it by ear with the help of a software called Transcribe which allows me to slow down the track to more easily hear the fast passages within the piece. This will prove to be very difficult as this is a very long, technically complicated song, but very rewarding, because if i succeed, I will be the only person on Youtube to have a complete lesson for this very popular song for aspiring guitarists, which should greatly increase the popularity of my channel, which is currently doing well, with the number of views on the first video nearing a 1000 and no negative comments or "dislikes" so far.

My Own Playing: I also hope to take the initiative of transcribing my own instrumental solo from a jazz standard, namely Sunny - by Bobbie Hebb, popularized by Frank Sinatra.

Service: I also hope to find a suitable community service activity to participate in during the holidays, but have yet to have found one.

Final Reflection for the Year

My CAS goals at the beginning of the year were:

Creativity: One of my greatest interests and hobbies is guitar, and i seek to learn it very seriously but there is no music course offered in school so i have taken it upon myself to teach myself. I am currently learning out of Modern Method for Guitar ( http://www.berkleepress.com/catalog/product?product_id=11250) which is currently the main textbook used for the Jazz program in the Berklee Undergraduate School of Music. My goal for the following year is to cover and master all topics presented in this book. This book is however a basic level book, and after finishing I hope to move on to The Guitarist's Guide to Composing and Improvising by Jon Damian, reputed as the best very best jazz guitar tutor in the world. I hope to master the content of both these texts by the end of the two years of the IB DP.

Action: Throughout the course of the two years i would like to be active in as many sports as possible, particularly during the first as it will be impractical during the second year of the IB DP. I hope to participate in SAISA Basketball and Track and Field. I also participate in karate outside of school and will be competing in my very first tournament in November, the Western Province Tournament, in which the first 3 will qualify for the All-Island tournament, which i will try my best to obtain.

Service: I have joined the Hope For Kids activity, in which we regularly visit the Maharagama Cancer Hospital, and spend time with children suffering from cancer. We hope to organize a fund raising program for this cause as soon as possible which i hope to take part in.

 _________________________________________________________________________


To be honest, i do not believe that i have put anywhere near the full amount of effort i should have, even though i have completed most of my goals, or at least come close, i still feel that i am lacking, particularly in the service component.
However i will not be discouraged by my shortcomings this year, and will use them as model for what no to do next year.

Currently, my only goals in mind are to score highly on my end of year exams, as they will make a large part of the grades considered when my predicted grades are decided next year, which will be put on my university applications, and in addition i am also doing a Physics AL outside school, as well as the SAT's, so i have a lot of studying on my hands.
My main method of studying for these exams will be to do past papers, because this is what has been of most use to me in the past.
I have now for the past 2 weeks begun a minimum 5 hour/ day study schedule and hope to follow through with it to the end of my exams.

All in all, CAS has been a very rewarding experience for me, and has greatly helped me become for self-aware (from all the reflection). I hope to pursue it much more diligently next year.

Youtube guitar lesson Channel

In order to fulfill my goals for both creativity and service both which i am lacking in, i have taken the initiative to create a channel on you tube to provide free video guitar lessons. This has helped me to Undertake a new challenge as i am completely new to teaching anyone anything, Developing new skills as providing lessons for other people made me be more critical about my own playing when i know that it will be under the criticism of many people. This is the link to my first lesson, on the introduction of Cliffs of Dover by Eric Johnson.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Me1OBH76MpY

Long Overdue Post: SOS Kids

Recently, i joined the SOS Kids group which works with children from a local orphanage, first interacting with them through games and presentation, and then swimming with them in the school swimming pool, making sure that they are safe, as well as active and entertained. This activity allowed me to Work Collaboratively with Others through aiding other group members to converse with the children because none of the children are fluent in English and very few of the other group members can speak Sinhala, and well as engage in an activity dealing with issues of global importance. Unfortunately, i have missed many meetings with the group, but hope to consistently attend from now on. My goal is to be CAS leader next year for SOS Kids.

Week Without Walls

During WWW the goal of our group was to help refurbish one of the schools constructed after the tsunami, to provide education for those who has been displaced. I also participated in the planning of the trip, although i was not able to go on the pilot trip. The planning involved deciding leaders for the groups in which other students will be sorted into based on their allocated jobs in the refurbishment process. It also involved planning the purchase of materials to be taken which would be used for painting, and playing with the children.

I participated in the painting of the interior of the single classroom of the school, as well as parts of the exterior, along with playing with the children, in which everyone participated.

My ability as a native sinhala speaker came in handy because it allowed me to converse freely with the children(even though most of them seemed afraid of me).

At the end of the week, the entire group performed a small skit after we watched the performance that the children had arranged for us.

In addition, after our service we also visited the Hambanthota Port currently under construction as well as the Yala National Wildlife Sanctuary.
 These experiences made me aware of issues of global importance through exposure to the major infrastructure development of the port, as well as the wildlife i witnessed on the safari in Yala.

The service portion of the trip also helped me undertake new challenges, and discover areas for improvement (such as keeping paint off my clothes), as well as working well in others in a large group.