October 14, 2021: Mayhem at a Sports Store

Image from apg.com.au
Note that this isn't the same Decathlon store I went to.

I remember cartoon channels like Disney Channel in Southeast Asia used the word "mayhem" a lot during breaks. I don't use this word a lot myself; I just use words like "chaos".

This week was full of adventure for me. I took Mom on a lot of early-morning deliveries from her bakery franchise to people's homes. Sometimes, I went with Mom and Dad to the mall: one time to look for new gadgets (and didn't find anything interesting), two more times just for me to slack off and explore while Mom and Dad work out.

This particular adventure, however, was pretty big for me. Dad invited us to Decathlon, a huge sports store featuring products for over 70 sports. Mom and my younger brother came with us.

Dad was mainly there to buy a new bike. I wanted gloves because my eczema prevents me from gripping things tightly without slipping or scratching my hands.

But before the Decathlon "trip", I didn't expect that we'd have lunch first at a mall. We ate at a Chinese buffet restaurant--I didn't eat much because my lack of sleep has reduced my appetite. I've been binging on Genshin Impact, teaching, and enduring the noise from my younger brother's military training.

I wrote this part 'cause this'll be important later.

Anyway, the cool thing about Decathlon is that customers can play certain sports...IN THE FREAKIN' STORE. This list isn't exhaustive, but there are tracks for skateboards and bicycles, there are archery targets, there's a pool table, and there's even a table tennis...table.

Mom and Dad seemed to take long to pick out what they want, so my brother and I slacked off by playing a few sports.

Decathlon is so far the only store I know that sells equipment for arnis (a Filipino melee weapon martial art). Not many people go to the arnis section, so we took advantage by grabbing some soft arnis practice sticks and hitting each other with them. Just like in fencing, we kept score based on the number of hits.

This was the first sport we played in the store, so we were in top condition (minus my lack of sleep). I destroyed my brother 4-2 while we both used a one-handed fencing style. Not gonna lie, I felt proud that I beat my brother at his own best weapon.

I mainly used lunges and ripostes; I wanted to capitalize on holes in his defenses and make it hard for him to attack comfortably with close-range attacks. I feel comfortable with lunges, after all.

Mom brought us to a table tennis table later on. I don't know about my brother, but I haven't played table tennis since that one time in...a hotel, I guess? It has been many years ago. Regardless, both Mom and my brother were fairly clumsy with the ball and missed it after just one serve. So did I when I took Mom's place so she could shop more.

I never really paid attention when I was taught table tennis grips in high school, but since I'm a weapons enthusiast, I hold pretty much any object with a handle as if it were a sword. As such, I had my pointer finger pointing upwards from the grip, kinda like holding onto a gun trigger. It felt comfortable, not gonna lie--I was able to serve reasonably well after some fails.

We often sent the ball flying fairly far, causing us to make crazy serves like raising our rackets above our heads. I was often in a panic to serve back a ball that was going so quickly as if I was about to get shot by an arrow.

When the ball did hit the floor but continue to bounce, I tried dribbling it like a basketball, bouncing it on the racket, then serving it back to my brother. He was able to keep up with many of them.

The chaos of our match was such that customers and staff were occasionally disturbed by the incoming ball. They didn't show any signs of disgust or whatever, but I do feel guilty.

One time, the ball even went between the legs of a female staff member. She seemed oblivious to it, though, at least. I was half-nervous, half-laughing in my brain.

I exhausted my energy by running after the ball at high speed each time I failed to serve back. I wanted to flex my speed, after all--I don't wanna be out of practice for when I actually gotta go fast.

As such, combined with my brother's military training (the mandatory ROTC was made law after I completed my Civic Welfare Training Service (CWTS), i.e. volunteering, which counted in place of ROTC), I got tired first. I occasionally held onto the table before serving, for example, while my brother stood up straight the whole time and showed no signs of tiredness. (Or maybe he's just being "socially acceptable" and he's secretly tired.)

At probably the 15-minute mark, we started 3 games where we kept score until 5 points. I lost every single one.

I finally rage-quit after maybe 30 minutes of playtime.

After getting our choices of equipment, we went back to the arnis section and did two more rounds of 5: one where we held the swords with two hands (I used a kendo style), and one where we did the usual one-handed fencing style.

My brother beat me 5-4 in both rounds.

In conclusion, I think I need more endurance training. I'm well-adapted to street fights where the goal is to end the fight as quickly as possible.

Regardless, my brother and I don't get to play a lot these days because we're both extremely busy doing our own thing, so I think this was a fun trip overall.