One Truly Amazing Race

Focus on the journey, not the destination. Joy is found not in finishing an activity but in doing it.

- Greg Anderson

     Have you ever watched The Amazing Race on TV..?  It’s this reality game show wherein teams travel to different locations around the world, having to fulfill tasks and overcome challenges along the way, receiving clues and working out riddles, with the goal of arriving first at a final destination and winning the coveted million-dollar prize.  I’m a big fan of this TV series; being a student of International Relations, I find it highly interesting to see how people react and adapt to cultures and locales that are so unlike their own.  Relationships were either formed or broken, intensified or doused, strengthened or shakened.  But at the end of the race, all teams, be it the winners or otherwise, claim that the experience was worth more than any amount of money in the world.

     Tonight, we had our own version of the Amazing Race in the world of Midgard.  James and I, being Board Event Organizer and Moderator of the RagnaBarkadahan Messageboards where we’re better known as SniperAngel and Odalisque, facilitated the “Destiny of Baldur” event.  Although the turn-out of participants was less than expected, we pushed through with much enthusiasm.  We started by meeting up at North Morroc at 6:30 p.m.  After a briefing, the race started with the participants choosing the answer to a pre-determined riddle from an assortment of loots vended by Montreal, James’ Biochemist.  They then had to look for Winter Solstice, my High Priestess, to hand over their answers and get a warp to the next pitstop, gaining points along the way.

     Overall, the race took a little over an hour.  Quite a lot of time in excess of the 15 minutes James had anticipated.  But it was so much fun!  Though I wasn’t a contestant, I felt excited and jittery as the participants teleported in haste with the hopes of being the first to arrive at the pitstop.  And what better way to cap off the entire event with a triple tie!  James and I were a little flustered about it, but we were elated as well.  The people who participated surely deserved it for all the enthusiasm they’ve shown.

     After the event, the participants obligingly posed with us for a few souvenir screenshots.  Despite the time it took and the fact that it was well past everyone’s dinner time, we all lingered a bit longer to chat, exchange congratulations, and even to register each other as friends.  I told James that I had so much fun and he assured me we’d do it again. 

     This has got to be one of my most memorable Midgard moments; evident of the fact that shared passions and goals build bridges between people, from the virtual to the real.  And this is all the more an affirmation of the fact that indeed, it is not the destination, but the journey that makes everything worthwhile. 

     Thanks Lana, Ian, Martha, and Olympia.  Thank you James, my angel.  You guys have just crystallized another perfect memory in my Midgard time capsule and in my life’s treasure trove of yesterdays.