Media release
Muscat, Oct 15: Mangalorean Catholic Centre for Parish (MCCP) of Muscat, Oman ushered in a new dawn of knowledge and competitive spirit among the community with the unveiling of a scintillating and engrossing quiz competition on a grand scale on Friday October 9 at the Ruwi Parish Main Hall.
Members were requested to form teams consisting of 3 members with at least one being below 18 years. A record of sorts was created with 30 teams participating in the competition. It was interesting to observe that children and teenagers of the community formed a large portion of the contestants.
The programme began with honourary treasurer of MCCP 2015-16, Sunil Furtado taking centre stage and welcoming participants as well as audience, who had gathered in good numbers. He then called on stage the president of MCCP, John Gonsalves, and the spiritual advisor, Fr Wilson Rumao. Chief guests of the evening Adolf D’souza and JoselynD’souza were also asked to grace the stage. They represented Raphael D’souza, proprietor of Muscat Golden Services, who is a major benefactor of MCCP and of this programme in particular. Fr Wilson Rumao prayed for the success of the event and invoked divine blessings on all the contestants so that they could perform to the best of their ability. The competition was declared open with the symbolic cutting of the ribbon by the dignitaries present on the stage.
President John Gonsalves gave a short introduction of the programme saying that he and his team wanted to break away from the normal pattern and bring in a new thinking and new initiative into the functioning of MCCP. This quiz competition was a step towards the same. He hoped that this would greatly appeal to the younger generation of the community as it would stimulate their personal development and growth.
Then, Sunil Furtado introduced the Quiz master of the Show, Hala Jamal and his team who have conducted more than 30 such shows in Oman, and appreciated their passion for promoting quizzing as a mean to develop creative young minds in Oman.
Hala Jamal then took over the proceedings and introduced the format to all those present. He promised them a full-fledged quiz show incorporating innovative and latest methods of quizzing with clues given in all possible formats such as audios, videos, images etc. He asked the audience to be on their toes as he would be directing many questions at them.
The first round was a written test with 26 interesting questions, whose answers were in Alphabetical order. Subsequently, these questions were thrown open to the audience, which generated tremendous enthusiasm and fun among them. After lunch, the 14 teams who scored the maximum marks were announced, with the top two teams qualifying directly to finals. The remaining 12 teams had to battle it out in the semi-finals.
These 12 teams were divided into two groups for the two semi-final rounds, which was a quick fire six question buzzer round. The ones who are most alert and quickest in this tough round made it to the finals. Two top teams from each semi-final joined the top two teams from the first round, to form the 6 teams required for the finals.
The final round heightened the interest among all present with four roundsof intense quizzing, which included two buzzer rounds. Fortune favoured the brave whotook chances to answer some really tough questions. The team ‘TTL’ raced ahead and won with a margin of 10 points over the other teams. However, there was a tie for the 2nd and 3rd position, with two teams scoring equal points. Then the Quiz Master had to ask the tie breaker question, which was correctly answered by the team ‘Quizzards’. Thus they walked away with the 2nd position and the team ‘Muscat Panthers’ settled for the 3rd position.
The winning teams were:
1st position: Team TTL consisting to Darrel Pareira, Johan Furtado and Prem Colaco
2nd position: Team Quizzards consisting of Jevita Saldanha, Arren Crasta and Darren Lewis
3rd position: Team Muscat Panthers consisting of Gavin Leema, Dorothy Lilly D'souza and Prabhat Alva
The team TTL in their winning speech commented that the acronym stood for ‘This Time Lucky’ and they really feel lucky to be the winners of such a beautiful and close competition.They thanked MCCP and Hala Jamal for coming together and putting up a great show. They said such programmes are the need of the hour and should be held on regular basis.
Team Quizzards consisting only of children created a sensation by securing the 2nd position.
All the 3 winning teams were presented with Trophies, certificates and prizes such as LED TVs, Mobiles, Tabs etc. The balance 3 teams of the finals and also the members of the audience, who gave correct answers, walked away with valuable prizes. Every contestant was given individual certificate of participation.
Ophelia Lazarus, Vice President (Finance & Sports) gave vote of thanks, remembering all those who tirelessly to make this event a success.
Overall, it was a tremendous learning experience for the community members present as they were treated with an international level of professional quizzing. It was heartening to see Adults as well as children of our community coming out in flying colours despite apparent high level of the questions. At the end, there were smiles all around as there were no losers but only gainers.
The President, John Gonsalves in his concluding remarks thanked all the participants and the audience for their whole-hearted participation and said that this would encourage having many more such events in the future. He requested all to be present in big numbers for the next event ‘Sports day’ that is being planned in November.
The sponsors for the event are, Golden Muscat Services, Areej Vegetable Oils and Derivatives SAOG.
The sponsors for the year are, Renna Mobile- gold sponsor, Omantel- gold sponsor, Hyssna International LLc- silver sponsor, National Finance Company SAOG- silver sponsor,Technofit Group- silver sponsor, Hydrotec International Llc- silver sponsor,Zahrat Al Rawdha Trading- bronze sponsor,Prestige Engineering Projects- bronze sponsor, Sky United Logistics- bronze sponsor, Muscat Pharmacy and Stores LLc- bronze sponsor.