When camaraderie defeats competition

Paige Richmond

of the Gateway

I’m not a competitive person — well, not anymore. There was a time, particularly when I was a little kid, when I cared if I won or lost anything.

I’m sure my parents have some photos of me knocking over a checkers board in anger or storming out of a soccer match because I lost the game.

I remember being angry about losing pretty often, and I think it’s because I wasn’t very successful at most games and contests. In short, I wasn’t much of a winner. And that losing streak is probably why I stopped enjoying competition.

Once I got used to losing, I found that the outcome of the game didn’t matter as much as playing the game itself.

So, when I decided to attend Dave’s Trivia Challenge at the Hy-Iu-Hee-Hee last week, I knew I wasn’t going to take the challenge myself.

And it’s not because I don’t like trivia. I love trivia. I’m a fan of Jeopardy! and Trivial Pursuit, and I find memorizing useless facts more interesting than remember important things.

For example, I can tell you that “Their Greatest Hits” by the Eagles is the No. 1-selling album of all time by a rock band, but I probably can’t tell you my best friend’s phone number unless I pulled out my cell phone to look it up.

In fact, my visit to Dave’s Trivia Night was not the first time I’d played pub quiz. It’s pretty popular in Portland, Ore., where I lived for five years, so I’ve seen my fair share of trivia competitions.

To be honest, I can’t stand the competition at pub quiz nights. It’s not the competitions between the different quiz teams that bothers me so much as the competition within the team. Everyone tries to outdo each other, claiming that the teammate who can remember the gross domestic product of China (it’s $2,668,071, according to the World Bank) is smarter than the person who knows when comedian Pauly Shore’s birthday is (Feb. 1, 1968).

So I was pleasantly surprised to learn that Dave’s Trivia Challenge is nothing like what I’d anticipated. For one, Dave Ralston, the quizmaster who runs the eponymous event, isn’t out to prove he’s smarter than his contestants. The questions he chooses are tricky, but they’re not impossible to answer.

“It’s not about proving how well you can surf the Internet,” said Ralston, who added that he thinks quizmasters at other pub quizzes are too focused on trying to stump their contestants.

One time, for example, he attended an event where the quizmaster asked questions solely about ants — a subject Ralston assumed most people don’t know much about.

“Some people treat (pub quiz) like a test in school,” he said. “If you feel like you’re sitting in chemistry class, you’re not going to do it.”

And most teams at the Hy-Iu last week definitely didn’t treat it like a test, since they were openly sharing information with both their teammates and with other teams. It didn’t even seem like the $350 prize mattered to anyone.

“No one comes for the money,” said Nick Babich, whose team attends the event every week.

Even though I had no chance of winning, since I wasn’t playing the game, I did try to answer a few of Dave’s questions in my head. I knew that the official language of Brazil is Portuguese, but I couldn’t tell the difference between a song by 1980s hip-hop group Run-DMC and alternative rap threesome the Beastie Boys, which means that if I had tried to compete, I probably would have lost.

But at least I know I would have enjoyed the game — and the crowd, too.

Reach Lifestyles Coordinator Paige Richmond at 853-9243 or by e-mail at paige.richmond@gateline.com.