30th International Physics Olympiad
- D.J. Minhinnick 7A

In July, earlier this year, C. Lim, R. Huang and I had the honour of representing New Zealand in the Thirtieth International Physics Olympiad in Padova, Italy. It was the culmination of nine months of work, which began towards the end of last year when we sat a national examination for selection consisting of an exam and a pair of essays. This was meant to be complemented by a week-long camp held in January for the top twenty students to select the team from, but due to a lack of money this was cancelled and a team was chosen directly from the exam. Money was indeed the biggest problem, and there was initially not going to be a team at all, if not for the string pulling of one of the team members and many letters requesting sponsorship. Indeed, in the early weeks it seemed as if more time was spent searching for money than actually doing physics.
In January, the five team members were each sent a text book the size of a telephone directory to work from and have completed by June. Although the initial target of two chapters per week did not seem that demanding, most of the team struggled to even get near finishing the book. This work, coupled with a weekly visit to the University laboratories and a series of fortnightly assignments sent to us by the team leader at Massey University, made up the bulk of our preparation. This preparation was capped off by two days of practise exams held at Auckland University at the start of July.
The New Zealand team was by no means the best prepared of all the teams competing, especially compared with the likes of the Chinese team who had been at a special school for over a year where they just learnt physics. Our team leader suggested that if New Zealand did the same we'd all pick up gold medals as well, although by the end we would probably hate him and the physics.
So with virtually no expectations and open minds we left for the Olympiad on the 13th of July, and went to Rome via Singapore and Frankfurt. On the descent into Singapore R. Huang started to bleed heavily from his nose and required surgery in Singapore. This meant that he and the team leader were delayed a day in Singapore, with the rest of us continuing on to Frankfurt and Rome. In fact, R. Huang used nose bleeds as a way of seeing many of the world's hospitals. The flight to Frankfurt was horrendous as we were all very tired, but were not able to sleep due to all the turbulence. The first thing to hit us when we arrived in Rome was the heat. While in Italy the temperature was consistently reaching 33°C, and would only subside to about 23°C at night.
We spent the first three days in Rome getting over the jet lag, although it also gave us the chance to do some sightseeing in one of the most spectacular cities in the world. The Pantheon, Sistine Chapel, St Peters Basilica and the monument to Vittorio Emmanuel II were all highlights, as was watching an old man lie down in the middle of traffic at a busy roundabout, cursing the traffic. Unfortunately R. Huang was sick the day the rest of the team went to St Peters, and after hearing how spectacular it was decided he had to go the next day. However, we forgot to remind him to wear trousers, so he was turned away by the fashion police at the door. There are stalls on almost every corner in Rome, and the easiest way to know you were getting close to one of the monuments was the increased number of stalls. The stalls sold a range of merchandise ranging from soccer shirts to marble statues of absolutely everything, from leather wallets to sunglasses, although they each sold exactly the same things as each other.
The first day, without our team leader we decided to see the Pantheon, but returned to our hotel six hours later having seen almost everything in Rome other than the Pantheon, although we did mange to see it on the last day. We each managed to roll off three or four rolls of film. However, when we arrived we started taking photos of these magnificent buildings. However these buildings paled in comparison to the grand monuments and actually turned out to be the Ministry of Agriculture and Ministry of Defence!
It did not take long for us to realise that the street kids in Rome should be watched. Within hours of reaching Rome we were almost robbed by teams of these kids who had a clever scheme of getting to tourists' beltbags. A couple of kids tug on each arm to grab your attention, whilst a third puts a cardboard sign over your beltbag, hiding their attempt to rifle through your belongings beneath. We avoided them on that occasion, but on the last day, C. Lim and I had our water bottles stolen from out of our hands. They work so quickly that they have your belongings and are away before you have time to react.
We then caught the train up to Padova, just out of Venice, hoping that the temperature would be a bit cooler there, but alas it was not.
During the Olympiad itself we stayed at the student residences at the University, which were surprisingly good. As our residence was a long way from the others, we spent a lot of the time with the other countries staying with us, in particular the Canadians and Finns. The Canadian team was probably the most diverse, with a British Canadian, French Canadian, Serb, Turkmenistani and Iraqi.
The Competition consisted of a 5-hour practical and 5-hour theory exam, which were held on the second and fourth days of the Olympiad.
Although both of the exams were easier than we expected, the markers still found it fairly easy to take marks off us. The practical exam was based around a torsional pendulum which is a twisting wire, whilst the theory exam had three questions. The first was on the properties of a gas in a jar, the second was on the magnetic field around a bent wire, and the third on the course of a spaceship passing through Jupiter's gravitational field. The Chinese team, who were expected to win five gold medals, was sitting next to us for the practical exam and looked to struggle with it. This was affirmed when the results arrived. For instance, one of the Chinese team got 30 out of 30 for the theory, but failed the practical.
The next few days were spent sightseeing, to give the markers a chance to do their work. We had day trips to the Dolomite Mountain Range, which was very spectacular, and had lunch at an ice hockey rink in Cortina, which once held the Winter Olympics. We also were able to see Venice, which was amazing. In Venice there are no cars at all which is in stark contrast to Rome, where crossing the road is life-threatening. In Rome there is an orange light on pedestrian signals as well which I guess means give it your best shot. The streets in Rome are packed with fiats and scooters, although no bicycles, motorbikes, Ferraris, Lamborghinis or Maseratis
On the last night we performed a haka, as all the time spent practising was not going to be for nothing. The 'practise' was more teaching the other team members the haka as I was the only member born in New Zealand and the only one who knew the haka. Although a Pakeha, leading two Taiwanese, a Chinese boy and a Chinese girl in a haka probably did not do it justice, it was nevertheless well received.
When the results arrived, we found out that we had done the best that New Zealand ever had. We won three honourable mentions, including one to R. Huang, as many as New Zealand had won at the last four Olympiads combined. An honourable mention is the equivalent of a bronze medal in the chemistry or maths Olympiad. I missed out by less than one mark on attaining honourable mention, which was fairly disappointing considering the work which had been put in. Individually, Russians came first and second with near perfect scores, although as a team Iran won the most gold medals with four.
The Olympiad was a once in a lifetime experience, and I was able to bring back a lot of fine memories, and a long list of addresses.
A very special thank-you must go to everybody involved; Dr Tony Signal at Massey University who provided the theoretical preparation, arranged the trip and accompanied the team; Nelson Christensen who assisted with practical experience; the headmaster, Mr Morris for helping with financial assistance, and to Messers Douglas, Hodges and Matheson for their expert teaching which resulted in my selection. Having three Auckland Grammar students in the national team of five is a monument to the expert job done by the whole physics department.
Finally good luck to all those students who compete in the future in this most worthy event!

By D.J.Minhinnick 7A