On Monday, 16 November 2015, I had to wake up early to reach Petrosains on time for the “Break The Code” Hunt which I had signed up for with fellow Bloggerati: Jessy The KL Chic, Ashley, Jessica as well as Samantha. Considering that I am living smack in the middle of KL, I thought traffic would be a breeze. It wasn’t, as it was a MONDAY! But I ended up being the early few anyway. 

As we waited for the others to arrive, we had to register ourselves and change into the T-Shirt provided. Honestly, we didn’t feel the least ready for the challenges that awaited us as we were still waiting for our brains to completely wake up. At the briefing, I was super lost because I haven’t been reading science in a long while! 

There were 3 parts to the game, which are to go around Petrosains and decipher codes and find the answers within the exhibits, break codes that form a sentence and actually do what the sentence tells us to do and also do physical challenges. All these had to be completed within 3 hours before the half an hour penalty time started. 

The treasure hunt was held to introduce and promote to the general public, especially the youth, of the activities, exhibits and programs available in Petrosains, including the current visiting exhibition on show in Petrosains, the ILLUSION: Nothing Is As It Seems. ILLUSION challenges visitors’ perceptions, disputing pre-conceived ideas in the mind to get visitors to use their senses to make sense of how the brain works. This exhibition inspired the “Break The Code” Hunt! 

There was a total of 20 teams comprising of four participants per team which sums up to a total of 80 students from local universities and everyone looked ready and excited! Which made me feel more nervous, to be honest. I really wanted to win especially when my teammates were so semangat! 

Of course in the middle of the hunt we realized that we really had to tour the whole of Petrosains to decipher the codes and do the physical challenges. Some of the many exhibitions that Petrosains houses is SPACE where visitors can learn about space science and technology. There is also GEOTIME DIORAMA where information about earthquakes, fossils and petroleum are exhibited. The highlight is the ”Oil Platform” area where visitors can experience being on the ”only oil rig in the city”. And we get to put on the orange jumper as if we were working there! There is also SPEED – a special area for Formula 1 fans and SPARKZ – a tinkering area for the young and the young at heart.

What I was amazed at is was how efficient my teammates were. I would ask them to look for something in the huge area, and they would be able to find it within seconds. We had really good team work! At the end of the 3 hours, about a second before the penalty time started, every one submitted their clipboards, whether they’ve finished or not because really, if you haven’t figured it out, you will never figure it out. I tried.

There were 5 consolation prizes of RM300, the top 3 winners, as well as 2 special prizes for most retweeted tweets. Guess what? WE WON 3rd PLACE! WOOT WOOT! We received cash prize of RM400 and RM50 PETRONAS Gift Card each. I used it up on petrol. Hehe. Second place received RM600 cash prize and RM100 PETRONAS Gift Card each. First prize is RM1000 and RM150 PETRONAS Gift Card each.