THE winning team of the first-ever SPOGOMI World Cup event to be held in Malaysia – GOMI Heroes – is preparing for its Japan trip scheduled in November this year.
GOMI Heroes will be representing Malaysia in a fully sponsored trip to Japan this November to compete against 20 other international teams for the SPOGOMI World Champion 2023 title.
On Aug 19, GOMI Heroes, comprising students Monessh Gopalkrishnan, 17, Muhamad Nauwfal Abdullah, 16, and their teacher Chung Boon Jin, 41, won champion against 27 teams competing in the SPOGOMI World Cup (Malaysia edition) event.
SPOGOMI is a Japan-inspired event that turns a local gotong-royong into a world-stage sporting event. It takes speed, skills, stamina, and strategy for a team of three members to collect and sort over 17kg of waste in just an hour.
In just an hour, the 27 competing teams collected 348.13kg of waste at the Dataran Pantai Queensbay Mall. Of the total, 186.17kg were recycled.
Students Monessh and Muhamad Nauwfal, and their teacher Chung, are members of the Green Educators’ Workgroup (GREW). According to its website, GREW is a non-governmental organisation that is concerned about the education for sustainable development (ESD) among primary and secondary school students.
Chung said, that as an NGO, GREW had organised many activities, some of which included collecting waste.
“Our NGO mainly focused on education and sustainability. We have over 70 young GREW Heroes in GREW,” Chung told Buletin Mutiara today.
Chung said this team was still preparing for the upcoming SPOGOMI World Cup 2023 competition in Japan.
“We are not familiar with Japan, so we will have to do more research. The waste segregation in Japan is different from how we do it here in Malaysia.
“In Malaysia, we segregate papers, plastics, and metal. Whereas in Japan, wastes are segregated into combustible and non-combustible waste,” Chung said, adding that the team would adapt and learn as much as possible.
He commended the idea of turning a local gotong-royong into a world-stage sporting event.
“Collecting and sorting waste is not fun, but the Japanese turn it into a sport. It is a good idea and should be adopted,” he said.
Muhamad Nauwfal said the team’s goal was to win and it was fun to collect and sort waste as a team.
Monessh believed that most people would realise that it is their responsibility to keep the environment clean.
“We, humans, are the ones polluting our environment. So, we are responsible to clean it up,” he said.