The Last One to Fail

Since childhood, she had poor body coordination. She learned to walk and run later than other children of the same age, and could only go up and down stairs independently when she was 6 years old. In elementary school, she was surprisingly slow and clumsy during gym class, and her classmates teased her as "the dumbest penguin ever."

Fortunately, her IQ was not low. At the age of 19, she was admitted to the Physics Department of the former East German University of Leipzig with excellent results. After graduation, she joined the Central Institute of Physical Chemistry of the Academy of Sciences and became one of the youngest researchers in the institute.

The scientific research work is dull and monotonous. To enliven the atmosphere, the Academy of Sciences often organizes various recreational competitions. She had been working for less than a month when she was told that there would be a "physical competition" in which young people had to compete. Being slow to move, she was forced to team up with Kerman, an engineer.

Kerman is in his late 60s and thin. She knew her team was going down.

She arrived on time that day. The host read aloud the rules: One male and one female two pairs of players, together to lift a 200kg boulder, without any tools, lifted off the ground for 10 seconds, the winner. The teams were rubbing their hands, but she could not find Kerman, thinking gloomily that the old man, like herself, knew he was going to lose and wanted to give up.

The game begins. A pair of young men and women first approached the rock, each crouched on one side, grabbed the stone base, and at the same time shouted, with all their strength to lift... Too bad the stone on the women's end hasn't budged. They tried three more times, failed, and sadly quit the game.

As she cheered along with the crowd, she looked for Kerman, thinking that the old man was taking his time. Come early and leave early.

Another pair of strong men and women approached the stone, one left, one right... The stone leans away from the ground, but the female player in the end, unable to hold on for three seconds, then let's go with a scream.

Then Kerman sauntered along. She ran forward two at a time and shouted to him to get into the race. Kerman shook his head and said, "I don't know the rules yet. Let's see how others compare." Then he dived into the crowd of onlookers and joined the shouts of the others, quite oblivious to the fact that there was a race to be had.

Two more acts fell, and she couldn't wait any longer. "Come on, you're going to lose anyway." Kerman seemed to remember that he had a match and said "yes" repeatedly, before adding apologetically near the arena entrance: "Excuse me, I have to go to the bathroom." Then she turned and ran away, so angry that she stamped her feet on the ground.

Kerman walked for half an hour and returned with only three minutes left in the match. He hastily led her by the hand toward the stone, repeatedly telling her to be calm, then gently helped her crouch on one side of the stone, and calmly walked himself to the other side. Two people put on a pose, but after all the strength, stone grain silk did not move.

At this point, the game is over. She smiled and reassured Kerman, "Just participate and do your best." "We are champions," Kerman said confidently. "We work well together." Thinking she had misheard him, she stared at Kerman. Kerman nodded heavily. "None of the players managed to move the stone, and we were the last team to lose. Aren't we champions?"

There seemed to be some truth in this, and she was incredulous. She was ecstatic until the host took the stage and announced that Kerman and she were the winners.

Kerman proudly said, "If the fastest speed, to do sure success is a kind of victory, then deliberately delay time, apply the rules to the extreme, let the ability to do things to the last minute to fail, is not a kind of victory!"

It dawned on her that slowness could be an advantage in dealing with what she knew would be a failure because it would allow the loss to come later. Taking that insight to heart, she turned her lumbering into a steady hand, choosing a career in politics that would see her elected 27 years later as Germany's first female chancellor.

She is Germany's "Iron Lady" Angela Merkel, who was re-elected chancellor of Germany in 2009. Now, in the face of the European economic crisis, Merkel still walks slowly and calmly. She also repeatedly admits that she is not a strong woman, so she needs more time to think. She chooses to make decisions half later than other countries but leads Germany to turn the tide repeatedly.