To all of you who dream of ORD

Army Fatigue

Who would have thought
That a uniform, spotted,
Printed, pixelised
Could hold the entire history
Of my universe?
Sweat fading brown dots
Bloody red mingling with the green
Tears making fabric
Perhaps coarser

Someday, outside barb wired fences
When our fatigues are as
Tired by duty as us
Will we hold worn garment
Closely – remembering how mirth and
Friendship intertwine scarred threads
Or shall we shred old memories
Into the deep recesses
Of wastebins?

Gideon Chew
Oct 2010

At Basic Military Training school

After nine weeks of BMT, all that’s left to do is to see the route which I’m headed for next. Officer, specialist or man. That, and to wait for the final Graduation Parade where I’ll be throwing my cap into the air. I suppose throwing a cap is ordinary enough, but I’m really looking forward to it because it marks the end of this period as a lousy recruit. A recruit’s life is not bad, really, but it will be a pleasure to move on and not be bossed around any longer. “Any recruits here? I need some help.” At 2 am in the morning. Uh, disgusting.

What I will miss is Rocky Hill camp. When we first moved in, we thought our camp was merely a deserted outpost in the middle of the jungle (which isn’t too far fetched, because it’s the old, abandoned SISPEC camp anyway… in the middle of the jungle). On the other hand, the recruits over at the Ladang HQ were getting laptops, internet and all sort of other out-of-this-world stuff. We thought we were worse off, but I think I really enjoyed the stay at Rocky Hill and I’d easily choose it over Ladang… Who wants laptops in the BMT anyway? It’s an extra weight to look after. Rocky Hill was wonderful because the bunks were huge, the air was cool and fresh, good scenery, and no high ranking commanders to watch out for. It was also good to be able to catch glimpses of one or two good friends in neighbouring Quebec and Yankee companies there.

Three coolest things in BMT:

1. Throwing a hand grenade. I was lucky because I wasn’t even supposed to throw it at all…was on Att B. I can tell you, the feeling of holding a real, live explosive thing in your hand and being afraid of it, then throwing it and feeling all that fear leave… is an amazing experience.

2. My encounters with animal life. The most interesting incident was digging my shellscape and finding and nest of eggs, about 8 or 9 large white ones, the size of an M&M chocolate. Not the small no-kick M&M's, it was the size of those M&M's with peanuts inside… maybe slightly bigger. I smashed one with the blade of my digging apparatus and found a snake inside. At least it was a long body with a bulging head. There were no feet at all to be seen, but my sergeant said it could be a lizard with its feet not fully developed. I was, and still am, hardly convinced, but I didn’t have a choice and shifted the eggs somewhere else and slept in that shellscape that night. No mama snake came to disturb me, thankfully… Besides that, I did see a long brown snake sliding across our field camp site once. Also, we saw a few wild boar, a monster centipede crawled up the latrine wall centimetres away when I was squatting down relieving myself, and I once crawled into bed in my bunk and found a bee inside the blanket. Luckily, nothing misfortunate happened - I didn't get stung or anything - so all those incidences became vivid, unforgettable memories to talk with friends about.

3. Having an awesome BMT company, Zulu Coy. We had wonderful commanders, especially our OC, who was like some angel always watching out for us and explaining things to us… I think my platoon performed pretty well, on the whole. We received a lot of praise from our commanders, and generally we weren’t pumping very much. Zulu was also champion for Games Day, and the feeling is great when your company wins and over two hundred people, commanders included, are ecstatic. I do think we’ll be crowned best company in the coming week. Hopefully. But even if we’re not, we’ll no doubt be too busy throwing our caps up to be disappointed.

Freedom

Another seven days and I’ll be enlisting into the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF).

Spent the last few months very blissfully. Caught up with friends, ate a lot of good food, did the things I dreamt of doing during my two years studying for A levels. For one, I had a backpacking trip to Malaysia with some close SAJC friends. Just four of us, without a car, but with the keys to my mum’s Perak house. We relied on coaches to get around. Stopped at Genting and KL too for the attractions/sightseeing/theme park. Real awesome. Below’s a pic of the twin towers at night, which was a lot prettier than I expected.

Also, I spent one and a half months working at the HDB. The job paid really well, 7/hr for doing simple admin work, and the office staff there were exceptionally nice to me. During my final two days, they sent me off with a party, treated me to lunch, and gave me presents. I think that is wonderfully extravagant; I was just a temporary office helper. Thank you God for such great friends at the job.

Comically, I worked overtime every Friday for six weeks - because no one told me work ends half an hour earlier on Fridays. Haha, dang. Where I’m headed for the next two years, though, that won’t be a problem 8)

A fresh year

I love entering into a new year. Christmas and New Year’s for me is a good excuse to party and catch up with friends. I love the festive food too, like turkey and wine (delicious).

For me, this new year is special because JC life is over and done with. I suppose one thing I learnt from two years of pre-u education is that one’s rewards are often proportional to the effort one puts in to something. You reap what you sow. I mean, SAJC wasn’t a particularly good school, but I really enjoyed the time I spent there. I suppose a large part of that is because I wanted to be there in the first place. As a result, I’d stubbornly see the good in everything, even when lectures were plain dull and when lessons weren’t any better. Which isn’t a bad thing, because it made school life very much more enjoyable. On the other hand, I certainly didn’t consider CCA part of “school” and happily skipped every CCA session I could. Consequently, I’m rather envious of people who have close friends from their CCAs. Like the rugby guys or the soccer girls. I’m guessing the reason they’re so close to each other is because toiling and training together after school though thoroughly exhausted and brain-dead from a day of books builds strong friendships.

Which shows it’s always good to give one’s best. Hopefully that’s something I’ll take into the new year. Anyway, readers, have a wonderful 2010. :)