dinomilo

Its been approximately 5 weeks since my last post, and it is getting harder for me to find adequate time to post properly, now that weekends are so precious to me i hardly dedicate time to blogging :/ Yup, i only get to book on on Saturday afternoons, exactly at noon if i'am lucky and i will have to report back to wing line at 9 the next day. True to what they say back at BMT, OCS is all about self sacrifice to the max...

It has been quite a tough 5 weeks there, we wake up at 5.15 plus plus every morning, followed by a 1.5km jog and then onwards to the day's activities, which more often than not, takes up the entire day, even till late at night. One thing i dig about OCS is their tendency to force one to absorb so much in so little time, ok, its granted that 9 months is a very short time to train an officer but how can you realistically expect a cadet to digest so much in such a short period of time yet expect him to be proficient in everything? But still, we all slog through the theory and practical tests in the end. 

Regimentation wise, its definitely on a whole new level, discipline is emphasized nearly every single day and we always double from point to point, seriously, why can't we just march there la. And speaking of running, our endurance runs are tough too, the most recent being 8km. The officers there expect alot from us, and personally, it is tough striving to live up to expectations :/ My platoon mates all try hard to be the best, and being the slacker me, i find it hard to motivate myself to compete at the same level as them. At times, i really hate them for trying so hard to prove themselves to the instructors and being so self centered in terms of trying to garner recognition. And when i think of that, i feel that i don't put in enough effort to try to be the best among them, and that sucks to the core. Its kinda hard to fit in to a group of people who think so differently from you and whom you don't click with easily. Sometimes, i wish i went to SCS instead, where most of the old gang are now :/

Oh and i really don't like it when other people seriously under-estimate you just because you normally don't speak up, i hate it when they give you that ' walau, how come he this kind of person also get selected one' look when you get picked to do things that others don't get to do, like when i got selected to fire the M203 HEDP rounds and to fire off the demolition charges because i did well for the theory and practical tests. True, i don't normally talk alot in front of the instructors and ask questions during lessons, but that does not mean i'am not competent in whatever i do.Therefore i really hate the competitive atmosphere there, which is always present in such institutions. 

Enough ranting, the dreaded 10 day field camp starts next week, and it'll burn one weekend in the process, ending only on the 27th of august :( But at least one comforting point would be that 2 weeks would be gone in a snap once i return from the field camp in tekong!

Oh, and i have another IPPT test on tuesday, and my previous timing was 9 mins 43 seconds for the 2.4km run! And thats when i have not been running properly for at least a week, I hope i can go faster on tues though, commando gold here i COMEEEEE!

Now that the first phase of my army life is over, i kinda started pondering what's gonna happen to me next. After all, i still have 20 more months to go before i'am done with the army, if i stay with the army. 

There are so many possibilities from here on, i could get posted to command school, namely SCS or OCS, and many other vocations, such as the Military Police, Artillery unit, Regimental Police and signals, just to name a few. And in the worst case, i might even become a rifleman too. People have been asking me where i hope to go, and naturally, i tell them i hope to get into OCS, which is officer cadet school by the way. But then, i think my chances aren't high, due to the fact that i missed my situational test, and there is no way they can assess me at all :( It seems so far fetched to even hope i can get into SCS in the first place, not to mention OCS. 

My bunk mates tell me my placing on their peer appraisals and even though its the best possible outcome i can ever hope for, i still don't think it's enough to get me into the place i want to go to. Not only that, i feel as if i'am letting alot of people down for not being able to get in, especially my platoon mates who always believed in me and gave me so much support throughout the 2 months. It sucks to let people down, really..

Arghh, it all boils down to tomorrow =(

But to sum it all up more accurately, its the worst ever POP but best ever BMT experience for me! I'll explain all about it later...

The whole week was more or less about parade rehearsals on Monday and Tuesday, as well as a MASSIVE cleaning and clearing spree which continued throughout the entire week. We all had to clear out our cupboards and make sure the bunk was virtually dust free, which for your information, is never possible in an environment such as Tekong. Therefore it was constant sweeping and wiping for the whole time we were inside the bunk...

Company cohesion night was on Wednesday, and we had a company barbecue, which is unheard of in BMTC and according to my sgt, we are the only company to have a bbq in tekong, and it was non-stop fun and eating throughout the whole night! Oh and i turn out to be exceptionally good at cooking hotdogs, while the rest specialized in the other aspects of barbecuing, such as making the fire, cooking satay or chicken wings LOL. Anyway, i just realized the guy who cooks the food is also the guy who gets to eat the most without others saying you are greedy and stuff, because after all, you are the one cooking for the rest of the people and while you are hard at work, others tend to offer you food in return for your hard work. So yupp, although i was rooted to the bbq pit, i did eat quite alot! :/

Thursday was quite a tiring day, in a sense that we had quite a handful of things going one, such as the BMT debrief, as well as the SAF day parade, where we were made to just stand at the parade ground and follow the parade commander's command as well as listen to the CO's speech under the sun. Not to mention the checking of store items and area inspection, which meant further cleaning for the day. One pretty amusing part of Thursday was the part where we pack our field packs in preparation for the 24km route march, with making the fieldpack as light as possible being the only thing on our minds. And no matter how hard i tried to clean out my cupboard the week before, i still ended up with a mountain of stuff i had to bring home, together with my 3kg water bag. 

 YAY! This series of posts about life on Pulau Tekong is finally ending! One final book in, one final week and its goodbye!

The past week has been hectic, with all of us getting very little sleep, far from the stipulated 7 hours minimum due to the graduation parade rehearsals  as well as games day.

Wednesday was our games day and the days before that were mostly the preliminaries, which always take place at 7pm at night, and last for more than 2hrs at once. I signed up for tug of war, and considering the number of applicants, its quite a miracle i made it into the main 12, hmmm, on 2nd thought , I DON'T THINK its so much of a miracle, i happen to be very strong now ok! 19 pull ups for the previous IPPT :) Lol, just kidding, but still, it wasn't easy getting a spot there. So we beat 2 teams on both Monday and Tuesday, the Tuesday one being Eagle Coy, who have to do 27 weeks of BMT due to - no offense to them - them being the obese batch. And it was us Zulu against Apache Coy - whose cheerleaders all happen to be fuckers - during the finals on Wednesday, and we beat them 2-1 to claim the champions trophy! Water polo, Volleyball, Frisbee and Cheer-leading were also champions in their respective categories and Zulu ended up raping all the other Coys for a record breaking win!

Parade rehearsals were also a big part of the past week, and with each one lasting at least 4 hours, it never fails to suck the life out of you after every session. 2 more rehearsals to go and we are ready to POP! There is just one more thing i'am very worried about, which is the final 24km route march before our parade, which i reckon will take about 8 to 9 hours, and roughly 3 to 4 snickers bars to finish :/

I hope i make it through the 24km route march though, and in order to lighten my field pack, i'am gonna throw away all my toiletries and live on only one set of uniform for 4 days. That way, my field pack should be relatively light when i carry it, and hopefully i will be able to pull through the march in one piece..

I've not been blogging for quite a while a while now, and quite a lot happened over the past week, good and bad.

Lets start with the bad shall we, i went back to tekong on wednesday at around 8 plus only to find out that the re-sit test group left in the afternoon for their, well, re-sit test, which for ya info, is a situational test in which commanders assess your ability to think and formulate ideas while outfield. Basically it is to see if you can think properly and lead others while your shagged out in the wild. And yup, i fucking missed it, fuck the COS for that day la, if that idiot told me to go back in the morn, i would have easily made it for the re-sit test without any issue. And now there goes my chances of getting into OCS or SCS. Fuck them all, seriously...

On thursday, we did our live grenade range, whereby we get to throw a real grenade at a target and the feeling was GREAT. Actually the only scary part was removing the safety pin from the grenade, which was kinda tight and the thought of removing the SAFETY pin from it makes one very nervous during the whole process. Then, it was ''GRENADE'' and there it goes flying towards the target, and 6 seconds later it blows up and sends a shockwave through the grenade bay, yes, even though we were hiding behind a concrete wall and the grenade being only the size of your palm, albeit slightly smaller, it sends a rather big shockwave which you can actually feel shaking your insides! Too bad i didn't get to experience the c4 detonation, which my friend told me sent his lungs vibrating even though he was like damn far away in the training shed and it made the whole ground tremble. Oh, and the purpose of the c4 was to detonate those grenades that fail to explode in the first place, and its just placing the c4 blocks next to the grenade and blowing it all up.

Rahh, and tomorrow is my final IPPT, my last chance to try and achieve a gold :/ Actually its all down to my 2.4 run, which i did in 10.08 minutes the previous time. With 9.44 minutes being the gold standard, i'am not very sure i can really get it :( Running has never been my greatest strength, and although the rest of the stations i can breeze through easily, the 2.4 run i'am not too sure...But still, i think i have improved quite a bit as i managed to maintain a pace of 4 mins for a 800m round run, and running a total of 5 rounds at that pace without stopping during the previous group run. So....i really hope i can finally get my gold tomorrow, and i HAVE to get it in order to try and salvage any chances i have for getting into command school, if there even is a chance in the first place...

6 Days flew by pretty quickly, living outfield and stuff, eating nothing but biscuits, powdered drink satchels and combat rations which nvr fail to amaze me with their exotic menus and the ever present preservative taste.

BUT 

I did learn many things though, and i did find many things which i could have never been able to find if i did not go through this

I learnt how to survive outfield without the daily privileges we have.

I learnt how to depend each other ( my platoon mates ) when each other is all we got out there.

I learnt who were my true friends out there, who were the ones whom were there when u needed them, and who are the fuckers who don't give a fuck when you need them.

I found the other side of me which likes to break rules and allowed him run wild, making a solid fuel fire inside the shellscrape when we obviously were not allowed to aft it rained, sitting together and talking when we were supposed to sleep, peeing at what we dubbed the peeing tree when we were supposed to go out to pee, doing all sorts of stupid things one would not expect a trained and mature soldier to do. I still kinda like the childish and rebellious side of me, i don't want it to disappear, i might be 18 and in army, but i don't care, its how i am, and no one else can change me.

I found the reason why i'am doing NS, not for the govt, not for the money, but for the ones we love, i'll gladly go to war for them, without them i'am nothing, and they would be nothing if i don't step up and take up the responsibility entrusted onto me.

I found the guts to tell my family i love them alot, like finally, after all these years, i never had the courage to do it, but i finally found it, mum, dad, little bro, i love you all alot  :)

I discovered the true me 

Heh, not even a 38.0 degree fever can stop me from typing this post. Oh, and thanks for being able to talk nonsense with me, it keeps me sane, seriously! :D

My field camp is tmr, and before that, a 8km route march to the field camp site. Hopefully everything will turn out fine for the 5 full days we will be spending outfield, sleeping in tents and trenches and a whole lot of other stuff :/ The thing i hate the most about said camp would be not being able to have a shower for all 5 days, YES 5 FREAKING DAYS! And to make things more 'colourful', we have to put on camo paint for ALL 5 days spent outfield :( 

Not to mention the absence of fresh food, ok, the cookhouse food is not all that great, but still, having to eat combat rations for 5 days, and for all 3 meals a day is no joke seriously. But to think of it, the combat rations cannot be that bad right? I'am crossing my fingers very tightly now :/ On a lighter note, i'am kinda looking forward to the field camp, since its smth that i have never tried in my life before, and that it is a totally different army experience altogether. Oh, and most importantly, once field camp is over and i book out, 2 weeks will be over! Which brings me closer and closer to my POP date on 2nd of July! 

Off to have dinner now! FIELD CAMP HERE I COME!

P.S Hopefully i get to see wild boars, i mean, who gets to sleep knowing wild boars are prowling around! SO EXCITING!

Courtesy of Vesak day, i managed to book out last night, albeit quite late at night, but still, its another day i get to spend at home! This week has been kinda tough for the first 3 days, training schedule packed to the max as usual and theres IPPT too, which was rather DISAPPOINTING ):): My friend fell sick during the day itself and i did not have any pacer to run with. But still, i managed to complete in 10.08 mins, which is a 17 sec cut from before, not much, but if my pacer returns, i think i can kinda push for 9.44 :/ 

I did abit of research on the SAF no.4 uniform, which is the green pixelised one we all wear, and it turns out that the camouflage ability of the new uniform is much more effective thn the older one. Check out the pic below! From up close the guy looks kinda obvious, but at a distance, he kinda blends in quite well? 

SO COOL! 


. 

Yay, so 4 weeks of BMT are over, and i still have like 5 more weeks to go! I guess i'll make a point to blog weekly when i come back, first to keep others updated and to ensure that i record down what has been happening in the army! 

So the past week has been pretty erm, wet and muddy, as it has been raining almost daily in tekong, BUT, whenever it rains, there don't seem to be any lightning present, and so, with the SAF being the SAF, we continue whatever we are doing in the rain :( Not that i mind the raindrops, but when water mixes with dry mud, you get gooey mud and your uniform becomes muddy and soggy at the end of the day. AND THAT SUCKS TO THE MAX, and i'll have to spend like 15 mins in the toilet just to wash off all the mud from the uniform...Not to mention the facepaint, which not only do we have to apply it, we have to touch up our lips too, and once i start sweating, it feels like i'am drinking camo paint every time i lick my lips :/

But still, life is starting to get better there, since i've almost fully adjusted and adapted to army life, i actually feel weird not being able to use the company toilet at night LOL. Everything is bearable except for the damn insects, and since i sleep next to the damn window facing the forbidden forest, they tend to suck my blood at night and irritate me while i sleep. I only dread not being to wake up as and when i like in the morning, and the schedule always seems to be the same, waking up at 0530 when its all dark. At least i guess its good for the body, and speaking of which, i think i've become even stronger there. Everyone says you shrink in army, but i don't think thats true, or maybe because we often screw up bunk inspection and get extra push ups which translates to more training :/:/

MOST IMPORTANTLY, I'am looking forward to next thurs, because of Vesak day on friday, which means ONE EXTRA DAY OFF! And i can finally meet more people during the weekend!

Okay, till next thurs then!

P.S I'am so gonna run my balls off for ippt on tues so i can get gold! Wish me luck!

OK, so i'am back from tekong after spending 17 days there, and true to what others said, time really flies by once you get settled in. Living conditions aren't that bad, the beds are not double decker ones and we have more than enough room inside to do whatever we want. BUT STILL, food is a very big issue, and even though its kinda passable, eating mixed vegetable rice for like 90% of the time is really damn xzxzxzxz, and the noodles they serve suck, there was once they gave some kinda noodle which had the texture of a dried up mop, and if i use them to clean the floor, i'am sure the noodles would do the job pretty well :/

Training wise-being the enhanced batch as they always say to us-our schedule is always packed to the brim, with runs followed by strength training and standard obstacle course training. Which basically means that on several occasions, my day is packed with physical activities all the way till night ): Speaking of which, i hope i can get a gold for my next ippt, getting silver sucks, since i have been consistently getting gold all the way since sec 4 till jc2, but in the army, the minimum standard for gold for the 2.4km run is 9.44 mins, while i currently run at 10.25 mins, which i think is a big improvement from my initial timing of 11.40 plusplus for the first ippt. BUT STILL NOT ENOUGH FOR GOLD, AND I WANT THAT GOLD BADGE! Mind over body from now on :/

Damn it, im gonna become some sort of a chiongster in the weeks to come, i can't stand always being behind others in terms of such stuff. Oh, and i think that my body has already adjusted to the army schedule, i kinda woke up at 7 plus this morn AUTOMATICALLY. The screwed up schedule of the army has officially succeeded in altering my body clock...

PLUS, the lack of female company in tekong was kinda jarring at first, but still, being able to hear your voices over the phone kinda helped during the first few days in there, at least i know im NOT turing gay! Maybe i should go for a morning run, oh god,the feeling of not running makes me feel kind of weird now :/ 

SCREW YOU SAF, WHAT HAVE U DONE TO ME!