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Updates stopped for this blog. Last post 20 August 2013.
Saturday, March 27, 2010
Been a while since I updated, and the reason is obvious. I actually came home last weekend, but I had to catch up on 2 weeks worth of news and apply for university courses, so I really didn't have time to do anything else.
Well, I'm not going to list out what the NS experience has been like from the start to till now, because that's just going to take pretty damn long. I'll just type out whatever stands out more.
So on the first day, you basically go to Pasir Ris Interchange, get on a bus, reach the ferry, get to Pulau Tekong, and you have to say oaths and stuff. They steal your pink IC, then they give you your green SAF card. After that, its lunch with the people who came with you, then its goodbye for 2 weeks. You go to your camp, get sorted to your bunks, then its a real busy day ahead of you. Its easily one of the longest days you'll have even though its factually one of the shortest.
First they'll give you a black duffel bag containing your army clothes and shoes and stuff. After that you'll get your field pack containing army equipment. Then I had to lug the damn things up 2 flights of stairs up to the hall to check if we had everything. Seriously dude, those things were heavy as hell. And my damn bunk is on the 4th floor.
Anyway you check your stuff. I really can't remember things well now, so what I say might not be very accurate. I think its lunch next, then things just get fuzzy. So to just list out the non-routine events of the two weeks:
1. Cut your hair
2. Get 3 jabs for vaccinations
3. Fill in a bunch of annoying paperwork
After all that administrative stuff is settled, life in the army is generally something like this:
0545: 5BX (basically morning exercises)
0630: Breakfast (not sure if its really at 6:30am, meh)
After breakfast to first parade: Clean the area you're assigned to
0730: First Parade (they make you drink 500ml of water and take your temperature)
0800:
1000:
1200: Lunch
1300:
1500:
1800: Dinner
Night:
2230: Lights Out
I'm sure you're wondering why there's blank spaces in the timetable up there. They're basically variables that change from day to day. It might be a route march, games, swimming, a talk, lessons, strength training, speed training, cadence runs, flexibility training, ability group run, area cleaning, or some other random rare event that might pop up.
So yeah, the army life is generally boring. Or to be more accurate, the physical training phase (PTP) of army. You're not going to be handling your SAR21 much, you're not going to learn to use the grenade, run the standard obstacle course (SOC), not going to go on field camps, no situational tests (something like the Band of Brothers part where Sobel had to lead his men through a set-up mission), nothing of that sort. In fact, I won't exactly call what I just listed above "fun". Its just unique and a special experience to go through.
Well, we all did get our rifles once though. Basically they're making us get used to the route marches, so they slowly add more weight and increase the distance we have to travel. The final target is 16km, with the full uniform, the load-bearing vest (LBV), field pack and rifle. Currently we're only wearing the green camo pants, the brown army tee, the LBV and the rifle. That's already about 8kg of weight. Oh, and we only march 3km.
So all we really did with our rifles is carry it around, oil it, and learn to check clear. Check clear is basically a process to ensure that there's no live rounds in the rifle. I'm not that keen anyway. Getting a rifle just means more responsibilities and more opportunities to screw up.
- The freakin' camp is infested with birds.
- We spent the first few nights smacking bees dead with a newspaper.
- I'm not sure if its a good thing, but staying away from the main camp requires transport, and its usually coaches we get to ride (air-con and comfy seats). Less time maybe?
- Thank God for putting me in the slackest platoon. I hope that title remains status quo. However, we've been told that we are crappy, so things may be heading downwards.
- There's ice cream every Tuesday during lunch.
- Their noodles and other noodle-like stuff taste damn weird. Its mushy and chewy.
- Their drinks always seem to taste better before you eat the food.
- You're going to gain weight.
- The floor surrounding the swimming pool is as gross as hell.
- Damn El Niños.
- Army songs are going to get stuck in your head for a while.
- Stale cigarette smoke. Sigh.
- Stop speaking Chineseeeeeeeeee!!!!!
And now for something interesting that even people who completed NS might not have experienced before.
Well on Wednesday, there were around 5 or so people who reported sick and came back from the medical centre with an "unfit for duty" status. On Thursday, it increased to about 12 or so. On Friday, there was close to 15 (light duty/unfit for duty). That's not including the people who were sick but did not report sick. I forgot to mention that this is purely on a platoon level, not company. My platoon has 64 people. If I'm to do a rough estimate on the number of people who are sick, I'd say 30 people.
That's a pretty alarming figure, so on Friday, we were sort of quarantined. On Thursday, they checked our bunks and water for ways that sickness might be spread. On Friday during morning exercises, we had to do it with a gap between us and the other platoons. During swimming, we didn't have to do warm ups, and we didn't have to swim. Damn that was good. Lots of us just slept through the swim. During gym session, we went off to a little corner to do our own exercises. To be honest, I kind of liked the way things was going, because it was like we had some sort of special status that just made us a special bunch. Its like we have our own VIP seats or something like that.
Thank God again for letting me kind of survive that. I'm not sick, though my throat is a little ticklish.
Friday was also book out day, but the bus driver went home when he was supposed to fetch us. Lol. Anyway, they called in army transports (you know, those huge lorries whose tyres are about three quarters my height). So we had to book out about 30-45 minutes later. Oh well.
Right. I just realised the title of the post is "time is scarce" and I've mentioned nothing about time being scarce at all. Well, I book out on Friday nights, reach home at 9:00pm the earliest. I have to bathe and stuff, and I'm sleepy as hell, so I usually sleep by 10:30pm. I have about 12 hours of sleep, wake up still sleepy on Saturday, read a week's worth of news and other crap, and I realise its almost time to sleep again. Then on Sunday, there's church, lunch, and when I reach home, I have to pack up, and its time to leave for Pasir Ris again. So really, I only have Saturdays to do what I want.
Ah well, 3 weeks down, 14 more weeks to go.
posted @ 11:06 pm
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