hello,
Will be adding to the OBS posts soon, but here's a favourite from the barracks! Last Kiss by Pearl Jam
Showing posts with label Posts by Daryl. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Posts by Daryl. Show all posts
Sunday, July 13, 2008
Saturday, July 5, 2008
OBS - The Daryl Version
Wow, since Asri has started the ball rolling, I shall continue! Well it's kind of jumping the gun since we were talking about the early days still, but anyway, Asri is the deputy squad chairman and this is our blog so who gives a stuff about chronology!
For me, OBS was a seminal event, it changed me in more ways than I care to admit, in fact I totally hated OBS, I felt that it was going to be the biggest and toughest waste of time in my life in that period of time. It was only further down the road that I realised how much good it was for me, it taught me that I could go beyond my self-imposed limits and it also taught me about people and how they would react under duress and what comes to the surface in such times. Most of all however, it really convinced me that Aziz, Asri, Terence and Mark were the people I could depend on in a backs to the wall situation and hence it really solidified our friendship.
Aziz and I were plonked in a group called Nehru. Since Mr Nehru was one of the pioneers of the Non-Aligned Movement, I guess it was always going to lead to the most factionalised and divded of all the 3 groups (they called groups watches at OBS I think) and it really led to alot of conflict and many people not talking to each other (uh actually, people not talking to me) once OBS was over. Anyway, the other group was called Elizabeth after Elizabeth Choy the great war heroine, of course that was to lead to some rather weak and cowardly behaviour by a less distinguished ah beng in our squad, we shall come to that in due course!
I don't know who gave input in the groupings but CM and FI sure tried to break up the squad cliques! But I thank the high heavens that Aziz was with me in Nehru, because he and Boon were probably the only people I could really count on when the chips were down and that Aziz was a source of sanity as he was probably the only one I could really talk to and plus Aziz had a tremendous supply of smuggled Oreos!
But yes, the rest of the watch were a collection of people from the other cliques in the squad and we just could not get along. In the end it all fell apart after the sailing expedition when we gave up all semblance of pretending to get along. OBS just had a way of bringing out the inner a**hole in many of them especially Gorby (pseudonym, we all know who he is!) I daresay I never talked to him after OBS despite the fact that we shared the same barrack.
I dreaded the day OBS came about, but it happened soon enough, the moment senior term came around, we were off to OBS. I vaguely recall having to do alot of shopping to get ready for the trip like buying a pair of boots just for the sailing and kayaking expeditions.
Despite all the information that we gleaned from the Seniors, I really did not know what to expect but after a prata breakfast at Jalan Kayu which seemed like fattening us up for the kill, we were on the boat to Ubin.
The first few days as I recall were all about team building and the initial heights confidence course. Eventually the expeditions started, land, sailing, solo and kayaking and we struggled through these expeditions and finally we ended off with a pointless 15km run! Then it was over, many of us had changed for good and relations had changed too and the men were separated from the boys. OBS changed my life, the 21 days I spent there were tough, but the time there made me a better person.
These are my memories and I shall elaborate on them in the next few posts:
For me, OBS was a seminal event, it changed me in more ways than I care to admit, in fact I totally hated OBS, I felt that it was going to be the biggest and toughest waste of time in my life in that period of time. It was only further down the road that I realised how much good it was for me, it taught me that I could go beyond my self-imposed limits and it also taught me about people and how they would react under duress and what comes to the surface in such times. Most of all however, it really convinced me that Aziz, Asri, Terence and Mark were the people I could depend on in a backs to the wall situation and hence it really solidified our friendship.
Aziz and I were plonked in a group called Nehru. Since Mr Nehru was one of the pioneers of the Non-Aligned Movement, I guess it was always going to lead to the most factionalised and divded of all the 3 groups (they called groups watches at OBS I think) and it really led to alot of conflict and many people not talking to each other (uh actually, people not talking to me) once OBS was over. Anyway, the other group was called Elizabeth after Elizabeth Choy the great war heroine, of course that was to lead to some rather weak and cowardly behaviour by a less distinguished ah beng in our squad, we shall come to that in due course!
I don't know who gave input in the groupings but CM and FI sure tried to break up the squad cliques! But I thank the high heavens that Aziz was with me in Nehru, because he and Boon were probably the only people I could really count on when the chips were down and that Aziz was a source of sanity as he was probably the only one I could really talk to and plus Aziz had a tremendous supply of smuggled Oreos!
But yes, the rest of the watch were a collection of people from the other cliques in the squad and we just could not get along. In the end it all fell apart after the sailing expedition when we gave up all semblance of pretending to get along. OBS just had a way of bringing out the inner a**hole in many of them especially Gorby (pseudonym, we all know who he is!) I daresay I never talked to him after OBS despite the fact that we shared the same barrack.
I dreaded the day OBS came about, but it happened soon enough, the moment senior term came around, we were off to OBS. I vaguely recall having to do alot of shopping to get ready for the trip like buying a pair of boots just for the sailing and kayaking expeditions.
Despite all the information that we gleaned from the Seniors, I really did not know what to expect but after a prata breakfast at Jalan Kayu which seemed like fattening us up for the kill, we were on the boat to Ubin.
The first few days as I recall were all about team building and the initial heights confidence course. Eventually the expeditions started, land, sailing, solo and kayaking and we struggled through these expeditions and finally we ended off with a pointless 15km run! Then it was over, many of us had changed for good and relations had changed too and the men were separated from the boys. OBS changed my life, the 21 days I spent there were tough, but the time there made me a better person.
These are my memories and I shall elaborate on them in the next few posts:
- Sub-human Dynamics in Nehru: The Monsters emerge
- The Useless Fatsos: The great abseiling misunderstanding
- Land Expedition: When we realised we couldn't get along
- Post Land Expedition: The Great Homophobic Moment (No it doesn't inolve the Choos either!)
- Round Ubin Canoeing: Barnacle Bob takes a chunk out of my shin
- Getting the Crap scared out of me: Solo Expedition
- Sailing Expedition: You can all b**dy swim back to OBS! The only moment where Aziz loses his cool and Daryl follows suit shortly after!
- Feedback Sessions: Picking the knives out of my back
- Interactions with other people: Instructors and other OBS participants
- Reflection Journal: Finding new ways to swear
- Kayaking Expedition: How to Kayak with a tray full of eggs in your cargo hold and not break any.
- Going Home
Monday, June 9, 2008
The Early Days Pics -Part II
It's amazing what you dredge out when you are clearing out your junk.
Here are 2 pics from the early days.
Quite what we did at ECP totally escapes my mind and who that is picking his nose in the front row third from the right also escapes me!
Here's another picture from the Yakult factory, I vaguely remember a consequence of the visit involving Terence consuming the CM's yakult? Terence, you care to elaborate on the said incident? I think we went there after our role as victims in some exercise on Jurong Island. Quite how going to the Yakult factory and learning about Lactobacillus Casei Shirota benefited us as future senior officers in the force is beyond me. Still, we did have fun and also improved our digestive tracts with good bacteria!
Here are 2 pics from the early days.
Quite what we did at ECP totally escapes my mind and who that is picking his nose in the front row third from the right also escapes me!
Here's another picture from the Yakult factory, I vaguely remember a consequence of the visit involving Terence consuming the CM's yakult? Terence, you care to elaborate on the said incident? I think we went there after our role as victims in some exercise on Jurong Island. Quite how going to the Yakult factory and learning about Lactobacillus Casei Shirota benefited us as future senior officers in the force is beyond me. Still, we did have fun and also improved our digestive tracts with good bacteria!
Sunday, June 8, 2008
Food, Inglorious Food
Since Aziz mentioned it, I suppose I should try to get into the good books of the squad chairman by discussing the delectable cuisine from the Police Academy. After spending a large part of 16 weeks in the SAF [Yes laugh and scoff at the PTP permanent resident], the tale of crap food as a NS experience seemed to be the stuff of history books. The Singapore Food Industries catering was nothing short of edible and filling to boot, and we didn't even have to wash our mess trays because there were none! We ate on proper plates with real cutlery. I'm told the quality of food has declined somewhat since then, I suppose we were one of the first few batches to get the catered food so I suppose there was alot at stake to make the food taste good. Even the venerable old Police Mess has started to get catered food, so this might seem to be a quaint experience for anyone from the catered generation.
Nothing quite prepares you for your first meal at the mess, not even the stories of the seniors who had long since decided that lining their stomaches with palm oil from the tonnes of instant noodles that they ate in the barracks was preferable to taking their chances in the mess. And so, armed with our mess trays and cutlery we marched to the mess. During our first week, we marched off in half-u, but all subsequent dinners were taken in full walk out attire, that is shirt, tie, police pants and we even had to bring our rain coats just in case of untimely precipitation!
Then we laid eyes on it, the fighting fish, despite my best attempts to convince people that it was caught sometime before the founding of Singapore, was in its previous incarnation a selar fish that swam the seas until it was brutally hauled up by a net and after changing hands a few times found itself some time [uh actually, probably alot of time] later in the kitchen of the Police Academy and was subsequently deep fried in some very dirty oil for an extended period of time and then dumped along with many others in a huge pot and eventually finding its way onto my mess tray. Accompanying this delectable piece of seafood were some horrendously overcooked vegetables and some very hard rice and a piece of fruit.
Most of the time, those of us who ate to live would gobble down the food, wait for the others to finish and then head off to wash our mess trays using LAUNDRY detergent and then head off to the barracks wondering about the possible consequences of eating the food.
Seeing as that fish is more or less a universally accepted food, it appeared in almost every meal over the course of the week. Of course if the chef was feeling inspired, you'd get chicken in orange water (i.e. chicken curry) or if he was in a particularly sadistic mood, you'd get sotong delight.
Ah yes, sotong delight, something coined by Chia Tze Wei in an inspired moment. Of course, Mark and I couldn't resist building further on that, ocean fresh calamari simmered in a light tamarind sauce served on a plate of steamed rice accompanied by pan-fried garden fresh vegetables. Well, it was anything but a delight and it was a occasion for us to visit the canteen en masse after dinner!
Sometimes if we were lucky we'd get Briyani rice or towards the end of our stint at PA, spring chicken, for lunch, though the instructors often tried to get us to work off the calories after lunch! I still remembered running a 2 x 2.4 with a mutton briyani in the digestive system, but ah yes, that is also another interesting story!
Breakfasts were sometimes very strange too, some mornings, we'd get the bread baked by prisoners in Changi Prison with the spiciest chicken curry ever, just before PT as well or really non-descript bee hoon mixed with bean sprouts and salt! Despite all this, the teh or milo was really well prepared and was good for raising morale before the start of any day.
Let's see we've talked about breakfast, lunch and dinner, of course, for the hungry or those trying to go on hunger strike against the food regime, there was night snack. This rather quaintly consisted of a tin of Lion Brand biscuits (to last 2 days?? [correct me if I am wrong]) and 2 kettles of milo per squad which 3 unfortunates had to carry back to the barracks after dinner. Try sharing that amongst 42 hungry officer cadets when the average squad size was about 30 plus! The first to go were the chocolate flavoured biscuits, then the lemon cream biscuits and this was followed by anything with a modicum of flavour. By the end of the week, there would be an accumulation of the unflavoured biscuits and by the end of the month, Fauzi would be the one who had to consolidate all the unflavoured biscuits into one tin! But eventually, we ate them all.
Finally if all else failed, you'd bring in food from the canteen or outside the Police Academy. Now, either could be potentially hazardous. Any attempts to smuggle food from the outside had to run the gauntlet of checks at the gate on book-in nights, so that was never a good avenue to try. Even if you succeeded, there were other metaphysical barriers! Apparently the area that we lived in was formerly a cemetery, so anything with any pork content tended to be viewed dimly by the supernatural elements co-residing with us who were apparently Muslim. I've never seen it but some have claimed to have woken up to their beds shaking violently because of an errant char siew pau. Well, not for the faint hearted that's for sure.
But we, in the lower barrack, plus Terence, the permanent resident, were far more enterprising than that. Mark, who had gotten married sometime during junior term, was given a night off on Fridays to spend time with his wife, so he kindly offered to buy us food. Buy us food he did! It couldn't last, and it didn't! One night he returned bearing packs of Mee Goreng, in the darkness of the barracks we were wolfing down the mee goreng when suddenly we heard a voice, "OCT, what do you think you are doing?" Not waiting to find out if it was an instructor or an instructor come back from the grave, we, brave officer cadets dived into bed and froze. Thankfully, it wasn't someone like Liew or Adrian or Hassan for that matter because he chose to ignore the scent of mee goreng coming from the table at the end of the barracks and warned us to go to bed. Stay in bed we did!
Nothing quite prepares you for your first meal at the mess, not even the stories of the seniors who had long since decided that lining their stomaches with palm oil from the tonnes of instant noodles that they ate in the barracks was preferable to taking their chances in the mess. And so, armed with our mess trays and cutlery we marched to the mess. During our first week, we marched off in half-u, but all subsequent dinners were taken in full walk out attire, that is shirt, tie, police pants and we even had to bring our rain coats just in case of untimely precipitation!
Then we laid eyes on it, the fighting fish, despite my best attempts to convince people that it was caught sometime before the founding of Singapore, was in its previous incarnation a selar fish that swam the seas until it was brutally hauled up by a net and after changing hands a few times found itself some time [uh actually, probably alot of time] later in the kitchen of the Police Academy and was subsequently deep fried in some very dirty oil for an extended period of time and then dumped along with many others in a huge pot and eventually finding its way onto my mess tray. Accompanying this delectable piece of seafood were some horrendously overcooked vegetables and some very hard rice and a piece of fruit.
Most of the time, those of us who ate to live would gobble down the food, wait for the others to finish and then head off to wash our mess trays using LAUNDRY detergent and then head off to the barracks wondering about the possible consequences of eating the food.
Seeing as that fish is more or less a universally accepted food, it appeared in almost every meal over the course of the week. Of course if the chef was feeling inspired, you'd get chicken in orange water (i.e. chicken curry) or if he was in a particularly sadistic mood, you'd get sotong delight.
Ah yes, sotong delight, something coined by Chia Tze Wei in an inspired moment. Of course, Mark and I couldn't resist building further on that, ocean fresh calamari simmered in a light tamarind sauce served on a plate of steamed rice accompanied by pan-fried garden fresh vegetables. Well, it was anything but a delight and it was a occasion for us to visit the canteen en masse after dinner!
Sometimes if we were lucky we'd get Briyani rice or towards the end of our stint at PA, spring chicken, for lunch, though the instructors often tried to get us to work off the calories after lunch! I still remembered running a 2 x 2.4 with a mutton briyani in the digestive system, but ah yes, that is also another interesting story!
Breakfasts were sometimes very strange too, some mornings, we'd get the bread baked by prisoners in Changi Prison with the spiciest chicken curry ever, just before PT as well or really non-descript bee hoon mixed with bean sprouts and salt! Despite all this, the teh or milo was really well prepared and was good for raising morale before the start of any day.
Let's see we've talked about breakfast, lunch and dinner, of course, for the hungry or those trying to go on hunger strike against the food regime, there was night snack. This rather quaintly consisted of a tin of Lion Brand biscuits (to last 2 days?? [correct me if I am wrong]) and 2 kettles of milo per squad which 3 unfortunates had to carry back to the barracks after dinner. Try sharing that amongst 42 hungry officer cadets when the average squad size was about 30 plus! The first to go were the chocolate flavoured biscuits, then the lemon cream biscuits and this was followed by anything with a modicum of flavour. By the end of the week, there would be an accumulation of the unflavoured biscuits and by the end of the month, Fauzi would be the one who had to consolidate all the unflavoured biscuits into one tin! But eventually, we ate them all.
Finally if all else failed, you'd bring in food from the canteen or outside the Police Academy. Now, either could be potentially hazardous. Any attempts to smuggle food from the outside had to run the gauntlet of checks at the gate on book-in nights, so that was never a good avenue to try. Even if you succeeded, there were other metaphysical barriers! Apparently the area that we lived in was formerly a cemetery, so anything with any pork content tended to be viewed dimly by the supernatural elements co-residing with us who were apparently Muslim. I've never seen it but some have claimed to have woken up to their beds shaking violently because of an errant char siew pau. Well, not for the faint hearted that's for sure.
But we, in the lower barrack, plus Terence, the permanent resident, were far more enterprising than that. Mark, who had gotten married sometime during junior term, was given a night off on Fridays to spend time with his wife, so he kindly offered to buy us food. Buy us food he did! It couldn't last, and it didn't! One night he returned bearing packs of Mee Goreng, in the darkness of the barracks we were wolfing down the mee goreng when suddenly we heard a voice, "OCT, what do you think you are doing?" Not waiting to find out if it was an instructor or an instructor come back from the grave, we, brave officer cadets dived into bed and froze. Thankfully, it wasn't someone like Liew or Adrian or Hassan for that matter because he chose to ignore the scent of mee goreng coming from the table at the end of the barracks and warned us to go to bed. Stay in bed we did!
Sunday, June 1, 2008
Go Back to Army lah!
Many of the seniors warned us that everyone would hate us, I think this was one of the few very useful things that they taught us. Well the other being that no matter how bad it got, all the nonsense would end by 1730hrs.
Initially, I scoffed at that suggestion, would everyone hate us? No way..... or so I thought. Two days, it was all true! Apart from a few senior instructors such as Sri Kanthan, Hassan, Firdaus, Zakaria and some younger ones such as Gus Miao and Clifton; EVERYONE, the JO trainees, regular or NSF; the NSF instructors; the younger regular instructors all set out to try to get us during the first few weeks. Everyone was out to get the fresh meat on the chopping block, all rubbing their hands in glee, "yeah man, let's see how tough these guys are"
In the first 2 weeks every single lesson took on a hellish routine of tekan after tekan after tekan. From the drill shed to the pool to the dojo, it was all a series of tests to see how tough these former army boys were. I still remember FI Liew making us do the step up and down on the stands in the drill shed for a supremely long time. I found it tough, goodness knows what the JO trainees who were caught in the crossfire during the session made of it. Without wanting to sound too cliched, thank goodness the army training came through for us and so we prevailed somehow or other.
Certain instructors like Liew were just out to get us and out of training they tried to get us at the mess when we went for lunch or dinner, or when we were walking out, a stray strand of facial hair or a minute amount of dirt on the boots was enough to get us despatched to the barracks. They even tried the barracks but they were quite scared of treading on Hassan's toes and so eventually the barracks became quite a safe haven from the other instructors but we could expect Hassan to appear at any time of the work day and even in the evenings at a time that we least expected. But from keeping us away from the innane rubbish from the instructors he might as well have been the messiah to some of us. Later on of course, Yusman and Young Azman tried their luck, uh, well that's for another post on its own of course.
The other hazard was the abuse directed as us from the JO trainees, most of it wasn't terribly intelligent or witty like Terence mentioned in the early post, "OCT go back to army la" or just plain abuse. Of course eventually we sorted them out in one way or another, whether it was at the mess when we were on mess duty and we returned the favour by dispatching them back to their barracks for poor bearing and turn out or just by thrashing them on the sports field.
Eventually, we all got numb to the abuse and the other instructors mainly stopped trying their luck. Of course there was the odd incident here and there, but things got quite bearable by the end of the second month.
Initially, I scoffed at that suggestion, would everyone hate us? No way..... or so I thought. Two days, it was all true! Apart from a few senior instructors such as Sri Kanthan, Hassan, Firdaus, Zakaria and some younger ones such as Gus Miao and Clifton; EVERYONE, the JO trainees, regular or NSF; the NSF instructors; the younger regular instructors all set out to try to get us during the first few weeks. Everyone was out to get the fresh meat on the chopping block, all rubbing their hands in glee, "yeah man, let's see how tough these guys are"
In the first 2 weeks every single lesson took on a hellish routine of tekan after tekan after tekan. From the drill shed to the pool to the dojo, it was all a series of tests to see how tough these former army boys were. I still remember FI Liew making us do the step up and down on the stands in the drill shed for a supremely long time. I found it tough, goodness knows what the JO trainees who were caught in the crossfire during the session made of it. Without wanting to sound too cliched, thank goodness the army training came through for us and so we prevailed somehow or other.
Certain instructors like Liew were just out to get us and out of training they tried to get us at the mess when we went for lunch or dinner, or when we were walking out, a stray strand of facial hair or a minute amount of dirt on the boots was enough to get us despatched to the barracks. They even tried the barracks but they were quite scared of treading on Hassan's toes and so eventually the barracks became quite a safe haven from the other instructors but we could expect Hassan to appear at any time of the work day and even in the evenings at a time that we least expected. But from keeping us away from the innane rubbish from the instructors he might as well have been the messiah to some of us. Later on of course, Yusman and Young Azman tried their luck, uh, well that's for another post on its own of course.
The other hazard was the abuse directed as us from the JO trainees, most of it wasn't terribly intelligent or witty like Terence mentioned in the early post, "OCT go back to army la" or just plain abuse. Of course eventually we sorted them out in one way or another, whether it was at the mess when we were on mess duty and we returned the favour by dispatching them back to their barracks for poor bearing and turn out or just by thrashing them on the sports field.
Eventually, we all got numb to the abuse and the other instructors mainly stopped trying their luck. Of course there was the odd incident here and there, but things got quite bearable by the end of the second month.
Friday, May 30, 2008
Barrack Songs - Stand By Me
Call me a sentimental fool but that was my favourite barrack song even though it wasn't on the radio at all. I still remember singing this song with Terence Choo (!) when he was strumming his guitar so I guess the unplugged version is the most apt.
Thursday, May 29, 2008
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
The end of the beginning
Shortly after we met our CM and got to know our squad mates and seniors a bit better, it was down to serious business.
Clearly Hassan had the right connections with the logistics people because we got hold of our uniforms pretty quickly, any thoughts of the wonderful efficiency of the SPF supply chain were quickly dispelled after we got our weekend shopping list. This involved buying loads of white long-sleeved shirts and singlets which I well couldn't afford! It was only after severe groveling at home that I managed to squeeze some money out of my folks for my trip to Beach Road. Thank goodness for Rabbit Brand singlets, cheap and very nasty.
We got our books for our law and police procedure lessons, we drew huge raincoats and put in orders for our law statutes (which we once again had to pay for!) and some enterprising FIs even tried to make money out of us to buy Asics running shoes (they were successful I might add).
With the admin stuff relatively settled, we began to face up to the need of electing a squad committee. Judging by the farcical nature of the squad committee of our seniors which had more leadership changes than a petty Central African banana republic, it was vital to elect a good committee.
Even though my name was briefly mentioned in passing, I was in the midst of my hard-assed don't mess with me stage so I stood as much of a chance of making the squad committee as Ralph Nader becoming the President of the USA. By this stage I was almost psychopathic as I had already hurled a truckload of abuse at JT when he attempted to get me to organise a squad barbeque and later attempted to tell me what a good job I was doing when I was trying to iron some crease out of my pants. I thought he got off quite lightly given I was tempted to hurl the iron at the said cretin, I'm glad to say he had no iron marks on any part of his body.
Ah yes, the cretin, what long running feud would not be complete without a cretin who had a far higher regard for his ability than everyone else. How he managed to get elected as vice chairman was beyond me, I remember scolding quite a few people who admitted they voted for him though I think they wouldn't admit to voting for him today.
Other luminaries deservedly elected included Aziz who impressed all and sundry with his facial hair and his on-ness. Asri also made it as vice chairman, so they'd have their hands full trying to manage the various miscreants in the squad.
Clearly Hassan had the right connections with the logistics people because we got hold of our uniforms pretty quickly, any thoughts of the wonderful efficiency of the SPF supply chain were quickly dispelled after we got our weekend shopping list. This involved buying loads of white long-sleeved shirts and singlets which I well couldn't afford! It was only after severe groveling at home that I managed to squeeze some money out of my folks for my trip to Beach Road. Thank goodness for Rabbit Brand singlets, cheap and very nasty.
We got our books for our law and police procedure lessons, we drew huge raincoats and put in orders for our law statutes (which we once again had to pay for!) and some enterprising FIs even tried to make money out of us to buy Asics running shoes (they were successful I might add).
With the admin stuff relatively settled, we began to face up to the need of electing a squad committee. Judging by the farcical nature of the squad committee of our seniors which had more leadership changes than a petty Central African banana republic, it was vital to elect a good committee.
Even though my name was briefly mentioned in passing, I was in the midst of my hard-assed don't mess with me stage so I stood as much of a chance of making the squad committee as Ralph Nader becoming the President of the USA. By this stage I was almost psychopathic as I had already hurled a truckload of abuse at JT when he attempted to get me to organise a squad barbeque and later attempted to tell me what a good job I was doing when I was trying to iron some crease out of my pants. I thought he got off quite lightly given I was tempted to hurl the iron at the said cretin, I'm glad to say he had no iron marks on any part of his body.
Ah yes, the cretin, what long running feud would not be complete without a cretin who had a far higher regard for his ability than everyone else. How he managed to get elected as vice chairman was beyond me, I remember scolding quite a few people who admitted they voted for him though I think they wouldn't admit to voting for him today.
Other luminaries deservedly elected included Aziz who impressed all and sundry with his facial hair and his on-ness. Asri also made it as vice chairman, so they'd have their hands full trying to manage the various miscreants in the squad.
Thursday, May 15, 2008
First Impressions Part II
I can't say I remember a huge deal about what transpired on the bus ride to the Police Academy which either means my memory is going or that nothing terribly significant happened on the bus. The only thing of note I suppose was Mark and I deciding to stick with familiarity and become buddies - a decision that worked out for the best in the end, though you will hear some of the domestic squabbles we used to have about the contents of our cupboard.
When we finally arrived at the barracks, it really was a far cry from SAFTI MI, for a start it was 30 in the top barrack and 12 in the middle barrack. I thank the highest heavens that Mark and I decided to move to the end of queue which meant we went to the middle barrack. Each pair were supposed to share a cupboard divided into 3 sections (hanging space, book and file space, personal space). It wasn't much but it was a price worth paying to get out of the SAF.
You can tell alot about a place through it's sanitary facilities. Judging by the 7 spouts that masqueraded as showers and the 4 cubicles to be shared by all 42 cadets didn't inspire much confidence, though going by the 'if it looks good you're not going to use it' theory, it looked like we'd be spending quite alot of time in the barracks!
The only catch about the middle barrack was that you had to share with the senior squad of OCTs. Ah yes, the senior squad it was quite interesting to see the dynamics in the squad, over the next few days we came to realise some of them hated each other because these individuals were more interested in becoming squad chairman than getting commissioned. Given the immense likelihood that the same thing would happen in my squad, I decided to set my stall out to be the most evil and foul tempered person in the squad so no one from my squad (or the senior squad for that matter) would take liberties with me.
Also at this stage, we realised that the food chain got a bit more complicated due to the appearance of our Course Manager (CM). My first impression of him was that I shouldn't mess with him too much and I felt that he wasn't a simple guy to deal with either. Well both would turn out to be true over the course of the next 9 months, more would be revealed later.
When we finally arrived at the barracks, it really was a far cry from SAFTI MI, for a start it was 30 in the top barrack and 12 in the middle barrack. I thank the highest heavens that Mark and I decided to move to the end of queue which meant we went to the middle barrack. Each pair were supposed to share a cupboard divided into 3 sections (hanging space, book and file space, personal space). It wasn't much but it was a price worth paying to get out of the SAF.
You can tell alot about a place through it's sanitary facilities. Judging by the 7 spouts that masqueraded as showers and the 4 cubicles to be shared by all 42 cadets didn't inspire much confidence, though going by the 'if it looks good you're not going to use it' theory, it looked like we'd be spending quite alot of time in the barracks!
The only catch about the middle barrack was that you had to share with the senior squad of OCTs. Ah yes, the senior squad it was quite interesting to see the dynamics in the squad, over the next few days we came to realise some of them hated each other because these individuals were more interested in becoming squad chairman than getting commissioned. Given the immense likelihood that the same thing would happen in my squad, I decided to set my stall out to be the most evil and foul tempered person in the squad so no one from my squad (or the senior squad for that matter) would take liberties with me.
Also at this stage, we realised that the food chain got a bit more complicated due to the appearance of our Course Manager (CM). My first impression of him was that I shouldn't mess with him too much and I felt that he wasn't a simple guy to deal with either. Well both would turn out to be true over the course of the next 9 months, more would be revealed later.
Monday, May 12, 2008
Friday, May 2, 2008
First Impressions
And so it came to pass, it was time for us to say goodbye to the Singapore Armed Forces and head off to the SPF. Of course, the SAF wasn't one to say goodbye in a warm cuddly manner, no hugs and kisses, no pat on the back and plaque, and certainly, no one told the Nee Soon people that we had to de-kit! So all of us rocket scientists left some of our army kit at home which was a dumb as dog shit thing to do, but oh well, that's all in hindsight.
After rushing like a mad man to go home to recover the last vestiges of my SAF kit, I stormed back to Nee Soon Camp in civilian and turned in all of my kit, helmet, SBO and all, but I had to pay money for the socks and swimming trunks I forgot all about. Well you'd think these items would be regarded as disposable, but not in the army!!
Of course, the other great revelation of the day was the 2 female soldiers working at the store were actually male! We swore for the longest time that they were female, and of course I'm sure Aziz was checking the Indian one during BMT. [A totally untrue remark I might add] The other great memory was Terence in a tank top and ripped jeans sauntering across the parade square which earned prompted to reflect on his bravery or lack of intelligence!
It was then that we met the Tekong people who looked alot less flustered than us, well it seems the message to de-kit got through to them. We also saw a couple of NS Inspectors who started shouting at us, we all though they'd be our PCs, but in truth, they were just a bunch of lowlifes from PNSD who just wanted to get off the bottom of the food chain by shouting at some lower ranked people.
Finally, we met the man, FI Hassan who for the next 9 months would be our instructor, mentor and tormentor at various junctures. He seemed a calm enough individual compared to those wankers from PNSD who faded away when Hassan took charge, and our Deputy Company Commander, Zakaria, a Staff Sergeant to boot! I remember thinking what type of warped organisation was this?!?
Then we boarded the big blue bus driven by our Deputy Company Commander (!) and it was off to the Police Academy at Thomson Road and out of Nee Soon Camp and soon the SAF was behind us.
I suppose it would be self-indulgent to reflect on my BMT experience, but damn it, I created this blog so I will do it anyway. I will say that I never enjoyed BMT in the least, but 10 years on, I still maintain it was an experience that I had to have. It taught me resilience and how to push myself past my self-imposed limits, it taught me never to take for granted the things that I have and it also gave me a smattering of self-confidence which I didn't really have up to that point. Of course it also taught me alot about other people and what they were like under pressure. Without this experience, I don't think I would be able to do many of the things that I have done and certainly all that training and discipline would come to good use in the days of training at the Police Academy, but that is for the next post.
After rushing like a mad man to go home to recover the last vestiges of my SAF kit, I stormed back to Nee Soon Camp in civilian and turned in all of my kit, helmet, SBO and all, but I had to pay money for the socks and swimming trunks I forgot all about. Well you'd think these items would be regarded as disposable, but not in the army!!
Of course, the other great revelation of the day was the 2 female soldiers working at the store were actually male! We swore for the longest time that they were female, and of course I'm sure Aziz was checking the Indian one during BMT. [A totally untrue remark I might add] The other great memory was Terence in a tank top and ripped jeans sauntering across the parade square which earned prompted to reflect on his bravery or lack of intelligence!
It was then that we met the Tekong people who looked alot less flustered than us, well it seems the message to de-kit got through to them. We also saw a couple of NS Inspectors who started shouting at us, we all though they'd be our PCs, but in truth, they were just a bunch of lowlifes from PNSD who just wanted to get off the bottom of the food chain by shouting at some lower ranked people.
Finally, we met the man, FI Hassan who for the next 9 months would be our instructor, mentor and tormentor at various junctures. He seemed a calm enough individual compared to those wankers from PNSD who faded away when Hassan took charge, and our Deputy Company Commander, Zakaria, a Staff Sergeant to boot! I remember thinking what type of warped organisation was this?!?
Then we boarded the big blue bus driven by our Deputy Company Commander (!) and it was off to the Police Academy at Thomson Road and out of Nee Soon Camp and soon the SAF was behind us.
I suppose it would be self-indulgent to reflect on my BMT experience, but damn it, I created this blog so I will do it anyway. I will say that I never enjoyed BMT in the least, but 10 years on, I still maintain it was an experience that I had to have. It taught me resilience and how to push myself past my self-imposed limits, it taught me never to take for granted the things that I have and it also gave me a smattering of self-confidence which I didn't really have up to that point. Of course it also taught me alot about other people and what they were like under pressure. Without this experience, I don't think I would be able to do many of the things that I have done and certainly all that training and discipline would come to good use in the days of training at the Police Academy, but that is for the next post.
Monday, April 28, 2008
Posting Day - Part I
Well, I can't claim to speak for the Tekong people [I will leave that for Asri] because most of us on the blog at the moment were from BMTC 2 at Nee Soon Camp, come to think of it, most of us were in fact from Gryphon Company, BMTC 2.
I was absolutely scared stiff on posting day, whatever the Singapore Armed Forces had in store for me, I wasn't looking forward to it. I had seen the barracks at SAFTI MI and I was convinced the better it looked the less you were going to use it. In preparation for the inevitable let down by the supply chain, I had packed 5 toilet rolls in anticipation of a long and painful confinement period at OCS.
But, somehow or other at the back of my mind, I had a feeling that it was going to be my lucky day. After all, it was 5 Oct 1998, it was my 22nd birthday.
So as Gryphon Company gathered reluctantly to find out the fates that awaited us, 2nd Lieutenant Tay, my less than sane Platoon Commander went "Wah Lau! Daryl Tan and Mark Tan half left hit it!" I started to think this really could be my day, was it really the mythical NSPI posting that I had heard much about but knew very little off.
Numerous push ups and crunches later, it was confirmed, Mark and I were going to the SPF and of course, we were overjoyed and we let our platoon 2 mates who were going to SISPEC know all about it as well. I looked around the motley collection of individuals from Gryphon who were going to the SPF as well, there was Mark who I didn't know particularly well except he was the talkative one from Section 3 who got the whole company into pumping position during range as he was hassling the resident gay boy in my platoon. Looking further up the line, there 2 guys who stood out as they were clearly less than enamored at the posting which was rather strange to me. One was the psychopathic looking Indian guy who had a moustache and looked like he was in his 30s and looked ready to kill. There was also the skinny Eurasian dude who had hassled me on guard duty a few weeks before.
From this less than promising beginning, Mark, Aziz, Terence and I would become the best of friends during National Service!
As they say, this was just the beginning!
I was absolutely scared stiff on posting day, whatever the Singapore Armed Forces had in store for me, I wasn't looking forward to it. I had seen the barracks at SAFTI MI and I was convinced the better it looked the less you were going to use it. In preparation for the inevitable let down by the supply chain, I had packed 5 toilet rolls in anticipation of a long and painful confinement period at OCS.
But, somehow or other at the back of my mind, I had a feeling that it was going to be my lucky day. After all, it was 5 Oct 1998, it was my 22nd birthday.
So as Gryphon Company gathered reluctantly to find out the fates that awaited us, 2nd Lieutenant Tay, my less than sane Platoon Commander went "Wah Lau! Daryl Tan and Mark Tan half left hit it!" I started to think this really could be my day, was it really the mythical NSPI posting that I had heard much about but knew very little off.
Numerous push ups and crunches later, it was confirmed, Mark and I were going to the SPF and of course, we were overjoyed and we let our platoon 2 mates who were going to SISPEC know all about it as well. I looked around the motley collection of individuals from Gryphon who were going to the SPF as well, there was Mark who I didn't know particularly well except he was the talkative one from Section 3 who got the whole company into pumping position during range as he was hassling the resident gay boy in my platoon. Looking further up the line, there 2 guys who stood out as they were clearly less than enamored at the posting which was rather strange to me. One was the psychopathic looking Indian guy who had a moustache and looked like he was in his 30s and looked ready to kill. There was also the skinny Eurasian dude who had hassled me on guard duty a few weeks before.
From this less than promising beginning, Mark, Aziz, Terence and I would become the best of friends during National Service!
As they say, this was just the beginning!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
