what doesn't kill you makes u stronger...

with reference to charlie, it nearly killed me, but i survived. so now as i move on to signals, i think the rest of my ns life won't be so bad hahaha i'll miss my bunk mates in charlie man, seriously. even though we never always got along, but we're a very diverse section. everyone works differently. and as a result we got quite a wide range of postings. 2 airforce, 3 aslc, 1 provos, 1 recce, 1 arti, 2 signals and 1 OCS. only don't have medic and pti. i guess we're not the life saving kind of people hahaha

anyway life in charlie was really an eye opener. got to see things i've never really seen before. by that i mean things one sees when he's tired and his mind ends up playing tricks on him, and how company administration can go horribly wrong in more ways than one, and as a result u have a company that hates your guts hahaha oh well... mr. "we will return it to you" and mr. "SAR!" will forever be in my memory man. can't forget those 2 characters. so incredibly screwed up and yet incredibly good in their own ways.

28 click wasn't as bad as i expected. no sore feet like 24 click in bmt. walked through ntu 4 times. the last one back to the soc ground was hell, because it got really draggy. walked past cheryl's hostel hall 4 times without even knowing, and feeling shaggedelic at the end of it all. the burning sensation in one's shoulders when standing on parade in FBO is something i'll never forget too man. really can't be described in words. just think pain hahaha

gotta wake up early to go to AHM tomorrow. the rest of the school will be running 10 clicks, but i got selected to do the division warcry hahaha which means i won't be running, which means i can save energy!!! hahaha but i guess running would be cool, since it'll be really crowded, and we might end up doing more walking than running hahaha hopefully we can be dismissed by 10, latest 10.30. it's gonna be really messy tmr

hmmm... carl's junior, it's gonna get messy!!! (sorry sidenote)

monday gotta wake up early again to report to stagmont camp. it's really near my driving school lah hahaha so it's not that far away from my house. i'm guessing it would take me about an hour to get there by public transport? rough estimation...

1 year 5 months to ORD... goodbye charlie... "thanks" for the ride of a lifetime!

everybody owes, everybody pays... the cost

i'll be keeping this note in my wallet, to remind myself to never disappoint you again. i'm so sorry honey...

everybody owes, everybody pays... the cost

3 more weeks and goodbye charlie...

the toughest week in my training programme is over. this week i had only a total of 15 hours of uninterrupted sleep. (uninterrupted sleep = 3 or more hours of sleep at one go) monday and tuesday night spent the night digging or staying up doing sentry or shouting "CONTACTED!!! CONTACTED!!!" wednesday slept late preparing stores for section battle drill on thursday. thursday slept late cleaning stores after SBD and nutcracker. friday slept late simply because we came back quite late from live firing hahaha tough week indeed.

this week won't be much different, just that we probably can sleep more outfield? i don't know. shall have to see what the weather on tekong is like. i seriously hope it's dry. at least if it's dry u can drink up more and u'll be fine. but if it rains, your skin is gone. u probably get every single skin problem known to man hahaha

going back to tekong will sure bring back memories. and i'm sure we'll use some areas that i used back in bmt too. but at least we won't be digging there, coz it can get really hard there

suddenly things are getting a bit hard. getting harder to balance my rest time and the time i can spend with her. this is the 1st weekend during sispec that i haven't seen her. hopefully i can see her on my half day off during national day. sispec is meant to really push you. or maybe that's just the situation in charlie. insufficient rest coupled with cramped training programmes that require a large amount of energy. it even pushes you until an extra hour of bookout seems like heaven already. but despite all the pushing, i still find that my standards are dropping. don't do things as well as i used to. don't put so much attention to detail into things anymore. maybe it's because charlie doesn't deserve it, or maybe because i've just given up trying because there's not always a point. but at least i haven't found the ability to slack off yet

lesson learnt from this week: digging your grave for the whole night can make you see wavy light bulbs... and imagine guys standing beside you drinking water hahaha

everybody owes, everybody pays... the cost

past 3 gypsies and 1 month is gone...

this sunday marks the end of my 1st month in sispec. after this... the going's gonna get really tough, with section training kicking into effect at the end of this week. imagine... spending a whole day outfield, consuming combat rations till u probably can't shit, coming back late at night only to spend hours cleaning your weapon and your equipment, before u have to prepare for the next day, then right the end you can clean up yourself. repeat that cycle everyday until week 8. then after that add in wanderer, grandslam and nutcracker, and u'll have one hell of a time in sispec hahaha

well the one good thing about the mad training is that you don't have much time to stone in the bunk and think. of course staying in the bunk is good coz u can rest, but when u stay in the bunk and have too much energy, you start thinking of what your friends are doing outside, how much fun they're having, and all the wonderful food they're eating, and if they've already watched pirates of the carribean (btw i haven't for reasons pertaining to very late bookout timings) these 4 weeks has passed by pretty quickly thanks to the fact they don't let us think too much. either we're focusing on the lesson, or we're fast asleep in it. usually it's the former, because if it's the latter then we'd be introduced to "jack". in charlie coy... jack refers to jumping jacks. the instructors just call "him" jack hahaha

anyway i'm done with ippt test. no more for the next 1.5 months. silver is good enough for me, mainly because my running timing is far off from the gold standard, so i'm settling for a silver. soc test next week i think. but then... i'm far off from passing man!!! i just can't bloody run with the equipment on me. maybe it's the way i run or something, but i just find it bloody tiring :( but whatever the case, i intend to pass it before my OC takes away my day off in the 9th week.

this will be the last week of lessons in the lecture rooms. got to enjoy the aircon while i still can, because after this the only aircon we'll get is probably from the platoon office hahaha 1.5 more months to a corporal. it's going to be a very trying time... but many have gotten through charlie coy, and i'm sure i can to!

everybody owes, everybody pays... the cost

welcome to charlie company...

2 weeks of sispec bslc training gone. 8 more weeks to go. honestly i'm not in much of a mood to blog. but i just wanna write some stuff down so that i won't leave like a huge gap in my blog, especially during this highly challenging part of my life. it's not as if the other companies don't have tough training as well, but there's always something about charlie that makes people say that it has the toughest training. so far the standard has been set, and can tell it's higher than alpha and bravo, but there are things they do that is slightly more tiring than us, for example running to SOC start point whilst we march there. but the sgts always ensure we put in our effort for soc lah. but then again, it's only the 1st 2 weeks. from week 5 to 7, we'll be going outfield everyday for section training. not outfield means long 4 sbo helmet rifle and jungle. jungle = mud. mud = leopard crawl in mud hahaha wonder how much more we'll do. and i just recently found out that my section commander signed on with the army simply because he likes to chiong sua... such a wonderful prospect hahaha after that still got grandslam on tekong. back to where it all began hahaha

this week... not SOOOO bad lah. had 2 SOCs, 1 speed training and 1 AGR. and the rest of time was spent in lectures and learning about weapons lah. really rushing syllabus for that man. like one day lesson, following day test already hahaha but it's quite learnable lah. they always try to make their weapons as idiot proof as possible, which is always a good thing =)

next week... learn more weapons, SOC and IPPT. booking out at night again. for 4 weeks booking out at night man. kinda sucks... but oh well, life must go on i guess. but i must admit, life in sispec could be alot worst. my section is turning out to be quite a good section! i've got quite an 'on' buddy, and my sectionmates are generally quite hardworking, except the one or 2 who only works when he really has to, but otherwise we're ok. not as united as my bmt one lah, but i'm sure we'll get there after all the outfield training we've got to go through together.

oh yes... and how could i forget... i've passed my driving test!!!! MUAHAHAHAHA not bad for someone who's driven only once a month since bmt started =p but i had to miss live firing for it. but at least i passed! so didn't waste my half day leave hahaha before i booked in again went to eat macs with my dad. really glad that he could pick me up from home and send me to the driving centre and back again. so didn't have to leave the house earlier and rush around, including back to camp. had a nice filling dinner before i headed back to camp.

now my bookout time is floating away in front of my eyes. every bookout now i face the same dilemma. to have proper rest at home for the next week of training, or go out and enjoy my bookout time as much as possible. it's tough making decisions like this, especially when you only have about 24 hours of bookout time to do whatever you want, and whatever you have to do. don't even have time to meet my classmates now. that really sucks man... but then again that's the price of being a physically fit singaporean male.

tags:
glenn: going to ord soon man! jiayou to then end! my ord in 2008 sia... long way more to go hahaha

xin: yeah those were fun times sia. but trust me... u'll have more fun in the army hahaha take care man! see you around one day hopefully...

everybody owes, everybody pays... the cost