Bookout Post:

Restored Post

We were weighed last week and I gained another kg, to 90.5. I've since shed that kg, so I think I've gained back the excess weight I lost during my bout of flu.

While at Kilo for the weight review last week, I surreptitiously bought a can of "Rich and Creamy Mug no caffeine Root Beer". The sample can in the machine was actually A&W Root Beer but this was not bad, though I do prefer A&W. Rich and Creamy Mug Root Beer is creamy and froths in the mouth. It has a slight sourish tang, and I detected a slight metallic taste - maybe it's just me, or because it's been in the can for a while. There are some strange ingredients - "purity gum, quillaia extract". The drink tastes more artificial than that of A&W, but Miranda Root Beer takes the prize for artificial taste! Yeos actually cans 3 types of Root Beer -A&W, Miranda and this Rich and Creamy Mug. Two timing?

Trench digging sucks. I don't know how much rougher my hands are now. Luckily though, I got Roy as my partner and the help of my sergeant. Even though they did the lion's share of the work, I was exhuasted. But Roy was very nice about it - "I know you're trying your best". I feel quite bad. This reminds me of my TCHS OBS Sea Expedition partner, who did most of the paddling. Another nice chap.

The day after Trench Digging, we had the 12km route march. I think I'll concuss on the 16km one, seeing how bad 12km was. During the first 4 km, we sang a lot of songs. On the 2nd 4km, the number of songs dwindled and on the last leg, we were quiet because we were too tired. How people motivate you during your route march - "You've done 4 click already, don't waste it!" or "4km to go only!". And if people want to fall out nearer the start, they'll probably go, "it's only been 2 km and you want to fall out?". So it's a no win situation, you never get to fall out :)

After the Route March, our Last Parade was at about 5pm. Someone had brought in a VCD of a Chinese Gongfu movie, so a lot of us crowded around and watched it. It's been a while, so I'd forgotten how funny (both intentionally and unintentionally) and impressive (all those extras standing around) Chinese Gongfu movies were. And impressive too. This one had many jokes inside, but too bad it ended unresolved. Apparently a sequel was to have been made, but it never was.

I've come to the conclusion that the biscuits they give us in the field rations are actually very good - crisp and tasty. But I think we've eaten so many, we're sick of them.

The best way to do 5BX - go into a training shed, turn off the lights and shout loudly.

One sergeant's bored of shouting "thousand" for warmups. So he moved on to making people shout "thousand" in other languages. Then one day he made us shout vulgarities instead, and "confinement" was not accepted :)

Taurus has over 70 OOCs and Charlie, 55. Well done.

The Honeydew Cordial they give us sometimes in the cookhouse is a vile colour - dark green like dishwashing liquid. I wonder what the makers were thinking.

Our sergeant was so tired of people exposing their underwear when they run that he imposed a punishment of 10 pushups for doing so. Heh.

I think I've seen maybe 1 or 2 cockroaches on Tekong so far. Weird.

The first aid dressings they give us are all expired. And we're expected to carry them everywhere (even when booking out!). Bah.

I don't know why people love to set their alarms blastedly early, do everything and go back to sleep. It's okay if you're the only one affected, but I'm the lightest sleeper in my section and the one who wants to wake latest.

I was pondering one day after calling us "sad sobs" when I realised that "sob" was not "sob" per se, but "s.o.b". So I've just insulted myself and my lot (and this was not the only time too). Oops.


In the end, I *was* attached out for the SIT Test after all. I did it with Hawk, which meant that I saw all my old RJ friends. My section was warning me about how bad it'd be, but it was actually quite okay. Hawk's a 'welfare' company, while Bravo's a shit one, so that explains it. One fallout from the first Sit Test confirmed that ours was much easier. During the Bravo one, they slept at 12pm and woke at 6am. We slept at about 9 one day and 10 the other and woke at 5:30. Also, we didn't have to double to and from stations. Maybe it was partly due to the fact that we were in "Platoon 5" so we didn't get knocked down as punishment.

I was in Andrew Tan's detail, which meant I could finally get answers to some questions I'd been meaning to ask. :)

A suspiciously disproportionate number of the people in the Mineclearer job were those from Gryphon and Delta who'd been attached after they'd missed their Sit Test. Ahem.

Apparently field rations taste much better if cooked, but we're too lazy. And those who did start fires all cooked Instant Noodles. Oh well.

The Delta people tell us they have a billards table, table soccer and a King of Fighters 95 machine with free play turned on in their Recruits' Mess. Oh well.

Lucky Calvin's No 4 nametag says "Calvin" instead of an ugly "K W Chong".

My section mate convinced me to fill my powder bottle with Prickly Heat, so during the powder bath, my body was aflame. "My balls are on fire" - someone.

We used our bayonets to open coconuts to drink the water inside (and those who were game scraped the meat to eat). Mmm, they were good.

Being obese has its advantages. Me and the other Gryphon guy were excused crossing a ~2.2m wide gap ~3.4m above the ground. "2 and 7, excused" - Assessor.

Andrew Tan cursed (albeit softly) 'lan jiao' when he fell into a hole. Ah, not even he has escaped the depredations of the army.

I think taking S Papers makes people speak in English. Few people chattered in Chinese during our Sit Test. Too bad it doesn't make them enunciate the "th" sound.

More ways to detect officers: The buttons at the end of their No 4s when they are in Long 4 mode are not buttoned tight.

The Sit Test actually reminds me of OBS in some ways, the "overcome this obstacle with your team" business. I'm very bad at "Knots and Lashing" so I couldn't help much with lashing logs to each other. Oh well.

One sergeant speaks with a quite pronounced American accent, but he slips into a Singaporean accent every few words. He also couldn't pronounce some more complex words, and he lamented that his English had gone to the dogs. I wonder if that will happen to me (sans accent).


We were late for our 12:30 boat. I was the one who most closely followed the timing given us (most of the rest went to bathe and came down late). The sergeants kept playing with a football in the company office, and some people didn't march properly so we were slowed. To add insult to injury, someone changed the channel on the TV in the fastcraft to Channel 8, and we saw soldiers doing the SOC and the flying fox (is it called that? The one where you slide down a rope holding onto some wheeled thing). Later I heard Lee Hsein Loong (on the radio) saying "National Service serves as a rite of passage". Right, that rubbish again. You might as well brand everyone, that'll be a shorter and less painful rite of passage. Oops, we have 2 BCGs already. Ahh you can chop off the tip of everyone's left pinky, then.

Apparently a rule is coming down in BMTC saying that resetting of pushups is now disallowed. I leave a wake whereever I go.

I think Going Back To Camp Syndrome intensifies sadness. I felt very lousy about my dismal showing on Thursday.

Some people try to encourage or congratulate me with things like "You're a man now" or "Men don't cry", but they don't realise that this has the opposite effect. It's really irritating.

Another irritating thing is this person who loves to not do things properly, eg moving in the file (a LOT), talking loudly in the file and doing pushups improperly when we're punished even though he plainly is capable of doing proper pushups. Yet, he's the first and loudest to scold "jee bye" when others do likewise. There's another person who's been on unofficial excuse for at least 3 weeks, skipping all the physical activities. Apparently his back hurts and he's afraid of getting Out Of Course, but it is really unfair to the rest of us.

Royston my buddy has OOCed. Most sad, with us having 3 weeks to go.

More sexism: We're freer nowadays since we've finished all our major activities, so I finally get to read the Straits Times everyday (excepting weekends when it doesn't come). In fact, I think I read it more often now than before I went in. Anyway, the Booker Prize winning author Arundhati Roy was jailed for 1 day to "show the magnaminity of the court and reflected the fact that Roy is a woman". This is disgusting.

All of us are excused the SOC station, the balance beam, where you high port (a term no one can pronounce! It always comes out as "i pod" or something) your rifle walk up to head level on a beam and then walk across precariously on a winding beam and then jump down. Yeh!

Kilo has a weird chant while marching: "Kilo, Stylo, Milo". I am flabbergasted.

Arms drill is painful. The foresight tip keeps digging into my right shoulder. Ouch.

2 of us were bundled into a rover after our Endurance Training run to help the sergeant buy Prata for the instructors. Too bad we didn't have any money (I had $1 in my slingbag but I didn't bring it down - pity's me!). Mmm, prata.

People keep calling the sling bag "shu1 bao1". I suppose the habit's ingrained already.

An explanation one sergeant gave for vulgarity use is that they are sometimes so frustrated with us that using vulgarities is the only alternative to physical abuse. Apparently when he was a recruit he felt the same way as me too. Well.


More information on the RJ female officer cadet (not all verified):

- she's a councillor
- "she like went directly to ocs.. in tri service now.. so she has one white strip.. soon we will all have to salute her.. : P"
- "They are applying for SAF overseas merit scholarship....
and thus have to do 10 weeks basic training.....plus OCS"
- "just so happened that Xiao Qing (3F)... applied for it.... in fact... the girl you saw in army garb is prob xiaoqing...."

Just in case said person visits this page (one of the disadvantages of my infamy and the grapevine), I think there's nothing wrong with joining the army. But I'll have to salute you soon.


Quotes:

"Do you ever get the feeling that you aren't sent to [the] Army, you're sent to a Boys' Home?"

"I have a very low respect for RGS girls now"

"[Me: The woman {there} looks like a man] Woman, where?"

"[On the coconuts we were drinking from, presumably from the trees growing beside the sea, which was the peeing are] You know where the water come from? It's from your pee. You are drinking 30 years of recruits' pee. (comes)"

"[On the disgusting things JC guys do to girls] They shave the girl, they cut the girl... They cut the girl while shaving."

"[On his SISPEC 'award'] Mine is rusty bayonet."

"[On my GP] Yah lar, B4, you must have insulted some religion... How can he get B4?... Too cheem already... Maybe he [the marker] was watching a soccer match, "fuck lar", B4"

"[On sand being kicked up] Jee bye, this place becoming like desert already (is becoming like a)"

"[To me] The Hawk people, all the same frequency as you"

"[On the fruit bars we get in our field rations] I went [to] CGH [Changi General Hospital]. I saw, buy 3 [at $1.65 each] get 1 free. [The free one was] Mixed fruit... We throw them away everyday."

"That's how I understand Tamil movies... First the boy and the girl will start dancing. Then a hundred people will pop up behind the boy. Then a hundred people will pop up behind the girl... Then the boy and the girl will dance around a tree... They will go to a vegetable market... The man will have a big belly and a moustache"

"[On wrapping towels around the body at the bust level] I find it very hard to breathe. I don't know how you stand it"

"[Before we booked out on the 7:30pm boat] I say again, cookhouse food not very healthy, eat less, later book out and eat."


"I don't deserve this award, but I have arthritis and I don't deserve that either.
Jack Benny (1894 - 1974)"