4 days at NCC:

I finally prevailed upon Ban Xiong to send me to Amoy Quee to cover NCC courses over 4 days the past week, so I got to stay out for 4 days and have fun slacking over there. I and Bob were assigned to cover the Specialists' Course for Boys for the Central district, so we didn't get to shake our heads much at how girls' NCC is much slacker (for one, on the occasions you are in No 3, you can't get knocked down!), though what little I saw from the other contingents already confirmed my suspicions. Meanwhile, I was entertained and enlightened by Bob's many profound observations on life, the universe and everything.

After observing NCC training, I am more perplexed than ever about why young schoolchildren would want to spend a day or two each week, and more during the holidays, being tortured. Especially the boys. Aren't 2 to 2 1/2 years of full time bondage more than enough? Maybe it's all the masochists who join NCC, so they can perversely rejoice in their suffering. Or maybe they're just channeling their innate and hormonal urges to play at being soldiers, the same way children play with toy soldiers, tanks, planes and what not.

In some ways, NCC is even more regimental than the SAF. When the cadets sit on the floor, they adopt a posture reminiscent of the lotus position, sitting cross-legged with straight backs and stretching both arms out to rest on their knees. They then have to ask their ICs permission to relax and adjust themselves or to drink water. Why the ICs don't give this permission every now and then as a matter of course, or just ask the superiors for carte blanche permission for the cadets to rest, is beyond me. Hell, even their eating is regimental! The ICs are also very fierce, even though they are the same rank as their men. Maybe it's all the vying for recognition so they can get promoted faster, or get the title of Best Trainee. Anyhow, everything can probably be summed up in one word: "discipline" (read: stupidity). Of course, they have their home, their parents, their siblings, a soft, fluffy bed and lots of soft toys waiting for them at the end of the day (or the week, at most), and if worse comes to worst, they can always quit.

In some ways, too, it seems the NCC cadets learn more than we did during BMT. For example they learn how to search people at rifle point. But then they have even less practice than us, so.

I've always wondered why the SAF needs medics to cover all sorts of trivial things. In fact, in the past, I have even had to cover a *reception*. I don't know, maybe they feared some General would choke on a fishball, or something. In the first two days of my NCC cover, people managed to cut themselves while loading magazines into and stripping rifles, so I suppose we were there to stop parental complaints. Anyway, the Police and just about everyone else (schools, organisations holding outdoor activities and more) manage to get by without medical cover, so I suspect maybe they're just finding work for SAF medics to do so we don't become too slack.

I saw what should be all of the Army Recruitment Posters in the "who has the ~" series! I tried to think of spoofs of each, but I didn't succeed. Results of my brainstorming below:
- "Who has the spirit?" -> "Who has flagging spirits?". Picture will show soldiers after a 40km route march - shagged, demoralised and close to exhuastion.
- "Who has the firepower?" -> "Who has insufficient firepower?". Picture will show a M1A2 Abrams beside an SM-1.
- "Who will keep us safe?" -> The lack of tenacity, will, patriotism and determination of many SAFs (and not a few regulars) is well known. Nonetheless, I could not come up with a counterpart to this poster.
- "Who has the motivation?" -> "Who has no motivation?". Picture will show the miserly pay that NSFs get every month. "You pay me peanuts, you get a monkey". What else can be added to show why NSFs lack motivation?
- "Who has the vigilance?" -> "Who has no vigilance?". Picture will show people slacking and sleeping during guard duty, or sleeping at various other places, like in a tonner.
- "Who has the courage?" -> "Who has no courage?". Picture will show someone (me?) hesitating at the high ramp.


Quickies:

Shit rolls downhill. Officers get specialists or officer cadets to do their dirty work, specialists get enlistees or recruits, and enlistees get NCC cadets (if available) :)

There was this short SCGS girl who put her bag near ours, flashed a shy smile and walked away. Gah. I actually felt tempted to throw her bag at her. There should be a law to regulate people's acting cute.

As some NCC specialists were marching past Bob, who was eating Ikan Perdas, I was looking for the guy who was chanting the traditional "loop, loop, loop right loop". To my great shock, it was the person mentioned in the above paragraph! Looks like Raffles Guys is not the only institution which provides this sort of training.

Somehow, this quote from BMT came to mind while watching the NCC ICs count strength: "[Recruit to sergeant while counting strength: X and X blank files, IC!] Fuck. I go to SISPEC for 5 months, come out and become IC. Knock it down!"

In the NCC office, there was this Army recruitment poster claiming that girls got turned on by guys in uniform. Hmmph. Even if there are people whose heads are so easily turned, you won't get to meet many of them in uniform!

It was relatively easy to tell the NCC Cadets from KC apart from the other female cadets (ahem). Oddly, though, some wore a T-shirt which said, at the back, "KC NCC Land Girls". I didn't know there was a boys' contingent in that school.

You always hear people talking about when the weather status "Cat 1" (lightning), but you never get to hear of the other categories - kind of like Hongkong movies, in fact. You always hear about Cat III movies, but never about Cat I, Cat II, Cat IV and Cat V movies. Anyway I found that Cat 2 means that it is raining, and Cat 3 indicates sunny weather.

Some of the older NCC females were wearing green boots with a splash of black. They don't use these anymore nowadays. Interesting. I wonder what the rationale for green boots last time was anyway. Guess SAF wanted to save money.

Amoy Quee seems like a nice, empty, relaxed, slack camp to be in. And it's near civilisation too.

Amoy Quee provides lockers for you to put prohibited items in, but you are "advised" not to put valuables in there. Right. So what could be prohibited without being valuable? Diskettes? CDs? Pirated/pornographic VCDs?

Bob likes to walk so fast. He walked so fast, in fact, that I got abrasions on my left toes, and became all sweaty. Bah.

Sign seen at 20th Singapore Artillery: "Safety habits need to be grilled". Wth?!

I think 20SA's cookhouse can clinch the coveted prize of "Worst Cookhouse In The SAF".

Since it's their lull period, people from 2SIR get to book out daily after their Company Runs. Looks like we in 42SAR really got shortchanged. Hell even 46SAR company line people are stayout during lull.

Strangely (or otherwise) enough, it was rather nice to be addressed as "Sir". I never knew I took even a smidgen of delight in such shallow and trivial things.

It's nice to be able to change your uniform daily.

The NCC song in its full horror! You can (naturally) listen to the mp3 too.

There's actually a further incident that I would put here, but someone accused me of being sick, so I won't talk about it :)

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