Here follows part 2 of rae Ume's story of his experience as a Slave.

rey is in a state of delirium yet reserved excitement over the potential outcome of his Canadian asylum hearing and its implications for his self n his future agenda which possibly involves the evisceration of conscription from the tradition of singapore. if anyone who reads this is in vancouver he'll treat them to coffee

Part 1 of the tale of woe and despair


I probably could have endured NS normally like the average conscript. The physical aspect of it would probably be just slightly higher than mentally-detached tolerable, meaning that at least some mental acceptance and support are needed to survive. If one is sincere in participating in the activities of the SAF, it is very improbable that physical mishap can befall the common conscript and render death upon him, because that is extremely abhorred and unintended of by the SAF. Thus, the basic near-infallible survival mantra of NS would be to blindly follow, have basic belief and support for the system and not to use any intellect or human sense at all for the entire existence in NS. It is a cheap way to live, cheating one of his principles and beliefs. To think and question would be extremely strenuous and dangerous for the mind, as it would result in doubt and discontent, as well as notions of individualism. With regard to me, all this in a nutshell is that I did not manage to believe in NS at all, as I have been so incontrovertibly corrupted by my previous life experiences as a free intellectual that I could not possibly adapt to the oppressive mental state as demanded of me by the SAF. It does not even serve a purpose which I believe in, thus rendering any romantic sincerity on my part impossible to attain. In this way, it meant that to survive one must adopt the SAF mental regime; and since most will do just about anything to survive, it meant that this mental conversion and bondage will be a very big reality among conscripts. I would also perform remarkable feats to survive, and I performed an unorthodox one for myself, probably never expected of by the SAF.

In my reserved rebellion to the SAF I have turned from one of the fit to one of the least fit in my BMT company in 3 short weeks. I also fell sick with a bacterial infection of the throat, due to stress doubtless. I have reported sick and I have obtained medicine, but I never recovered because I had no rest. In fact, my sickness worsened because I had to participate in almost all of the activities of the platoon. I spent many nights awake, struggling within for the mastery between physical preservation and the matter of principles. At the end of third week field camp was scheduled to arrive. I was extremely frail on the night before and already had many nights of sleeplessness. The next day I went to report sick. I told my sergeant that I had a throat infection. He replied cynically that I should not report sick if it was not life-threatening. By that time I have pretty much gotten used to such attitudes and remarks, and my technique of handling them was to just act stupid and pitiful or remorseful. Anyway whatever the case I made sure I had my way. I managed to report sick and when I was interviewed by the MO, I told him that I actually was suffering from depression and that I could not tolerate the rigours of BMT anymore, and I told him that field camp was the main reason for it. I also broke down forcedly to make my case. With a threatening hand, as if to slap me, he ordered me to stop crying in a raised voice. Then he gave me a form for the suspension of BMT, and he dismissed me. I filled in the form in the toilet, with such a feeling of ecstasy within me! I had never been so excited. I was basically struggling from bursting out in hysterics. I was finally suspended from training! I returned to my company and filed my form to the clerk with relish. There is a space to be filled in by the MO for the reason of suspension, and for mine it read “Undisclosed”. I basically told everyone that I did not know why the doctor wrote it that, but my back was really hurting me! I must have appeared quite genuine because I was in such awesome spirits, it was quite difficult to imagine me being depressed. For the next few days, I did area cleaning and ad hoc duties around the company block. It was a good time for physical recuperation and refuge from mental and principle harassment. I had a routine interview with my platoon commander and there was not an ounce of sincere information he got from me. Even by then, the conscripts were asked to fill in many forms, and I had the good habit of misinforming in many of them. Giving false contact numbers and false educational backgrounds was a very normal routine. My contempt and disregard for the system were ever present.

My feelings at this time were quite relieved. I did not have to worry about suffering unrestrained indignity from my superiors, or adapting our minds to the subliminal programmes of our superiors or the SAF in general. I was rather much spared from the insidious influence of the social-reforming characteristic of NS. One time, the OOT conscripts were together at the water area filling up jerry cans. A sergeant walked in and stared at us. He told us that he had found a critique letter in the company office. The letter is yet unsigned and he wanted to know who wrote it! At that point he was hurling insults and threats at us with such rapidity and ferocity even I felt a little threatened, conditioned as I was to such abuse. He finally found out who the author was through his abuse. As he stood there condemning the poor conscript to hell, the rest of us, roughly 3 persons, stood there solemnly and observed the spectacle. As it was slowly revealed, it appeared that the conscript in question had written a letter to be sent to someone high up, and that the letter mentioned of abuse by the instructors by ignoring the conscript’s physical ailments, which was some sort of knee problem I presume. Anyway the sergeant was abusing him roundly with insults and knuckle-shaking, and as it that were not enough, he had to involve the conscript’s parents too in his abuse. Many times I wanted to step in, knowing that the sergeant had no authority over me and my opinions, but I was afraid that I might jeopardise my position as there are many creative and shady ways that he can make life hell for me. Since I was not really a pet among the instructors, I thought it unwise to butt in as I had no leverage in case of anything.

By then, I had already experienced myself changing, unconsciously being affected by the environment of “listen, obey, unquestioningly”. It was a feeling of fear, worry and wariness. Prior, I would normally spend a second or two thinking before committing an action, be it speech or movement. I was not a person who was bothered with appearing rude, even if I were aware of myself. I was not exceedingly polite too, unless if I wanted to. I was not rude, just not being over-polite. However, I began to change, and I had to be aware of my behaviour. I felt an obligation to be over-polite, as if acting the contrary might welcome some form of unhappiness. I began to behave in a reflexive, humiliating, servile and solicitous manner towards all forms of authority. Behaving like this made me feel “safe”, and such a feeling was very welcome in that minatory atmosphere. I would answer every command and question authority posed with enthusiasm and a smile, acting willing but incompetent. It was undignified but comforting, comforting to know that I might not be offending anyone with my seemingly “impertinent” attitude. It was perhaps controllable behaviour on my part, but I was too exhausted and wary to attempt anything that might appear offensive.

Life had begun to treat me better. I was beginning to settle down into my lifestyle, forgetting about my scruples and dissent. It was a laid-back country life, albeit a slave life. My company was still in field camp, and the OOTs had the whole company block to themselves. My normal routine would be to wake up, bring food from the cookhouse to the company block, and fill up the jerry cans with water whenever the trucks come back from field camp. There were many other ad hoc duties, but I do not remember anything now. The whole military experience was one that I loathed and tried hard to forget, and it would be impossible to recall complete, or even accurate, memories of what transpired. I was later posted to become a storeman in Murai Camp. The posting came a few days after my company came back from field camp. It will be from that moment on that I gradually and inexorably transformed into a lethargic, depressed, defeated individual, with no more motivation left for life. I wanted to defeat conscription with a professional and clinical attitude, one that I could adopt quite easily with my personality and previous expertise in family and social backgrounds. I have completed putting on my false front. This mask will unknowingly become so ingrained with my life that one day I will forget my goals and original self.

I turned into the veritable Kengster/slacker. I did what I could to master and exploit the system in my new surroundings. Murai Camp was a slack camp, a small establishment with the accompanying easy atmosphere. It was a stay-out camp and my department would come late by 10-15 minutes everyday. A department detachment in the neighbouring Tengah Airbase has no supervision, and those who were assigned there probably came late by half an hour each day. And the duties they performed were basically nothing but man the unused stores. They slept their time away there. My duties were slightly different. Since I was considered the most highly educated in the department, the only one who had gone through JC, I was supposed to take over the cookhouse record duties of the department. It was a job that required a lot of Excel and minute number sifting. I could have learned it and done it, but I did not. I was a good actor, I pretended to be a complete klutz with computers, and they bought it all. The person teaching me was a LCP conscript who had been there for some time. He was an interesting character, but basically almost everyone in the department had a story to tell, provided they wanted to tell it. There was Simon, the one I believed was the most pitiful, and who received my greatest sympathy, and Kumar, the married youngster who was really affable and interesting in his own way. There were many others too, but these two were the main ones that stood out in my memories. I proved (or pretended) to be the earnest but luckless dimwit who could not achieve in any endeavour, the pitiful complaisant little bastard who got on well with everyone, or mostly anyone with authority. The others I simply pitied, because they were conscripts like me, unwilling slaves, or perhaps who had become uninformed converts to the system through the grindstone of the military tradition. Those who got on my wrong side would be treated with frustration, but I did no more, and I could not do more, because it would be incorrect of me. Our lives never should have crossed, and never should have offended each other, if not for the monstrous effect of the military. We, as humans, should have and would have complemented each other. I was confident of my beliefs. Unfortunately, the brute brunt might of coercive power will crush everything in its path. Such was power.

I could provide irrelevant but interesting anecdotes in this account, but for the sake of consistency to the theme, which was the depressing and unmitigated transformation of an individual and his thinking into something very pitiful, corrupt and malevolent, I will reserve my camp stories for another time. During my time in camp, I socialised a lot with the RPs and the clerks from HQ. I would spread my dissident and subversive ideas to them, the condemnation of the system, the dirt of the system, the injustice and incorrectness of the system. Everyday is cursed for me. I would wake up in the morning to find myself deprived of sleep because I could not sleep the night before, or because I was ruminating on the system. I would spit so often, mostly because of the disgust and anger at some sudden thought on the system. I would swear so often, even at hapless and innocent people, like the old lady who stank or the volunteer worker doing a fund drive. I had lost my ability to rationalise or be sensible. It was a sad time to be alive. I was an angry man. A sad and angry man. There were many times when I curse my impotency and question why I did not perish on that fateful day. There were many times when I wonder why I am even still alive, why I have to continue serving. I wonder why I serve, whom I serve, and why I do not have the courage to stop doing such an infernal thing! Perhaps that would be my real self manifesting. My mask would normally not ask such questions but invest and enjoy the clinical yield from tactical manoeuvring and system exploitation and abuse. I would not involve more with the system, and I enjoyed my status as the useless storeman who knew nothing and did nothing. However, I was to be sent for the storeman course. I would not learn and participate, but falling short of an outright rebellion, my mask sprang into action. I went for the course. A few days into it, I went to TTSH to declare depression. It was actually quite true, because I was seemingly at my wits’ end as to how to end this complicity with the system. Ironically, the answer was to be honest, something which totally escaped my mask, but still ultimately got to my attention. The doctor at TTSH was quite bewildered and cynical, but who was I to bother? I was the one who have learned to curse at tottering old ladies. He wondered what depression a storeman could have. I could have explained it to him, but it would have required 5 cups of coffee and a lot of logical work from his mind, not to mention an inordinate amount of time. Since I had none of those, the truth is best kept with me. Anyways, who can determine depression truly? Only the depressed knows. Only he, has the benefit of the doubt. He, he, and he alone. That is why the system is ineffective and wrong. I was to be dropped from my course, but I passed the theory and practical test on the last day. I even managed to fulfil the minimum attendance requirement. I had quite a lot of days of absence. I had the ability to judge which authority was exploitable and which would be better off avoiding.

Time really crawled in the military. In time, I was to be called for a FFI review. If I passed, I would head back to BMT. I did not wish to experience the same routine again, and my mind always panicked when there was an FFI. There was a real incentive to beat the system, and I was sure this incentive applied to everyone. It was a competition, with real advantages, without any immorality, but utter rationality. I had luck. I suffered an acute back pain, without really knowing the cause. I went to a TCM practitioner. She gave me 2 weeks of MC. I knew it would have been an invalid MC, but I used it anyway. It was bold of me, but I knew I had everything going for me as I had never been told of such an impropriety of visiting a TCMP, and I had a genuine problem, which could probably have been verified by the western practice. After my hiatus was up, I went to validate my MC at the MO. The MO was an extremely nice reservist who did not even look twice at it before stamping its validity. We even discussed a little about how silly conscription was. When I submitted my MC to the administration office, they informed me there was a problem, and possibly a gigantic problem. They told me that TCM MCs were not accepted. I knew then that I could play my way out of it, because I had it validated, and I did not know anything about such a policy. Furthermore, the admin staff were all good friends of mine. In the end, they accepted it, but in an underhand sort of way. That problem would ultimately cause a referral from the MO to the SAFTI physiotherapist, starting a long term relationship with colossal camp-cutting. I would normally schedule my appointments in the afternoon, picking prime Fridays, and other assorted days, and definitely afternoon. If the appointment was at 3, I would leave camp at 1, arrive there at 2:30ish, get some food, go in for probably 20 minutes, come out and go home, and to be free from authority. Initially, it would be as frequently as 3 appointments a week, but it slowly slowed to once a week, and it was good too because my officers were already watching my back because I was probably the most notorious slacker in camp, even if I did not openly reveal my exploits in exploitation. If I were given any task, I would take 2-3 times the time for other people to do it, and I had no qualms with staying back. My method would be to 1st, expend as little energy as possible in the task and 2nd, build on my earnest but luckless dimwit image. I had to be extremely professional in all my hidden agendas, and my extensive early training in school on professionalism and perfection proved really useful to me. However, I proved to be extremely competent in tasks which I find advantageous in doing, like despatch which the QM department had many of, and other out-of-camp businesses. Ultimately, my working method won me abstinence from delegation for onerous hard labour, and assignment of many despatch tasks, of most which I was allowed to exploit the system and earn many benefits, like going straight home after business, or spending an inordinate period out of camp. Thinking back now, life was really cheap and pathetic then. I am ashamed that I harboured such attitudes and committed such actions. I am such an asshole. Such feelings manifest itself often, especially now, after I am free from that evil institution, and I still do not know how to deal with them. But I am digressing, and the next chapter begins.