Of 31 BBQ and shopping

31 had a BBQ at East Coast Park Pit 31, coincidentally. Food was plentiful, enough to satisfy every stomach present. Warrant Tan, Master Teo and Instructors Jason, Seow, BK and Puy turned up. So we had fun, talked and ate. Some guys brought their girls along to enjoy the atmosphere. Lots of photos taken as well.

Halfway through, songhon me and shern hit the arcade for Time Crisis 4. Probably due to the abysmal frequency of customer visits, the credits for each game were significantly cheaper. That was kinda good, and bad. Good, because it was cheap to play. Bad, because I kept changing new tokens after each death, thinking it was cheap so it was okay. I died the most out of the three of us, and the final toll on my wallet amounted to 3.50, in comparison to shern's 1 dollar spent. Jialat la. After we got back the bbq was almost done, so we left shortly.

Well, that was for Monday.

Today was scheduled for shopping since my wardrobe is in dire need of fresh apparel. I had actually planned to go alone but Jared was free so we met and had a look around Tampines. Thank god it was a weekday and the usual crowds in Tampines 1 and the surrounding malls were missing. I got my stuff and Jared got his. Spent a (nuclear)bomb. Kinda satisfied but that familiar sense of guilt kicked in yet again. Eek.

Something that kept bugging me today was the constant URGE to shit. First thought that came to mind : the bbq. 2 times today already and i can feel the 3rd itching to come out. Argh.

What else. Hmm. Rainy day, guilty of not exercising, and oh, i need a new beanie!

Thats all for now!

The Black Hole

Cool. Aha.

(Temporary) ORD LO!

Okay, actually it's just POP. So......POP LO!!!!

Block leave here i come. More, later!


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POP day. Phew. Last, yes the very last day of a 10-week long BMT.

Got the ball rolling by a PT run in the morning. Nothing much took place in the day until route march was due. Instructor Koh had us do a pasar malam - laying out of fieldpack items - at the basketball court.

" I don't care how you do it, 30 secs camou on. Now! "

I squeeze the semi-liquid paste onto my palms and creamed up Angus' face, with him doing the same to mine.

" Whole lot, take a dip in divepool "

I thought it was actually fun. 31 batch ran to the pool and jumped in at the shallow end, with no.4 and boots and camou on, leaving the water slightly murky with runny camou off our faces.

And so, we started the 12-klick march with runny camou, waterlogged boots and being drenched to the skin.

POP-ed at Kranji War Cemetery, got our berets and we secured for the night.

But that wasn't all. Back at 29, it was a rush to get into our bookout-rig and then we had 9 mins to run all the way to the main gate to book out before it gets too late. And we did. Abrasions kicking in and all, we ran like it was another route march. Except that this one led to home and freedom.

Final Week

Artist's Comments

Perhaps you're being told that the army is amazingly brilliant. well if ya don't like gettin dirty then don't bother joining up. A british army cadet helpfully posed by the puddle with his rifle as i snapped away.

Came back from IFC with energy level almost at zero percent. Running a fever as well. All i can remember about field camp is mud, camo, rain, sandy tent, basically nothing pleasant. Oh. Except for the part where i got to throw a smoke grenade :) hehe.

Had a heap of dirty laundry to clear so i got the ball rolling by soaking the clothes, round after round, to get rid of the mud that has caked on the no.4s after so much time spent cooped up in the ziplocs. Gore-tex boots needed a rinse as well, along with those socks with a killer stench. All in all the toilet became slightly muddy after my attempt to clean my stuff, so yes, i had to clean the toilet too.

The fever didn't get better. What started out on 2nd last night of field camp, was around 37.8 deg. Friday morning was 38 plus. Saturday afternoon it skyrocketed to 39.8 deg. I conducted periodic water parades myself and took temperature regularly to ensure that it went down. Luckily it did. I went to the doc and got an MC. Damn. My zero report sick record is gone (five, ych). So yeah, i'll return to camp on Mon instead.

Phew. 9 weeks have really flown. The final week is looming up ahead. One more evolution to clear - the 12 klick route march. Hope i've recovered by then, can't afford to miss this last one before block leave comes! And yes, i think this upcoming friday is going to be unforgettable. Unforgettable.

Alright then, see you!

Introduction to PCP

Friday, 8th of May 2009.


Today's bookout was surprisingly(or should i say not)early. We FO-ed at 2pm. Sounds like an easy day? Nonono. There's always a catch. Haha.

Started the morning with a water parade, full bottle as usual. Ran to grinder, warmed up, mustered on road and got ready for a run.

Now's where the 'fun' starts. I can't really give exact details of our evolutions, but basically, we ran at a bloody fast pace, bear-crawled till our hands became paws, with slender strands of saliva dripping from our mouth as we inched forward. Then it was on and off, run to bear-crawl, bear-crawl to run, a tedious cycle. Following that, thank the heavens it rained, but the fun just got started. Back to the grinder and we started PT. The entire evolution started at around 8, and ended at 12 noon.

Looks like PCP is going to be 'fun'.

Changing parade

This time, short week.

Friday was Labour Day so we had a nice long weekend ( about 3 days and 3 nights ? ). Adding to that was 30th Batch Graduation on Thursday. Seniors' Big Day. 31st Batch became saikang warriors. Saikang better than Bokang (no work) right? Hooya!

Parents, girlfriends, sisters and brothers came to NDU, injecting certain life into the place which aged back to the colonial times. Seniors did their Terror Jump in No.3s, receiving roaring applause from their friends and family. 31st summed it up with a Hooya to the 30th, and they Hooya-ed back. Go Seniors! (although we don't know you guys very well)

However the highlight of the day(to us 31st), was the afternoon changing parade. Haha. Mainly smart-4, pt-rig, pt-rig-with-boots. And then....came the KINKY RIG. I wonder if other units practise this. We mustered in trunks and boots, other than that, bare skin. Later on we had to powder down with Prickly Heat so it got very COOLING(emphasis intended). That alone got us quite high and we ran up yelling during the course of the changing. Honestly, it was strangely enjoyable.

Wolverine was a disappointment. Alright maybe because i actually follow Marvel Comics last time. But even some parts the CGI was mediocre. Sigh. X 1,2,3 still outshine this so-called prequel.

Uh, i lost my train of thought all of a sudden. Maybe it's fatigue. Alright then, shall end here for now.

I must wake up early tomorrow! I must!

Halfway through

Hello people!

First of all i want to thank all who have wished me on my birthday last Thursday, really appreciate it you guys! Adding on to that i want to give greater thanks to my dhs buddies who had dinner with me and bought me presents(one was a 65 cent SAF mug which served as a decoy).

The past week in camp was slightly better, albeit the lack of sleep. Monday was IPPT day as usual, Tues we were scheduled for SOC at Nee Soon but foul weather stepped in. Damn. Wednesday and Thursday were full days spent at the Nee Soon live range for live firing of the AR-15. I did better in night than in day, probably because of the own-time-own-target factor in the former.

The whole of 31 was sleep-deprived on range days. We returned at 12am, returned arms, went back to Blk 29, then had water parade at 1am. Finally hitting the pillow at around 2, many of us went ZZZ straight away, having to wakey-wakey at 4.30am. Thursday we had an extra 1.5 hours of sleep, but we still had to fight the fatigue war throughout the day. Some of us felt it was pseudo-hellweek. Haha.

Friday was payback aka The-Day-the-Hammer-Drops. We paid for our mistakes at the fence and field, just before dinner. After that it was time to FO, short for F***-Off, which is often used by our instructors to describe book-out.

Weekends are getting routine, but precious nonetheless. Met up with people i haven't seen in a long time, caught up, had fun. Love you guys man.

Until next week, goodbye.