idk how im supposed to describe this week sia. i feel like i'm in no place to say it is shiong, it is unreasonable, or is it effed up, knowing exactly what other ppl have to tahan. but for me, this week is fking unpredictable, i got caught off guard so many times and got thrown left right center with different situations and emotions, it felt pms like. i think the best way i can describe this week is jibai la haha.
the best way to actually make this readable for anyone, for those ppl i din't chase away with my previous posts, is to go by chronological order. yes i know it will end up fking long lol, if it's sian to read just skip to after the **** (cos bookout day was messed up). but ya, need to get this shit out of my system. i know i feel completely different from how i did last week, but there's still this excitement to blog about it.
so tuesday was a perfectly fine day, interesting signals lesson, a lot of talk cock waiting in the garage, though suddenly the marathon we were supposed to prepare for got thrown 12 hrs later and we had to leave battery line by 4 am the next day. so ya wtf, but sergeant told us is for our welfare. actually its cos a higher up effed up, but anyway its not an extremely bad news, i guess. but maybe it wasn't, since i acquired 2 ic roles for the 3 consecutive days, and this was just technically lol.
so we left for jurong camp at 4. we all gathered at the tonner to leave for jurong camp, and because the morning ride was extremely sian, everyone was half asleep but still need to move things in and out, i tried talking to people, ended up seeming like a super extra wayang person, like the day before. seriously not my intention, i just got carried away and while i knew so much more things, my situational awareness still not there yet.
the first time we sat on a tonner through civi roads and all these new unfamiliar terrain felt rather fresh to me, there was one point i just lost all my sense of direction and wondered why all this knolls looked like cameroon highland's base to me. its pretty impressive just to sit on the tonner and stare as the day got brighter. we got dropped off at the second last water point area, and ya no sergeant was there to teach us what to do, luckily though my 4-men detachment did water duty (twice) the day before
anyway, i thought the tiger trail event, while rainy, could be similar to the adidas event i did before last year, however it was rather unpleasant. being sleep deprived since i stayed up two hours longer, and also breakfast deprived since it rained and no food was delivered till much later, i acquired quite a bad headache. but that was before i watched two episodes of anime together on my friend's phone, which was fun haha.
then it rained, we delayed the run, it stopped, sergeants participated as well and we got busy, then it rained again. logistics-wise it was a disaster and we end up resting field camp style under medic tentage. somehow our lunch got delayed damn long, then suddenly sergeant got like pissed even though we thought we moved fast. sergeant major somehow got pissed also, and we got pt squeezed in plus tekan towards the day end, not much to say. then all of a sudden, with my shag half-sick feeling, i became ajax battery ic. fml i really wasn't ready for it lol, tried to avoid but still became, cos the previous ic was same platoon bmt and a lot of common stories.
start of hell la, i already ic so much shit liao, cos need to a lot of admin. im willing to do it for my bunkmates, cos they all super fun to be with de, so i tank abit of discomfort le, the two days before. but then they had to start a 42 pull-up regime, in sets of 6, spread out 3 times a day. i was always shag throughout the day basically, then had to run here and there to do small errands. so i made alot of minor mistakes, though at least i was the 2 ic for that day.
i really tried my best yesterday to grasp the situation, with my shag headache and shit, so that i won't screw up bookout day, and i tell u that sergeant really damn good at wasting ur time. so i was starting to wise-up, trying to like discuss what i should clarify with sergeants, and what i should not say, cos it annoys them la basically. at least yesterday went smoothly, even though i almost had zero time for myself, doing key ic, dat ic, and platoon ic duties. and yesterday night fking fun, 3 hr admin time, was just shiokkkk, talk cock study session.
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today was the most stressful, intense, just apeshit crazy day. i was the ic, i tot i handled things well all the way till lunch. i fked up in the morning cos 42 pullup shag and marching the whole day yesterday makes u stomp with ur pt shoes 1st thing in the morning, but it was damn minor. i tanked a little shit for ppl, but i was willing to do so, since bookout lo, everyone quite good mood. so everything was going pretty smoothly even though that sergeant had a lot of comments.
so basically, 5 km in the morning, a theory test, and that a prac test after lunch was the schedule. there were a fkload of changes in strength today, but i asked ppl and tried to clarify when we had a bit of lax time to roughly understand who was where. until the guy with wheelchair came back. everything started going wrong, standards of marching, confusion, i also got confused sia, especially after two mentally draining activities.
the thing that screwed up everything after that was my detachments extreme bad luck. our prac test dragged 5 hours long, cos we used another garage, but the new transfer guy failed the automated and maintenance prac test. so we seriously delayed our manual test, though at that point it was ok, just sian that our bookout time was just burning to zero.
then our manual test, our gun really screwed up, we had on-the spot maintenance on the first(me) and last (new) guy. at least i knew my shit, even though i made some safety breach (damn minor but supposedly can get confined one), so we knew its machine fault. but when it came to the last guy, we could not fix in the travel lock motor twice, dunno why. third time sergeant had to help us while we all dying of shag-ness and sian-ness supporting the weight. it doesn't help knowing the whole course is waiting for the 5 of us.
the last killer blow was that we (supposedly only sergeants) had to do one auto as a final check for the gun before we can leave, except it became a practice for the 5th guy. then the batteries ran out of power. we had to on the engine to charge power, while the rest were getting knocked down for being sloppy, and we had to off the engine again, cos the sergeant major had something to address everyone. delays just chained non-stop for the whole thing. thankfully, sergeants still joked with me, punish me abit but still fun.
when we march back, everyone had to bring back different things, it was a mess. i was in a mess for sitting down 4 hours also, and everyone was extremely impatient already cos our seemingly early bookout just got throw far out the window. dinner was good, we were just going to finish our delayed area cleaning. then holy fk our time shortened from 30 mins to 3 mins cos of miscomm, we literally crawled out of our rooms while trying to standardize everything.
my bunk got typhooned cos some ppl seriously dint expect it to be so soon. bedsheets got pulled out, slippers got kicked out of the room, lockers were pulled out and stuff. i was bunk ic, so i just felt quite bad for the mess they made. then later, all the sergeants went apeshit bmt mode, even the one who joked and let me relax less than 1hr ago. i had to pull out shit, tear down posters, put someone's helmet next to the dustbin. omg i just felt so damn freakin bad when someone got shouted in the face right in front of me, get their shit thrown.
when the whole thing was over, i went to my room and just broke down. we really tried our hardest to prepare for bookout 1 day before, and this kind of unexpected shit happens. i tried to focus on what to do next, end up i almost forgot to take care of my ownself. fk sia it was a super hopeless feeling. other ppl had to ask me to chill, even though i was already trying to calm myself down. all that build-up of stress really sucks la.
when we did our final packing and assembled downstairs, i finally calmed down, but all the sergeants suddenly reverse mode and ask me to chill, talk to me even though i already stopped crying. fking embarassing and attention drawing, it felt like that, but i was still trying to go at the same pace in the morning even though i could barely keep my face together haha. then sergeants started laxing, empathizing with us, and the final march was damn funny, that my mood just lifted completely haha. especially when i went out the gate and shared a cab with 3 other nice ppl.
i nvr suffered so much emotional stress ever other than 24km, but it made me realise a few things, as weird as it may seem.
firstly, i needed to restrain but also push myself, but i felt i have adapted to situations much better than i ever had before. the bmt me would have got me killed this week haha. i think i got a lot of dislikes at the start of this week, but at the end, alot of ppl actually consoled and helped me perform my duties, knowing that i tank quite a bit of shit for them out of goodwill haha. i seriously have a lot of fun whenever there's non-serious time, even though i'm still talking too much, but now i'm trying to control myself and let them talk to each other more also.
second thing is that it seems like my sergeants are doing exactly what i was trying to aim for during my ns, which is to mature myself. getting all this shit thrown at me and tanking stuff for ppl created a serious mode in me (between shag and angry) that makes me a much faster person (though i still need time to concentrate on what im doing). and i seriously learn how to put in more effort for the fun things. my bookouts now are like double, triple their bmt value. i share stories to my family honestly, as well as put in a lot of effort to fill up my days with friends, because my bookout makes me feel damn fulfilled inside haha.
last thing is the weirdest shit ever. experiencing this week, and abit of everything before has made me fill that army is really the place where u can make all ur mistakes, damn big ones, and still get forgiven for everything. in school, and the future, every relationship decision has a conseq, but when in army, though i made so many mistakes and left embarrassing stuff for almost everyone around me to know, it feels like when tough shit happens, everyone seriously just forgives each other and tahan.
it's like when bookout day comes, shit gets real, but when we go home, we seriously forget everything and leave it for next week. and it's a super good feeling when u leave all the stress from that day behind for just one week to really fully enjoy urself haha. everyone here has went through the same emotions before, and they really don't truly hate us, still give us peace when we bookout at the very least. in the end, one confinement or guard duty here doesn't really mean anything once u get to the gate of the camp haha.
i really hope i don't have to go through the same stress next week or dat
screwed up bookout feeling. i had a lot of fun but its still messed up lol. its going to be shag though since i know there's two long runs and a whole week of maintenance. there's mess to clean up, and i still haven't break out the bad news to the whole course, which is that we owe 325 (just take another effing look) pushups just for today. spread across 25 days though, it would make 13 pushups during admin time, at least benefitting everyone for the new IPPT ba.
anyway for now, i really hope to enjoy this bookout as well (shorter liao), and maybe reach a stage where booking in doesn't feel sian for me anymore. that's all for now ba. bye ~~
working ur way from bottom to top really feels different than just being up there haha
