Hello guys. I've put off posting this again (as has been my usual habit). So now I have about half an hour? Terrible. But what can be done about it? My mind has taken enough punishment by the end of the week usually to find the freedom a little too hard to deny, and procrastination thereof. In other words, sometimes it feels good just to procrastinate again, remember what it feels like.

Well, as you can see, there wasn't a confinement period for my new camp. Good? Perhaps. But there are too many negatives for me to be happy.

The good news is, unlike Officer cadets, Specialist trainees don't get demoted from Recruit to Cadet. We keep our Private rank, and therefore have a few more rights than recruits do. For example, I doubt there'll be another time during my training where I'll be confined for field camp and stuff like that. Even if there is, we'll be repaid fairly with extra days off. Privates don't get confined for any stupid reason like recruits and cadets do... (the guys over at OCS are still confined, and will be for another 2 weeks >.>). At most, we get 1 day less, booking out Satuday and back on Sunday. Otherwise, it's Friday night.

Now, the bad. I had the ill luck of being posted to what's widely accepted as the worst company in SISPEC. No names, of course. And damn, after a week in there I understand why. Firstly, unlike BMT, almost all my superiors here are regulars. Which pretty much means that the army is their job. Makes life a whole lot different for those people under them, compared to BMT, where almost everyone was serving their NS like ourselves.

As is the case with regulars, the NCOs aren't exactly very educated, simply put. If anyone with decent qualifications signed on, they would have gone straight to OCS, to become commissioned officers. The problem is, there are no commissioned officers in my company. The whole thing is run by NCOs, and you can probably tell what that means in terms of the intelligence levels of *some* of my commanders. I noticed a strange pattern in this company, probably applicable across SISPEC. The higher the rank in the company, the less educated. Which seems to hold true at least. The trainees ourselves, most of us have GCE 'A' level qualifications or equivalents. And yes, we do feel out of place. Those who don't have those qualifications are probably extremely fit, to be able to come to command school with say a diploma. Since mine was the JC batch, only those with A levels and were physically the fittest made it to OCS. SISPEC took those with either one. The rest were posted to ordinary units as privates.

Anyway, back to the topic. The sergeants immediately over us aren't so bad themselves. At least they have some degree of intelligence, probably holding some form of diploma at least, if not A level qualifications. Most of them signed on after finishing their diplomas due to various reasons such as financial circumstances. I can understand that. They'll probably leave and find a proper job once their term is done. Then come those above them. The platoon commanders are where it starts to get sad. These people are old, or getting there. They finished their initial sign-on term, but decided to carry on serving in the army. It is these people who truly have no lives, and no educational qualifications to speak of really. Having nowhere to go, guess where they ended up.

On to the saddest part of this topic. We have to take lessons from people like our platoon commanders. This week was one of the most trying for myself, and i'm sure at least a few others who feel as scandalised and disgusted as I do. The poor PC has to conduct lessons like Team Building and other things, and he doesn't even understand simple words. The word "discretion" is a perfect example, among others. On top of that, his rank and proud attitude create a situation where he's not humble enough to ask when we present words that he doens't know, instead berating us for not questioning the speaker to clarify any speculation of the various meanings of words we used for things like visions (not his exact words, of course). Did I mention he has no sense of grammer or spelling either?

In this sense, the week has been mentally trying. Humbling myself to take lessons from him, then brunt his anger at us because he, himself, did not know what we mean, then tank some more anger for not asking questions of a lesson he found challenging (which should have been, in fact, easy for a year 6/primary 6 student) to get his non-existent brain around. I'm rambling, I realise. You get the point.

The physical aspects of training are no better. We've been running a lot, 2km, 4km, runs at speeds impossble to catch, with little or no recovery between the current and the next physical activities. My legs turned to jelly after our very first run, about 4km long on day 1, and up until now has not improved much. Training resumes tomorrow morning. 2km and static exercises every morning, before the training regime even begins.

Privates occasionally get "nights off", but our company sucks so much we don't get any.

Oh, by the way. This 6 months of training is in fact broken down into 2 parts: BSLC, the first 2 months, and then ASLC, another 3 months+. After BSLC, there's a chance we'll get posted straight out of SISPEC to units. Hopefully this happens, in the event my medicine application does not make it. ASLC with this company (they do conduct ASLC too) would be hell, if this isn't it already.

Went out with my church friends on Satuday, went for cell group (which I haven't been to for a long time) with this new group in Singapore. Went alright, then went out for dinner and this "Board Games Cafe". New idea, but not a bad one. They have tons of board games, hundreds in fact, most you've never seen/heard of. The waiters know every game, and even introduce new ones when you don't know where to start/what to do. Not bad. Had Kimchi fried rice for dinner, which was really nice. Reminded me a lot of back home, Chris and Ji-yoon especially, and eating Kimchi with them T.T.

Well it's late, and I have to finish (start) my packing, as well as shower etc. get ready to leave. My camp is on the other side of Singapore, as I mentioned... Going to take a while getting there =(. 'Til next week.

Adios.

Hey everyone. It's the end of my block leave, the day I've dreaded but known would come eventually. I watched the day advancing closer steadily advancing until it's right here in my face. Tomorrow morning, about 6.45am, I leave for my new camp. Apparently there's no confinement period, perhaps I'll be back this weekend...

Yes, I recieved my posting on Friday: I've been posted to the School of Infantry Specialists (SISPEC), as an Infantry Leader (Trainee) as the vocation. And it's in Boon Lay (other side of Singapore, gay (no, Singapore isn't as small as you think =P)). SISPEC is considered command school, so here comes even tougher training than the first 3 months. Ahhhhhhhh T.T!! 6 months minimum, then varies depending on what happens after that, how I specialise (they are called specialists, after all).

Oh, the worst thing so far about the new camp (mind I haven't even been there yet). No MP3/MP4 players! Which means... Bye bye iPod, bye bye PSP =(. These were two things that kept me going through BMT really, and the new camp sort of banned them. Most notably will be my music, which I have found (to my glee or dismay, haven't decided yet) that I am really hard pressed to live without. But it looks like I'm going to have to. Sigh.

So yeah, the past week just been sort of taking it easy (however much that's possible with my mum around. Always manages to find stuff to do >.>). Socialising with my mum and stuff I guess, probably going to be a long time before I see her again. She flies off tomorrow, same day I enlist. Also happens to be my 18th birthday =.=". Apparently were going to have some sort of mini celebration among the family tonight, but I don't know how I'll enjoy it given the stress level at the moment, with packing and preparing to leave again T.T.

Oh yeah, during the week, went to see this movie my dad/sister recommended from Australia. So went with my mum to see it. The movie is called August Rush. Believe me, I'm not such a huge fan of movies much, and there are very few I would truly award the title "impressive". But this movie made the cut. I really recommend it for anyone musically inclined/literate, or even anyone who simply appreciates music. Pure music, that's the thought the movie provoked in me. I thought the plot and stuff was really inspiring and touching, brought me to the point of tears it did >.>. Keri Russell looked great in it too.

Went out for dinner with some of my WoW guildmates on Friday, namely those now members of Friendz. Among some of the names of those who I (David, Michael W, and Chao too) raided with in the old days who were present that night were Hachi, Koshi, Probing (now leader of Friendz), Tossen, Reifu. The other guys probably either raided under another name (doubt it) or transferred servers/joined our guild in the Burning Crusade era (pretty much all of them), where I was missing from action due to Year 12/NS. Sort of fun chatting with people with similar interests as myself; it was the first for many of them to meet each other in real life (IRL).

Went a little crazy downloading music this break, I've almost gone through the entire In Flames Discography, and almost done with the whole Nightwish Discography now. Within Temptation too, but not that far yet. It's still downloading/getting reviewed, but David recommended them, and their actually not bad either, if not as famous. Too bad about my musical exploits, they'll have to go on hold for a while. A long while. *Cry*.

Glad I managed to finally get the mail out to my closer friends over in Australia, it won't do to lose touch. Hope to do it every major advancement in my training, while constantly updating stuff over here. It was good to hear from them, their replies etc. Really touching stuff. Yet at the same time motivating like nothing else ever could.

Time to go, I've got to go out for some dinner >.>. Hope I'll be back next weekend!

See you all!

Precious ones.

Ave, all. Yes, it's the week after. Also my last weekend in BMT. Somehow, the feeling isn't as satisfying as I would have expected. Perhaps, over these 3 months, I've sort of grown comfortable (not in the sense of comfort, if you know what I mean) with the lifestyle i've been living, if not the physical training and agony. Now, all of a sudden, with all the effort I put into adjusting, it feels a waste that it would be all thrown away soon. All my bunk mates, grown into friends over time, will no longer be with me, going through the same trials again. Instead, I'll have to adapt to a new environment, comprising of new platoon mates, new training, new schedules, new camps, new rules, and the Light help me, new commanders.

Ah yes, the 24km route march. It was different from the others in the sense that this one was done on a school level, meaning there were a total of 9 companies marching together. Made for a really long line. Many times, by the time we would reach the rest point as the last company, the front company would already be moving out. Anyway, in short, I really wouldn't have made it. After the 16km rest point, as we started on the 16-20km route in almost complete darkness, I simply could not match the pace the line was moving at. It goes much further than just enduring pain or mentally pushing myself. My legs simply started to give way, and it's not fun when your body starts defying your orders. I had people encouraging me, pushing me, pulling me, and it took nothing short of a miracle to get me to the 20km rest point. Somehow, the last 4km was easier. Maybe it was the slightly longer rest break we had, maybe it was the fact that there was only 4km left, but the last stretch wasn't so bad. By that I mean that I didn't faint. The rest of the night though, I had this terrible feeling of wanting to vomit (I find this happens when I push myself beyond my body's limits. Trust me, it's one of the most unpleasant things I've felt, beating feeling travel sick or having a hangover.), but I was unable to, due to the fact I could neither eat nor drink, it was just too overwhelming. Anyway, i'm glad I survived that route march. Coming back after my POP for a re-march would have been terrible. (w00t, I hear in command school you have to do a 32km route march, with a live firing practice at the end =.=")

Gah, enough worrying. I've done enough of it to realise that it isn't really so useless at all (it's a form of mental preparation in a way for me, but only in small amounts), but it's far from positive or helpful either. The past week has been quite possibly the busiest week for all of us, even our sergeants. Ever since the 24km route march, we were pretty much living on 5 hours of sleep a night, to wake up to a full day of drills, rehearsals and parades as we neared the end of BMT. The army is like the number one place for protocol and tradition. And it's not the cool protocols you read about or imagine. It's painful. It's easy to imagine the head of the army as some sort of control freak.

The passing out parade is really quite a stupid thing, and the amount of rehearsing we have to do for it is a joke, compared to what our parents and stuff will see on the day. Tell them we spent a whole week (literally, a week (not equal to a week doing something outside of the context of a military camp)) rehearsing, they'll probably die rofling. Not much of a choice anyway (when is there ever...).

Oh yes, Recruits Evening was this week too, the day after our POP. Our company came in third place, out of 9 other companies, which is not bad considering the amount of time and effort we put in (not much at all). The winning company did such a hilarious representation of the movie 300 in the context of military life, everyone knew they had won by the end. The thing is, I don't think our company's OC is very happy, keeping in mind our company has been the Recruits Evening champions for 2 batches running, and our company is only that many batches old -.-". We are the third batch, and successfully broke their streak. Yay.

Our company seems to have been quite a disappointment really. Our Drill Squad didn't win either, our Recruits Evening performance didn't win, our live range firing saw our Company Best Shot go to someone who scored 29/32, compared to last batch where they had a 32/32 -.-". The last event, Games Day, on this Tuesday, is really our last chance for redemption. Hope we win this one. The first batch of our company managed to win their first Games Day, too T.T.

This book out, I figured I'd try something I hadn't dreamed of attempting before... Playing Dota with the guys back in Melbourne! The most surprising thing was, despite slight lag, it was actually playable. I was, quite frankly, overjoyed. I then went on to feed that game. Progressive games didn't get any better. Something to do with the constant international lag, I'm betting. Anyway, David says BA (Bored Aussies, the server I've been playing on for my last 2 (and possibly greatest) years of Dota) is shutting down at the end of this month. What happens to our guild then, and where we move, is still hanging in the balance. I'll leave that to our dedicated guild Captain =).

I hope to use the 2 weeks I get off after my POP to catch up with everything I haven't had the chance to do this last 3 months, anime being one of them -.-". The sad thing is, these 2 weeks use up what little leave I have for myself this year, leaving me with pretty much no chance to take any off days the rest of this year. Sigh. Again, nothing for it.

My mum just arrived this morning! You have no idea how much I missed her. Heck, I had no idea how much I missed those close to me, my friends and my family. Too bad we don't have much time to talk, I have to leave soon to book in (as usual) for the last time into BMT! My POP is on Wednesday morning, for which my mum will be there. Really thankful that she could be here for it (don't really know why). Recently I keep dreaming of those people close to me, mainly close friends (you all know who you are ^^) and immediate family. As in, being plagued by dreams that have been all to real lately. I can actually recount the entire dream, even details like what they wore, what happened. It's scary, and has frankly only ever happened to me a few times in my life. Sigh, miss you guys all too much.

Time to go, the next post will be sooner than usual! Hopefully Wednesday and Thursday, when my temporal illusion of freedom would have enveloped my weakened mind, all too ready to accept the respite, no matter how brief.

I've been crying too much lately.

Cya.